[pp.int.general] The Songwriters Association of Canada endorsesfilesharing legalization

[Wybo Wiersma]

I think the proposal by the canadian songwriters is not so bad as it
sounds, at least in some respects...

First of all it does mean an end to the problem of artificial scarcity
(e.g. digital creations are nonrivalous goods, and thus selling them
piecewise creates a theoretically infinite deadweight loss) that even 
reducing the duration of copyrights still has...

Second it does provide for an income to creators. And they do need to
be able to make a living... It is in no way unreasonable that they
want this... (and no, for some kinds of media, like software and films
you can't have performances to cover the costs...)

It's only weak on privacy (but that can be fixed by technical means
like anonimizing the stats or making them voluntary), and on the issue
of re-mixing (how to distribute between bits in derived works)...

> First, the proposal fails to answer the most basic question:
> 
> WHO is going to be compensated FOR WHAT and WHY?

A fair system for that is possible, even if it won't be easy, and it
can also be safe and fraud-proof. This basically is a technical 
problem (and by far easier and better for privacy than the DRM-stuff 
the industry heads for now)...

And especially if one keeps in mind that value of creativity and 
digital content is likely to grow, and thus deserves an economy of 
it's own. The costs of researching and creating it are likely to be 
minor compared to the benefits (we as a society did find ways to do 
safe banking too, didn't we ?).

For this it would be good if the distribution-scheme resembles a
market, and thus does not depend on councils, commissions or other
bodies for decisions on who gets what. One - at least moderately
successfull - example of such a market is that of the rankings in
science based on the number of citations (or googles pagerank 
algoritm)... And there are more examples...

> Second, if they should get this benefit of taxing the public, don't expect
> moviemakers, porno filmers, mp3 books etc. to stand far behind in line. They
> have assumed that everybody could pay $5 a month, but are not seeing the
> bigger picture of more people wanting a slice of that pie, should it prove
> to exist.

If I read their proposal correctly they speak of rightholders in
general, and not of themselves in particular...

> I see a bunch of people saying "We are starting to understand that the world
> has changed. But we still like money. Therefore, in order to make sure we
> get money, we would like the ability to tax the public."

I am sorry, but just like with other commons like roads, they don't
drop from the sky spontaneously, and even if they do to some extent
(amateur artists), we might have more of it coming if people have a
decent chance of a fair income...

(especially as research and creativity become more and more central 
to our society and economy... and thus professionalize...)

Wybo