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Disney to Acquire Twenty-First Century Fox

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Re: Disney to Acquire Twenty-First Century Fox

#81

Post by nickik »

bovermyer wrote: post #27
jjoonathan wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Market freedom leads to competition, doncha know?

Market freedom leads to consolidation which leads to the exact opposite of competition. This is why the United States, contrary to popular opinion, is not a purely capitalist nation; it is instead a hybrid between socialism and capitalism. Reasonable regulation protects the free market.

Its simply false that market freedom always leads to consolidation. There is a very complex interplay between transaction cost, information problems, scaling economics and so on. You are just throwing out populist phrases because they sound good.

The solution is not to declare some kind of neo-progressive trust busting but locking at individual industries and figuring out why they are consolidating and if it will be bad.

In this case Disney can only do what they do because massive help from government protecting their intellectual property. Intellectual property, both patent and copyright, need reform. This is the relevant practical problem here.

Re: Disney to Acquire Twenty-First Century Fox

#82

Post by emodendroket »

donatj wrote: post #80
emodendroket wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think a greater concentration than ever of movie studios is going to lead to creative flourishing, no.

I feel like it could lead to more independent studios popping up, but I’m an optimist.

I'd think the independent studios would be less able to gain a foothold in this scenario.

Re: Disney to Acquire Twenty-First Century Fox

#83

Post by andruby »

amelius wrote: post #41
ekianjo wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's visionary. Actually the Simpsons got lucky with several of their goofy predictions, it's always amusing after the fact.

Can we have a list of mispredictions?

* Trump as president, predicted in the 2000 episode "Bart To The Future" [0]

* Top 10 Simpsons Predictions That Came True [1] (not a great video though)

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iZyaDKaun7w

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NQGXofzQEiE

Re: Disney to Acquire Twenty-First Century Fox

#84

Post by snuxoll »

fragsworth wrote: post #73
Larrikin wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disney having more money and power to lobby against sane copyright laws is a negative for every citizen and really the world

I don't think it's bad that Disney protects things like Mickey Mouse and all of their old IPs. It's not just shareholders, there's a lot of people whose jobs depend on Disney being able to make money from these historic IPs. And I think it's fine that they keep it, it doesn't really hurt anyone. The problem is the easiest way to protect this is by having Congress extend the copyright law duration on all copyrighted w…

Letting only unused IP go to public domain is completely contrary to the stated goals of the constitution.

To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries.

Much of our creative works and culture are driven by building on top of what came before. The asinine length of copyright we have today means we have to wait entire generations before works are available to adapt and build upon, which is extremely hypocritical wrt Disney since most of their classic movies were based on public domain books.

Re: Disney to Acquire Twenty-First Century Fox

#85

Post by ocdtrekkie »

exelius wrote: post #49
jakozaur wrote: post #24

Sane antitrust regulations should kill this deal. It is bad for everybody other than shareholders of those two companies. In particular bad for customers, other companies and employees: https://www.economist.com/news/finance-and-economics/2172555... https://www.economist.com/news/briefing/21695385-profits-are...

Disney is only interested in the creative/film assets; broadcast distribution and news/sports are being spun off.

The "big five" studios decreasing to the "big four" is not a good thing either. I feel like people have decided that because they really want an Avengers/X-Men movie (I want one too), it's okay that one of the largest companies on the planet is buying out one of their largest competitors.

Re: Disney to Acquire Twenty-First Century Fox

#86

Post by henrik_w »

paulus_magnus2 wrote: post #60

Why not go all the way and merge all companies into 1 big one. Being born on the wrong side of the iron curtain I already saw economy based on monopolies. Communism failed because prices were centrally set. We knew how to build useful things (that don't break 1 day after warranty) but not which ones to build and how many. (wiki) A price signal is information conveyed to consumers and producers, via the price charged…

Relevant story from The Onion (almost 20 years ago): "Just Six Corporations Remain"

https://www.theonion.com/just-six-corporations-remain-181956...

Re: Disney to Acquire Twenty-First Century Fox

#87

Post by donatj »

emodendroket wrote: post #82
donatj wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like it could lead to more independent studios popping up, but I’m an optimist.

I'd think the independent studios would be less able to gain a foothold in this scenario.

I feel like the consolation leaves a hole in the market, particularly considering Disney’s conservative tastes in movies they allow to be made in their name.

Re: Disney to Acquire Twenty-First Century Fox

#88

Post by icebraining »

jjoonathan wrote: post #70
maxerickson wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disney makes an awful lot of money based on government restraint of competitors. Copyright.

Ok, so let's get rid of copyright. Now the embarrassing problem is that markets are terrible at incentivizing the creation of what-was-previously-known-as-IP.

markets are terrible at incentivizing the creation of what-was-previously-known-as-IP

Or so it is claimed. Recipes and clothes designs don't have copyright (in the US), yet we don't see to be lacking in them.

Re: Disney to Acquire Twenty-First Century Fox

#89

Post by Tyrek »

fragsworth wrote: post #73
Larrikin wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disney having more money and power to lobby against sane copyright laws is a negative for every citizen and really the world

I don't think it's bad that Disney protects things like Mickey Mouse and all of their old IPs. It's not just shareholders, there's a lot of people whose jobs depend on Disney being able to make money from these historic IPs. And I think it's fine that they keep it, it doesn't really hurt anyone. The problem is the easiest way to protect this is by having Congress extend the copyright law duration on all copyrighted w…

It's not just shareholders, there's a lot of people whose jobs depend on Bitcoin/Tesla/UBI/Cloud failing. And I think it's fine that they keep it, it doesn't really hurt anyone.

Re: Disney to Acquire Twenty-First Century Fox

#90

Post by emodendroket »

donatj wrote: post #87
emodendroket wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd think the independent studios would be less able to gain a foothold in this scenario.

I feel like the consolation leaves a hole in the market, particularly considering Disney’s conservative tastes in movies they allow to be made in their name.

But how do you get into theaters who don't want to upset, after all, the guys with the blockbusters?
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