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Breaking through the copyright quagmire

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@shreyas99
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Copyright arrangements are kind of a legal monopoly for use of creative content. This is meant to incentivize artists with fair uses cases only allowed for non profit work. There has been an argument for these particularly with the creators, that its a protectionist measure to incentivize artists to keep making great content & that if these measures are removed would lead to even more exploitation in a field dominated by corporate distributors. Let's look at their origins.

Overview of copyright laws

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_One thing to be noted is that these laws came through lobbying of entertainment conglomerates notably Disney in the US to have copyrights last forever for it's characters like Mickey Mouse. Some of which are estimated to be worth hundreds of millions today. This shows how the laws are designed not with creators but rather the distributors in mind

_The laws are so overly broad that they actually stifle an individual’s creativity. Let's see how it's so. With the emergence of YouTube new forms of content like video essays, analysis and commentary based on remixes or based on other original works. And the terms of fair use are not very clear about the same thereby keeping this sector in limbo

_These laws are hard to enforce in the digital world. This is seen in the rampant nature of piracy. Even outright bans/ website takedowns mean little as emerging clones/ VPN amongst other methods render the regulations ineffective

_And lastly these laws are so complicated and unclear that they can be easily abused by companies with access to lawyers. It’s too complicated and expensive for individual artists/ creators to actually enforce the rights that the law gives them.

The above scenario heavily favours the massive entertainment conglomerate and with the backing of massive money leaving the creators/ production studios which are relatively small with few choices if any.Let's see how this affects us as customers with a particular focus on video streaming services

Using this massive advantage they vouch for exclusivity arrangements on their streaming services. The end result is a fragmented market with consumers having to end up paying for multiple streaming services. And with every new service coming up with splitting libraries every other day piracy has become the norm rather than the exception.

Disruption through tokenization

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So let's explore how decentralization can help us break through yet another monopoly practice. The best way to go about this would be tokenization of the creative work using a decentralized blockchain similar to how NFTs were made for artwork/ collectibles to establish ownership of the same.

Many parallels can be drawn with NFTs as in with passing of ownership would ensure that the artist/creators gets a cut of the deal everything that happens. This has the potential for creators making flexible arrangements/ smart contracts with distributors. This has the potential for equalising terms for both parties. This has potential for democratization of this sector and allowing for smaller players to emerge that work together with creators rather than trying to rip them off. Similar arrangements can be made for reworked/ remixed content appropriate rules can be established for usage and have the rewards shared with the original source just like with NFT transfers transactions benefiting the original artist

Further copyright is based in legal systems of the countries and often the large diversity and complexity of laws means that the efforts for expanding in newer regions is often not worth the benefits (Reason why streaming services have different catalogs across regions, or have categories blocked across certain regions) Tokenization can help us bypass this & make the creative content available all over the world and expand the market multi-fold for creators making their reach and support truly global. and lastly, implementing anti-piracy measures would be way easier. The blockchain system can be both used to check for content ownership and help in identification of the creator. Whilst this can't completely eradicate piracy at least it can serve as a better alternative to what we have for verification

In the next article we would be exploring how decentralization can help us build & grow a better alternative for the video distribution platform

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