Australia The Latest To Look At Having Artists Paid Multiple Times For The Same Work

from the economic-illiteracy dept

We were just talking about how New Zealand was scrapping its plan for an artist resale right, when Michael Scott pointed us to the news (from last month) that Australia has just proposed an artist resale right. It's not clear how many times it needs to be explained that such things are bad for most artists before politicians will get it. The only artists such a "right" helps are those who are quite successful -- in other words, the ones least likely to need it. For new and upcoming artists, such a resale right creates quite a bit of harm. It acts as a disincentive for anyone to buy or sell their artwork, and limits the likelihood of their artwork becoming well known.

The problem is that, thanks to the rise of the copyright lobby, people really do think that "creation = permanent ownership" at this point. If you're going to create a resale right for art, why not for everything else? If I build a house, why shouldn't I get a percentage of the transaction every time it's sold? The argument is the same as for a resale right for art. Keep applying the argument in other sectors and you realize how dumb it becomes. As part of my job, I use a Lenovo laptop. That laptop helps me make money -- and therefore, under this reasoning, shouldn't I pay a percentage of any profits I make back to Lenovo? Of course not. Why? Because I paid Lenovo originally for the laptop and that was a completed transaction. The fact that I then went on to create value with the laptop is for me to benefit from, not Lenovo. The same is true with someone buying a piece of artwork. They paid for that artwork, and the reward for investing in that artwork and recognizing its potential is that it helps to add value to the artwork, which they profit from when they resell it. The artist made their deal, just as Lenovo made its deal. To come back later and demand a piece of the profits for value added later makes no sense.

Filed Under: artist resale rights, artists, australia, copyright, right of first sale

New Zealand Scraps Plan To Get Artists Paid Multiple Times For A Single Piece Of Work

from the getting-paid-multiple-times dept

We've never quite understood the reasoning employed in a few different countries to allow artists to get paid every time their artwork is sold. The given reason is usually that if the artwork becomes valuable at a later date, the artist should get a piece of that, but that doesn't make much sense. Once the artist becomes famous than all of his or her new works will also command a much higher premium. All such a "resale right" does is make it that much more expensive to buy and sell art, since you now have to pay a fraction of every transaction back to the artist. This actually harms the artists, because it makes people less willing to buy and sell their artwork. It basically punishes those who actually believe in an artist and buy their early works. It's been shown that such a resale right harms up-and-coming artists (it makes it more expensive to buy their works), and really only tends to help the super successful artists (i.e., those who are already earning plenty from their artwork).

Lawrence D'Oliveiro alerts us to the good news that New Zealand has decided to scrap such a plan. There's not a full explanation for why the plan was scrapped, but it has economically ignorant artists complaining that it's just not fair and it means New Zealand "doesn't value its artists." Hopefully someone will explain to them that making it more expensive for their artwork to be sold means that they'll be selling a lot less artwork -- and that doesn't seem very "valuable" at all.

Filed Under: artist resale rights, artists, copyright, new zealand, right of first sale

Wealthy UK Artists Want Their Families To Get Paid Multiple Times For Their Artwork

from the incentive-to-create? dept

A few years ago, we wrote about the rather silly plan in the UK to create an "artist resale right." This says that even if an artist has sold his or her work, if that work is resold, the artist still gets a 4% cut. The non-economic thinking on this is that an artist is forced to sell his or her work when it's not valued as high, and thus deserves a cut when the value is much higher. However, that's not at all what is happening. Instead, evidence has shown that this is more often used to depress the local art market by making it more expensive to sell art (and decreasing the incentives of anyone to resell any art they've bought). It profits big name artists, but tends to hurt the lesser known artists (you know, the ones it's supposed to help).

So, of course, it should come as no surprise that the wealthy artists who benefit the most from this resale right in the UK are looking to expand it (found via Against Monopoly). Currently, it only applies to living artists. However, they're now pushing to extend the right to 70 years after death, where the family of the artist will be compensated -- claiming that families deserve to be compensated for artwork a family member may have sold off a century earlier because: "Our loved ones often sacrifice a lot to support an artist in the family." Of course, there are lots of sacrifices that families make for people in other professions as well, but they don't get paid a century later for their efforts. This clearly has nothing to do with encouraging more art, since it seems to discourage that. It is, like so many "intellectual property" grants, a way for established creators to get more money out of what they already created, while hurting the market for new upstarts.

Filed Under: artist resale rights, artists, copyright, right of first sale, uk

Court Says Reselling Software Is Okay

from the good-news dept

Last year, we wrote about a case filed by an eBay seller against Autodesk, claiming the company unfairly prevented him from reselling used copies of Autodesk software that he had legally purchased. Basically, every time the guy listed Autodesk software, the company would send a DMCA takedown to eBay who would take it down. Each time, the guy would send a counter claim, which Autodesk would ignore, allowing the software to go back on the site. However, with so many takedown notices, eBay banned his account for abuse -- even though he successfully responded to each claim as being false. For that, he sued Autodesk. Autodesk moved to have the court dismiss the case claiming that the seller had no right of first sale because the software was "licensed" rather than sold. If that sounds like weak semantics, you've got a point... and it appears the court agrees with you. In denying Autodesk's request to dismiss the case, the court indicates that, even though the case law covering this issue often varies, it believes that the software has been sold, not licensed, and therefore the right of first sale does exist on Autodesk's software. The case should now proceed if Autodesk doesn't quickly show up with an offer to settle the case quietly (which it might). Assuming the case does go forward, it's going to be worth watching closely, as it will have important ramifications for the right to resell software you purchased.

Filed Under: auctions, autocad, dmca, right of first sale
Companies: autodesk, ebay

Musicians Want To Be Paid Multiple Times If Concert Tickets Are Resold

from the perhaps-you-shouldn't-have-sold-it-so-cheaply-in-the-first-place dept

What is it with the music industry always running to the gov't to try to grant them a new "rights" that force people to pay up for things that the musicians have already been paid for? There are so many different "rights" involved it's nearly impossible for people to keep track of them -- and now they're asking for more. Specifically, the managers of a bunch of well known musicians are asking for a "resale right" that would mean that any time a concert ticket is resold the musician gets some of the money again. This is double (or triple or quadruple or whatever) paying. The musician chose to sell the tickets at a certain price, and if there's a resale market, that's between the buyer and seller -- not the musician.

This really highlights an increasingly disturbing trend of trying to create "copyright-like" regulations on what you can do with non-information goods. In a normal, functioning economy, if you buy something, it's yours. You are then free to do what you want with it, whether that's modify it, enhance it, destroy it or resell it. In the copyright world, there is some ability to mimic this behavior with a "right of first sale," but there are still so many limitations within copyright that others have looked to take those limitations beyond copyright. We've already seen efforts, such as the law in Japan to ban the sale of some used electronics as well as a push in the UK to grant artists a resale royalty as well (so that any time a piece of their artwork is resold, the artists would get another cut).

While the aims of the music managers may be good (they claim it's to protect consumers from being ripped off by scalpers), the means are highly questionable. A market is efficient for a reason, and giving the original "owner" the right to a cut from every resale messes with that efficiency and is simply unnecessary. It simply becomes a way to get paid multiple times for the same product, distorting the real market.

Filed Under: reselling tickets, right of first sale