Why not? There is more merit to exclusive ownership of digital property than physical property. My entitlement to my yard is pretty comical—that land was there a billion years before I was born and will be there a billion years after I’m dead. But Captain Marvel? That’s a thing that only exists in the universe due to the labor of certain humans. Why shouldn’t they own it?
"A person can enforce ownership of their physical property by themselves"
Except in reality, you don't. The state very strongly enforces your property rights that's a good chunk of why the police exist, and most people do not own guns.
The OP argument is not unreasonable.
To wit: in Canada, there is actually no enshrined right to own property. The far left party opted to keep it out of the new constitution written in the 1980's so Trudeau Sr. was forced to keep it out if we were to have a new constitution at all. So it's an intellectual concept.
I'm not sure if I completely agree with "Except in reality, you don't."
In some sense I enforce ownership of my house just by living here. Someone is here most of the time. The lights are on. There is activity. That keeps others out.
If I just abandoned the place, eventually someone might poke their head in and see if there was anything to take. Sure, that would be illegal, but the cops aren't going to post a guard for me under most circumstances.
You actually see this happen in downtrodden neighborhoods where whole blocks get abandoned. In theory that property is still owned by someone, but without anyone actually there, eventually houses get stripped of valuable goods and in some cases squatters move in.
Another good example is house sitters. When traveling for extended periods of time, people will let trusted 3rd parties stay in their house for free. Why? Enforcement of property ownership.
Again, I don't think that's really true historically. Even in pre-state societies or in present day societies with failed or weak states people still have homes that they live in consistently from day to day.
Sure, sometimes the dudes with guns show up and force them out, but that isn't a constant occurrence.
Yeah but well before your presence is a relevant factor in preventing squatters, everyone in the whole equation has long been socialized to understand that you can't take other people's stuff without dire physical consequences. That is 100% the power of the state and 0% you.
dude, how hard is this to understand? if a group of dudes with guns were to rock up to your house and say 'get out, this is our house now', you would not be able to do shit unless you somehow go john wick on them. the monopoly of violence and enforcement of rules within a territory (a state) is the foundation necessary for property rights.
just because we don't walk on all fours and smell urine for information doesn't mean that we would not revert back to aggression and dominance if you remove all manmade recourses for settling disputes and enforcing property rights. why on earth would you think people would respect ownership of goods when you can just take what you want through intimidation? all ordered systems are at the mercy of entropy and it takes effort (i.e. the state) to maintain such order. it only takes one person to step out of line in times of anarchy for others to realise that it makes no sense to cooperate and follow rules when there is no one to enforce them, sending the whole system back into chaos.
"Rent seeking" is by definition trying to extract payments ("rent") from value you didn't create. Charging for access to value that results solely from your act of creation (like "Captain Marvel") is literally the opposite of rent seeking.
Aren't you a lawyer? Copyright is a textbook example of rent seeking. After the first copy is sold, restricting re-copying is rent seeking: extracting money without adding more value.
Show me a textbook that uses that example, because it would be a shitty textbook. You’re not creating additional value after the first sale, but you’re also not recovering the full market value of the creation from the first sale. Imagine painting the Sistene Chapel and charging $10 a pop to see it. Is that rent seeking?
Temporary, yes, and it should also have certain exceptions.
Exceptions should include things like reverse engineering for making compatible accessories or compatible competitive products. They should include fair use for critique and criticism. They should include the right to resell your property and to repair or customize your own copy of a property. There are probably valid and important exceptions I'm not listing.
During that limited term and subject to those exceptions though copyright should be solidly enforced. Otherwise the people creating things will just be ripped off wholesale by people who do nothing but rip them off and relabel things.
Now, I think the copyright term is far too long. It is especially too long for abandoned works. I'd like to see something akin to trademark rules applied to copyright, in which if you're not offering a work or a work directly derived from it for X years the term ends early. The maximum term should be a bit shorter than it is for the specific work, too, but I think suing people for copying or modifying something you are no longer willing to sell them is asinine.
