It's that time of year again: All the quarterly and annual appointments piled up in a relatively short window. It's sort of like ripping the bandaid off instead of slowly and carefully peeling it off — hey, wait, there's another insurance form for that?
- In a rather short, sharp shock to the underlying meme of the fine arts — that "the original" is The Only Thing That Matters, meaning that to appreciate it or learn from it at all one must go to where it is to physically view it (with all of the subtle, and not so subtle, class/ethnic/nationality elements embedded in that journey), and that no copy ever allows for Appropriate Appreciation — the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam has digitized its collection for free public access. The sideswipe at the memes of photography-licensing oligopoly, as distinct from the interests of actually engaging in original expression individual photographers, is also highly appropriate; particularly as that subculture is precisely the opposite of encouraging "Progress in the useful Arts."
- The contrast with the, well, dubious competence of the Anthropic claims process — in conception, design, and execution — is pretty obvious to those of us who've been inside the system for both creators and transferee-exploiters. On one hand, the lawyers involved were constrained by both lack of first-hand knowledge and the stated priorities of their clients; on the other, both general ethics and the specifics of class actions required more disinterested effort, in both conception and implementation, than is apparent… for fees on just the plaintiff's side exceeding the gross revenues of almost everyone involved.
Which really, in the end, leads to the other half of "reform": Don't just criticize, but conceptualize and actually build something better that doesn't itself have large unintended consequences (at least not when predictable). That's the real problem with the "Information Wants to Be Free" movement (especially as exposed in "we refuse to pay anyone for data to train our large-language-model generative systems"): It doesn't — indeed, actively refuses to — engage with both the systemic and individual costs of information-creation mechanisms and environments.
No, I'm not going to be specific until at least all of the briefs have been filed in the appeal. My concerns relate directly to the stated subjects of the appeals, and it would be inappropriate (not to mention would require taking the conduct of a few of the players outside for a spirited discussion and attitude adjustment assisted with a rhetorical 2x4). Suffice it to say that one of the nonparties has demonstrated that, at least until its entire leadership and senior staff changes, it can never satisfy Fed. R. Civ. Proc. 23(a)(4) due to its built-in blind spots (and borderline narcissism, but we are talking about the arts here…) — and that the concept of the "real party in interest" is also relevant to satisfying that part of the Rule.
- The rhetoric is building, and won't subside until well after 03 January 2027: Expect to hear more and more about "voter fraud" from ill-informed quarters (often with poorly-hidden conflicts of interest and narcissism well beyond anything found in the arts community). For a change, how about some validated data analyzed by, like, experienced nonpartisan interpreters of laboratory and other experimental data on the prevalence of voter fraud? Or, at least, voter fraud measured by its actual standards, and not "they didn't vote for me" (semipaywall).
- That last link sausage leads into contemplating both the ingredients and, perhaps more to the point, the cleanliness of the kitchen — and more likely the lack thereof. Direct election of anyone expected to exercise judgment within the bounds of a profession is incredibly stupid. We're at least smart enough not to do it for military officers (we don't directly elect unit commanders!); we shouldn't for health officials, judges, prosecutors (and Attorneys General), coroners, law-enforcement officials, etc. And especially for that last as to "sheriffs," who historically were not "cops" as we know them but armed tax-collectors and proxies for absentee liege lords (viz. the legendary Sheriff of Nottingham) who more often than not dealt only with writs and "major" crimes like stealing sheep, not driving a horse cart while intoxicated. In this context, direct electoral approval is worse than relying on (all-too-often evaded) professional regulation; the irony that the reason professional regulation often fails — twisted, conflicted concerns for "reputation of the profession" combined with a lingering internal sense of "there but for grace go I" — for the same reasons as "candidate reputation" must be acknowledged but shouldn't detain us for too long.
But in present law, that remains (but shouldn't be) "constitutional" as consistent with "a Republican form of government." Something can be stupid without being overtly unconstitutional, though, and subjecting professional judgment in individual instances (often wound up with nonpublic information) to approval by direct election is at minimum stupid. We've got enough stupid in government (and any other "institution") without building its structure to elect more stupid.