Re: Technology does TOO change the rules of business.

From: "Daniel P. B. Smith" 
> On Oct 23, 2010, at 7:53 AM, [email protected] wrote:
>> The basis of your argument on this is that the technology changes the rules of business. I see no evidence this is so.
> 
> Of course it does. When radio came into the picture, despite almost everyone's wishes to the contrary, it was only a matter of time before people started playing records over the radio and the rules of business changed. Hence ASCAP, and later BMI (which was the cause of the ascent of rock-and-roll, ASCAP having signed up all of Tin Pan Alley forcing BMI to search afield for marketable talent). Very few record labels say "not licensed for public performance" on them any more.

I'm not dismissing what you write, but this was merely an extension of live public performance, both theatrical and orchestral. Radio transmission was incorporated with an agreement that recognised the need to pay a fee  for copyright material. Much of the importance of this may come out of WWII in the UK, where the radio was an important element both at home and with the forces. But the inclusion of stage and concert hall were only changes in the sense the conditions of the new media required adaptations. This is also music, which is not quite the same. Directly relevant is 'A Book at Bedtime', which was a volume serialised over the week; and licensed in exactly the same way as any other content use. Plays were not much different from stage terms.

> 
> When home video tapes came into the picture, the rules of business changed. Despite the studio's longstanding traditional of licensing according to audience size and number of performances, and forcing people to rent a "B" picture in order to get an "A" picture, they were forced to accept the fact that (then-current technology) gave them no way of knowing how many people were in the room or how often the tape would be played.

The effect on the business was one thing, an after adjustment to the new media and technology it is a very profitable one - though again not books. But the rules and the ;icensing were adjusted, rather than the new form creating a new system.

> 
> As you say, these conflicts arise continually. There's nothing new about the conflicts. In the past, the result was always that the conflict was resolved by the publishers acknowledging that the rules had changed and reaching some compromise or accommodation. Now, they have the illusion that digital restrictions have finally given them absolute power and they have become obdurate. Eventually they will find that change is the irresistible force and they are not the immovable object.

'Absolute power'? I wish! No I don't really, but I'm really not sure quite  how you see it that way. The right over copies is the basis of copyright, not a new introduction. Again the media and technology require an additional way to ensure that right is exercised.

> 
> The railroads followed one set of rules of business, then the Grangers made a fuss and the Supreme Court _ruled_ that the states had a right to regulate the railroads and public utilities commissions arose and the railroad's _rules_ of doing business changed.

The issue is totally different. Railroads are  hard to duplicate, and the problems are completely different matters. th issue of regulation is complex and mostly about saving lives and injury. The othe areas of control of transport are quite different matters again.

> 
> If you want to define the term "rules of business" in some fundamental-things-apply-as-time-goes-by way then OK, but to make a definition so broad that the Pony Express and the mobile phone follow "the same rules of business" (must earn a profit, etc.) is to render it meaningless.

I think I have indicated above that from th estart of printing in Europe to now the fundamentals of copyright are unchanged, and the application of it - which is the most essential constant in book publishing business - is an issue of contract change, rather than significant change to business model. The kind of changes you see are adjustments to include new media in the exisiting licensing system, not the creation of either a new basis of copyright, nor any substantial change in contracting potential. This has been a feature of publishing business at least since the transfer of copyright control to the author by the Act of Queen Anne.

Variations of publishing formats date a long way back, and derivative works also. The multiplicity in digital media is no different, except in the actual technology. In one sense it is just like the continuous changes over centuries. What it has challenged is the marketing which has broadly worked for some decades, and the policing of breaches.

> 
> 
>> To give an Old Testament quote: there is nothing new under the sun.
> 
> That's from the same guy who said "of making many books there is no end; and much study is a weariness of the flesh!"
> 

;-)

Joseph



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