It is superior to 'coin tossing' in that it is 'share tossing' (tossing an equal share of my weekly street performer budget) and thus has lower decision cost.
It's an improvement on TipJoy, but it's still essentially donation - a unilateral payment.
There is considerable groundswell pressure to enable a means for fans to pay/reward/commission artists - without seeing a large (or even a small) chunk of their payment end up in the pockets of middle-men. Even PayPal's single digit commission is a bit steep in some people's eyes.
And remember, this is money in exchange for intellectual work, not for copies (which are free).
Rather than 'reason to buy', it's more 'reason to patronise'.
The fan (patron) enjoys the art, appreciates the artist, and would reward them for what they've done whilst simultaneously incentivising them to produce more work (in expectation of further reward).
If it's any kind of exchange, it's an asynchronous one.
Very similar to tossing coins in a street performer's hat, i.e. "Thanks for entertaining me! If you keep up the good work, I, or someone with my taste, may well reward you again". And the hat says "If you've enjoyed my performance or would encourage me to continue then consider depositing a comensurate amount".
cc, there are two obvious exchanges:
1) Commission an artist to produce good work one is confident they will produce.
2) Pay artist for unpublished work they offer for sale (with previews, samples, reviews, etc.)
In both cases the commissioning party comprises thousands of fans (micropayments collected into payment).
It's a familiar problem with exchange (since time immemorial). The worker doesn't want to produce/deliver the work until they're confident they'll get paid what they expect for it, and the commissioner doesn't want to set aside or part with their money until they're confident they'll get the work they expect for it.
All I can say is that there are no guarantees even in two party exchanges, but that doesn't prevent, let alone discourage, MANY successful exchanges.
Remember, each party has a reputation to maintain, and each trusts the other in proportion to their reputation and the consequences for default. And that's long before the law needs to step in to apply more severe consequences than loss of reputation.
The smaller your reputation the smaller the value of your transaction that the other party will risk. That means a thousand fans with small reputations and small value payments can easily balance a reputable artist hoping to exchange a high value product for a large value payment.
There's many exchanges of tens of readers' pennies for prosaic paragraphs that can happen before you scale up to millions of movie fans stumping up dollars for sequels.
I reckon exchange (money for the production of intellectual work not yet received) is a better transaction than a donation (reward for work already published and received).
Supporting donations and minimising their decision cost may be a lot easier than supporting exchanges and minimising their decision cost, but I reckon the latter have the edge.
Re: Re: Re: Re: Recent corruption of 'public domain'
Law? The 'public domain' is not part of law. You'll be hard pushed to find any copyright law that even mentions it in passing, let alone that defines it.
The definition of 'public domain' I'm talking about is the one in common parlance - the one that's changed from 'public possession' to 'not protected by copyright'. The latter is only recently the more popularly inferred - and the one that helps alienate the public from its own culture.
Nasch, it stands to reason (you don't need citation - you can read the history yourself).
Even today, publication is supposed to be delivery to the public (into the public domain) of knowledge, art, facts, ideas, etc. An intellectual work is supposed to enter the public domain from the moment of its publication. Allegedly, this delivery is incentivised by copyright.
It is only in the 20th century with the growing recognition by the public of the potential to utilise reproduction and communications technology to share and build upon published works that a work's copyright status enters the public consciousness.
Prior to the 20th century only publishers (or those editors/authors expecting to produce and publish a translation, abridgement, compendium, derivative) were concerned about a published work's copyright, or as we'd put it today, whether the work's fixed expression was in the public domain as opposed to its ideas.
So it's a very subtle perceptual shift that has occurred recently. Only today with a technologically enabled public is it more important to know whether a work's fixed expression is available to the public than whether its ideas are.
And that's why it's only in the 20th century that 'public domain' has changed in meaning from 'All published works and everything otherwise known to or accessible by the public' to 'Anything not protected by copyright'.
With such a gradual transition there is no single point at which the meaning flipped from one to the other.
You do know that the definition of 'public domain' as all published works not protected by copyright is very recent, don't you?
All published works are supposed to be in the public domain, that was the original pretext behind copyright - to incentivise the delivery of original works into the public domain - for the public's benefit.
Suggesting that copyright protected works are not in the public domain is casuistry we have to thank publishing corporations for.
It can be compared to the speculation that Murdoch has every expectation that paywalls will fail, but he has to try them in order that their inevitable failure can be used to justify collection of a news tax or levy.
RICAP also has to demonstrate that both copyright enforcement and 'legal' alternatives fail to deter piracy in order to collect a music tax or levy.
If by 'content' you mean the intellectual work contained within published copies (or broadcasts), and by 'free' you mean freely shared by the public typically free of charge then yes, I agree.
However, this does not mean that intellectual work cannot be commissioned or sold to those who want to receive it or have it produced.
The copy is a distribution mechanism. It may convey the work, but it is not the work. The conflation by 'content' of work with copy is due entirely to copyright indoctrination (publishers sell containers of work and use copyright to pretend that the copy IS the work).
In the future intellectual workers sell their work. Copies are subsequently free for anyone to make, modify, remix, sell, share, etc.
So really, we should stop using the term 'content' just as we should stop using the term 'consumer' in the context of enjoying the intellectual work that has been commissioned and published.
If people are happy to throw money away on things that may be non-infringing, but are less useful than the potentially-infringement-facilitating alternative, perhaps they should try throwing money at the more useful alternatives?
Here's a prototype I made a few years ago: Quidmusic. No DRM. The musician sells their music. Copies are free (in both senses). The fans can share and remix all they want (the artist has been paid).
There's a lot more money to be made by locking up knowledge, suspending mankind's liberty to share and build upon it, even conning people that such actions promote the progress (which certain people not too far from here are happy to pay lip service to), THAN campaigning for transparency, restoring people's liberty, abolishing the anachronistic privileges of copyright and patent.
Copyright is not a right, but a privilege. It was neither guaranteed nor granted by the Constitution, nor was Congress empowered to grant it.
Rights (unlike privileges) are inalienable, imbued in man by nature (protected, but not granted by statute) and thus cannot be signed away through contract.
It is ethical to ignore privileges, since by definition they are instruments of injustice.
Re: Only fools waste time arguing with fools such as Lessig
So Steve, are you suggesting that Paul Williams did not say the following?
"What I find most fascinating is that those who purport to support a climate of free culture work so hard to silence opposing points of view. They will not silence me."
Granted, I have not read that Paul Williams classed Lessig's offer to debate as an effort to silence him, but even if that was an unfounded allegation, the above quote puts Lessig in the far more credible light.
However, I'd still doubt the credibility of both given their shared belief in perpetuating the instrument of injustice that is copyright.
"Anti-copyright crusaders are currently engaged in a publicity campaign to discredit ASCAP's efforts to defend the copyrights of our professional songwriter and composer members."
That sounds like me.
"The copyleft movement has encouraged a culture of disrespect for copyright by defending corporate and individual infringers; undermining every effort to provide more effective protection, no matter how limited or reasonable; promoting a reduction in copyright protection; supporting the dismantling of our rights through the courts; and questioning the basic premise that the tidal wave of infringements and unlicensed uses online hurts creators."
Again, me (but, dismantling privileges, not 'rights')
Hmmm. Maybe Paul Williams is referring to me?
I'd certainly agree with Mike that Creative Commons and Lawrence Lessig are stalwart supporters of copyright, so I can't see how Paul Williams can be referring to them.
Then again, I don't advocate musicians give away their music (except for promotional purposes). I suggest that copies should be free, but that's not at all the same thing as music (see Selling Music - NOT Copies.
I'd also not want to silence anyone. How could anyone championing the restoration of the individual's freedom of speech and cultural liberty want to silence anyone? It's a contradiction in terms.
I think I'm probably a better fit to the profile of those Williams castigates than those he nominates, but it's not a good match even then.
Who would guess that lil 'ol me would make Williams fearful of being silenced?
Collecting societies and any other organisation collecting a levy or tax on cultural exchange should certainly disappear, and will when copyright is abolished, but the staff of such organisations aren't consequently silenced. They simply need to find more ethical occupations.
Well, it can be "The corner of the entrepreneur", so singular possession can work too.
The thing is, isolated from the context of its expansion, "entrepreneur's" doesn't really read so well. Because of over-familiarity with spurious possessive apostrophes, the apostrophe in this case looks spurious - even though it can clearly be argued otherwise.
I think it just makes a rod for its own back.
I'd change it to "Entrepreneur's Corner" or "Entrepreneurs" as in "Entrepreneurs click here for The Entrepreneur's corner".
If your book is copyleft, then any book printer/distributor/retailer can print their own copies and sell them for whatever the market will bear. They'd be a bit silly to refuse to sell a popular work just because the author didn't play ball.
The traditional copyright/paper business model will be around for as long as authors and their readers consider it superior to the alternative.
When you add it up:
1) Free, instantaneous distribution (Internet)
2) Free, just-in-time printing (Lulu, etc.)
3) Free, viral/word-of-mouth promotion (copyleft)
4) Direct, disintermediated readers-to-author commissions for new work
I suggest it would help authors more, if it were properly recognised that no author should, through an 18th century privilege, be effectively able to alienate themselves from what should be their inalienable right to liberty - to freely share and build upon all published writings - including their own (qv Glyn Moody above).
On the post: Getting Past The Hurdles Of Micropayments
Re: Re: Re: RTB?
It's an improvement on TipJoy, but it's still essentially donation - a unilateral payment.
There is considerable groundswell pressure to enable a means for fans to pay/reward/commission artists - without seeing a large (or even a small) chunk of their payment end up in the pockets of middle-men. Even PayPal's single digit commission is a bit steep in some people's eyes.
And remember, this is money in exchange for intellectual work, not for copies (which are free).
On the post: Getting Past The Hurdles Of Micropayments
Re: RTB?
The fan (patron) enjoys the art, appreciates the artist, and would reward them for what they've done whilst simultaneously incentivising them to produce more work (in expectation of further reward).
If it's any kind of exchange, it's an asynchronous one.
Very similar to tossing coins in a street performer's hat, i.e. "Thanks for entertaining me! If you keep up the good work, I, or someone with my taste, may well reward you again". And the hat says "If you've enjoyed my performance or would encourage me to continue then consider depositing a comensurate amount".
On the post: Getting Past The Hurdles Of Micropayments
Re: Re: Exchange rather than donation
1) Commission an artist to produce good work one is confident they will produce.
2) Pay artist for unpublished work they offer for sale (with previews, samples, reviews, etc.)
In both cases the commissioning party comprises thousands of fans (micropayments collected into payment).
It's a familiar problem with exchange (since time immemorial). The worker doesn't want to produce/deliver the work until they're confident they'll get paid what they expect for it, and the commissioner doesn't want to set aside or part with their money until they're confident they'll get the work they expect for it.
All I can say is that there are no guarantees even in two party exchanges, but that doesn't prevent, let alone discourage, MANY successful exchanges.
Remember, each party has a reputation to maintain, and each trusts the other in proportion to their reputation and the consequences for default. And that's long before the law needs to step in to apply more severe consequences than loss of reputation.
The smaller your reputation the smaller the value of your transaction that the other party will risk. That means a thousand fans with small reputations and small value payments can easily balance a reputable artist hoping to exchange a high value product for a large value payment.
There's many exchanges of tens of readers' pennies for prosaic paragraphs that can happen before you scale up to millions of movie fans stumping up dollars for sequels.
On the post: Getting Past The Hurdles Of Micropayments
Exchange rather than donation
Supporting donations and minimising their decision cost may be a lot easier than supporting exchanges and minimising their decision cost, but I reckon the latter have the edge.
We'll see.
On the post: Why World War I Recordings Won't Enter The Public Domain Until 2049
Re: Re: Re: Re: Recent corruption of 'public domain'
The definition of 'public domain' I'm talking about is the one in common parlance - the one that's changed from 'public possession' to 'not protected by copyright'. The latter is only recently the more popularly inferred - and the one that helps alienate the public from its own culture.
On the post: Why World War I Recordings Won't Enter The Public Domain Until 2049
Re: Re: Recent corruption of 'public domain'
Even today, publication is supposed to be delivery to the public (into the public domain) of knowledge, art, facts, ideas, etc. An intellectual work is supposed to enter the public domain from the moment of its publication. Allegedly, this delivery is incentivised by copyright.
It is only in the 20th century with the growing recognition by the public of the potential to utilise reproduction and communications technology to share and build upon published works that a work's copyright status enters the public consciousness.
Prior to the 20th century only publishers (or those editors/authors expecting to produce and publish a translation, abridgement, compendium, derivative) were concerned about a published work's copyright, or as we'd put it today, whether the work's fixed expression was in the public domain as opposed to its ideas.
So it's a very subtle perceptual shift that has occurred recently. Only today with a technologically enabled public is it more important to know whether a work's fixed expression is available to the public than whether its ideas are.
And that's why it's only in the 20th century that 'public domain' has changed in meaning from 'All published works and everything otherwise known to or accessible by the public' to 'Anything not protected by copyright'.
With such a gradual transition there is no single point at which the meaning flipped from one to the other.
On the post: Why World War I Recordings Won't Enter The Public Domain Until 2049
Recent corruption of 'public domain'
All published works are supposed to be in the public domain, that was the original pretext behind copyright - to incentivise the delivery of original works into the public domain - for the public's benefit.
Suggesting that copyright protected works are not in the public domain is casuistry we have to thank publishing corporations for.
On the post: Kazaa Returns As Expensive, Crappy DRM'd Music Service
Re: I'm just speculating here...
It can be compared to the speculation that Murdoch has every expectation that paywalls will fail, but he has to try them in order that their inevitable failure can be used to justify collection of a news tax or levy.
RICAP also has to demonstrate that both copyright enforcement and 'legal' alternatives fail to deter piracy in order to collect a music tax or levy.
On the post: Dear Jeff Zucker, Whether You Like It Or Not, Content Will Stay Free
Free Copies not the same as Free work
However, this does not mean that intellectual work cannot be commissioned or sold to those who want to receive it or have it produced.
The copy is a distribution mechanism. It may convey the work, but it is not the work. The conflation by 'content' of work with copy is due entirely to copyright indoctrination (publishers sell containers of work and use copyright to pretend that the copy IS the work).
In the future intellectual workers sell their work. Copies are subsequently free for anyone to make, modify, remix, sell, share, etc.
So really, we should stop using the term 'content' just as we should stop using the term 'consumer' in the context of enjoying the intellectual work that has been commissioned and published.
There's intellectual work and there's copies.
The market for copies has ended.
The market for intellectual work continues.
On the post: Kazaa Returns As Expensive, Crappy DRM'd Music Service
Throwing money away
Here's a prototype I made a few years ago: Quidmusic. No DRM. The musician sells their music. Copies are free (in both senses). The fans can share and remix all they want (the artist has been paid).
On the post: The Intellectually Dishonest Claims Of Those Fighting Against Open Access To Federally Funded Research
Money & Power Corrupts
On the post: ASCAP Boss Refuses To Debate Lessig; Claims That It's An Attempt To 'Silence' ASCAP
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
Rights (unlike privileges) are inalienable, imbued in man by nature (protected, but not granted by statute) and thus cannot be signed away through contract.
It is ethical to ignore privileges, since by definition they are instruments of injustice.
On the post: ASCAP Boss Refuses To Debate Lessig; Claims That It's An Attempt To 'Silence' ASCAP
Re: Only fools waste time arguing with fools such as Lessig
Granted, I have not read that Paul Williams classed Lessig's offer to debate as an effort to silence him, but even if that was an unfounded allegation, the above quote puts Lessig in the far more credible light.
However, I'd still doubt the credibility of both given their shared belief in perpetuating the instrument of injustice that is copyright.
On the post: ASCAP Boss Refuses To Debate Lessig; Claims That It's An Attempt To 'Silence' ASCAP
Profile matching
That sounds like me.
Again, me (but, dismantling privileges, not 'rights')
Hmmm. Maybe Paul Williams is referring to me?
I'd certainly agree with Mike that Creative Commons and Lawrence Lessig are stalwart supporters of copyright, so I can't see how Paul Williams can be referring to them.
Then again, I don't advocate musicians give away their music (except for promotional purposes). I suggest that copies should be free, but that's not at all the same thing as music (see Selling Music - NOT Copies.
I'd also not want to silence anyone. How could anyone championing the restoration of the individual's freedom of speech and cultural liberty want to silence anyone? It's a contradiction in terms.
I think I'm probably a better fit to the profile of those Williams castigates than those he nominates, but it's not a good match even then.
Who would guess that lil 'ol me would make Williams fearful of being silenced?
Collecting societies and any other organisation collecting a levy or tax on cultural exchange should certainly disappear, and will when copyright is abolished, but the staff of such organisations aren't consequently silenced. They simply need to find more ethical occupations.
On the post: British Library Worries That Copyright May Be Hindering Research
Re: Re: Helioselection
On the post: British Library Worries That Copyright May Be Hindering Research
Helioselection
Do you tend to keep UK articles for the UK daylight hours, and the US ones for the US daylight hours?
Moreover, do you select publication times to optimise for readership or commentary/citation/tweeting?
On the post: Theater Owner Begs Hollywood Not To Give Consumers What They Want
Re: Re: Re: Re: Typo
The thing is, isolated from the context of its expansion, "entrepreneur's" doesn't really read so well. Because of over-familiarity with spurious possessive apostrophes, the apostrophe in this case looks spurious - even though it can clearly be argued otherwise.
I think it just makes a rod for its own back.
I'd change it to "Entrepreneur's Corner" or "Entrepreneurs" as in "Entrepreneurs click here for The Entrepreneur's corner".
YMMV
On the post: Theater Owner Begs Hollywood Not To Give Consumers What They Want
Re: Re: Typo
On the post: Big Name Authors Realize Their Old Contracts Don't Cover eBooks; Route Around Old Publishers To Release New Versions
Re: Re: Re:
The traditional copyright/paper business model will be around for as long as authors and their readers consider it superior to the alternative.
When you add it up:
1) Free, instantaneous distribution (Internet)
2) Free, just-in-time printing (Lulu, etc.)
3) Free, viral/word-of-mouth promotion (copyleft)
4) Direct, disintermediated readers-to-author commissions for new work
The alternative is looking pretty tempting.
On the post: Big Name Authors Realize Their Old Contracts Don't Cover eBooks; Route Around Old Publishers To Release New Versions
Re: Re: The End of Digital Slavery
Why even now, we have the WIPO perversely attempting to 'protect' folklore from the depredations of the very privilege that threatens it: http://www.ip-watch.org/weblog/2010/07/26/wipo-sees-first-real-progress-on-text-for-protection-of-fo lklore-in-10-years-2
When WIPO attempts to protect folklore you should have a clue that something somewhere has gone terribly wrong...
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