The ethics of copying and it's legalities occupy a significant amount of our discourse.

Where does monkey see, monkey do cross over into actionable infringement?

Let's say you write up an item and give it to a publisher. Then someone askes to take your practice videos and notes and publish those elsewhere. Then the first publisher cries foul. Is there an implicit non-compete in signing over copyright to a work?

With the advent of the internet and subsequent duplicating technology, copyright infringement had become rampant. But regardless of the ethical, moral, and legal principles being violated, unless you are independently wealthy, there's almost nothing you can do about it. As my music attorney once told me, "It all depends on how much justice you can afford."

Different disciplines have different community standards. Your specific example does not have a one size fits all answer.

No ideas? So it's just up to those who can afford to litigate?

Does the farmer sell the topsoil and mineral rights to the land with his produce?

I don’t know the law but it seems to me, there ought to be royalties to paid on magic, like there is on songs.

To the OP: consult your agreement. Failing that, standard practice I know of in the magic business is the publisher only has claim to his documentation of the performance.

You go on CBS. They own the copyright to that show; not your act.

When it comes to teaching, the same applies though it is exceptionally poor form to sell your services to a second publisher in the same market very soon after the first.

Royalties would be an honorable tradition, but I doubt a governing body could be formed. We are just such a small community and the big $ players are the ones who benefit the most off ignoring history.

Be careful what you sell to the first publisher. In most magazine and newspaper markets, you sell "First (North American or European, etc.) Serial Rights Only". What that means is that the object that you offer the magazine or newspaper has not been published in any other serial publication, and you won't offer it to someone if they buy it.

You can sell second serial rights etc. after that.

As Tom notes, if you try to offer first rights to more than one place at once, your name will quickly become mud in the industry.

It would depend on the contract but it seems to me, the contact ought to say, that if CBS repeat the show, then the artist performing it gets royalties. Flat rate, or a piece of the action?

Tommy, that's not necessarily true. Sometimes you can negotiate for royalties, but often it makes more sense to do a buy-out.

For example, CBS recently used two of our songs for a novelty act appearing on Stephen Colbert's Late Show. That same episode was repeated about two weeks later, which meant our songs were aired on TV again.

However, the licensing agreement we negotiated with CBS for this segment is good for a year. So, no royalties for the "repeat performance." Nevertheless, we make a nice chunk of change for this kind of buy-out. And CBS has the option to air the segment again after one year, in which case we'll get paid again.

Thanks.

I just went to read an old poem at a site and there was a warning there roughly saying: Copyright laws are constantly changing all over the world and so it is best to see what the law is now in your neck of the woods before downloading.

Jon, I offered what I think is the most important and ultimately most useful idea: community standards.
The magic community, the poetry community, and the software community will have, inevitably, different standards.
Legal recourse is generally for those who can afford it, i.e. not you or me, and do not necessarily guarantee justice.

Does this example make sense?

Let's say you write up an item and give it to a publisher. Later someone asks to take your practice videos and notes and publish those elsewhere in some other context. Then the first publisher cries foul and claims the second publisher and you have no right to use those materials in a new work for any purpose.

Is there an implicit non-compete in signing over copyright to a work?

Again, it depends on the community.

If we're talking about magic, where we trade in secrets, the community will (theoretically) not allow practice videos to be published with publisher B, as they contain the same secret as the original publication with publisher A, albeit in a different form.

But let's say we're talking about a short story that publisher A brings to market. Then publisher B publishes the first draft of the story--a draft so different that the story is near unrecognizable. Let's say for example that Harper Lee's recently found manuscript was published by some house other than the publisher of To Kill a Mockingbird, by the order of Ms. Lee. I suspect that the community would react differently than in the above magic example.

But you're familiar with the Doctorow and Nina Paley arguments against copyright--what do you think about them?

The history of recent magic publishing is ripe with uncontested examples of an artist offering his work for republication. In Jonathan's hypothetical, the first publisher has no basis for complaint unless his contract exceeded the details of this community's current publishing standard.

I know Richard Kaufman has stated that the rights of some books that he has published many years ago will revert back to the authors; that may just be a standard contractual clause. But I think Jon's example is significantly different, assuming he means simultaneous publishing.

Let's say the first item to be submitted and published is a is a video of demonstrating a trick/explaination (or science paper - or poem - some fixed form we agree has copyright) the other item to get published is a collage of notebook pages and a video clip of a tour of the workshop. This is a way to explore the other issue about the science paper publisher where the basic research, raw data and experiment demonstration are or are not seperate items from the terse formal journal article.

No, I don't think conclusions hold from one sphere to another. What is true of magic is not necessarily true of science. I think you're barking up the wrong tree. Each discipline has issues related to it that are unique to that discipline, e.g. the "secrets" issue in magic, and the "public good" issue for science.

I think if you want to discuss the science paper issue, other analogies are only going to muddy the waters.

Okay let's say it's a science paper. Written to the standard of the journal. Then someone else wants to kook at the raw data and film the procedure and interview the researcher, making a documentry film. That's about to get released... When the journal files an injunction and seems damages.

What do you think?

Cory Doctorow is not against copyright. Nina Paley has argued for non-fee creative commons licences.

Remember its not real for anyone else without link to tje source document.

Nina Paley's blog from 9/1/2010 , I'd link but on limited browser.

Blog.ninapaley.com/2010/09/01/paley-vs-Doctorow

Credibility begins with citations.

In that case, I think the journal is overreaching. They don't own the ideas.