Pixel stained techno-peasant stuff
Jan. 8th, 2009 06:01 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pecuniumI care about copyright. As someone who sells my creative efforts it matters to me that I can do so without fear of someone else making money from it, and my being cheated.
Copyright is really useful in that regard. I am not, however, on board with the idea that I have to have absolute, 100 percent, complete and total control of every single thing which happens to my pictures. Go to my Flickr stream and you can see the images I load in the largest size. You can copy them. You can do the same thing with the images up at Terrence Karney Photography (where there is a new post up, on workflow).
I've said it before, I can't stop it, so what I can do it make it hard for people to get a free copy which is equal to the ones I sell. I figure those who truly can't afford it, will; at the very least, be willing to tell other people about where they got the image.
Which is why a story about a quotation from Roger Ebert, about a movie being scuppered because a copyright holder is too greedy to take a chance on not making money.
My cynical self is pretty sure it knows why they are willing to shoot themselves in this foot; they are deathly afraid the "total control" model they are using will be shown (again) to be wrong. That a more open flow of things (like music) will be shown to be profitable.
Why this bothers them, that's harder to fathom. I suspect it's a case of projection. They are so greedy they can't imagine people being less greedy, and willing to pay for something, which they might be able to get for free. Me, I'd rather have a clean copy than a free one; and I am reasonably certain that's the case for enough people that money won't be lost.
Even when I can get a free copy, as clean as the paid copy (say an MP3 of Stan Rogers' Barret's Privateers), I'll want more of his stuff, and I'll spend the money to buy an album; or go to a concert (where I may buy an album). I also can't afford to buy an album on spec, for every artist I might like.
In any case, the more people know of an artist, the more chance that artist has to sell. There are a lot more artists out there (even on big labels) than the radio plays. Keep me from hearing them, and there is no way I will buy them. So bottling them up this way... it's robbing Peter to starve Paul.
Copyright is really useful in that regard. I am not, however, on board with the idea that I have to have absolute, 100 percent, complete and total control of every single thing which happens to my pictures. Go to my Flickr stream and you can see the images I load in the largest size. You can copy them. You can do the same thing with the images up at Terrence Karney Photography (where there is a new post up, on workflow).
I've said it before, I can't stop it, so what I can do it make it hard for people to get a free copy which is equal to the ones I sell. I figure those who truly can't afford it, will; at the very least, be willing to tell other people about where they got the image.
Which is why a story about a quotation from Roger Ebert, about a movie being scuppered because a copyright holder is too greedy to take a chance on not making money.
My cynical self is pretty sure it knows why they are willing to shoot themselves in this foot; they are deathly afraid the "total control" model they are using will be shown (again) to be wrong. That a more open flow of things (like music) will be shown to be profitable.
Why this bothers them, that's harder to fathom. I suspect it's a case of projection. They are so greedy they can't imagine people being less greedy, and willing to pay for something, which they might be able to get for free. Me, I'd rather have a clean copy than a free one; and I am reasonably certain that's the case for enough people that money won't be lost.
Even when I can get a free copy, as clean as the paid copy (say an MP3 of Stan Rogers' Barret's Privateers), I'll want more of his stuff, and I'll spend the money to buy an album; or go to a concert (where I may buy an album). I also can't afford to buy an album on spec, for every artist I might like.
In any case, the more people know of an artist, the more chance that artist has to sell. There are a lot more artists out there (even on big labels) than the radio plays. Keep me from hearing them, and there is no way I will buy them. So bottling them up this way... it's robbing Peter to starve Paul.
no subject
Date: 2009-01-09 05:40 am (UTC)I think that's the essence of it. It says more about who 'they' are, be they people or corporations.
no subject
Date: 2009-01-09 06:35 am (UTC)You'd think the bottled water industry would've put an end to that kind of thought.
no subject
Date: 2009-01-09 11:22 am (UTC)I'm not disagreeing with your overall point, but the specific argument doesn't quite fit here: the expected bump in the Annette Hanshaw that would be expected from the movie doesn't mean much to the copyright holders here.