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> Why not crowdfund those amounts instead? That way, all creators get paid before the work even starts and the result can be safely released into the public dom

> Why not crowdfund those amounts instead? That way, all creators get paid before the work even starts and the result can be safely released into the public domain. Then shouldn't every business have to follow the same rules? Making a "copy" of an iPhone costs $20 or $30, should Apple have to crowdsource their factory and IP then sell iPhones by weight or value of raw material? Why do content creators get screwed because physics doesn't let them attach an atom to their creation? The vast majortiy of what you pay for in any product is the creation, not the material.

matheusmoreira 6y ago
> Then shouldn't every business have to follow the same rules? No. Physical goods are actually scarce. Making copies costs lots of money and finite resources. Making copies of data is as easy as copy paste. Copying data actually does cost money due to electricity, storage and bandwidth costs but this is so widely distributed over the general population it might as well be zero. > Making a "copy" of an iPhone costs $20 or $30 I thought electronics factories cost billions of dollars to set up and operate. > Should Apple have to crowdsource their factory and IP then sell iPhones by weight or value of raw material? Not at all. > Why do content creators get screwed because physics doesn't let them attach an atom to their creation? Because data is really just a number. Like all numbers, all creations already exist. The creator just happened to somehow find the exact sequence of bits that represents the picture or music being imagined. All intellectual work boils down to this. Even programming. Trying to sell data is like trying to sell numbers. It just makes no sense. > The vast majortiy of what you pay for in any product is the creation, not the material. Yes, but physical products actually lend themselves well to being sold in a free market since they're actually scarce. This allows companies to recoup the costs associated with intellectual work. This model breaks down when people want to do nothing but intellectual work and sell the resulting data as if it were a physical good. That's when people start coming up with insane ideas such as intellectual property, copyright, patents and god knows what else. It actually worked well for centuries... Until people invented computers, a technology that trivialized the copying and worldwide distribution of data. We have computers in our pockets and homes which can copy and distribute data worldwide with zero effort and cost on our part. Data simply isn't scarce. Maybe one day we'll invent Star Trek replicators and making physical copies of iPhones will be similarly trivial.
- creato 6y ago
  > No. Physical goods are actually scarce. Making copies costs lots of money and finite resources. Making copies of data is as easy as copy paste. Not nearly as scarce as the price of an iPhone would suggest. Physical goods have counterfeiting problems as well, for basically the same reason: the marginal cost of a copy is significantly less than the actual cost of development. > I thought electronics factories cost billions of dollars to set up and operate. And? Setting up a movie studio probably costs hundreds of millions. Why is it different?
c22 6y ago
> Making a "copy" of an iPhone costs $20 or $30 I think you might be off by a factor of ten or so. [0][1] [0]: https://technology.informa.com/596781/iphone-x-costs-apple-370-in-materials-ihs-markit-teardown-reveals https://technology.informa.com/596781/iphone-x-costs-apple-3... [1]: https://www.bankmycell.com/blog/how-much-do-iphones-cost-to-make https://www.bankmycell.com/blog/how-much-do-iphones-cost-to-...
- thinkloop 6y ago
  Those are components composed of mostly IP, which OP doesn't think should be paid for. In terms of raw material it is much less.
sjy 6y ago
What prevents competitors from manufacturing an iPhone for $20 or $30, or even $200 or $300? Not the copyright laws that stop you from pirating movies. Other forms of IP such as patents and trade secrets are more important. These are not generalisations of copyright, they’re distinct concepts with very different rules, and criticisms of copyright do not necessarily apply to them.

matheusmoreira 6y ago

> Then shouldn't every business have to follow the same rules? No. Physical goods are actually scarce. Making copies costs lots of money and finite resources. Making copies of data is as easy as copy paste. Copying data actually does cost money due to electricity, storage and bandwidth costs but this is so widely distributed over the general population it might as well be zero. > Making a "copy" of an iPhone costs $20 or $30 I thought electronics factories cost billions of dollars to set up and operate. > Should Apple have to crowdsource their factory and IP then sell iPhones by weight or value of raw material? Not at all. > Why do content creators get screwed because physics doesn't let them attach an atom to their creation? Because data is really just a number. Like all numbers, all creations already exist. The creator just happened to somehow find the exact sequence of bits that represents the picture or music being imagined. All intellectual work boils down to this. Even programming. Trying to sell data is like trying to sell numbers. It just makes no sense. > The vast majortiy of what you pay for in any product is the creation, not the material. Yes, but physical products actually lend themselves well to being sold in a free market since they're actually scarce. This allows companies to recoup the costs associated with intellectual work. This model breaks down when people want to do nothing but intellectual work and sell the resulting data as if it were a physical good. That's when people start coming up with insane ideas such as intellectual property, copyright, patents and god knows what else. It actually worked well for centuries... Until people invented computers, a technology that trivialized the copying and worldwide distribution of data. We have computers in our pockets and homes which can copy and distribute data worldwide with zero effort and cost on our part. Data simply isn't scarce. Maybe one day we'll invent Star Trek replicators and making physical copies of iPhones will be similarly trivial.

creato 6y ago
> No. Physical goods are actually scarce. Making copies costs lots of money and finite resources. Making copies of data is as easy as copy paste. Not nearly as scarce as the price of an iPhone would suggest. Physical goods have counterfeiting problems as well, for basically the same reason: the marginal cost of a copy is significantly less than the actual cost of development. > I thought electronics factories cost billions of dollars to set up and operate. And? Setting up a movie studio probably costs hundreds of millions. Why is it different?

c22 6y ago

> Making a "copy" of an iPhone costs $20 or $30 I think you might be off by a factor of ten or so. [0][1] [0]: https://technology.informa.com/596781/iphone-x-costs-apple-370-in-materials-ihs-markit-teardown-reveals https://technology.informa.com/596781/iphone-x-costs-apple-3... [1]: https://www.bankmycell.com/blog/how-much-do-iphones-cost-to-make https://www.bankmycell.com/blog/how-much-do-iphones-cost-to-...

thinkloop 6y ago
Those are components composed of mostly IP, which OP doesn't think should be paid for. In terms of raw material it is much less.

sjy 6y ago

What prevents competitors from manufacturing an iPhone for $20 or $30, or even $200 or $300? Not the copyright laws that stop you from pirating movies. Other forms of IP such as patents and trade secrets are more important. These are not generalisations of copyright, they’re distinct concepts with very different rules, and criticisms of copyright do not necessarily apply to them.