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gozo | 10 years ago
"How exactly is a software developer/musician/artist supposed to be compensated for their time/labor without copyright and the ability to determine the terms of the sale?"
There are plenty of creative people who sell their time, just like chefs. Of course plenty of companies today don't even sell software, but essentially services.
"There is significant up-front time and expense involved with any type of creative work"
Yes, but this is to some extent a different issue than copyright itself. I'm not even arguing for the removal of copyright (I'm personally for stronger authors rights with drastic reduction in terms), just that copyright is mainly rights to artistic, rather than utilitarian or scientific, things i.e. doesn't have a whole lot to do with labor.
This should be even more apparent today with cloud distribution, where software can't be resold.
TimJYoung|10 years ago
I also do not really care for the super-long copyright terms, and my posts here should not be confused as a defense of the likes of Disney, etc. Most software is obsolete within a year. The unauthorized copying of newly-released software is my primary issue, having been directly affected by it for so long.