Over on Techdirt, Blaise Alleyne rips apart ASCAP's "Bill Of Wrongs" for Songwriters and Composers, point by point, item by item.
1. We have the right to be compensated for the use of our creative works, and share in the revenues that they generate.
Why? In what other industries do creators maintain control over their creations after they reach consumers? Lenovo has no right to be compensated for the use of my laptop or to share in the revenue I generate through developing software. This is not a given.
It's all debatable, of course, and that's the point. These are not rights granted by the U.S. Constitution or current copyright law, as ASCAP implies. It's just a wishlist, "just an assertion of the status quo by those who depend on copyright law to protect their obsolete business models."
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I love how every time someone describes it as theft, the response is "dude, you're behind the times, it's just a different business model."
You could hide all sorts of wrongs under the rubric of a 'different business model'.
That post is BS and uses disingenuous comparisons to make untenable points.
The creation of a unique piece of art in any format that can then be reproduced requires some level of protection that the art continues to serve its intended purpose if its creator wishes. Even in the simple example given above, that Lenovo laptop is a machine that the user pays to use for their purposes in perpetuity up front, but there is intellectual property - drivers, codecs, etc. - on that laptop that the purchase price goes in part to their original creators that they might continue their work. This then allows the owner of the laptop to produce more/better work as that code is improved.
Almost every rebuttal to those points is an apples-to-oranges comparison, easily dismantled when you take into account the myriad purposes that a piece of art can be used to serve and benefit someone other than its creator.
SMACK DOWN!
You know the long standing rule, "the first person to call the other a Nazi automatically loses the argument"?
Well, I think there needs to be a corollary that says the first person to use the word "untenable," wins.
Y'know, I agree with nearly every word of Joshua's post, but if he puts it here in this itty bitty comment section it's not really a smackdown...he should post it where Blaise Alleyn is likely to read it.