https://doctorow.medium.com/monopolys-event-horizon-23c051ab604b
"When a superdense, concentrated mass forms a black hole, the laws of physics
around it change, giving rise to an eldritch zone where the normal rules don’t
apply. When corporations form a concentrated industry, the laws of economics
likewise change.
Take copyright: when I was a baby writer, there were dozens of comparably sized
New York publishers. The writers who mentored me could shop their rights around
to lots of houses, which enabled them to subdivide those rights.
For example, they could separately sell paperback and hardcover rights, getting
paid twice for the same book. Under those circumstances, giving authors broader
copyrights and easier enforcement systems could directly translate into more
groceries on those authors’ tables and more gas in their cars’ tanks.
But today, publishing has dwindled to five giant houses (possibly four soon,
depending on whether Penguin Random House successfully appeals its blocked
merger with Simon and Schuster). Under these conditions, giving exploited
authors more copyright is like giving bullied schoolkids more lunch-money.
Whatever copyright authors get will be non-negotiably extracted from them via
the near-identical, unviolable core contracting terms from the Big Five
publisher. Today, the bullies don’t just take your paperback rights, they also
acquire your audio and ebook rights.
Most of them now want your
worldwide English rights, so you can’t resell the
book in the Commonwealth, and some have started demanding graphic novel, film
and TV rights.
In our new book, Rebecca Giblin and I call this “chokepoint capitalism”. In
today’s highly concentrated creative labor markets, copyright’s normal role of
giving creators bargaining leverage over their supply chain is transformed.
https://chokepointcapitalism.com
Instead of being a tool for creators, copyright is inevitably transferred to
part of the supply chain — a publisher, label, streamer, ebook retailers, etc —
where it becomes a tool to beat up on the rest of the supply chain, especially
creators."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
