I'm not sure it's that dissimilar to the top 40. I've just read the linked post from Ian Rogers (TopSpin), where he says that we have gone from an era of mass media to one of niches, and he suggests we are now heading into an era of "trusted brands", where we will all subscribe to content from a few sources that match our tastes.
Or, to put it another way, we've gone from an era of few sources (organised but increasingly uninspiring content) to one of many sources (some good but disorganised and hard to find content) and are now heading back to one of few sources again.
This isn't to say it's a bad thing. I think it's fair to say that the top 40 worked pretty well for a while, but it has become increasingly irrelevant to the tastes and desires of many people today. Introducing a personalised top 40 (based on the tastes of people or brands I trust) sounds pretty good to me.
In a sense, the model hasn't changed that much: we still have a small number of brands / companies / people providing music to us. But they should be working with us as enablers, not working against us as gatekeepers. Here's hoping. :)
My reply seems to have been eaten by the comment system. Trying again without the link...
There would certainly be potential for publishers to exploit ('exploit'?) others' content, but I'm not convinced it would happen very often. If I want to get a picture for a book cover or a website I'm much more likely to head to iStock (or pay a photographer if the project requires it) than to go trawling through Flickr, sxc.hu et al. on the off chance they have a suitable photo I can use for free - because my time's worth something here too and I'm prepared to pay for the convenience of getting what I want quickly. I'm sure there would be occasions where it would happen, much as people's snapshots sometimes make it onto the front page of newspapers, but most of the time it doesn't.
Professional photographers wouldn't be affected by this as they would presumably register copyright on their photos.
A halfway house may be to stick everything under a CC BY-NC licence (or something) by default, though then you'd run into the problems discussed by Nina Paley on her blog (title: Paley & Doctorow argue over Non-Commercial licenses).
Another question is whether this exploitation / 'exploitation' would really matter. Copyright is supposed to be about promoting the progress, not censorship. It may be weird to have your photo unexpectedly gracing the front of a book, but has it really cost you anything?* Has it cost society anything? I'd argue that for nearly every photo taken the chances of them being picked up and used is pretty much zero, so you wouldn't have lost out by being on that book cover.** Society has gained a new book with a cool cover and, who knows, maybe you can sell some t-shirts off the back of it. :)
Thanks for the conversation about this - it's forcing me to think through the ideas more and see if it still holds up...
* Yeah, sure there are privacy / publicity rights issues here too, but that's separate from copyright.
** I know you've lost out on being paid for use of the photo, but the prospect of such a payment didn't incentivise the creation of the photo and nor is it likely to encourage you, as an amateur / occasional photographer, to take more pictures in the future. Furthermore, had it not been picked up by the publisher, it would have languished on Flickr with hundreds of others in your account.
Yeah, this goes back to the overlap between the attention and cash economies, as Mike discussed here a few years ago. I think the distinction is that those outlets are trading viewers' eyes for money and therefore would probably be harmed by, for example, someone replacing all of a sponsor's adverts with their own in a broadcast. Of course there are YouTube videos (etc.) that are manifestly in the cash economy too, and the same monopoly rights given by copyright can benefit them as well, but for most people I don't believe copyright helps. Be interested to know what you think.
No, I'm not arguing that 'professionals' should be the only ones accorded copyright. If we did that, we'd end up trying to create dubious (and rather arbitrary) distinctions between professionals and amateurs, much as we've seen in some of the stories here where someone tries to give professional journalists special privileges.
What I'm suggesting is that, for most people, copyright is not necessary - and can be deleterious - in providing an incentive for producing new content. They take the time to post pictures on Facebook in exchange for attention, not with any expectation of remuneration.
One possible solution would be to move back to a model where copyrights have to be registered. Then people could self select: those who believe their work has commercial value will do it, those who don't, won't. Though I can see problems with that too (giant databases, integrating with sites and services, etc.).
This is a really interesting point, and one that I hadn't considered until now. There's certainly a huge deluge of new content being produced, the vast majority of it by amateurs. But nearly all of this content (the Facebook photos, Twitter updates, YouTube videos) operates in the attention economy, not the cash economy, and I can't see how copyright could increase the value in that space:* in the attention economy, infinite goods become more valuable the further they spread, because this distribution is of itself payment.
So, while the purpose of copyright should be to "promote the progress" by providing more content overall, I'd argue it can't extend beyond the (semi-)professional sphere because the idea of restricting distribution of infinite goods is antithetical to content in the attention economy.
I think.
* Though there are plenty of reasons why it could decrease it.
I'm not qualified to comment on its merits in this case, but the judge specifically addressed this in his ruling.
When a "work consist[s] of sounds ... that are being transmitted"-that is, when a work consists of sounds that are being "communicate[d] ... by [a] ... process whereby ... sounds are received beyond the place from which they are sent," id.-the work is considered fixed "ifa fixation of the work is being made simultaneously with its transmission." Id. This provision "creates a legal fiction that the simultaneous fixation occurs before the transmission" for purposes ofan infringement claim. United States v. Moghadam, 175 F.3d 1269, 1280-81 (II th Cir. 1999).
In other words, the law treats the unauthorized recording of sounds that are transmitted live and recorded simultaneously as an infringement of the copyright in the fixed work (assuming the work otherwise qualifies for protection), notwithstanding that the alleged infringer does not copy the fixed version ofthe work but rather records the live transmission directly.
It's an interesting conversation, but the one point that really caught my attention was over the question of whether or not the bots "understood" what they were saying. The obvious answer is "of course not, they're just bots," but Lipson made an interesting point: at times it's not clear that actual people know what they're saying.
This is (roughly :) what I was wondering too. Derek argued that a significant chunk of the $250 difference between the iPad's hardware-only value and its selling price is due to its app ecosystem.
I don't think many people would argue against Mac hardware being slicker than almost all PC hardware. Many (though by no means all*) people think the UX experience of OS X is nicer than Windows too.
But PCs have a wider range of software than Macs. Most major applications are either available for both (Photoshop, MS Office) or just for the PC (games, principally). So I don't think the range-of-apps argument works here, but Macs still command a hefty price premium, which presumably then must be attributable to the brand and overall (UX, hardware, shopping) experience.**
* Including me, though there are a lot of 'legacy' issues here. :) I also build my own, so I avoid all of the crapware that's typically bundled with PCs.
** Though the % difference in price is significantly less than the 100% markup over hardware only on the iPad postulated here.
ANNM left a comment on Rick Falkvinge's post that presents a much better solution to the 'problem'. Excerpt:
If the copyright industry thinks that they need compensation for legal private copying, then surely the easiest and fairest way to generate that compensation would be to add the fee to the price of the copyrighted product (e.g. music downloads, DVDs, CDs, Spotify subscriptions and so on). After all, you can’t copy a copyrighted work if you don’t actually have access to it in the first place. This way would be much fairer (if we were to pretend that the fee is needed at all) since it would only affect those who bought copyrighted works and thus had the ability to make copies of it.
Related to this, a recent post from danah boyd discusses the problems of enforcing a real names policy and the groups of people who are most affected by it. The whole thing is well worth reading.
What's most striking is the list of people who are affected by "real names" policies, including abuse survivors, activists, LGBT people, women, and young people.
Over and over again, people keep pointing to Facebook as an example where "real names" policies work. This makes me laugh hysterically. One of the things that became patently clear to me in my fieldwork is that countless teens who signed up to Facebook late into the game chose to use pseudonyms or nicknames. What's even more noticeable in my data is that an extremely high percentage of people of color used pseudonyms as compared to the white teens that I interviewed. Of course, this would make sense...
The people who most heavily rely on pseudonyms in online spaces are those who are most marginalized by systems of power. "Real names" policies aren't empowering; they're an authoritarian assertion of power over vulnerable people.
There have been calls in Germany and Estonia for increased surveillance too. Can't be long before more politicians and countries jump on the bandwagon.
It's very hard for anyone in power to respond to a horrific tragedy by doing nothing, but if the track record of post-terrorist-attack legislation is anything to go by, "nothing" would be a refreshing change.
Yes. I thought the speech by Norwegian PM Jens Stoltenberg linked from here a couple of days ago, responding to the tragedy, was incredibly brave, dignified and statesmanlike.
It basically said, despite this horrific violence, we're going to continue doing what we've been doing, only more so. Your actions won't provoke us to oppress our people. Your actions won't incite us to take action against any groups living within our borders. In fact, you've already lost.
"If one man can show so much hate, imagine how much love we all can show together."
Our answer is more democracy, more openness and more humanity.
I like it! And while we're here, why not start licensing clothes instead of selling them? Then the manufacturer could prevent you from wearing last season's clothes ever again, or maybe charge you 20% more if you had the gall to wear that smart business skirt on a night out.
Instituting region restrictions could also be a lot of fun and, if governments got involved in enforcing these things, that trip through security could leave you naked not just for the trip through the body scanners, but for the whole flight. I can hardly wait.
On the post: New Record Label Will Give Out All Its Music For Free; Wants Fans To Subscribe To The Label
Re: Re:
Or, to put it another way, we've gone from an era of few sources (organised but increasingly uninspiring content) to one of many sources (some good but disorganised and hard to find content) and are now heading back to one of few sources again.
This isn't to say it's a bad thing. I think it's fair to say that the top 40 worked pretty well for a while, but it has become increasingly irrelevant to the tastes and desires of many people today. Introducing a personalised top 40 (based on the tastes of people or brands I trust) sounds pretty good to me.
In a sense, the model hasn't changed that much: we still have a small number of brands / companies / people providing music to us. But they should be working with us as enablers, not working against us as gatekeepers. Here's hoping. :)
On the post: Facebook Hosts 4% Of All Photos Ever Taken In History
Re: Re: Re: Re:
There would certainly be potential for publishers to exploit ('exploit'?) others' content, but I'm not convinced it would happen very often. If I want to get a picture for a book cover or a website I'm much more likely to head to iStock (or pay a photographer if the project requires it) than to go trawling through Flickr, sxc.hu et al. on the off chance they have a suitable photo I can use for free - because my time's worth something here too and I'm prepared to pay for the convenience of getting what I want quickly. I'm sure there would be occasions where it would happen, much as people's snapshots sometimes make it onto the front page of newspapers, but most of the time it doesn't.
Professional photographers wouldn't be affected by this as they would presumably register copyright on their photos.
A halfway house may be to stick everything under a CC BY-NC licence (or something) by default, though then you'd run into the problems discussed by Nina Paley on her blog (title: Paley & Doctorow argue over Non-Commercial licenses).
Another question is whether this exploitation / 'exploitation' would really matter. Copyright is supposed to be about promoting the progress, not censorship. It may be weird to have your photo unexpectedly gracing the front of a book, but has it really cost you anything?* Has it cost society anything? I'd argue that for nearly every photo taken the chances of them being picked up and used is pretty much zero, so you wouldn't have lost out by being on that book cover.** Society has gained a new book with a cool cover and, who knows, maybe you can sell some t-shirts off the back of it. :)
Thanks for the conversation about this - it's forcing me to think through the ideas more and see if it still holds up...
* Yeah, sure there are privacy / publicity rights issues here too, but that's separate from copyright.
** I know you've lost out on being paid for use of the photo, but the prospect of such a payment didn't incentivise the creation of the photo and nor is it likely to encourage you, as an amateur / occasional photographer, to take more pictures in the future. Furthermore, had it not been picked up by the publisher, it would have languished on Flickr with hundreds of others in your account.
On the post: Facebook Hosts 4% Of All Photos Ever Taken In History
Re: Re: Re:
On the post: Facebook Hosts 4% Of All Photos Ever Taken In History
Re: Re:
On the post: Facebook Hosts 4% Of All Photos Ever Taken In History
Re: Re:
What I'm suggesting is that, for most people, copyright is not necessary - and can be deleterious - in providing an incentive for producing new content. They take the time to post pictures on Facebook in exchange for attention, not with any expectation of remuneration.
One possible solution would be to move back to a model where copyrights have to be registered. Then people could self select: those who believe their work has commercial value will do it, those who don't, won't. Though I can see problems with that too (giant databases, integrating with sites and services, etc.).
On the post: Facebook Hosts 4% Of All Photos Ever Taken In History
So, while the purpose of copyright should be to "promote the progress" by providing more content overall, I'd argue it can't extend beyond the (semi-)professional sphere because the idea of restricting distribution of infinite goods is antithetical to content in the attention economy.
I think.
* Though there are plenty of reasons why it could decrease it.
On the post: Forget Wiretapping Laws, Now You Might Be Able To Use Copyright Law To Stop Anyone From Recording You Ever
Re: Re: Photos
On the post: Forget Wiretapping Laws, Now You Might Be Able To Use Copyright Law To Stop Anyone From Recording You Ever
Re: The judge needs to learn some tech
When a "work consist[s] of sounds ... that are being transmitted"-that is, when a work consists of sounds that are being "communicate[d] ... by [a] ... process whereby ... sounds are received beyond the place from which they are sent," id.-the work is considered fixed "ifa fixation of the work is being made simultaneously with its transmission." Id. This provision "creates a legal fiction that the simultaneous fixation occurs before the transmission" for purposes ofan infringement claim. United States v. Moghadam, 175 F.3d 1269, 1280-81 (II th Cir. 1999).
In other words, the law treats the unauthorized recording of sounds that are transmitted live and recorded simultaneously as an infringement of the copyright in the fixed work (assuming the work otherwise qualifies for protection), notwithstanding that the alleged infringer does not copy the fixed version ofthe work but rather records the live transmission directly.
On the post: Forget Wiretapping Laws, Now You Might Be Able To Use Copyright Law To Stop Anyone From Recording You Ever
On the post: Professor Behind Two Chatbots Chatting Discusses What Happened
Chinese room
This is basically Searle's Chinese room, isn't it?
On the post: HP Tablet Fire Sale Lets Us Put A Price On The Value Of A Strong Development Community
Re: I'm not sure you understand...
I don't think many people would argue against Mac hardware being slicker than almost all PC hardware. Many (though by no means all*) people think the UX experience of OS X is nicer than Windows too.
But PCs have a wider range of software than Macs. Most major applications are either available for both (Photoshop, MS Office) or just for the PC (games, principally). So I don't think the range-of-apps argument works here, but Macs still command a hefty price premium, which presumably then must be attributable to the brand and overall (UX, hardware, shopping) experience.**
* Including me, though there are a lot of 'legacy' issues here. :) I also build my own, so I avoid all of the crapware that's typically bundled with PCs.
** Though the % difference in price is significantly less than the 100% markup over hardware only on the iPad postulated here.
On the post: Dear Sweden: Will You Tax Hard Drives And Give Me A Cut Every Time Someone Visits Techdirt?
If the copyright industry thinks that they need compensation for legal private copying, then surely the easiest and fairest way to generate that compensation would be to add the fee to the price of the copyrighted product (e.g. music downloads, DVDs, CDs, Spotify subscriptions and so on). After all, you can’t copy a copyrighted work if you don’t actually have access to it in the first place. This way would be much fairer (if we were to pretend that the fee is needed at all) since it would only affect those who bought copyrighted works and thus had the ability to make copies of it.
On the post: US Copyright Group Lawsuits Based On Highly Questionable Evidence
Now there's a great tagline. I look forward to seeing it in a violator on US Copyright Group's website soon.
On the post: 'Real Names' Doesn't Exactly Guarantee A High Level Of Conversation Either
Re:
On the post: 'Real Names' Doesn't Exactly Guarantee A High Level Of Conversation Either
"Real Names" Policies Are an Abuse of Power
What's most striking is the list of people who are affected by "real names" policies, including abuse survivors, activists, LGBT people, women, and young people.
Over and over again, people keep pointing to Facebook as an example where "real names" policies work. This makes me laugh hysterically. One of the things that became patently clear to me in my fieldwork is that countless teens who signed up to Facebook late into the game chose to use pseudonyms or nicknames. What's even more noticeable in my data is that an extremely high percentage of people of color used pseudonyms as compared to the white teens that I interviewed. Of course, this would make sense...
The people who most heavily rely on pseudonyms in online spaces are those who are most marginalized by systems of power. "Real names" policies aren't empowering; they're an authoritarian assertion of power over vulnerable people.
On the post: Finnish Police Respond To The Norwegian Tragedy By Increasing Internet Surveillance
Coming elsewhere too
It's very hard for anyone in power to respond to a horrific tragedy by doing nothing, but if the track record of post-terrorist-attack legislation is anything to go by, "nothing" would be a refreshing change.
Yes. I thought the speech by Norwegian PM Jens Stoltenberg linked from here a couple of days ago, responding to the tragedy, was incredibly brave, dignified and statesmanlike.
It basically said, despite this horrific violence, we're going to continue doing what we've been doing, only more so. Your actions won't provoke us to oppress our people. Your actions won't incite us to take action against any groups living within our borders. In fact, you've already lost.
"If one man can show so much hate, imagine how much love we all can show together."
Our answer is more democracy, more openness and more humanity.
On the post: Would Fashion Copyright Have Made Kate Middleton's Knockoff Wedding Dress Illegal?
Re: Fashion copyright is not enough!
Instituting region restrictions could also be a lot of fun and, if governments got involved in enforcing these things, that trip through security could leave you naked not just for the trip through the body scanners, but for the whole flight. I can hardly wait.
On the post: AP Finally Learns That On The Internet, You Can Link To Other Sites
On the post: WSJ's Defense Of News Of The World: Hey, It's Not Like They Published Wikileaks Secrets
Wikileaks = phone hacking
On the post: False Advertising: CRIA Becomes 'Music Canada,' Even Though It's Not
"Supporting Big Content through the Big Issues"
"Stronger IP laws. Stronger America."
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