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YouTube and Facebook Are Losing Creators to Blockchain-Powered Rivals

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Re: YouTube and Facebook Are Losing Creators to Blockchain-Powered Rivals

#241
post #211
post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It is a huge topic in the blockchain community to find a way to reward content creators and we see early attempts that may or may not succeed at this. What of the "information wants to be free" faction which is indifferent or hostile to the idea of content creators being rewarded? I expect there continue to be polarization where most creators of commercially viable content remain within establishment channels despi…

I don't think the faction is "hostile to the idea of content creators being rewarded" per se, but people are hostile to content middlemen being rewarded, and they're hostile to what I call "content prevention services": the real work of MPAA et al is not in distributing content, but in preventing content from being distributed.

They're fine with content creators selling t-shirts, but they are hostile to the idea of creators being compensated for the distribution of their creations, or having any control at all over the propagation of their work -- because that necessarily constrains the ability to copy "information" at will.

The big winners in a world without copyright are ISPs, who achieve instant vertical integration of both content and distribution -- facilitating end-user lockin to their portals.

Re: YouTube and Facebook Are Losing Creators to Blockchain-Powered Rivals

#242
post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'll be the guy this time: copyright violation is a different thing from stealing. I'm surprised after so long this meme is still going strong.

It's still going because that's the way people talk. You can actually "steal" an idea, even though it's not physically possible to remove the original from the person's mind. You can steal a kiss. You can steal second. Words mean what people use them to mean, and it's a perfectly acceptable use of the word "steal" to mean something like "adopted use of an artifact for the purpose of deriving a benefit rightfully belo…

> Words mean what people use them to mean

Semantics matter though when even courts start to become confused by the inexact use of terminology.

Here is a copyright infringement case that had to be taken to the US supreme court to reverse a guilty verdict for "interstate transportation of stolen property": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dowling_v._United_States

Re: YouTube and Facebook Are Losing Creators to Blockchain-Powered Rivals

#243
post #167
post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For Game of Thrones it's not such an issue, but I do feel bad if there's e.g. an old BBC film I want to watch, but there's no way to get it legally, sometimes at all. Other times it's £20 for a DVD. No way I'm paying three months of Netflix subscription (or a large fraction of a license fee) for that. The BBC has such an extensive and amazing back catalogue of content they wholly own. Why they don't chuck it on iPlay…

The BBC has such an extensive and amazing back catalogue of content they wholly own. Why they don't chuck it on iPlayer is beyond me The infuriating thing is, we’ve already paid for it. Anything BBC should be “free” to anyone who had paid their TV license in the last year it was broadcast. We own it already, it’s sheer extortion to make you pay full price for a DVD.

> The infuriating thing is, we’ve already paid for it.

No you didn't. For the example, the BBC typically only pays independent production companies (which is about 40% of their output) a fraction of what the content costs to make because the indie retains distribution rights afterwards and can make up the rest with sales. Same with scriptwriters, or actors.

Re: YouTube and Facebook Are Losing Creators to Blockchain-Powered Rivals

#244
post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And much of it predates people even thinking about this stuff. Thus, you have a TV series like Northern Exposure for which the music was a fairly integral part and you can't even buy DVDs with all the original music included. Even today, I was reading that one Black Mirror episode for which the closing song was just so on had licensed it for 15 years. Which is a long time but hardly forever.

Wierd to License something like that for only a few years. What happens in 15 years? They have to renegotiate a license or re-edit the show?

Yes.

Which is quite common (Scrubs for example has had to re-edit library music into most of it's episodes for most uses, instead of the original tracks).

Re: YouTube and Facebook Are Losing Creators to Blockchain-Powered Rivals

#245
post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You certainly don't need blockchains and distributed databases to reward creators, centralized solutions like Patreon work perfectly fine. If you want Netflix style monetization, that is not a technical problem but a social one, Netflix relies on the concept of copyright. Any community that does not respect copyright will switch to the free alternative, leaving voluntary donations as the only monetization option. May…

Patreon has on a multitude of occasions exercised its centralized right to block creators and payments across its platform. This is why centralization is bad. With centralization we're delegating the act and responsibility of filtering to third parties.

> With centralization we're delegating the act and responsibility of filtering to third parties.

Assuming that third parties have better information than the average person, that's not a bug, but rather a feature. The issue is that information asymmetry makes it difficult for average consumers to know which third parties actually do have better information and which ones are just gatekeepers collecting tolls.

In general, I'm inclined to believe that centralized third-parties are better at keeping out shysters and low quality content than a free-for-all. People always like to claim that 5-star scales driven by normal consumers are adequate filters, but the fact is that these are easily gamed by sockpuppets or the end-user's ignorance of what they're rating (i.e., you can go to one dentist with many 5-star ratings who was a good bedside manner, then go to a better dentist who has to undo all the fuck-ups that the first dentist made, and which you, as a non-specialist, were ignorant of). Crowdsourcing doesn't triumph over the groupthink, pluralistic ignorance, and other failings of collective intelligence.

Re: YouTube and Facebook Are Losing Creators to Blockchain-Powered Rivals

#246
post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And much of it predates people even thinking about this stuff. Thus, you have a TV series like Northern Exposure for which the music was a fairly integral part and you can't even buy DVDs with all the original music included. Even today, I was reading that one Black Mirror episode for which the closing song was just so on had licensed it for 15 years. Which is a long time but hardly forever.

Wierd to License something like that for only a few years. What happens in 15 years? They have to renegotiate a license or re-edit the show?

Licensing is generally complicated but it's often for some fixed period of time. I expect part of the problem is in the incentives. I get the credit if I can negotiate a lower licensing cost today. If the license expires in 10 years rather than 50, that's probably not my problem.

Re: YouTube and Facebook Are Losing Creators to Blockchain-Powered Rivals

#247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wierd to License something like that for only a few years. What happens in 15 years? They have to renegotiate a license or re-edit the show?

Yes. Which is quite common (Scrubs for example has had to re-edit library music into most of it's episodes for most uses, instead of the original tracks).

What a pain in the ass.

If you own the song, seems like you'd want to avoid leaving money on the table. I wonder how common relicensing is vs. editing.

Re: YouTube and Facebook Are Losing Creators to Blockchain-Powered Rivals

#248
post #191
post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is subscribing to HBO inconvenient? It's a combination of price and convenience. There's some upper limit to the monthly price you (and everyone else) is willing to pay for content.

"HBO GO. It's HBO. Anywhere." click "To access HBO GO℠, you must reside within the fifty states of the United States of America." Some time ago while traveling I actively tried to find a way to pay to watch Game of Thrones. I failed miserably. Also I really don't like having to have and manage subscription for various providers, nor do I like to be locked in with one. I would love to have a single subscription or eve…

Basically this - a lot of the time the options just aren't there for the rest of the world.

I think stuff like Netflix, Spotify, Steam, etc have proven that when content is priced right and delivered in a convenient manner folks are more than happy to pay.

News media is one of the worst for not figuring out how to adapt. I'd love to read some newspapers, watch a couple news networks, etc - but i'm not willing to plop down $100 a month and deal with a bunch of different apps to do this so I stick with online.

Re: YouTube and Facebook Are Losing Creators to Blockchain-Powered Rivals

#249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because that's what has happened at the extreme left (Stalin, Mao). If someone ignores the evils of fascism, would you not inform them?

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Re: YouTube and Facebook Are Losing Creators to Blockchain-Powered Rivals

#250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, the only thing they have going for them is that the initial factor they use for putting someone against the wall is economic and not race based. They still put innocent people against the wall. How is this not clear to you?

>How is this not clear to you? Because it's objectively a straw man and isn't based on anything except your ideological preconceptions? >the initial factor they use for putting someone against the wall is economic and not race based. * Huge citation needed

Citation? Lenin, Stalin, Mao, three generations of Kims, Guevara, Castro, Pol Pot, Ho Chi Min. All murdered massive amounts of their own people for not being communist.
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