Summations Only

What's so great about "Hollywood" and why should anyone care if it gets destroyed? All they are doing is rehashing old ideas now anyways. The only fresh/new ideas are indie films. "Ooh ooh! I want Toy Story 12 and then buy all the Toy Story 12 stuff at the store!" or "Oh Micheal Bay, PLEASE make another Transformers movie! Pretty please?!?!?!?!?!?! Only this time with MORE CGI explosions!"

Surely you realize how absurd that is? The world where you can't make something at all because somebody else says they had the idea first and now they've legally enjoined anybody else from producing a competing product - even if they never actually release their own - is the world where it's harder and harder for anyone to create something. Your motivation is that it's your idea and if you don't do the work, nobody else will and your idea will never come to fruition. In other words your motivation is the same motivation that has always motivated artists - making something new.It makes zero sense to say that you have less motivation in a world where you're free to make whatever you can imagine than you do in our world, where you can bust your ass to make something truly original, and then Activision comes in, asserts a spurious patent claim on your work that you're too poor to answer in court, and takes your profits (and control of your creation) right out of your hands.Copyright is what stifles innovation, by taking away people's control over their own culture and ideas. To assert that the lack of copyright "stifles innovation" is both nonsensical and ahistorical, in that it overlooks how the world's most enduring artistic achievements occurred in societies that gave approximately zero copyright protection to anybody.

Poor little Hollywood, not making billions anymore, I weep for you... Since they already have more than 4 times their aimed for budget, I'd advice them to make the game for twice the budget and keep the rest as profit, and give it away for free. Not having copyright would not have impacted the donations one bit. Like unknown developers could get that kind of money today, with nothing more than "let's make a shooter". Of course there are risks, but they are there today as well. You might not feel them directly, but indirectly you already pay for the flops the games industry produces. Like we can't get it for free on the day of release right now.

This is the world Apple wants. I HAVE NO INTENTION OF REHASHING AN APPLE BASH SESSION!!!!! I'm just sayin'.

Agreed, it's the world every business wants.

Well I'm not going round it all again - this is a really interesting business model and, like some of the music models now growing around the internet and performance, I'm sure some of these new models will work well.But it's all happening without changing an atom of the copyright law and it all falls apart - imo - when the entire population has got used to free media easily available. (And no, neither of those two situations exist yet - not even close.)

You think it would've turned out different had Tim Schafer said: "listen, we would like to make a game, but we need money. Once we reach $400.000 we will make the game and give it away for free, all extra donations will be spent on the game, and if we get more than $x we will keep the rest as profit. Yes we are, the entire population already has free media easily available. Must I list the top 100 most popular torrents on pirate bay as an example?

Well, theoretically, I could sell my copyright to Activision and still get paid for my contribution.But yeah, in general, which is why I'm in favor of copyright revision, but in no way am I in favor of copyright removal.

And you could set up a donation system and still get paid for your contribution.

Without sounding rude or anything, it appears to me that you need to venture into the seedy underbelly of Piracy from an insiders perspective. Everything you've said is said from the standpoint of someone who knows nothing of the piracy community. If you took the time to poke around, you'd notice quickly that a good percentage of habitual pirates would gladly pay for content that was in a consumer friendly format. The only reason people are "used to" free content is because right now the PAID model is fucking garbage. Actors and musicians still make millions, all the while crying about copyright infringement just so they can make more millions. Fuck making something people want, I want money.

You could sell it anyway, provided you don't tell them what it is until you get paid.But, look, if you're willing to blab it, I don't see why you should get paid at all. You shouldn't be able to control an idea like that, and our society is measurably worse off because of the mistaken notion that you can.

Yes, both extremes are bad. Perpetual copyright is bad, removal of copyright is bad. I advocate for a revision of copyright. But why would I want to do any work, when the end result is that some other company will take what I've invested time and money into, make it faster and cheaper, because they already have all the work I did, take credit for it, make a profit, and leave me poorer and weaker than had I never even started? Yeah, I may be able to go buy the game and play it and see the world I created brought to life, but that's a bit bittersweet, isn't it? provided you have the money and resources to do so But at least your idea will come to fruition...and isn't that your motivation? Perpetual copyright does. Why does it have to be one extreme or the other? Why can't we just reform copyright law, rather than deciding that we'd rather have no copyright law at all, making it nearly impossible for the low-funded, unknown artist to make a living off their effort?

Cool. Cuz as it stands, I do have a pretty cool idea for an MMORPG. Wanna send me some money to get it started?I can't say much, I don't want Activision to steal it, but trust me, it's pretty awesome.

That's my point, I don't want to blab it, but then what makes a prospective investor want to send me money?

No, sorry, don't fancy another MMO. However, make it a single player RPG and I might be tempted. What's the budget you're aiming for?