This concept of "Colour" causing difficulties exists only because of the extreme flexibility and "genericness" of digital data, currently unparalleled by anything else in the real world. If/when technologies to manipulate physical objects generically at the level of atoms become feasible and widespread, we might be asking "What Colour are your atoms?"
> This concept of "Colour" causing difficulties exists only because of the extreme flexibility and "genericness" of digital data
It predates the digital data and it has caused trouble before then. Authors who happened to publish similar stories/melodies/compositions used to bicker over the source of the "bits". It mattered whether it was a coincidentally similar creation or just plain old copying.
Or the other other way around: Star Trek style replicators will never see the light of day. As soon as the technology even REMOTELY gets close, everyone with a financial interest in keeping physical goods scarce (basically all manufacturing companies), will collectively come down on it like a ton of bricks. If you think the record and movie industry lobbying effort against sharing is powerful, imagine basically every manufacturing company in existence joining in.
