Sunday, April 3, 2011

Copyright City

Imagine a city where everything is available for free and no one has to work. If you want to throw a party every day, just go get the stuff you need and make it happen. The catch? To live in the city, you sign over all your intellectual property rights to whatever entity runs the city. Your art, writing, music, or whatever is marketed to the rest of the world and that money pays for the needs of the city.


Would this work as a real city? No, probably not without careful selection of the inhabitants. But with only minor variations, this exact scenario plays out every day, in a wide swath of industries.


What does it take for living in Copyright City to be a good deal?