Abstract

This article discusses the implications of the intellectual property system as applied to software, especially the use of patents, for innovation in developing countries; it also assesses the possible consequences of the appearance of free software and a new intellectual property system in the innovation process in countries such as Brazil; finally, it attempts to analyse the new dimension of intellectual property as well as its context in the current debate on 'global patents' as opposed to a more flexible copyright system. Some of the questions discussed are: Is a more flexible copyright system an instrument to promote technological innovation? Does the reduction of the income of some software companies in developed countries point toward an exhaustion of the sales model of user licenses for software? What are the threats and opportunities for the new business model based on free software and copy left in Brazil? Can the motivations for the use and development of free software promote the Brazilian software industry?

Abstract

Globally, the recording industry has experienced significant revenue decline and piracy growth within the last five years. In some countries like the United States, piracy is comprised mainly of the illegal sharing of digital recorded music files such as MP3s. In other countries like Spain, recorded music piracy is dominated by the physical production and sale of CD-Rs by organized crime networks. While there have been a number of legislative and law-enforcement changes made in many countries across the globe, these defensive efforts have at best served to slow piracy's growth. The next step for the recording industry is to develop a recorded digital music strategy for each country in an effort to restore revenue growth and reduce piracy by offering consumers a compelling digital music value proposition. In this paper, I explain why.

Abstract

The paper investigates empirically the behavior of copiers over P2P networks based on an ordered Logit model of intensity using a dataset collected from more than 2,500 French households. In accordance with the prediction of the Beckerian framework, copying behavior is negatively correlated with the willingness to pay for an original when a copy is available. But individuals also make their decisions according to their social neighborhood and to the degree to which they have learned about copying. Furthermore, we find that copiers are motivated by the search for diversified contents, and they are also very concerned about the interests of artists. We then consider the efficiency of anti-copying policies on the copying of music and movies.

Abstract

DRMS are often described as essential in the development of the legal online supply of content, notably of music (In this paper, we do not study the cases of sites that sell pre-recorded music, such as Amazon). That is why they are becoming a crucial stake for the whole recovering music industry. In the first section, we will precise the strategic role of DRMS. The market for DRMS in the online music supply is a very recent one, but it is expected to grow rather fast. Moreover, DRMS are becoming the heart of the online music value chain. The aim of this paper is to study the technological competition between the firms that try to impose their standard on the growing market of DRMS. Because this competition relies on the lack of interoperability and on a possible monopolization, we find that the results of this competition may not benefit the content industries.

Abstract

Several empirical studies exist that measure the impact of filesharing services on music sales, and most suggest that there was a negative impact on sales. Still, most of these studies do not examine (at the household level) whether consumers substituted out of music and into movies. This paper uses micro-level data from the Consumer Expenditure Survey (1998 through 2003) to test for this possible substitution effect. The data do not support the hypothesis that music consumers spent less on music because they spent more on either movie tickets or prerecorded movies (purchases or rentals).

Abstract

The Society for Economic Research on Copyright Issues held its 2005 Congress in Montrýal, Canada. Some of the papers presented at that congress are contained in this issue of RERCI. This introduction also includes a report on the round table session which was held on the pricing of copyright. For the sake of this introduction, the presentations could be informally regrouped under three headings: the proper compensation principles for copyrights; the phenomenon of copying and sharing, including the piracy activity; the development of the open/free source software movement.

Abstract

The idea of alternative compensation methods for recording artists has gained increasing popularity as Internet copying has started to seriously threaten record sales. We start this article by looking at the general theory on alternatives to copyright royalties and show that recording artist income is in practise not dependent on record sales. Then we move forward and map the features of the current alternative proposals and construct yet another iteration of a levy-based compensation method. As an example, we analyze what our model would imply for Finland. In the end we reflect on the idea of a levy-based compensation method to the current predictions of technical advances in communication networks and note that the traditional copyright royalty model is seriously threatened by tremendous personal copying covering practically all the music ever created. We conclude this article by discussing what this will mean for the alternative compensation proposals and the music industry in general.

Abstract

The fundamental conflict in the goals of intellectual property (IP) policy is the apparent incompatibility of protection of the creator and ease of dissemination. Copyrights and patents seem to favor the first goal and conflict with the second, but patents have actually helped to resolve the conflict by transforming the IP into a tradable commodity. As a result, many patent proprietors actively promote use of their IP by others, even direct competitors. Patent licensing is a major revenue source for many firms. Patent pools institutionalize remunerative sharing of IP. Even from their medieval beginnings, patents were used to encourage dissemination and they continue to serve that purpose directly via disclosure requirements. So, perhaps with some redesign and innovative usage, copyrights can help to reconcile the two apparently conflicting goals - provision of incentives for both creative activity and widespread use of its products.

Abstract

This study sheds light on the relatively recently emerged new business models employing open source activities in the software industry. We analyze data from 73 Finnish OSS companies' product type (i.e. proprietary vs. OSS product) and license type (i.e. the copyleft vs. non-copyleft licenses)choices. Our data indicate that firm ownership structure has a major influence on software firms' business strategies. Family owned firms tend to rely on the traditional proprietary software in their product selection, whereas diffusely held companies are more likely to supply OSS products. We also find that more service oriented firms are likely to offer more complementary products and further supply their products more often under the OS licenses. Moreover, the market trends concerning a firm's software products affect the license type decisions of the software firms. Consistent with the international data on the dominance of the Apache server that is released under the non-copyleft license, we find that servers are more likely to be licensed under the non-copyleft license. Our estimation results further suggest that a more restrictive form of open source licenses, the copyleft license, is used more often in those companies that have participated in open source software development projects. This finding is consistent with earlier studies that have found that more than 70% of the OSS development projects employ the GPL copyleft license.

Abstract

Joseph Schumpeter is the father of evolutionary economics and the origin of notion that technical change is the key to capitalism as an engine of economic growth. His most famous book is Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy (1942) which develops the thesis that capitalism is always an evolutionary process of creative destruction. When this book was published fifty years ago, there was little solid scholarship on technical advance. Now there is a great deal, so much so that it would take a book to do justice to it. Nevertheless, Schumpeter's book correctly captures many of the stylised facts about technical progress revealed in recent research but, oddly enough, he never discussed, or even mentioned, intellectual property rights and this despite the fact that patent legislation was a prominent subject of debate in nineteenth century economics. This is a puzzle I hope to resolve in this paper.

Abstract

Although it was once considered inevitable that unauthorized copying would harm copyright owners, it is now understood that this is not necessarily the case. The concept of indirect appropriability played an important role in shaping this newer understanding. In recent years, however, many economists seem to have taken the message from this new understanding too far, seeing gains to the copyright owners from unauthorized copying in every nook and cranny of the economy, when in reality the instances of such gains are likely to be rather limited. The current literature on this subject, which consists mainly of theoretical models, seems to be badly out of kilter. In this paper I attempt to explain some of the problems and try to provide the outlines of what I believe to be a more balanced and nuanced view of copying. It emphasizes the importance of examining various institutional and behavioral details of individual markets, which are often overlooked by researchers.

Abstract

In the modern theory of innovation, monopoly plays a crucial role both as a cause and an effect of creative economic activity. Innovative firms, it is argued, would have insufficient incentive to innovate should the prospect of monopoly power not be present. This theme of monopoly runs throughout the theory of growth, international trade, and industrial organization. We argue that monopoly is neither needed for, nor a necessary consequence of innovation. In particular, intellectual property is not necessary for, and may hurt more than help, innovation and growth. We show that, in most circumstances, competitive rents allow creative individuals to appropriate a large enough share of the social surplus generated by their innovations to compensate for their opportunity cost. We also show that, as the number of pre-existing and IP protected ideas needed for an innovation increases, the equilibrium outcome under the IP regime is one of decreasing probability of innovation, while this is not the case without IP. Finally, we provide various examples of how competitive markets for innovative products would work in the absence of IP and critically discuss a number of common fallacies in the previous literature.

Abstract

Technological changes over the past two decades have made it easier to distribute and to copy intellectual property. Creators and owners of intellectual property have responded to these changes with a variety of creative pricing strategies. The paper reviews some of these pricing innovations. Two broad categories of innovations are explored: those that facilitate price discrimination and those that exploit complementarities between different types of creative works.

Abstract

An extensive literature has developed that argues that in many settings the social welfare costs of copying or piracy are limited because of the presence of indirect appropriability. Indirect appropriability is the idea that original good producers can appropriate some of the value derived by the consumers of copies because of the return that buyers of original units receive from allowing copies to be made. In this paper we discuss the limitations of indirect appropriability, where the two we focus on are the "flooding" of the copy market and substitutability between new units and copies. We also discuss the ramifications of our analysis for real world markets.

Abstract

20 years ago, Stan Liebowitz's famous paper on indirect appropriability was published in the Journal of Political Economy. At the time, it would surely have been impossible to predict the impact that the paper, together with two or three others published in the same journal at around the same time, would have on the fledgling area of economics that was being re-born under the label of "the economics of copyright."