I make a modest portion of my income on writing. For me, abolishing copyright would suck because I know what would happen: More of the same things that already happen. Organizations that command large audiences would slurp up my work and republish it, selling the space alongside to advertisers. People and groups with axes to grind would edit and redistribute my work to serve their own ends. I would lose income generated when publications want to reprint my work. Spammy websites would fill their pages with my text to look legitimate to search engines. And so on. I would have no legal recourse.
I agree that America's current version of copyright is flawed, and that rights-holders hold the rights for too long. Maybe copyright should require a tax, as some have proposed. Make it a penny for the first year, doubling annually.
On one hand, post-copyright you would certainly have predatory interests taking media and trying to profit from it.
But you would also have the cultural shift into the rationalization that digital information isn't being artificially confined anymore. Anyone looking at something asking for money to see it will learn over time that no, they cannot stop you from finding that information as long as someone valued it enough to make it available.
The mindset of creators would have to change. Instead of making the thing (and risking everything on the ability to sell it) you don't have to go into it as a gamble, and you don't have to execute doublethink by assocating something that is worthless (copying) with profit while something valuable (creation) is done for free. You would have to make something to have credibility, but from that point forward you just need to offer your creativity to make things, say how much money you want to make / release some creative work, and once made create / publish it. And then its free, and all of humanity can enjoy it, and you defeat the predatory middle men much more so than today.
And beyond that, people are a bit wiser to fake news now. I'm using "fake news" as a shorthand for the very real concern the author pointed out:
People and groups with axes to grind would edit and redistribute my work to serve their own ends.
This sounds like the fear is that people will maliciously butcher your work by carving it up, or altering it, or otherwise presenting a piece of your work (or quotes, or thoughts) without the full context. And there's no one that does this better than the news agencies.
It's having less effect now. It's still a real concern, but it's interesting that as people are becoming more aware of the fakes, we're also spotting cases similar to the above concern. And no legal protections were necessary to call them out.
If you repurpose someone's work, at no point in history has it been easier to make noise: twitter, reddit, HN, medium, anywhere. If your story is true, people are thirsty for drama. Which is rather upsetting and repugnant, but you can also take advantage of it when you need to.
It seems true to say that we could axe copyright without authors being negatively affected. People still pay for content, and for those who can generate it. But it would require testing it out to see how it plays out in practice, and that's not so easy.
Why would I pay someone to produce something, when as you said, I would not be able to stop people from finding it online for free?
For example, why would I pay to have a new Star Wars movie produced, when cable companies, NetFlix, and YouTube would all copy the film and have it available for free on the day of release? If I operate a cinema, I would need to charge $15 a ticket to recover the costs of producing the film, while John Doe can start a cinema, and show my film for $3 a ticket. So, why would I pay to have the movie produced? What would be my advantage over the competition, and how would I recover a few hundred million dollars?
At least personally I know I would give Disney (or any third party creative wanting to make a Star Wars movie I found reputable) money to make them, because I like watching them.
Independently, no, I would not be able to single handedly fund the millions of dollars required to create such a film. The good news is there are a lot of people in the world who like Star Wars, and I imagine in the absence of artificial scarcity soaking up spending money those fans would put their money towards seeing the films they want made... made.
I agree that America's current version of copyright is flawed, and that rights-holders hold the rights for too long. Maybe copyright should require a tax, as some have proposed. Make it a penny for the first year, doubling annually.