Scan barcode
Reviews
The Knockoff Economy: How Imitation Sparks Innovation by Kal Raustiala, Christopher Sprigman
adamrshields's review against another edition
4.0
Short Review: The Knockoff Economy: How Imitation Sparks Innovation-This is an interesting look at parts of the economy where copyright and patent law do not apply, yet creativity is thriving. Why it works in those areas and why it may (or may not) work in other areas where copyright and patent law do apply. Quite readable. The primary illustrations are in the areas of food, fashion, football, comedy, magic & open-source software. The book ends with an epilogue that looks at music and movies and where they have made mistakes with copyright and where they might learn from the other non-copyright areas of the economy.
Click through for longer review http://bookwi.se/knockoff-economy/
Click through for longer review http://bookwi.se/knockoff-economy/
erikars's review against another edition
4.0
As copying becomes easier, fast and cheap copies are going to appear in more domains. Although copyright is important, the assumptions that it was built upon are becoming outdated. In this book, the authors looked at several industries that are thriving despite little to no copyright protections. The goal of the authors is to not argue that copyright should be removed, but rather to provide data points that might be useful in reconsidering copyright laws in the modern era.
In industries such as fashion, comedy, food, sports, and finance, copying is common. Although these industries may have some intellectual property protection, in practice, copying is easy and widespread. Yet all of these industries show significant innovation and output. Why? And can those lessons be applied in other domains, such as music, that have traditionally relied on traditional copyright laws.
Each of these industries is different. There is no set of key principles that "fix" copyright. However, the diversity contains a lesson in its own right. Innovation is different in different industries. The lifetime of a new creation, the expense of creation, and how it is consumed all contribute to how innovation works in that field. One-size-fits-all copyright law is unlikely to make sense in the future.
Diversity isn't the only lesson. The authors identify six themes that, while not universal, are intriguing. Note that for this discussion, copying may include point-for-point copies but also includes derivative copies.
Industries that are driven by trends and fads, such as food and fashion, are highly innovative even without intellectual property protection. Innovation does not just happen despite copying; you can argue that innovation happens because of copying. The life cycle of a trend requires copying because if something is never copied, it will never become trendy. Point-for-point copies serve to make something more popular, as do derivative copies. Derivative copies have the further benefit of pushing a trend (or a technical innovation) to its limit. Once that limit has been hit, the next innovation appears and the cycle starts again.
Social norms can provide incentive against copying within a creative community when it is close knit enough. The authors give the examples of comedians who have strong social norms around copying. These norms go beyond what is protected by copyright law to the point of protecting a particular idea. Although they have their limits, norms can provide protections with a subtlety that law is unlikely to ever match.
Another way innovation thrives despite copying is when innovators turn what they are selling from a product into a performance. The food served at a nice restaurant isn't just about a particular dish. It's also about the experience of eating at that restaurant: the atmosphere, the quality, even the price you pay all add to your perception of the quality of the experience. Performances are much harder to copy (and copies of the product can even drive demand for the authentic version and everything it entails).
Open-source methods, eponymously used in software but also practiced to some degree in areas such as cooking and football where practitioners commonly train each other, can turn copyright on its head by explicitly allowing copying to promote further innovation.
The harm of copying can also be balanced by a first-mover advantage. For example, in football, plays are not covered by copyright, but the first team to develop and effectively play with a new technique will have a significant advantage, and once that technique stops being effective, then it will be time for something new.
Finally, copying can be advantageous because copies can serve as advertisements for brands. This happens most often when the original version of a copied item is still seen as somehow superior, whether because of a true quality difference or just a difference in perception. Although some people will by the inferior copies instead of the original, other people will buy the original because the copies increase awareness of the original.
The book had a lot of other good points -- my list of notes is quite long, but I want to highlight just a few more.
One limitation of our current copyright laws is that they disproportionately give advantage to what Raustiala and Sprigman call Pioneers and ignore what they call Tweakers. Pioneers are the people who come up with some brilliant new idea. Tweakers are the people who take existing ideas and change them, ultimately making those ideas better and pushing them to the limit. In any field Tweakers play a huge role in making progress. Innovations generally come when the previous innovation has been tweaked to the limit (there is even some argument as to whether or not Pioneers really exist, or if they are really just the people who make a tweak that happens to be game changing; either way, Tweakers add value in their own right).
Another key observation the authors emphasize is that the true purpose of copyright law is to foster innovation. Preventing copying is just one approach for doing that, but since copying can itself be innovative, preventing copying has costs as well as benefits, and those costs and benefits must be balanced.
One facet of this that they discuss at length is that while preventing copying increases the expected return on a creation, reducing the cost of innovation also increases the expected return. Thus, as technology has reduced the barriers to entry in a diversity of fields, they have exploded with innovation, even when there isn't copyright protection. One example of this that the authors give is fonts. Creating fonts use to be something that required many highly specialized skills. Now, fonts can be created with easily obtainable software, and the number of fonts has exploded as a result. Music is another area where there the traditional centralized model is suffering, but the relative ease of creating and distributing high quality music has led to a huge amount of musical creativity.
This is an important book for anyone interested in copyright and innovation.
In industries such as fashion, comedy, food, sports, and finance, copying is common. Although these industries may have some intellectual property protection, in practice, copying is easy and widespread. Yet all of these industries show significant innovation and output. Why? And can those lessons be applied in other domains, such as music, that have traditionally relied on traditional copyright laws.
Each of these industries is different. There is no set of key principles that "fix" copyright. However, the diversity contains a lesson in its own right. Innovation is different in different industries. The lifetime of a new creation, the expense of creation, and how it is consumed all contribute to how innovation works in that field. One-size-fits-all copyright law is unlikely to make sense in the future.
Diversity isn't the only lesson. The authors identify six themes that, while not universal, are intriguing. Note that for this discussion, copying may include point-for-point copies but also includes derivative copies.
Industries that are driven by trends and fads, such as food and fashion, are highly innovative even without intellectual property protection. Innovation does not just happen despite copying; you can argue that innovation happens because of copying. The life cycle of a trend requires copying because if something is never copied, it will never become trendy. Point-for-point copies serve to make something more popular, as do derivative copies. Derivative copies have the further benefit of pushing a trend (or a technical innovation) to its limit. Once that limit has been hit, the next innovation appears and the cycle starts again.
Social norms can provide incentive against copying within a creative community when it is close knit enough. The authors give the examples of comedians who have strong social norms around copying. These norms go beyond what is protected by copyright law to the point of protecting a particular idea. Although they have their limits, norms can provide protections with a subtlety that law is unlikely to ever match.
Another way innovation thrives despite copying is when innovators turn what they are selling from a product into a performance. The food served at a nice restaurant isn't just about a particular dish. It's also about the experience of eating at that restaurant: the atmosphere, the quality, even the price you pay all add to your perception of the quality of the experience. Performances are much harder to copy (and copies of the product can even drive demand for the authentic version and everything it entails).
Open-source methods, eponymously used in software but also practiced to some degree in areas such as cooking and football where practitioners commonly train each other, can turn copyright on its head by explicitly allowing copying to promote further innovation.
The harm of copying can also be balanced by a first-mover advantage. For example, in football, plays are not covered by copyright, but the first team to develop and effectively play with a new technique will have a significant advantage, and once that technique stops being effective, then it will be time for something new.
Finally, copying can be advantageous because copies can serve as advertisements for brands. This happens most often when the original version of a copied item is still seen as somehow superior, whether because of a true quality difference or just a difference in perception. Although some people will by the inferior copies instead of the original, other people will buy the original because the copies increase awareness of the original.
The book had a lot of other good points -- my list of notes is quite long, but I want to highlight just a few more.
One limitation of our current copyright laws is that they disproportionately give advantage to what Raustiala and Sprigman call Pioneers and ignore what they call Tweakers. Pioneers are the people who come up with some brilliant new idea. Tweakers are the people who take existing ideas and change them, ultimately making those ideas better and pushing them to the limit. In any field Tweakers play a huge role in making progress. Innovations generally come when the previous innovation has been tweaked to the limit (there is even some argument as to whether or not Pioneers really exist, or if they are really just the people who make a tweak that happens to be game changing; either way, Tweakers add value in their own right).
Another key observation the authors emphasize is that the true purpose of copyright law is to foster innovation. Preventing copying is just one approach for doing that, but since copying can itself be innovative, preventing copying has costs as well as benefits, and those costs and benefits must be balanced.
One facet of this that they discuss at length is that while preventing copying increases the expected return on a creation, reducing the cost of innovation also increases the expected return. Thus, as technology has reduced the barriers to entry in a diversity of fields, they have exploded with innovation, even when there isn't copyright protection. One example of this that the authors give is fonts. Creating fonts use to be something that required many highly specialized skills. Now, fonts can be created with easily obtainable software, and the number of fonts has exploded as a result. Music is another area where there the traditional centralized model is suffering, but the relative ease of creating and distributing high quality music has led to a huge amount of musical creativity.
This is an important book for anyone interested in copyright and innovation.
claudiorrr's review against another edition
3.0
Buena la idea pero se vuelve un poco monótono. Debió ser mucho más corto, un ensayo.
More...