Re: Paul Krugman holds forth on the future of publishing

Bill Seitz wrote:

> I think you're all mis-understanding the position of the "info wants
> to be free" crowd. They're not saying that they think information
> *should* be price=0, they're saying that given
> 
> * it's ultimately impossible to use technology to protect information
> (DRM, etc.)
> * it's ultimately impossible to enforce intellectual property law
> (anonymous super-distribution)
> * there's an explosion in the number of creators
> 
> The price of information gets pulled (not pushed) toward 0.
> 
> Therefore the sooner you find a new way to get paid, the better off you will be.

I do not necessarily believe that this is, in fact, the position of the 
"information wants to be free crowd," but it /is/ how /I/ view it.

Literalists will argue that information, being an abstract idea, cannot 
possible "want" anything. This argument can, of course, be immediately 
discarded as it does nothing to move the discussion forward.

My personal view is that "information wants to be free" in the same way 
that water "wants" to run downhill. Its not an expression of an ideal, 
its a description of the natural order of things. In general, people 
want to share what they know, not horde it. Who hasn't heard a joke on 
[fill in your favorite late-night talk show host]'s show and repeated it 
the next day? It's in our nature.

I suspect there my be an evolutionary imperative to this tendency. 
People who shared knowledge with their children had a better change to 
have their genes survive, as did those communities which shared 
knowledge within the community. We have such a strong need to share that 
we have the street-corner prophets who insist on sharing their message 
even when the community-at-large has made it clear that they are not 
interested in it.

Now, just as a lot of power can be gained by damming up a river, so 
power can be gained by damming up the flow of information. Copyright 
laws and moral outrage are both artificial methods of attempting to 
stifle the flow of information for some perceived "greater good." And in 
many cases I agree that the /perceived/ greater good is, in fact, both 
desirable and achievable.

But one has to be aware that these artificial impediments to the flow of 
information /are/ artificial, and oppose a strong natural force. Some 
water will always find a channel around the dam, and the broader the 
dam, the greater the pressure to circumvent it. And just like the river, 
damming the information flow too tightly may cause more harm than good 
(consider Nazi book burning and the effect of the Hoover dam on the Sea 
of Cortez).

Some restrictions on the flow of information are certainly appropriate 
to reward creative efforts, particularly when the restrictions apply 
only to a specific /expression/ of any idea, and not to the idea itself. 
But the degree of restriction has to be carefully controlled, and we 
have to recognize that these restrictions are working against a very 
powerful natural force.

/Should/ information be free? I don't know; I don't do "should." I only 
know that there are very strong forces that make it very hard to 
restrict it. To mis-quote Mitch Leigh, Joe Darion and Dale Wasserman: 
"maddest of all is to see life as it should be, and not as it is."

I believe that if you can find a business model that takes advantage of 
the natural flow of information you will be much better off than if you 
insist on following a business model that relies on information scarcity 
caused by artificial restrictions.


> On Fri, Jun 6, 2008 at 9:13 AM, Mary E Tyler <[email protected]> wrote:

[snip]

>> There is another alternative to "they must find a way." It's that they
>> won't find a way and that the intellectual property will just go away.
>> It will never be created in the first place. People who otherwise
>> would have written great books will flip burgers or go into investment
>> banking. They will be tired and sapped of creativity at the end of the
>> day and they will never write because they have lives and families and
>> like to eat and have shelter just like the consuming public.

I'm not sure this is necessarily a bad thing. We probably have a lot 
more authors writing today than we need. A little social Darwinism might 
be just the ticket. In 1908 the term of copyright was a maximum of 42 
years after publication (one 28 year initial term plus one 14 year 
extension upon application), yet this appalling short term didn't seem 
to keep Samuel Clemens from creating an impressive body of work. And it 
wasn't until 1831 that "widows and children of authors" were allowed to 
file an application for renewal. (Prior to 1831 the term of copyright 
was a maximum of 28 years -- a 14 year initial term and one 14 year 
extension).

I seem to recall reading in the 80's a science fiction author explaining 
why he wrote. He said that for him writing was like a bowel movement. It 
was not necessarily an enjoyable experience, but he couldn't not do it.

The era of copyright is less than 300 years old, and the era of modern 
copyright is less than 150 years old. Making authors adapt to changing 
conditions may make things hard for individual authors who are not 
particularly flexible, but I doubt it will have much impact on society 
as a whole.


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