I have been writing songs and screenplays for years.
It can take years for a an original song to be recorded for commercial distribution. It takes a fair amount of money to produce studio-quality demos to "pitch" songs. I am aware of songs that got no commercial play or distribution for more than ten years after they were first created and copyrighted by creation.
It certainly takes a fortune to produce a feature motion picture from a copyrighted screenplay.
Those who invest a fortune in developing a screenplay deserve an opportunity to recover that investment and make a profit.
The majority of Hollywood motion pictures do not make much money if they even break even. We only hear about the profits of "tent-pole" blockbusters like Toy Story and Spiderman.
Independent, low-budget movies rarely recover their production costs.
Sundance Film Festival receives 5,000 indie films per year and may exhibit 100 of those. The rest of those indie films may or may not ever even be seen ANYWHERE by the public.
Why should the creators be robbed of any chance to earn much from their work which may take years to develop and market?
If you put your heart and soul into a creative work and spend money to bring it to market, why should others be given a green light to steal it?
That is the argument of a communist (Your work, comrade, belongs to the collective).
Actually not true. I've published quite a number of scientific papers over the years, all copyrighted. And I hold an extensive number of patents, so I am VERY familiar with the concepts of "intellectual property".
"I have been writing songs and screenplays for years."
And I've been inventing things for "years and years".
"It can take years for a an original song to be recorded for commercial distribution. It takes a fair amount of money to produce studio-quality demos to "pitch" songs. I am aware of songs that got no commercial play or distribution for more than ten years after they were first created and copyrighted by creation."
And the exact same thing applies to patents. It takes a LONG time to commercialization, if ever, and is FAR more costly than copyright, yet a patent, on a real good, lasts only twenty years.
"Why should the creators be robbed of any chance to earn much from their work which may take years to develop and market?"
Nobody is talking about "robbing the creators". I personally think that the author's lifetime is quite sufficient to let the CREATOR earn from their work. What I object to is that the system is set up to grant monopoly rights to people who did NOT create the work.
"That is the argument of a communist (Your work, comrade, belongs to the collective)."
If you make this argument, you are truly ignorant of what the Founding Fathers did with respect to granting a government-enforced MONOPOLY (which is what patents and copyright actually are) on certain rights.
That is the argument of a communist (Your work, comrade, belongs to the collective)
No doubt you were able to create those works using technology for which patents have expired. You were not forced to pay a royalty for the electric light, the keyboard, and the telephone. Your work will be displayed using motion picture or printing press technology that although created by an individual are now available for your free use. You were able to create your work only by mining the "collective" knowledge.
[Payments you make are for the physical manifestation – e.g., a particular keyboard, the specific celluloid to strike your print, the paper and printing costs for your particular text. You are not paying to use the design/ideas.]
It is that "collective" knowledge that allows us create new advances. Technological advancement would grind to a halt if every discovery were owned by an individual or cooperation. Inventors would need to run every single experiment or trial through a legal check to insure they were not infringing on another's "intellectual property." It is most likely that every trial would use the work of another for which they would need permission. It is not just a case of cost, such permission could be denied thus stopping future inventive work.
The same problems would apply to creative work. Many modern works have their roots is the classic myths. Should Disney continue to pay royalties to the original writer of the story? Should Shakespeare's descendents continue to receive royalties for (or indeed be able to prohibit the performing of) the Bards's plays?
To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries.
The important words are "limited time" and "exclusive Right." Copyright is a temporary monopoly privilege. All our growth depends on shared knowledge. It requires that we be able to mine a common resource without fear of punishment or need for permission.
Intellectual "property" cannot be degraded by over use. There is no tragedy of the commons. Physical property needs tending by the owner to flourish and remain productive. Physical property will be degraded by over use, and does best with a single caretaker.
I think the "limited time" (and I do mean limited as compared to the "infinity minus 1" proposed by some) strikes a good balance between the rights of creators and the need to share knowledge. Communism fails because it under protects physical property leading to the tragedy of the commons. Current capitalism may fail because it walls off to much knowledge, creating a tragedy of the uncommons (I can't use your knowledge and you can't use mine, so we both lose).
Thank you. I get fed up sometimes with the philistinism of some FRers. As a writer and artist married to a musician/composer it frustrating to see how little some people understand what goes into this type of work. It can take five years to write a novel. It costs thousands of dollars to make a quality recording. Artists often go through decades of grinding poverty in order to finish a work. They should be able to pass the fruits of this labor onto their descendents.