In my last post in Reading William Patry's Moral Panics and the Copyright Wars, I was disappointed that he had taken a turn into a confused discussion of copyrights as property and real estate a property. That was up through chapter four. He has come roaring back!
Chapter five started out with more of the same, then shifted back to brilliant stuff. The book is already worth the price of the first four chapters, and it gets even better in six, seven, eight as he gets to specific cases and some unsavory history. He gets into details of the music business that are pretty fascinating, such as credit card companies make more off the sale of music than do the artists, and how and why. I'll have more to say on these brilliant chapters anon.
I wonder why Patry included the confused part on real property in this discussion, for if he left it out this book would be required reading for libertarians and anarchists, a voracious reading public. (I say it still is, but he is going to get an argument with each copy he sells.) His point is simple, copyrights are out of control if they are considered property, even if only metaphorically. This Patry does brilliantly.
Patry notes the constitutional basis for patents and copyrights, here you go Article 1, Sec 8, clause 8:
This is specifically aimed at the commonweal, not individual wealth. It is about progress for us all, not riches for one. It left the fine tuning of what "limited times" "exclusive" "right" and what constitutes writings and discoveries up to congress to sort out later.
Now, Patry's thesis is the system is broken because the punishments are too harsh for too generous a reading. And further, much of what passes for copyright law since the 1990s has, in his own words, moved us over to fascism. As a centrist on the topic, he advises we get back to what the constitution calls for, which is law grounded in the regulation intended to promote the progress of science and the useful arts.
For this libertarians and anarchists world wide would all hail William Patry. Then they would say, "Bill, show us proof that there is a regulation that can be written that will promote the progress of science and the useful arts." And he would say, "Well, in 250 plus years, no such evidence has ever been developed, probably because it cannot be proven."
Then libertarians and anarchists would say, well, think about that.
There is something in here for conspiracy theorists, that Patry does not comment upon. Patry does make Jack Valenti, head of the MPAA to be the arch-villian in USA copyright law. So what? In that famous picture of Jackie Kennedy standing next to Lyndon Johnson while Johnson is being sworn in after the killing of JFK, why, there, full faced in the lower left of the picture, is Jack Valenti. Jack Valenti handled the news media for the assassination of Kennedy. And then went from there to manage Hollywood as head of the MPAA. Again, Patry makes no such association, but the book is full of fascinating items. Read it.
Feel free to forward this by email to three of your friends.
Chapter five started out with more of the same, then shifted back to brilliant stuff. The book is already worth the price of the first four chapters, and it gets even better in six, seven, eight as he gets to specific cases and some unsavory history. He gets into details of the music business that are pretty fascinating, such as credit card companies make more off the sale of music than do the artists, and how and why. I'll have more to say on these brilliant chapters anon.
I wonder why Patry included the confused part on real property in this discussion, for if he left it out this book would be required reading for libertarians and anarchists, a voracious reading public. (I say it still is, but he is going to get an argument with each copy he sells.) His point is simple, copyrights are out of control if they are considered property, even if only metaphorically. This Patry does brilliantly.
Patry notes the constitutional basis for patents and copyrights, here you go Article 1, Sec 8, clause 8:
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.
This is specifically aimed at the commonweal, not individual wealth. It is about progress for us all, not riches for one. It left the fine tuning of what "limited times" "exclusive" "right" and what constitutes writings and discoveries up to congress to sort out later.
Now, Patry's thesis is the system is broken because the punishments are too harsh for too generous a reading. And further, much of what passes for copyright law since the 1990s has, in his own words, moved us over to fascism. As a centrist on the topic, he advises we get back to what the constitution calls for, which is law grounded in the regulation intended to promote the progress of science and the useful arts.
For this libertarians and anarchists world wide would all hail William Patry. Then they would say, "Bill, show us proof that there is a regulation that can be written that will promote the progress of science and the useful arts." And he would say, "Well, in 250 plus years, no such evidence has ever been developed, probably because it cannot be proven."
Then libertarians and anarchists would say, well, think about that.
There is something in here for conspiracy theorists, that Patry does not comment upon. Patry does make Jack Valenti, head of the MPAA to be the arch-villian in USA copyright law. So what? In that famous picture of Jackie Kennedy standing next to Lyndon Johnson while Johnson is being sworn in after the killing of JFK, why, there, full faced in the lower left of the picture, is Jack Valenti. Jack Valenti handled the news media for the assassination of Kennedy. And then went from there to manage Hollywood as head of the MPAA. Again, Patry makes no such association, but the book is full of fascinating items. Read it.
Feel free to forward this by email to three of your friends.
2 comments:
Check out this link:
http://creativecommons.org
Have you ever used a "creative commons" license before? They have license's with varying degrees of "share-ability" notification for published works. I can see that this license can possibly increase the widespread dissemination of an author's work, without a potential user having to actually contact the author for permission.
Yes, but I go one better... my book is up on googlebooks for 100% access so anyone can "steal" any of it any time and do what they like. I keep the copyright so no one can take over the book and keep me from exploiting it. But as I have written in this blog before, I'll crush anyone who tries to compete in the market with my book against me, with my superior marketing,
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