• cbarrick@lemmy.world
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    4 months ago

    Let’s say you write a novel. It’s really really good. But no one reads it because no one ever hears about it.

    Later, I stumble upon your novel and recognize how great it is. Then I republish it verbatim, except with my name as the author. I am much better at business and marketing than you, so it goes viral. I receive millions in sales, am tapped to produce a movie version, and win a Pulitzer for it.

    Is that fair? Or should you have some rights in all of this since it was your copy?

    • Hugucinogens@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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      4 months ago
      1. The current system doesn’t protect small writers either. Look at the amount of money plagiarism gets you, with copyright law in effect.

      And

      1. at the stage where you’re big enough for copyright to effectively protect you, provable publication dates take care of that problem through reputation. If you become known(read: found out) as a plagiarist, you get the boot from the public zeitgeist, never to receive public money again.

      Copyright only protects the Mouse’s bottom line, and strangleholds creativity.

    • yetAnotherUser@discuss.tchncs.de
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      4 months ago

      That’s plagiarism.

      You can have plagiarism law distinct from copyright.

      That way, the original author will always be mentioned as a source in the derivative works and it is highly unlikely they will receive no attention should your derivative work become popular.

      • cbarrick@lemmy.world
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        4 months ago

        In this example I would have committed both crimes.

        It’s copyright infringement for me to republish and profit from your work without your consent (while that work is not in the public domain).

        It’s plagiarism for me to pass that work off as my own.

        So it was a bad example.

    • tate@lemmy.sdf.org
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      4 months ago

      Copyright has nothing to do with plagiarism. It is literally about the mechanical work of producing copies, which used to be expensive.