[Groop] Fw: OT - Harvey Awards night

Wed Sep 1 09:00:32 PDT 2010

The trouble is, Tone, no one is selling then deleting ONE copy of digital 
content. By duplicating digital content and selling or giving it away, you are 
PUBLISHING that material illegally.

Most people who are for free sharing of digital content simply like the idea of 
getting free stuff and could care less about anything other than getting stuff 
for free. 

If you've got to sue the occasional 6 year old to teach people basic lessons 
about stealing and the difference between right and wrong (as opposed to What I 
Want To Be Right...) then so be it.
 -Larry "mrgrooism" Steller 

________________________________
From: Tone <Tone at cranksgiving.net>
To: groop at groo.com
Sent: Wed, September 1, 2010 11:33:20 AM
Subject: Re: [Groop] Fw:  OT - Harvey Awards night

    I read the blog/debate about Sergio versus Waid, and I think there is an
argument for/against digital copyrighted content, which I have not heard
yet… resale. Now before I begin to explain, I do believe artists/creators
should be able to maintain copyrights to their works, and with it control
over exactly how they desire the content to be sold, resold, and/or
distributed… so any examples I give here are referring to legal copyright
sales/transfers, etc. rather than piracy. I realize resale is not
specifically what the debate is about, but it does have great
ramifications down the line.
    Getting back to my point of resale…anyone, who buys a physical copy of
say a movie, music CD, video game, e-book, art print, or comic book, can
sell the tangible physical object at possibly a loss because of
wear-n-tear/low-demand or profit due to rarity/high-demand. Most people,
who buy any piece of video or audio material, do not usually take into
account that possible return in value when originally buying an item, but
many comic collectors do.

    However, when buying digital copyrighted content, there really has not
been any procedure put in place to allow a consumer to legally sell, or
even give away, his or her usage rights to the copyrighted material. For
instance, when I buy and download a video game through Xbox Live Arcade,
once I beat it and get bored with it I can not offer a sale of my “copy”
possibly at a loss from my original payment amount or even give my “copy”
away to another Xbox player. In most of the Xbox Live content downloads I
do not even think I could include any downloaded games as added value on
the Xbox hard drive if I wanted to sell my used Xbox 360. That is because
the content I downloaded on the hard drive is associated with my
gamer-tag/user-name and not usually the Xbox itself, which means any
person receiving my Xbox would not be able to use the games I bought
unless I gave up my own gamer-tag identity as well. If the receiver
wanted to play one of my downloaded games under their own gamer-tag, then
they would have to buy the rights to it themselves with the only extra
benefit of not having to spend the time downloading the big game files
because the files are already on my hard drive.
    Of course this also restricts the use of possibly a son inheriting a
father’s Xbox upon his death, which has downloaded games the two played
together when the son was younger. This restriction might especially suck
if the Xbox Live download system no longer supports Xbox 360 titles or
its rights usage after so many years. The son might never be able to play
the downloaded content as a remembrance of the good times they spent
together. The only thing allowed seems to be a gamer’s ability to delete
the content with the permission to download and delete it unlimited times
in the future as long as the Xbox Live network is still running. I am not
a big iTunes or other similar service user, nor have I ever subscribed to
digital comics, but I imagine it might work the same on those systems.

    This presents a couple of issues. Obviously, a digital copy will not
degrade and can be infinitely reproduced as long as the source
system/network is functioning properly. In my opinion this negates
possible arguments about rarity causing sale values to increase, so no
copyright owner can gain super profits due to price increases as if there
are only two “copies” left in the world like might be the case for a
comic book. Price increases might only be practical if there is simply a
demand in the market where consumers are willing to pay more… even though
the copyright owner knows they have an infinite supply and reproduction
costs them nothing. This is not all that ethical, but as long as people
are willing to pay, it becomes the reality.
    For rights-holding end-users this presents a somewhat unfair situation,
not just because certain people might have paid more for the same content
than others… but also because they are not allowed to resell their usage
rights in direct competition to the source-providing copyright owner.
Therefore, in this case a comic book creator, like Sergio, would have a
clear and significant advantage. If Sergio went the digital-only route
for all his future publications, then all those non-existent physical
comics being resold on eBay would not cut into his market value. He would
not miss out on additional income generation like he does now whenever
his current paper comics get sold on eBay because there simply would not
be competition. All consumers would legally have to purchase from his
content network. This is presuming of course an ideal world where digital
piracy was kept under control and he would have complete control of his
sales (more about that possibility further down in my post).

    What happens upon his death though? As some people in the blog-debate
mentioned… would his rights fade into the public domain. If this is the
case, then who would be providing the ongoing source copies for future
generations? Would Sergio’s children take up that task or even have the
rights to do so… or would all his content legally be released to the
public domain. If digital content became the standard, then some might
argue whoever could universally provide a source network for consumers to
purchase/acquire copies in the future, should have the copyright. In a
situation like this, I would imagine Sergio would have to will his
content to possibly some corporation/company with a legal clause stating
his direct descendants would be given a cut of the sales. I say a “cut”
because keeping a network running, even when sales are down, takes money.
Therefore in some ways being a copyright holder and provider does take a
certain amount of expense and risk. Alternatively, Sergio could will his
content to some sort of non-profit museum, where on-line visitors could
view his content for free or a possible small donation to maintain the
costs of the museums digital network.

    In either the digital copy or physical print realm… it still somewhat
boils down to a physical item… whether that be a disc, hard drive,
network, soft cover comic, or hard cover book. In terms of long time
spans, who ever has ownership of a legally permitted physical “copy”, can
resell at least one copy as long as they take measures to keep their
“copy” in good condition. The primary difference in the physical and
digital realms is the fear of duplication and the sales or lack of sales
(as in free copy give-aways) diminishing the income of a
creator/copyright-holder.
    This brings me back to video gaming as an example. Like on some web sites
with simplistic puzzle games, technology and internet speed have
developed to the point where someone can buy a physical gaming system
along with a “gamer-tag” associated with it, then log in to a network to
play a selection of video games directly from the network without ever
downloading content to their home-based hardware. Basically, it is like
downloading video game content as you play, which is almost exactly like
watching a streaming video on your computer from Netflix. This streaming
digital format greatly restricts the spread of “copies” because it uses a
similar “gamer-tag” usage-rights association to a piece of content rather
than ever transferring a digital copy to something the end-user
physically owns. Furthermore, hardware designed specifically to work with
such a streaming system can greatly prevent piracy. There are ways to
defeat this system, but it takes some effort and the vast majority of
consumers would most likely opt to go the legal route to avoid the
hassles.

    Again, the primary issue with digital content systems like this, which
are inherently more pirate resistant, is the consumer with his/her
right-usage does not have a way to resell what they bought. However, the
way I view it is a digital consumer chooses to purchase a digital copy
rather than a physical copy, like a disc or book, and thus gives up
his/her right to resell the content. Ideally in this scenario the
copy-right owner would and shoulder recognize the difference by keeping
the price of digital content much cheaper. This is only fair because…
1) The copyright owner does not have to spend money on the production,
distribution, and marketing of physical devices/products.
2) The copyright owner knows they can instantly, freely, and endlessly
produce digital copies for sale, which in its own way devalues the digital
market because no “limited editions” can be sold.
3) The copyright owner knows the sale of a digital rights-usage restricts
consumers from future resale of what the consumer bought, and thus greatly
reduces future sales competition against the copyright owner.

    Despite the restrictions to the end-user, this sales model of a
higher-cost for a physical copy I believe is incredibly beneficial…
1) It encourages consumers to purchase a digital copy, which reduces the
resource costs of a physical item’s production, distribution, and
marketing. Therefore there is less pollution by trucks, processing of the
end paper, plastic, or whatever product, and no waste generation from
marketing-enhanced packaging.
2) The end user might also be able to experience his/her copy in different
interesting and convenient ways. With digital comics for example, as a
reader gets older and their eye-sight diminishes they can most likely
instantly zoom in to read otherwise small text. Even before aging they can
zoom in to appreciate/study the artistic pen/paint-brush strokes of the
artist, which is quite the case in so much of Sergio’s detailed scenes.
3) Also, a reader’s comic book collection with thousands of titles
associated with it can be accessed through a single portable space-saving
device, which will ultimately never degrade in quality because even if
damaged, stolen, or lost a reader can acquire a replacement device and
still access all their purchased rights-usage content. Again, in this
scenario all the content would be accessed through a user-name on a remote
server, so a lost/stolen device would hardly provide any value and could
even have its serial number banned and possibly even traced by the police.

    When I met Sergio at his table in Baltimore I spoke to him about digital
content, and I could immediately tell he was opposed to it. He obviously
fears the possibility of illegal duplication and resulting loss of
income, but he also greatly prefers a tangible object to cherish. He is
clearly more old-school, and his choice to allow his work in only
physical formats is his right as a copy-right owner. During this current
infancy period of change into digital formats we will have people on both
sides, but I think eventually once the kinks are worked out (mostly
piracy issues) I do believe digital and physical formats can exist
harmoniously together.

    Aside from the physical/digital resale values I bring up, the other
arguments regarding a creator’s work not having value and immediately
becoming public domain simply because of the artist’s love of creation
are ridiculous to me. In most cases common sense should dictate when
someone creates anything they should expect it to have value even if, AND
ESPECIALLY BECAUSE, they created it out of love of the art. People, who
argue the opposite, are clearly lamers (a term originating from
hacking/piracy itself), who have no skills to create their own content
and do not even appreciate the process of producing content.

_TONE_

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