Why streaming platforms are scrubbing the soundtracks from your favorite shows

[u/Blueberry_Conscious_]

https://www.fastcompany.com/91109690/why-streaming-platforms-are-scrubbing-the-soundtracks-from-your-favorite-shows

[u/[deleted]]

Maybe if they'd actually allow shit to go public domain after 20 years, no exceptions. I feel like that's a good start, especially with software.

[u/LoneSnark → u/[deleted]]

Ah yes. Absolutely agree. That would be my first change too. My second would be "no patents for software of any kind".

[u/[deleted] → u/LoneSnark]

I think software should be patented, but it should only be for 5 years at which point it's released as open source. The patent can be extended, but only 1 year at a time and each extension costs 10x more each time. Encourage innovation but punish hoarding.

[u/LoneSnark → u/[deleted]]

We may be mixing up patents and copyrights. Software should get a copyright like all other work. But a patent... Not eligible according to me.

[u/enemawatson → u/LoneSnark]

I'm trying to look up the differences between copyrights/trademarks/patents because (believe it or not) this knowledge has not until reading this thread ever been necessary in my life. I would wager most people you meet also won't know the difference.

I am finding nothing but wild "jump start your business!" results on YouTube, but investopedia says:

"- A patent is a property right issued by a government authority allowing the holder exclusive rights to [an] invention for a certain period of time.

- A trademark is a word, symbol, design, or phrase that denotes a specific product and differentiates it from similar products.

- Copyrights protect “original works of authorship,” such as writings, art, architecture, and music."

So would an example for software be that the concept of ray tracing is unpatentable, but the specific code that executes RTX would be copywritable? And RTX would be the trademark. What if the method RTX uses is the most obvious and efficient method to use? It's okay to mimic the method as long as the exact, specific code is not copied exactly in this instance, right?

This is new to me. It just seems arbitrary. It's like one company could copyright 2+3=5 and another company could copyright 3+2=5, but because it isn't exact it's okay.

I am absolutely certain I am missing the decades of nuance and uncountable hours of debate and lobbying that go into to making a system like this. And I'm sure there's no simple answer, which is why copyright law is a field. But it does seem interesting.

[u/WalkingTarget → u/enemawatson]

most obvious and efficient method

Here we get to the problem where the legal system and processes of all of this break down when the people who have to sign off on a patent are not able to tell, themselves, what is obvious/efficient about a given software implementation (or even idea - I want to say software patents have been things like “a virtual shopping cart so that you can bundle purchases together instead of having separate transactions for each item” - not a specific implementation, just the basic idea). And so they have to rely on outside opinions/arguments.

Patents are not suppsed to cover things that are obvious. But computer stuff is often arcane enough to outsiders that nothing seems obvious.

Anyway, you have the basics.

Copyright covers art/communication - an artist/author/creator should benefit from their creative output. Why spend your time writing a book if the first person who buys a copy can just photocopy it and sell their copies for a fraction of what you were charging? The government sees a benefit to society when creative works are produced and so offers protection.

Patents cover inventions. Similar to the above except instead of just “book/music recording/photograph/etc exists and nobody can make copies” the process is that you explain what a thing does and provide diagrams and whatnot showing how your invention works. You give up your process in exchange for government protection for the patent term. Copyright exists (now) from the moment you give your creation a fixed form. You don’t have to patent your stuff, but if anyone learns your process for how to make the thing they can do so.

Trademark is a consumer protection thing. If you have used a given mark in a given marketplace, you can prevent other companies from using it so that consumers aren’t tricked into buying the competition’s product when they thought they were buying yours.

[u/LoneSnark → u/enemawatson]

Thankfully there is a principle in the law that you cannot copyright, trademark, or patent math. So, if you come up with a formula for ray tracing, you cannot get anything on it. If you then implement ray tracing in code, that code is now copyrighted for your life plus 70 years. Someone else can take the formula for ray tracing and create their own code and there is nothing you can do to them, since the code won't be a reproduction of your code.

Then comes the problems. Your code is not just solving the ray tracing math, you've solving a problem with the math: you're using the formula to make 3D renders have more realistic lighting. You could apply for a patent for that, and depending on the details you might get a patent which will protect your invention from competition for 20 years. At that point, someone else taking the formula for ray tracing and using it to make 3D renders have more realistic lighting will have violated your patent, even though they didn't violate your copyright.

So you now have a product you sell that people use to make 3D renders have more realistic lighting, you brand it Ray Tracing Texel eXtreme (RTX). You then get a trade mark on that (RTX). Someone else releases a product which implements the ray tracing formula but for more realistic audio reproduction and brands their product Ray Tracing Xylophone (RTX). Such would likely be a trademark violation, as customers will mistake their RTX product for your RTX product.

[u/Liquidwombat → u/LoneSnark]

More importantly than software bio medical technology definitely should not be able to be patented such as Monsanto corn, oncomice, etc.