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0 pointsjohnnyanmac2y ago0 comments

I mean, your app is making use of either scraping or using an API that's not yours. You may own the app but there's not much of value you can copyright. I wouldn't feel entitled to royalties becsuse you're not getting royalties to begin with.

But for BOTD: tech workers tend to get paid well to deliver one specific project so the industry doesn't have as strong demand for royalties as art. Especially since tech isn't necessarily creating art itself but implementing other's creations. It's a bit different compared to an artist who makes a popular character and that character is being used decades later to sell plushies. Or a writer who's book is turned into a billion dollar franchise. The worst thing you can sell as an artist is your entire creative IP but that's unfortunately common in industries like animation or publishing.

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robertlagrant2y ago

> tech workers tend to get paid well to deliver one specific project so the industry doesn't have as strong demand for royalties as art

It's not exactly that; a builder doesn't get well paid, but still delivers one specific project. That builder won't get royalties from all the transactions that happen from building a shop building.

We've just decided that we'll special-case art so people can live off the proceeds for work done in decades past.

johnnyanmacOP2y ago

At the end of the day, yes. It's all arbitrary and art's monetization came from diferent historical contexts. There could be a timeline where artists are highly respected and well compensated positions while tech is just some nerdy hobby being used for exposure.

But I feel it's more interesting to understand why and how we came to those contexts. e.g. for tech, the big money came from the explosion of tech in the U.S. during the 90's and the vast amounts of money being invested into up and coming companies to take advantage of it. Getting to a point where the biggest companies would give the biggest money to the biggest talent simply to keep them away from competition, or from becoming future competitors themselves. Companies paid for labor and time, so compensation worked accordingly.

I don't have an intimate history in art but I imagine a part of its monetization history comes from the fact that the primary delivery doesn't make that much money on its own; i.e. you don't become rich broadcasting Mickey Mouse on public cable to millions. You get rich selling Mickey Mouse merch and making deals to slap Mickey Mouse on whatever wants the advertising boost. So how do you determine how much to pay the creator in that case, which may make $100 or 1 billion? some sort of rev/profit sharing system makes sense. If it fails they get a pittance and if it becomes huge success the creator retires for life while the IP holder still gets the bulk of the money.

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