more on : Milton Mueller replies to economists on extending copyrights

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

-----Original Message-----
From: Anonymous <cripto () ecn org>
Date: Tue, 24 Feb 2004 20:58:44 
To:dave () farber net
Subject: Re: Milton Mueller replies to economists on extending copyrights

Let's look at the logical structure of this argument. First, keep
in mind that the debate is not about the retroactive aspect of the
copyright extension, but about whether an extension of an already-long
copyright term to one that lasts even farther into the future will make
a difference in today's creative efforts.

Mueller (M) is rebutting a claim by Liebowitz and Margolis (L&M), who
are themselves rebutting what they call a "common claim" (CC):

CC: Copyright extension so far out in the future can have little effect
on creativity.

L&M: Books are mostly not commercially successful, but those few that
are will still generate profits far out in the future. Hence far-future
copyright extensions materially increase the profitability of those
books which are successful, therefore increasing expected profitability
of book-writing and stimulating creativity.

M: No one knows which 2% of books were going to be profitable. Therefore
all the books would have been created regardless of whether the
protection term was extended or not. (???)

Mueller says, "Put more simply, longer copyright protection does not
increase the chances that one will produce valuable work, nor does
it increase the amount of work that will prove to be valuable for a
long time." Granted, but expected profitability is the product of the
probability the book will be valuable, times the financial profitability
of valuable books. Mueller here is only describing the first term in
the equation, the chance of profitability. L&M described increases in
the second term, financial profitability given that the book is a success.

The motivations for creativity must come from the product of both terms.
By ignoring the second term, Mueller is failing to even address L&M's
point. On this basis I conclude that his rebuttal is unsuccessful.

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