The mistake here is thinking that property rights only extends to physical bits. Property rights have extended to non-physical (e.g. the right to do things under a contract) things for literally hundreds of years.
That is false. Copyright is not an property, and does not have property rights.
Calling copyright a property is an simplification. Copyright is an state enforced monopoly, given as a privilege by the state to the author. Privileges is not properties, and as thus have no property rights attached to them.
Copyright is not different from any other state given privilege. Some people has got permissions to sell drugs, produce weapons or export particular products to specific countries. Neither of those privileges are "rights".
Of course, we can turn this around and say that all property right is privileges given by the state (as they are the only one enforcing the law). However, this kind of thinking would then require one to accept that property, like that car parked in the house, is property owned by the state and given as an privilege to someone they define as an owner. It leads to a place where we are better off defining physical objects as different compared to privileges that we receive from the state.
> However, this kind of thinking would then require one to accept that property, like that car parked in the house, is property owned by the state and given as an privilege to someone they define as an owner.
This is a failure of logic. Even in the absense of a government, you would own your car--but you would have to personally defend that ownership at all times. The privilege that the state grants is security in your ownership: external protection from uncompensated use or taking. This is how intellectual property rights are analogous to other property rights. The government does not create or own the content; what they grant is protection from uncompensated use or taking of the content.
Property rights obviously extend to non-physical and abstract things, that's what "intellectual property" means.
The problem, which pg explains in the essay that I linked, is that technology has made it no longer practical to treat information (aka a particular stream of bytes) as a piece of private property that you can sell copies of, because copying and distributing it is now almost free. "The record labels and movie studios used to distribute what they made like air shipped through tubes on a moon base. But with the arrival of networks, it's as if we've moved to a planet with a breathable atmosphere. Data moves like smells now."
But in order to protect their profits, "The RIAA and MPAA would make us breathe through tubes if they could." At this point, viewing content through cable is becoming the equivalent of "breathing through tubes." Aereo's workaround is basically a way to say "Look, we are breathing through tubes, the tubes are just invisible!" Very clever.
Meh. Just because it is easy to commit copyright infringement due to the increasing presence of highspeed internet doesn't mean that it should now just become legal to download your entertainment when you want, where you want, and for exactly how much you want.
Why is "copyright infringement" even a thing, though? What is sacred about copyrights?
And what value is the owner of a media copyright actually providing to me anymore? They used to add value by distributing media, but now the media is obsolete because technology has given us faster, cheaper, and easier ways to share digital content.
The other thing these companies do is market the content and talent. But "marketing" is not a product, it has no value to the consumer. Their advertising even has negative value because it wastes my time--viewing it is another price that I pay in order to enjoy the content.
So if the copyright-owning companies don't have a value-add, why should I pay them for anything? Because they asked nicely? No, the only conceivable reason to do so is because the law says I have to. And why does the law say I have to? Because those companies wrote the law.
The law certainly isn't there to protect artists. Artists will always make art, regardless of whether others are able to buy exclusive legal rights to sell their art, or not. And the artists get a pitifully small slice of copy sales anyway.
> So if the copyright-owning companies don't have a value-add
its not true that they don't value add; its just that their value adding happens once - the cost of production is borne by media companies, and they assume the risk of not making back their investment money. The value they created then is the possibility of a good work being created.
However, asking to be paid continuously for the right to copy the work even after the cost has been repaid to create it is wrong (but this is what copyright law dictates).
Under the old system, artists are commissioned (by the state, or the wealthy) to create a work, which is then freely available to all (granted, a painting can't be so easily copied back then...). I say as technology improves, we need to change to that system again.
When artist(s) want to create a work and want to be sure to be paid accordingly, they first need to solicit the money (including their living/salary/costs) from the general public, and once their costs are met, they produce the artwork. Those who have sponsored would then have full work, but they cannot enforce copyright over any copies made, including copies they themselves distribute. This way, the masses who didn't pay benefit from those who did, and the artists got paid their share (and upfront too). No longer will there exist rent seeking by middlemen for owning the "right to copy".
>its not true that they don't value add; its just that their value adding happens once - the cost of production is borne by media companies, and they assume the risk of not making back their investment money. The value they created then is the possibility of a good work being created.
Investment is not a value-adding activity. When you invest, others' value-adding is what makes your investment grow. The value-adders are the people who take your capital and use it to make something of greater value than the principal amount you invested.
You're onto something when you mention commissioning works of art, though. Currently the motivation for companies to invest in the production of art is the ROI they can get from (exclusively) selling copies of the art, as guaranteed by copyrights. If copyrights are technologically obsolete because copying is now virtually free, then we as a society do need to find a new way to finance the creation of large-scale, expensive works of art--if we still want to enjoy that type of entertainment, that is.
> Under the old system, artists are commissioned (by the state, or the wealthy) to create a work, which is then freely available to all (granted, a painting can't be so easily copied back then...). I say as technology improves, we need to change to that system again.
Most art created under the patronage system was not freely available to all--usually the exact opposite, actually.
The only reason you are even aware of art created under the patronage system is because copyright has since made it economically viable to distribute at low cost. You can download a performance of a Mozart composition for a few bucks on iTunes--a tiny percentage of your wealth. Under the patronage system only a few thousand wealthy people would ever hear these pieces of music, because you needed to be physically present at a performance put on by the patron.
Your argument begs the question many are raising on this thread. What is stopping anyone from creating content and giving it away? Nothing. It turns out that the existing copyright laws are integral to the process of getting the huge resources together to create high quality content.
Content is not like air, and arguably limiting access to content through "artificial" means harms no one as these methods do not preclude the distribution of other content.
On the other hand, if there is a worry of harm to the public of having an under supply of sufficiently awesome content, property rights are an established method of ensuring this production.
Property rights obviously don't extend to non-physical and abstract things, but there are some enough analogies between property law and 1)copyright 2)patent 3)trademark laws to label them as "intellectual property" laws - i.e., something similar to property laws but not actual property laws.
