[HN Gopher] This file has Pantone colors that have been removed ...
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       This file has Pantone colors that have been removed and replaced
       with black
        
       Author : tosh
       Score  : 351 points
       Date   : 2022-10-28 11:18 UTC (11 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (twitter.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (twitter.com)
        
       | kevin_b_er wrote:
       | And now we see the asymmetry of a contract with Adobe Inc. Adobe
       | has altered the deal, pray they do not alter it any further.
        
       | moolcool wrote:
       | The comments here seem to be mostly litigating whether Pantone
       | ought to be allowed to license colour names. To me though, the
       | scandalous thing about this is that a piece of software which you
       | paid for can work fine one day can stop functioning the same way
       | the next because of a change in the vendor's license agreements.
       | Like imagine if you bought a song which uses samples and one day
       | the backing track just disappears because the artist didn't renew
       | the sample clearance.
        
         | ehnto wrote:
         | It's a complex problem when you start to dig into it, mostly
         | because so much software (including Photoshop) is delivered as
         | a SaaS product and even more so as they become more and more
         | cloud connected. Behaving more like a live-service that you're
         | connected to rather than a discrete application on your device.
         | You could say that your application should continue to have the
         | licensed content, but their live-service couldn't continue to
         | provide it through their servers.
         | 
         | I think these are just oversights in the contract in a way. I
         | would hope we'd see less of these mishaps as time goes on and
         | companies get better at writing long-term outcomes into their
         | contracts. It would be a pain in the butt to write software
         | that handles legacy licensing per user over a live service
         | though.
        
           | moolcool wrote:
           | You're right, but that doesn't stop it from sucking. Like
           | every defense of Adobe and Pantone here are technically
           | correct and rational, but that doesn't stop this from being a
           | stupid problem which is deeply unfair to the consumer.
        
             | ehnto wrote:
             | Oh I agree wholeheartedly. And we will probably be bringing
             | up the Adobe Pantone debacle in ten years when auto owners
             | suddenly lose access to their heated seats because their
             | licensing ran out, or somthing equally asinine. We seem to
             | be very busy applying all these same mistakes but to real
             | world products like coffee pod machines, cars and TVs, home
             | security and such.
        
           | mindslight wrote:
           | We should plainly reject the adoption of Software Augmented
           | with Additional Surveillance. If the purpose of some software
           | doesn't involve communication, yet a specific piece of
           | software arbitrarily requires Internet access (likely for the
           | developer's own purposes of control), then don't use it.
           | Period. In addition to saving yourself from this type of bait
           | and switch, you'll be dodging some surveillance and other
           | user-hostile anti-features enabled constant connectivity.
           | 
           | There are plenty of older releases of Photoshop available on
           | torrent sites that will install locally, that should have
           | long passed into public domain if copyright law were sane. If
           | Adobe isn't even willing to sell you a version of Photoshop,
           | and insists that you can now only rent it, that's yet another
           | reason to not feel bad about piracy.
        
         | AequitasOmnibus wrote:
         | This happens all the time in the entertainment industry.
         | 
         | For example: TV show X licenses pop song Y for its initial
         | broadcast. The group that owns the syndication rights didn't
         | buy the right to use song Y, consequently they have to replace
         | the music with generic Muzak in subsequent broadcasts.
         | 
         | You pay for Netflix, start watching show X, and when it gets to
         | the big dramatic moment with sweeping music (that you remember
         | from when the show originally aired), it's replaced with
         | elevator music.
         | 
         | Same goes for a lot of movies.
        
           | pradn wrote:
           | Same issue for video games:
           | https://www.gamesindustry.biz/alan-wake-to-be-removed-
           | from-s...
        
           | LocalH wrote:
           | The difference is, those changes don't affect _existing_
           | copies, they affect _new_ copies. If you have a VHS or DVD
           | copy of the show before the license expired, then you have
           | the original music. This is mangling old documents unless you
           | pay a fee. Yet another example of modern copyright leading to
           | the individuals having the least possible rights, in order to
           | be nickled and dimed.
           | 
           | It would make more sense if existing documents could still
           | retain their colors, but _new_ documents couldn 't be made
           | with the Pantone colors in question. It'd still suck, but
           | it'd be more respectful to the end users of the software.
        
             | frosted-flakes wrote:
             | But with screaming there are no old copies. And if you
             | never update Photoshop/Illustrator/InDesign Pantone colours
             | will continue to work.
        
               | Macha wrote:
               | How long is not updating photoshop an option? Will the
               | DRM stop supporting old versions eventually? (like it
               | already has with some of the CS versions)
        
               | frosted-flakes wrote:
               | I'm not sure. I stopped using Adobe CC products as a
               | hobbyist because it costs way too damn much (I was only
               | able to get three years of a student subscription from 2
               | different school email addresses).
        
               | LocalH wrote:
               | People are also having issues with face detection
               | libraries in the latest perpetually-licensed version of
               | Lightroom. So that's not always true.
        
           | moolcool wrote:
           | Yes, but that doesn't stop it from sucking. Also, they can do
           | it with streaming media, but they can't come to my house and
           | replace my DVDs. Just because it's technically correct,
           | doesn't mean that it's not a bullshit model which is anti-
           | consumer and anti-creativity.
        
           | jakub_g wrote:
           | > You pay for Netflix, start watching show X, and when it
           | gets to the big dramatic moment with sweeping music (that you
           | remember from when the show originally aired), it's replaced
           | with elevator music.
           | 
           | > Same goes for a lot of movies.
           | 
           | Wait wat? Do you have some examples / links?
        
             | AequitasOmnibus wrote:
             | Dawson's Creek, for one: https://entertainment.ie/on-
             | demand/on-demand-news/why-does-d...
        
             | mbg721 wrote:
             | WKRP in Cincinnati used a lot of rock/pop music that was
             | replaced in syndication. I believe that's also why The Drew
             | Carey Show isn't readily available these days.
        
             | yoyohello13 wrote:
             | Pretty much the entire Scrubs soundtrack is different on
             | Netflix.
        
         | xwdv wrote:
         | I think people just need to change their way of thinking.
         | Software these days isn't really just a program, it's a complex
         | collection of business relationships and software is just the
         | contract that allows them to operate together, and you're one
         | end of it. The software is just a supply chain that allows you
         | to create new content, and it can be suddenly broken the same
         | way a physical supply chain can be.
        
         | drewbeck wrote:
         | Agree. Updating old files with black specifically is egregious.
         | Even replacing the color with a CMYK/RGB near equivalent would
         | be far far less hostile than this approach. Oh you want to know
         | what colors you used on that piece from 15 years ago? Pay up.
         | It's basically a shakedown and should be illegal.
        
         | thereddaikon wrote:
         | You don't buy Adobe software. You subscribe to the Adobe SaaS.
         | This is the consequence of replacing products with
         | subscriptions. If people don't like that then they should do
         | something about it. Too late to vote with your wallet, the
         | industry as a whole has moved to this.
         | 
         | Adam Smith, the guy who came up with capitalism, wrote about
         | the evils of rent seeking. You need a regulatory approach.
        
           | xnyan wrote:
           | I am not opposed to using regulation, but I can't see what
           | could be done with regulation that would lead to, say, non-
           | subscription adobe products. Mandate that offline versions be
           | available for purchase? There would also have to be some kind
           | of price control mechanism or adobe would make it
           | unaffordable. That seems very specific and messy, but I'm
           | sure there are other ideas.
        
       | afrcnc wrote:
       | Pantone did not invent colors... physics did. Who the fuck
       | allowed this company to register colors under copy rights?
       | 
       | What's next? Bayer copyrights oxygen and I have to pay a breathe
       | tax now?
        
         | fazfq wrote:
        
           | InCityDreams wrote:
           | >- in some places masks were mandatory unless you were
           | vaccinated, which meant that literally you couldn't breathe
           | (well) unless you paid big pharma for the right.
           | 
           | Could you expand on this, especially the "literally you
           | couldn't breathe", part. And the rest, too, could do with
           | some development.
        
         | lupire wrote:
         | Everything is physics. That's not an argument against copyright
         | or patents.
         | 
         | Anyway the OP is about Pantome's databases, not the colors or
         | their RGB descriptions themselves.
        
           | Maursault wrote:
           | > Everything is physics.
           | 
           | Not everything.[1]
           | 
           | [1] https://xkcd.com/435/
        
           | nine_k wrote:
           | Pantone colors are not RGB but CMYK, plus there is a number
           | of non-CMYK paints and printing inks for spot colors which
           | use Pantone color names.
        
         | quitit wrote:
         | pantone have a colour mixing system based on 6 primaries called
         | hexachrome, they then publish a book of formulas using those
         | colours - it's an easy way for printers to mix up the colours.
         | This represents the majority of "pantone" colours.
         | 
         | Anyone is still able to mix and use a colour through other
         | means, but no one can put out a book with pantone's same
         | formulas.
         | 
         | The real problems however arise with trademarked colours (think
         | tiffany's blue, whiskas purple, kinder orange, etc.) That's
         | where you literally can't use a colour in a particular
         | copyright category.
        
           | throwaway09223 wrote:
           | "The real problems however arise with trademarked colours
           | (think tiffany's blue, whiskas purple, kinder orange, etc.) "
           | 
           | Is it a problem, though? The only limitation is that you
           | can't use these colors to misrepresent a product a product in
           | a commercial setting. You can't sell an item wrapped in
           | Tiffany's Blue.
           | 
           | " That's where you literally can't use a colour in a
           | particular copyright category. "
           | 
           | No, these colors are not protected under copyright, only
           | trademarks. The limits on using them only apply to particular
           | context of trade. You can use trademarks freely as long as
           | they're not misrepresenting the trade item. You can paint
           | with them. They can appear in your photographs.
           | 
           | What you can't do is brand a product with them.
        
             | quitit wrote:
             | Sorry, yes I mistyped "copyright" for trademark, however
             | the earlier reference to trademarks should have clued to
             | the correct word.
             | 
             | However contrary to your assumption; trademark protection
             | is proactive or the owner risks losing their trademark to
             | general use. This requires that even similar usage in other
             | branding/trademarks is opposed.
             | 
             | For the Tiffany & Cp example, it means any kind of medium
             | blue can't be used in their registered trademark categories
             | regardless if it obvious that it's not Tiffany & Co. The
             | benchmark for litigation is not misrepresentation.
             | 
             | This is a problem as there is currently a land grab for
             | colours, and since each must be protected broadly, and each
             | trademark owner files the broadest number of categories
             | possible this becomes a minefield.
        
               | throwaway09223 wrote:
               | Sure, and I think we probably agree that some reform is
               | needed around trademarking colors. So I'll correct myself
               | as well and agree that it is a problem -- though somewhat
               | limited in scope.
               | 
               | My point was only that it isn't a broad limitation such
               | as Copyright creates that spills over into say, letting a
               | camera take pictures with a shade of blue or using blue
               | in a piece of software. I believe the scope of the
               | trademark's application is fairly narrow, so it's not
               | something most people in other fields need to worry
               | about.
        
           | horsawlarway wrote:
           | I thought it was well established that recipes (incl -
           | formulas, compounds, and prescriptions) can't be covered with
           | copyright - so I'm assuming this only applies specifically to
           | the pantone names, as listed in a compendium with other
           | copyright material?
        
           | ilyt wrote:
           | Sooo what would stop someone from just producing say
           | "mantone-123" color that's same as "pantone-123" color ?
           | 
           | Did they patent every single proportion of paint mixture or
           | what ?
        
         | chrisseaton wrote:
         | Pantone did invent their names for colours. You can use the
         | colours, but not their names. These files are using their names
         | is the issue. If the file used their own names or raw CMYK
         | values it's be fine.
        
           | Maursault wrote:
           | This is true. And you can also drag a Pantone color into a
           | swatch and rename the color. Problem solved.
        
           | sokoloff wrote:
           | Note that not all Pantone colors can be matched exactly in a
           | 4-color CMYK process.
        
             | themoonisachees wrote:
             | Does that matter if the thing being designed is gonna
             | printed by a cmyk printer or displayed on a screen? And
             | more: does it matter if the color is 1/3 of a lumen off
             | from whatever was shown on a screen that was possibly not
             | even properly calibrated?
        
               | jon-wood wrote:
               | Generally no, it doesn't matter if you're just displaying
               | on (mostly uncalibrated) screens, or printing in CMYK on
               | normal paper stock. It gets more interesting if you're
               | producing things like brochures, in which you care about
               | the texture and technique used to apply particular areas
               | as well as the colour itself. Thing about things like the
               | glossy lettering on a brochure which can't be represented
               | as a set of four colours.
        
               | ghaff wrote:
               | And the fact is that a lot of designers can get
               | incredibly anal about tiny details of color/texture/etc.
               | I remember back in undergrad when I was doing some press
               | work, there was one poster that the designers had
               | specified two different (Pantone) shades of dark neutral
               | ink and I doubt anyone looking at the poster saw anything
               | other than "black" for both of them.
               | 
               | And before any developers throw shade on this sort of
               | obsessiveness, remember stones and glass houses.
        
               | jon-wood wrote:
               | I picked up a love of design obsession from the years I
               | spent working as a developer in design agencies. A lot of
               | it is very much focused on how a thing feels to whoever
               | receives it, even they don't consciously notice that
               | happening. Stuff like the paper stock or binding is only
               | ever going to _excite_ a professional designer, but even
               | people with no education on this at all can tell the
               | difference between a glossy brochure with thick textured
               | pages and a cheap flyer printed for as little money as
               | possible. Some companies even target the latter because
               | they don 't want to give the impression of being a luxury
               | retailer.
        
               | thesuitonym wrote:
               | If you're printing CMYK you wouldn't really use a Pantone
               | color anyway. The value of Pantone is that you can get a
               | specific color with just one printing pass. If what
               | you're printing only has black, and forest green, then
               | instead of doing a cyan pass, a magenta pass, a yellow
               | pass, and a black pass, you can do a black pass and a
               | Pantone 17-0230 TCX pass.
        
               | pessimizer wrote:
               | If you pick up a pantone book and flip through it, they
               | put their colors opposite CMYK equivalents. Sometimes
               | they barely resemble each other. CMYK is optimally
               | expressive, not maximally expressive. To make all the
               | pantone colors requires a wall full of sloppy cans of
               | paint to be mixed through a book of arcane formulas. To
               | make a CMYK color, you need four cans of paint and four
               | percentage values.
               | 
               | edit: anybody who thinks the gamut of CMYK is anything
               | like the gamut of Pantone, try printing out something
               | purple on your printer. I worked prepress, and trying to
               | get a good CMYK purple is my idea of hell.
        
               | chrisseaton wrote:
               | I think it's physical properties like coating, which yeah
               | do have a large impact.
        
               | PaulHoule wrote:
               | People use Pantone because they want to get colors that
               | don't exist in CMYK. It's what makes Pantone worth paying
               | for.
        
         | traceroute66 wrote:
         | > Pantone did not invent colors... physics did. Who the fuck
         | allowed this company to register colors under copy rights?
         | 
         | The point is communication, usability, and reproduction.
         | 
         | Communication because "Pantone 123" is easier to convey
         | throughout the chain than "C:11,Y:22,M:33,K:44".
         | 
         | Usability because Pantone swatches are easier to use in a
         | design environment, and also easier to choose the swatch number
         | in Adobe than to mess around choosing "C:11,Y:22,M:33,K:44".
         | You can also give your client a Pantone swatch book and let
         | them loose without them having to know about CMYK, substrates
         | etc. etc.
         | 
         | Reproduction because you can ensure you consistently achieve
         | the same output irrespective of substrate
         | (uncoated,coated,glossy, paper, fabric yada yada yada ...). It
         | also gives printers a well defined reference for ink mixing,
         | quality checks etc.
         | 
         | TL;DR: It makes everyone's life easier, clients, designers,
         | printers etc.
        
           | mysterydip wrote:
           | Why don't we have a public domain standard to discuss colors
           | the same way?
        
             | dangerface wrote:
             | Pantone is an ink the public domain standard would be cmyk.
             | 
             | If you get five printers and ask them all to print
             | C:11,Y:22,M:33,K:44 you get five different colours as each
             | will have to mix their cmyk inks to get that colour.
             | 
             | Pantone is a spot colour that means you can buy a pot of
             | ink thats Pantone 123 there is no mixing so the colour is
             | always the same. If you want to print on glossy paper thats
             | going to change the look of the colour so Pantone also do
             | inks for each surface you want to print on, they also do
             | dyes for plastics and clothes etc.
             | 
             | Edit: The difference between the five printers would be
             | insignificant but if you are a designer or want your logo
             | to look exactly the same on stand ups, pamphlet, business
             | cards etc you would use a spot colour.
        
             | rtkwe wrote:
             | Part of the utility of Pantone is not just the color spec
             | but the physical samples they produce that are the actual
             | specifications and standards. They make color swatches and
             | cards so that you can see for sure what everyone else will
             | (try) to produce when you say "make this accent piece
             | Pantone 13459 with a matte finish and this bit over here
             | Pantone 9329 with a glossy finish." The utility isn't 100%
             | just in the standard but also in producing those physical
             | instantiations so designers and artists can KNOW what color
             | they're actually specifying and can see it in different
             | lights not just on a screen that might not fully replicate
             | the color.
             | 
             | Making all those samples is tougher to do with an open
             | standard, you'd need some certification body/process for a
             | company to make for people to use to satisfy a similar
             | niche as Pantone.
        
             | PaulHoule wrote:
             | Because somebody hasn't done all the work. Why would they?
             | 
             | As an individual crafter/designer I could see myself
             | developing specifications for a small number of colors I
             | use in a project. Doing 1000s of colors would be a huge
             | project that would need some way to pay for it.
        
           | joezydeco wrote:
           | Don't use Pantone 123 in your product because that's Fluke
           | trade dress. =)
        
             | jeremy151 wrote:
             | Pantone, a division of X-Rite, is owned by Danaher. Fluke
             | is also owned by Danaher. I have no particular point, other
             | than I found it interesting that the two brands of shared
             | parentage collided spontaneously in conversation.
        
               | joezydeco wrote:
               | Fluke and the sister measurement companies (like Tek)
               | were spun out of Danaher in 2016 and are now called
               | Fortive. More corporate shenanigans.
        
               | jeremy151 wrote:
               | Ahh, interesting, good to know, thank you. I've been
               | outside of that world for a while.
        
               | ilyt wrote:
               | Also HP had big test equipment business, then the HP went
               | with computers and the measurement stuff was spun into
               | Agilent.
               | 
               | Then the electronic measurement stuff was spun into
               | Keysight and the Agilent was left with every other
               | instrument stuff. So the soul of HP changed name twice
               | 
               | The HP also spun into HPE for servers/switches/storage
               | and other datacenter stuff.
               | 
               | All to shed business units that are "just steadily making
               | money" from ones that see bigger growth.
        
             | ilyt wrote:
             | https://www.redbubble.com/i/skirt/Pantone-123C-by-
             | palmea1/21...
             | 
             | That dress seems to be doing just fine
        
           | [deleted]
        
       | greatgib wrote:
       | Another clear proof that you are easily fucked when you use
       | proprietary softwares! The worse for users is to remember that
       | they paid to be screwed like this.
        
         | jollyllama wrote:
         | Doubly so when it's a subscription model w/ forced updates. At
         | least in the old days, when you paid to "own" a copy, you could
         | keep it running as long as all of its dependencies worked.
        
         | CharlesW wrote:
         | I think you mean "proprietary color systems". Open source
         | software has never supported PANTONE.
        
           | josephcsible wrote:
           | > I think you mean "proprietary color systems".
           | 
           | No, "proprietary software" is correct.
           | 
           | > Open source software has never supported PANTONE.
           | 
           | The point is that with open source software, once you get
           | something it can't be unilaterally revoked, and this doesn't
           | make that false.
        
       | karaterobot wrote:
       | Let's get specific here: what does "replaced with black" mean? Is
       | the swatch itself remapped to the "black" swatch, or is my
       | Pantone color name the same, and only the values change? If the
       | swatches are still named the same thing, at least I can recreate
       | the colors, but if that information is lost, we've got chaos on
       | our hands.
        
       | eithed wrote:
       | So, if I pay for license to Adobe, using the colours provided is
       | not covered by license?
        
         | CodeWriter23 wrote:
         | Not any longer.
        
       | pfoof wrote:
       | Reminds me of times when Facebook wanted to patent the word
       | "face" and King wanted to patent the word "candy"
        
       | alberth wrote:
       | Pantone for those not aware is like DNS to IPs.
       | 
       | It's a lot easier for designers to discern the Pantone name
       | "Mahogany" than its RGB value (205,74,74).
       | 
       | The rub here is that X-Rite (like a Registrar) owns the rights to
       | the Pantone names. Now they want to collect a fee for it's
       | Pantone names (similarly to how Registrars collects fee for
       | Domain Names)
        
       | mellonaut wrote:
       | I am in no way affiliated with them, but if you want a great
       | alternative for the creative suite that HAS pantone support1,
       | definitely try out the Affinity counterparts:
       | https://affinity.serif.com/
       | 
       | 1.
       | https://twitter.com/affinitybyserif/status/15859336521015992...
        
         | brudgers wrote:
         | Also Corel Graphics Suite. Still available on physical media
         | with a perpetual license.
        
         | samwillis wrote:
         | I decided to go cold turkey a few months ago, cancelled my
         | Adobe CC subscription, uninstalled and went with Affinity
         | Designer+Photo (they had a 50% off offer on).
         | 
         | To be honest, it's hard! Every time I open the apps the muscle
         | memory isn't there, everything takes longer.
         | 
         | I didn't used CC often enough any more to justify the
         | subscription. But 20 years of knowledge and experience (at
         | times I was using it every day) doesn't translate as quickly to
         | another app when you are only using it once a month.
         | 
         | The Affinity products are good, they just aren't exactly the
         | same as the Adobe equivalents.
         | 
         | I'm committed to not going back though.
        
           | WickyNilliams wrote:
           | I have Affinity Photo and suffer the same problems. I was
           | never a Photoshop expert, nor a designer (I know its fallen
           | out of fashion for web design), but I had been using it for
           | 20 years.
           | 
           | I struggle and get frustrated with affinity photo (why are
           | there multiple types of pixel layer??), even if it is good
           | software, because to me - wrongly, of course - photoshop is
           | de facto _how_ a photo editor should work. I'm sure I'll
           | adjust with time. But I use photo editors less than ever, so
           | it's very slow going.
           | 
           | But, I can't really complain for the price I paid, and no
           | subscription necessary. A lot of respect for Affinity in that
           | regard. It's a business model that is becoming increasingly
           | rare.
        
           | mellonaut wrote:
           | This is true. They are a rival creative suite, and not a
           | clone. For some things you will need to adjust your mental
           | model, for which their in-house video tutorial series1 are
           | quite nice. For other things such as studio layout and
           | keybindings you can either try to make them as close to Adobe
           | as possible, or invest some time adapting to the new
           | situation.
           | 
           | 1. https://affinity.serif.com/en-gb/learn/
        
       | fmajid wrote:
       | If you are still using Adobe software, you have demonstrated a
       | willingness to bend over backwards and pay subscriptions. Is it
       | any wonder Pantone wants to get in on the action of fleecing
       | sheep?
        
         | alar44 wrote:
         | The $15/mo I pay for the Adobe suite is well worth it.
         | Baaaaaaa.
        
       | asciimov wrote:
       | Just wait till next year when Adobe will go free 2 play on their
       | big names like Photoshop.
       | 
       | Wanna open files from other people? Just get the $15/month "Fun
       | with Friends" DLC.
       | 
       | Oh need to save a file, better grab the "Sharing is Caring" Extra
       | content pack, it's a steal at $20 a month.
       | 
       | But wait, don't forget about your magic lasso, it's part of the
       | "western costumes and accessorizes pack". Not only do you get
       | your magic lasso but you get a fancy cowboy hat for your desktop
       | icon, and some chaps for your menu bar, just to show off your
       | western side. It's a real bargain at $44.95 a month! We'll even
       | include some real life six-shooter sounds to make it feel even
       | more authentic.
       | 
       | ---
       | 
       | All this rent seeking needs to die.
        
         | umanwizard wrote:
         | > All this rent seeking needs to die.
         | 
         | What, people charging money for software? How is that "rent
         | seeking" and why does it need to die?
        
           | baobabKoodaa wrote:
           | > What, people charging money for software? How is that "rent
           | seeking" and why does it need to die?
           | 
           | There's a difference between buying and renting.
        
             | umanwizard wrote:
             | "Rent seeking" is a term of art that means a specific
             | thing, it doesn't just mean "whenever you offer to let
             | people rent something".
        
               | baobabKoodaa wrote:
               | > "Rent seeking" is a term of art that means a specific
               | thing
               | 
               | Right, and specifically in this context, it refers to the
               | act of charging money from software in small continuing
               | installments as opposed to charging money in one up-front
               | installment (which might be called "buying").
               | 
               | In your earlier message you equated "rent-seeking" with
               | "charging money for software". My point is that not all
               | ways of charging money for software are rent-seeking.
        
         | sascha_sl wrote:
         | Arguably, that model is already dying in favor of what Adobe
         | already does: Maximum extraction from everyone who doesn't have
         | price sensitivity and scraps for everyone else.
         | 
         | Magic The Gathering for is releasing a set with 60 random non-
         | tournament legal cards for $1000, while thinning supply for
         | their previously most popular product (Draft boosters) in favor
         | of more "premium" products with eye-watering prices.
         | 
         | Overwatch 2 has moved on to charging $20+ for their skins and
         | limits essentially all progression to a non-randomized
         | Battlepass that requires you to turn the game into your second
         | job to complete. In OW1, loot boxes were awarded regularly and
         | contained enough currency that a few hours of play could get
         | you any of the now $20 skins.
         | 
         | Mobile games figured out that the top 1% of consumers of
         | entertainment media can pay for the bulk of it if you just ask
         | for prices asinine enough. I guess we'll see if barring the
         | other 99% from all optional content will lead to dives in
         | player populations.
        
       | DemocracyFTW2 wrote:
       | In a way, this isn't new, people have been using toxic colors for
       | quite a while. The innovation here is really that Pantone managed
       | to get toxic color without using heavy metals or any other
       | chemical ingredient.
       | 
       | Another proof that too much money destroys everything at some
       | point, much as you need water but too much water will kill you.
       | 
       | In Germany, Deutsche Telekom has long tried to own the letter
       | U+0054 Latin Capital Letter T and the color magenta. Use any of
       | those and you risk being sued.
        
       | superchroma wrote:
       | That's a real piece of shit move. Why not make a lookup table to
       | convert to regular colors?
        
         | beardyw wrote:
         | Probably a legal issue. A converted pantone colour might still
         | be interpreted as being a pantone colour. Madness I know.
        
         | [deleted]
        
         | fxtentacle wrote:
         | You need multiple LUT for different profiles black 100% with
         | Fogra39 will come out differently than black 100% on a desktop
         | inkjet.
         | 
         | And this collection of look up tables to make color
         | reproduction more predictable, that's precisely what Pantone
         | licenses... So that's probably why Adobe wasn't allowed to add
         | it for free.
        
           | superchroma wrote:
           | It doesn't have to be accurate. Anything close is better than
           | black.
        
             | traceroute66 wrote:
             | > It doesn't have to be accurate. Anything close is better
             | than black.
             | 
             | No. Because that breaks design intent.
             | 
             | If the client and designer agree on "Pantone XYZ", then you
             | can't just go replacing that with "something that looks
             | vaguely like Pantone XYZ".
             | 
             | That would be a breach of the agreement between client and
             | designer. It would also, as explained further up this
             | thread, "its not that easy". "Pantone XYZ" is not "just
             | another name for C:1,M:2,Y:3,K:4", its all about ensuring
             | consistent reproduction of that colour across all desired
             | substrates.
        
               | probably_wrong wrote:
               | How about letting the user choose? Because if Adobe
               | stopped acting like they know better they could solve
               | this with one click:
               | 
               | > _You are using Pantone colors, but you don 't have a
               | license for them._
               | 
               | > _[X] Replace with a similar CMYK value, obtained from
               | printing the color in Bob 's old home printer._
               | 
               | > _[ ] Purchase rights to the Pantone library._
               | 
               | Now the x% of designers who _really_ need Pantone colors
               | can pay for them and the remaining (100-x)% users can use
               | their files in peace. This is similar to what Inkscape
               | does when converting a PDF with unknown fonts, and it 's
               | (IMO) a much better solution.
        
         | kuschku wrote:
         | Exactly that lookup table is the entirety of Pantone's
         | business. They've got a list of colors (which are just indices
         | into this table) mapping these color names to a specific CMYK
         | combination as well as chemical formulas for _exactly_ that
         | color in printing, plastic, in all kinds of materials.
         | 
         | That ensures that any two people naming the same pantone color
         | will always know exactly which color is meant.
         | 
         | And this lookup table is what's copyrighted under database
         | rights.
        
           | CodeWriter23 wrote:
           | Selling spot color inks is a non-trivial portion of Pantone's
           | business. There's no such thing as a hexachrome flexo or
           | offset press.
        
         | sokoloff wrote:
         | Not all Pantone colors can be expressed in CMYK colorspace.
        
       | mlindner wrote:
       | This is what happens when you rent your software instead of
       | buying it. Don't support rental software. If you want your
       | software to keep working for when you need to use it again far in
       | the future, don't rent it.
        
       | fxtentacle wrote:
       | This is not about the colors, FYI. This is about someone
       | referencing a specific Pantone product as a spot color. And the
       | automatic conversion from that spot color name to the regular RGB
       | / CMYK color values is now gone. But if you embedded the actual
       | RGB/CMYK values into your file, then it'll still open just fine
       | and display those colors just fine.
       | 
       | Edit: Also, converting from Pantone to regular RGB/CMYK is a lot
       | more lossy than one would think. If I reference a Pantone
       | product, that pretty much covers all properties of the printed
       | surface, including things like reflectivity angles, fluorescence
       | and phosphorescence. A cheap xRite will already measure
       | reflectivity in 13 wavelength bands. And then it'll average those
       | 13 characteristics into 3 RGB numbers. Professional color
       | measurement tools can have hundreds of properties per ink type,
       | thereby making reduction to 3 values even more lossy.
       | 
       | If I give you RGB, that merely specifies the color at direct
       | reflection under normal light. If I give you a Pantone ID, you
       | also now how it'll look from the side or under UV light. RGB
       | specifies an averaged wavelength mixture, Pantone specifies a
       | chemical ink mixture.
       | 
       | Edit2: You know these car paints that have fresnel reflections,
       | meaning they appear to have a different color of you look at them
       | from a different angle? That's an excellent example of a case
       | where you need to specify a specific ink type like Pantone,
       | because the RGB value changes based on the viewing angle.
        
         | scarface74 wrote:
         | Thanks for the explanation, of course the internet likes to
         | simplify things to generate nerd outrage.
        
         | [deleted]
        
         | mindslight wrote:
         | > _If I give you RGB, that merely specifies the color at direct
         | reflection under normal light_
         | 
         | Not exactly. What primaries? What gamma? What max intensity?
         | 
         | Sure, many of these things have generally accepted defaults.
         | But point being it's still not that simple. But really, RGB
         | only seems exact because it produces one specific color on the
         | monitor in front of you. And it's nowhere close to being able
         | to represent the full _gamut_ of possible colors. For example,
         | it 's missing all violets!
        
         | technogeek00 wrote:
         | Having worked with colors and system conversions a lot, deeply
         | appreciate the technical detail here. Cheers!
        
         | FridgeSeal wrote:
         | This is so fascinating to learn.
         | 
         | Here is was just thinking Pantone colours were some fancy
         | standardised names...
         | 
         | Also, TIL "fresnel" is the name for that colour/pattern!
        
           | laserlight wrote:
           | I'm not sure fresnel is the right term. What GP referred to
           | is probably iridescence [0].
           | 
           | [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iridescence
        
             | mcdonje wrote:
             | Yeah, he didn't call the color effect fresnel. He called
             | the _reflections_ fresnel. You 're right that the color
             | effect is called iridescence.
             | 
             | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fresnel_equations
             | 
             | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fresnel_lens
        
           | RHSeeger wrote:
           | The fresnel lens/effect is used in a number of places
           | 
           | - Those "invisibility shields" you see videos of
           | 
           | - In (vision) glasses, to correct for double vision (you can
           | get prism in the glasses or, if the double vision is too much
           | for that, a sticky "fresnel" lens that gets attached to the
           | glass. I have one setting on my desk that I was using before
           | my corrective surgery, actually... woo, tangents)
        
         | fortran77 wrote:
         | This is the real story behind Pantone colors. I've blocked /
         | downvoted all those "experts" on twitter who are saying "here's
         | a chart of hex equivalents."
        
           | pavlov wrote:
           | Is there a downvote button on Twitter nowadays? (Serious
           | question, I've given up on the platform -- just curious to
           | know if they've changed it)
        
             | lillywastaken wrote:
             | Yes, but only for replies.
        
           | acomms wrote:
           | I don't understand - in lieu of paying for a Pantone
           | subscription, isn't the next best option to use RGB and just
           | separately log what the final printed spot Pantone will be?
           | Maybe I misunderstand why you dislike the hex equivalents
           | chart.
        
             | dangerface wrote:
             | RGB is used for describing the colour of light if you are a
             | web developer like me you will never need anything else.
             | CMYK is used for printed colours that reflect light and as
             | such there isn't a direct correlation between them.
             | 
             | For example RGB blue #0000ff is so bright it can not be
             | printed, if you tried it would look a lot darker blue than
             | the screen shows. This issue with printed colours looking
             | different from screen space colours is that printed colours
             | will also look different depending on the surface they are
             | printed onto and a variety of other variable.
             | 
             | Your work around is fine for me as I work in RGB and would
             | really only need the Pantone when im printing once every 5
             | years? If you are a print designer then you will be using
             | the colours all day every day and having to switch or a
             | reference that isn't exact results in expensive printing
             | mistakes.
        
             | mceachen wrote:
             | People saying "just convert to RGB" are kinda missing the
             | point. RGB can't be used for printing-typically you'll send
             | CMYK separations.
             | 
             | Unfortunately, the color gamut of CMYK is quite limited. If
             | you have a print job that requires a very specific color,
             | say, for your logo, it can be cheaper to order a black and
             | spot color print run. If the color is out of gamut, you
             | have to provide a spot color.
             | 
             | That spot color, at least in the US, was always specified
             | in PANTONE.
        
         | dzdt wrote:
         | Is there any more open standard than Pantone that expresses
         | color properties across viewing angles/lighting conditions?
         | Like in the 3d digital modelling space maybe?
        
           | brudgers wrote:
           | I don't know if one exists.
           | 
           | But if it does, I am not sure how useful it would be because
           | the effort to get an ink/paint that met all those
           | requirements would be at least as complex as the Pantone
           | factory.
           | 
           | Probably more complex since Pantone designs colors for the
           | production facilities they have in existence (or can
           | procure).
           | 
           | Basically the problem is who will make the color you
           | specified?
           | 
           | There are problems with Pantone, but availability is not
           | ordinarily among them.
        
             | ilyt wrote:
             | There is no "open source" because it is a shitton of work
             | someone has to pay for it and actively manage, and open
             | source means anyone else could just take your income source
             | (selling the paint catalogs) and re-make it cheaper.
             | 
             | If you're buying a lot you can just design the color, get a
             | bunch of samples mixed and pick one.
             | 
             | Hell, you could go to good paint shop and get anything you
             | want matched and get a recipe for it, that's how car can be
             | painted to match the paint that changed the color with age.
             | 
             | Just costly for anything not mass market.
        
               | brudgers wrote:
               | A paint shop does not perform the testing required to
               | confirm a paint meets the classes of specifications the
               | GP of your comment describes.
               | 
               | Achieving that level of known properties requires
               | equipment, personnel, and materials beyond what would
               | make commercial sense outside of the market segment in
               | which the cost of Pantone systems make sense.
               | 
               | To put it another way, cost of entry is Pantone's moat
               | and why it has been filling the same market segment for
               | many decades...where $21/month is pretty much no
               | different than free.
        
           | twic wrote:
           | An attempt was made: http://adaptstudio.ca/ocs/
        
           | [deleted]
        
           | throw_a_grenade wrote:
           | In Europe everyone uses RAL, not Pantone, for selecting paint
           | colours, though I'm not sure about exact differences between
           | those colour systems.
        
             | exmadscientist wrote:
             | RAL has some serious coverage gaps. Classic RAL has crummy
             | oranges and pinks, for example (though they did recently
             | fill a major gap with HN-orange-ish, it's not in my deck,
             | so it may as well not exist!). Design D2 is much, much
             | better, but still not really adequate in many areas that
             | Pantone does cover.
             | 
             | But RAL is definitely the better choice for anything but
             | printing... if it has your color (colour?).
        
           | account42 wrote:
           | The term for that is a bidirectional reflectance distribution
           | function (BRDF). No idea about libraries of BRDFs for common
           | materials but considering how even games have moved to
           | physically-based rendering there must be.
           | 
           | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bidirectional_reflectance_dist.
           | ..
        
             | bogwog wrote:
             | The original PBR paper cites a materials database made by
             | one of those big Japanese companies many years ago (I think
             | it was Mitsubishi?)
             | 
             | EDIT: found it! It's called MERL (https://merl.com/brdf)
             | 
             | Modern PBR specifically doesn't really rely on artists
             | choosing a BRDF though. The idea is to pick one that's
             | accurate, and expose a handful of variables to control it
             | (roughness and metalness mostly)
        
         | code_duck wrote:
         | But how does the chemical ink mixture and angle viewing
         | translate into colors on a monitor?
        
           | johannes1234321 wrote:
           | By having a mapping to RGB values and a calibrated monitor.
           | 
           | This of course then only gives an approximation. However this
           | isn't typically used for digital output, but the pantone ID
           | is carried along so that when printing (or otherwise
           | producing) the physical object the correct color and material
           | is being used.
           | 
           | (And some 3D rendering/CAD tool might also deal with
           | reflections etc. in digital space)
        
           | ilyt wrote:
           | The answer is not very well.
           | 
           | You get best estimate, make your pics, get it printed and
           | then actually see it.
        
         | mavhc wrote:
         | Is there a more advanced standard colourspace that we could be
         | using?
        
           | acomms wrote:
           | This is about "printing" isn't it? I guess 3D modelling
           | should have spectral qualities - but Pantone is made for spot
           | colouring in print and paint.
        
             | mavhc wrote:
             | Except the parent talked about reflections and other
             | frequencies of light. Do we need a next gen colourspace
             | (materialspace?)
        
             | BashiBazouk wrote:
             | It use to be and still is to a certain degree but Pantone
             | has been trying to move digital and make consistent colors
             | when printing 4 color. All the old books have ink formulas
             | for spot colors which have limited uses these days. The new
             | books ditch the formulas and give RGB, CMYK and html for
             | each swatch.
        
           | patmorgan23 wrote:
           | I think it's less about 'color space' and more about modeling
           | material properties.
        
           | PaulHoule wrote:
           | There are wide color gamut RGB spaces such as
           | 
           | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ProPhoto_RGB_color_space
           | 
           | that do a better job of modelling many forms of color vision
           | than conventional RGB spaces.
           | 
           | The response of the eye under ordinary situations is modeled
           | well with three stimulus values, but real colors are on a
           | spectrum. Consider
           | 
           | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dolby_3D
           | 
           | which uses a total of six colors and high precision filters
           | such that there is a red that passes the left filter and a
           | red that passes the right filter. The two reds look almost
           | the same without the filters, but with the filters one
           | becomes completely invisible. In situations where light is
           | interacting with something other than your eye (filters, a
           | prism) the physics become vastly more complex.
           | 
           | Speaking of 3D images lately I've been frustrated with wide
           | gamut displays because I make images that are viewed through
           | these glasses
           | 
           | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anaglyph_3D
           | 
           | Namely the red channel goes to the left eye and the green and
           | blue go to the left eye. (0, 180, 0) in sRGB is converted by
           | the application (Photoshop, Web Browser) to something like
           | (16, 176, 15) before sending to a wide gamut model. Adding a
           | little bit of red and blue to the wide gamut green makes it
           | look less saturated and more like the sRGB green, but it's
           | bad for anaglyph stereograms because the extra red light
           | causes an unwanted ghost image to appear in the wrong
           | channel.
        
           | exo762 wrote:
           | Just guessing, but that seems to imply two possibilities. One
           | containing colors that can't be implemented - no such
           | pigments / ink / chemicals exist. And other one describing
           | actual inks and their behavior - which sounds like what
           | Pantone is doing.
        
             | brudgers wrote:
             | Yes, Pantone describes inks using samples of actual
             | products because it is in the business of selling ink.
             | 
             | Familiarity is the big design advantage of Pantone color. I
             | look at the samples, pick a color, and that's what I will
             | get. Whether or not my monitor is calibrated or whether or
             | not I am using a computer at all.
             | 
             | From a business perspective, if you're logo is Reflex Blue,
             | then any reputable print shop can print your leave-behinds
             | and any decent sign shop can make your tradeshow display.
        
             | mavhc wrote:
             | I think I'd start with: a list of how much of each range of
             | frequencies of light are reflected, a list of light that's
             | emitted, how matte/mirrored the surface is
        
       | UncleSlacky wrote:
       | Relevant commentary from Cory Doctorow:
       | 
       | https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/28/fade-to-black/
        
       | pessimizer wrote:
       | Without spots, Photoshop/Illustrator are bordering on worthless.
       | This is just a covert price bump.
        
         | CharlesW wrote:
         | > _Without spots, Photoshop /Illustrator are bordering on
         | worthless._
         | 
         | This doesn't mean that spot color support is going away.
         | 
         | Other color systems supported by Photoshop's spot color
         | support: ANPA-COLOR, DIC Color Guide, FOCOLTONE, HKS swatches,
         | TRUMATCH.
        
           | pessimizer wrote:
           | But there are Pantone colors in the spec, and by "the spec" I
           | mean "every spec." The logo for the company you work for is
           | probably defined as a specific Pantone spot. And if I have to
           | pay separately for Pantone in Photoshop, there's no reason
           | for me not to move to another tool other than if Pantone
           | intentionally refused to sell spot support to me on another
           | piece of software.
           | 
           | Which leads me to think that they (Adobe, not Pantone)
           | endlessly tested and researched the maximum they could add to
           | the price if they blamed it on Pantone (who are happy to take
           | the blame because they're so entrenched that it won't affect
           | their business in the slightest.) They did it, and Pantone
           | and Adobe are going to split the proceeds. Or, rather, you're
           | going to "subscribe to a Pantone license" and "subscribe to a
           | Adobe plugin for Pantone management" as a pretense.
        
         | dawnerd wrote:
         | Definitely a price bump, mid contract too. If I actually relied
         | on Pantone I'd be pretty mad that it's suddenly 21 more dollars
         | a month.
        
       | polishdude20 wrote:
       | Good opportunity for someone to make a pantone -> non pantone
       | converter. Pop in your file, convert all the Pantone colors to
       | similar free colors. Profit.
        
         | jeroenhd wrote:
         | I don't think Pantone will give you a license to their database
         | if you make a product to compete with them. If they do, you can
         | probably expect a lawsuit anyway.
        
           | fy20 wrote:
           | I wonder if that is considered a copyright violation. The
           | customer is giving you X and you are giving back Y. But Y is
           | not copyright. It could be considered a derivative work, but
           | what if you change Y, so it's a couple of degrees off on the
           | HSV scale?
        
             | kuschku wrote:
             | It's exactly this mapping which is what pantone owns and
             | licenses, reproducing it is very likely going to be
             | illegal.
        
               | nine_k wrote:
               | I immediately remember encrypted, region-locked DVDs and
               | the oppressed but often open-source tools to counteract
               | it, like DeCSS. Early 2000s were fun!
        
             | zinekeller wrote:
             | > But Y is not copyright.
             | 
             | In a similar vein, phonebooks. The answer... is
             | complicated. There is a thing called "database rights",
             | which as you might guess is a mess. The US argues that
             | there is no right as you've simply compiled information
             | (see _Feist Publications, Inc., v. Rural Telephone Service
             | Co._ , and that's why I used phonebooks as an analogy)
             | while Europe (not just EU, even UK and Russia) _do_
             | recognize database rights.
             | 
             | Even skipping about it, Pantone _named_ them, which could
             | give them copyright protection in the US (and other
             | countries without specific database rights).
             | 
             | Wikipedia about it:
             | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Database_right
        
         | [deleted]
        
         | fxtentacle wrote:
         | The correct RGB values heavily depend on your printing process.
         | And your ICC profile. So conversion is not trivial. You could
         | license it, though, because that's precisely what Pantone has
         | been selling for 20 years.
        
       | [deleted]
        
       | hcarvalhoalves wrote:
       | The greed is unlimited.
       | 
       | I can imagine some MBA whose job is to spend the day thinking:
       | how can I suck more money out of this without adding any real
       | value? This MBA is at every company now.
        
       | nine_k wrote:
       | It's not even an Adobe fault likely. It's Pantone's market
       | segmentation, AFAICT. "We don't want cheapskates who would ever
       | mind paying mere $21/mo for access to Pantone(tm) colors", they
       | could say. They want to deal with larger print shops / agencies,
       | and better monetize their chokehold on the industry-accepted
       | color-matching system.
       | 
       | This makes a niche for a more open, non-commercial color-matching
       | system for print. Which has few incentives to happen: print color
       | is hard, buy-in from paint producers is likely even harder.
       | 
       | For Web and other screen-only work, I suppose you don't need
       | Pantone.
        
         | [deleted]
        
         | fxtentacle wrote:
         | That niche is filled pretty nicely by Heidelberg. Their
         | printers come with their own color correction and matching
         | system. Plus they ship ICC profiles for accurate screen
         | preview.
        
         | traceroute66 wrote:
         | > This makes a niche for a more open, non-commercial color-
         | matching system for print.
         | 
         | Wikipedia tells me Pantone has been around since 1950, TL;DR if
         | open non-commercial was going to happen, it would have happened
         | already.
         | 
         | As you say, few incentives. Its harder than it looks, its not
         | just a case of someone randomly declaring FOO 123=CMYK XYZ.
         | Further, the whole supply chain is already well established
         | with Pantone.
        
           | quitit wrote:
           | We have CIELAB for expressing colour in absolute form. This
           | could always be used to express an intended colour.
           | 
           | However you are correct Pantone is entrenched as it is based
           | on a simple set of formulas for easy mixing by print shops,
           | this is also cemented into various systems that take premixed
           | pantones directly (eg HP Indigo). Pantone also extends into
           | neon and metallics where LAB of course doesn't exist.
           | 
           | Declaring arbitrary CMYK or RGB values without including a
           | corresponding colour profile will produce inaccurate results
           | across different devices/output methods due to variation
           | (hence why we have colour profiles.)
           | 
           | This change will just likely lead to more colours being
           | specified as arbitrary rgb and cmyk values with accuracy be
           | damned, which is a trend of new style guides for the last few
           | years (also due the rise of trademarking colours).
        
             | ilyt wrote:
             | How you even define metallic paint in numbers ? Both shape
             | and type of particles can differ
        
               | cypress66 wrote:
               | Bit of a cheeky response but you could always encode the
               | BRDF with numbers.
        
             | aidenn0 wrote:
             | I know of at least one color lab that spent years and had
             | multiple really smart people trying to come up with a
             | closed-form solution for the color (both diffuse and
             | specular) given a {ink, illuminant, substrate} combination
             | and last I heard never succeeded. Without that, you are
             | limited to making giant tables, which is what PMS does and
             | it's only useful if everyone is using the same tables.
        
               | quitit wrote:
               | I think part of the reason is that beyond a certain scope
               | there is limited commercial desire for such levels of
               | exactness.
               | 
               | While companies will talk the talk about always needing
               | their brand colour represented perfectly. I've found very
               | few walk the talk. Presenting printing quotations with
               | PMS versus standard CMYK, they often compromise.
               | Presenting premiums or other production which isn't
               | print-based, suddenly they're happy to compromise rather
               | than organise a custom dip.
               | 
               | So while we have CIE as our solid reference, for cosmetic
               | representations, we probably don't need more beyond than
               | that commercially for the bulk of clients.
        
       | cultofmetatron wrote:
       | Theres really no reason these days not to get affinity products.
       | They are top quality and the price is really cheap for what you
       | get!
        
       | hairofadog wrote:
       | If Shakespeare had better lawyers we'd all be paying $7.99 per
       | user per month just to talk, or $9.99 for the pro version
        
         | jfengel wrote:
         | Shakespeare had no lawyers, and that's kinda why we ended up
         | with this system. Shakespeare's work was regularly published
         | without him getting a penny in royalties. He himself never got
         | anything for his plays except what his theater paid him.
         | 
         | The official Folio edition was published after he was dead. The
         | quarto editions made during his lifetime are riddled with
         | errors because they were made from people's memories of his
         | plays, not the manuscripts. The manuscripts were kept carefully
         | guarded, and the actors given only "sides" containing their own
         | lines to prevent them from running off and selling them.
         | 
         | Actually, Shakespeare did have lawyers; much of what we know
         | about him comes from legal documents. (Including lawsuits. He
         | was kind of a litigious bugger.) But he didn't have lawyers to
         | protect his works because there wasn't any such thing. And it
         | was precisely that which caused the copyright system to be
         | created.
        
           | burkaman wrote:
           | And yet despite the complete lack of copyright protections,
           | he was able to make quite a comfortable living and died with
           | a sizable estate, and his work survives to this day.
        
             | [deleted]
        
             | jfengel wrote:
             | Most of it. Several Shakespeare plays are lost. And many
             | more playwrights, without wealthy friends, are completely
             | lost. It would be fascinating to have Thomas Kyd's version
             | of Hamlet (likely Shakespeare's immediate source), or for
             | that matter Kyd's precursor to The Spanish Tragedy. Kyd
             | was, at the time, more popular than Shakespeare.
        
           | M2Ys4U wrote:
           | >Shakespeare had no lawyers, and that's kinda why we ended up
           | with this system.
           | 
           | lol, no. Copyright was invented primarily as a censorship
           | tool, and secondly to enrich _publishers_ rather than
           | authors.
        
             | such12 wrote:
             | In Europe maybe, but not in the US.
        
             | such12 wrote:
             | Is there some historical evidence of this?
        
               | saurik wrote:
               | FWIW, the most obvious Google search found this within a
               | few seconds:
               | 
               | https://www.techdirt.com/2010/08/11/the-cycle-of-
               | copyright-o...
               | 
               | Which references this:
               | 
               | http://web.archive.org/web/20110616151937/http://www.tele
               | rea...
               | 
               | As its source for this:
               | 
               | https://open-spaces.com/articles/the-purpose-of-
               | copyright/
               | 
               | Where we find an explanation:
               | 
               | > In 1557, the desires of the booksellers and the desires
               | of the crown coincided. The crown perceived the need to
               | gain greater control over "the dangerous possibilities of
               | the printed word" and so granted a royal charter to the
               | Stationers' Company that limited most printing to only
               | members of the company. This charter also empowered the
               | company to search out and destroy "unlawful" books, which
               | gave the guild the public enforcement mechanism for its
               | private law. If a nonmember was printing a work that had
               | been registered with the company by a member, the
               | nonmember could now be stopped. It also meant that if a
               | work which was disagreeable to the crown was being
               | published, it too could be stopped. This arrangement
               | provided the crown with added policemen to enforce its
               | goal to control printed works. Censorship was born.
               | 
               | But like, once I found that, I immediately realized that
               | we can just look at Wikipedia.
               | 
               | https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_copyright
               | 
               | > The origin of copyright law in most European countries
               | lies in efforts by the church and governments to regulate
               | and control the output of printers.[9] Before the
               | invention of the printing press, a writing, once created,
               | could only be physically multiplied by the highly
               | laborious and error-prone process of manual copying by
               | scribes. An elaborate system of censorship and control
               | over scribes did not exist, as scribes were scattered and
               | worked on single manuscripts.[10] Printing allowed for
               | multiple exact copies of a work, leading to a more rapid
               | and widespread circulation of ideas and information (see
               | print culture).[9] In 1559 the Index Expurgatorius, or
               | List of Prohibited Books, was issued for the first
               | time.[10]
               | 
               | Which cites:
               | 
               | [9]: MacQueen, Hector L; Charlotte Waelde; Graeme T
               | Laurie (2007). Contemporary Intellectual Property: Law
               | and Policy. Oxford University Press. p. 34. ISBN
               | 978-0-19-926339-4.
               | 
               | https://www.google.com/books?id=_Iwcn4pT0OoC&dq=contempor
               | ary...
               | 
               | [10]: de Sola Pool, Ithiel (1983). Technologies of
               | freedom. Harvard University Press. p. 14. ISBN
               | 978-0-674-87233-2.
               | 
               | https://books.google.com/books?id=BzLXGUxV4CkC&q=Areopagi
               | tic...
               | 
               | There is another, much more detailed paragraph, which
               | starts a bit later with:
               | 
               | > As the "menace" of printing spread, governments
               | established centralized control mechanisms,[16] and in
               | 1557 the English Crown thought to stem the flow of
               | seditious and heretical books by chartering the
               | Stationers' Company. The right to print was limited to
               | the members of that guild, and thirty years later the
               | Star Chamber was chartered to curtail the "greate
               | enormities and abuses" of "dyvers contentyous and
               | disorderlye persons professinge the arte or mystere of
               | pryntinge or selling of books." The right to print was
               | restricted to two universities and to the 21 existing
               | printers in the city of London, which had 53 printing
               | presses. The French crown also repressed printing, and
               | printer Etienne Dolet was burned at the stake in 1546.
               | 
               | Citing a different page of the same source as 10:
               | 
               | [16]: de Sola Pool, Ithiel (1983). Technologies of
               | freedom. Harvard University Press. p. 15. ISBN
               | 978-0-674-87233-2.
               | 
               | https://archive.org/details/technologiesoffr00ithi/page/1
               | 5
        
               | such12 wrote:
               | Very helpful. So it's reasonable to concede that in
               | Europe, and only in Europe, the origin of copyright was
               | in censorship and the protection of profits for
               | publishers.
               | 
               | However, the US is an entirely different story. Turning
               | the page on your preferred source:
               | 
               | [16]: de Sola Pool, Ithiel (1983). Technologies of
               | freedom. Harvard University Press. p. 15. ISBN
               | 978-0-674-87233-2. https://archive.org/details/technologi
               | esoffr00ithi/page/15
               | 
               | We see the following:
               | 
               | American legislators and courts rejected these three
               | abuses which publishing had suffered in their country of
               | origin: licensing of the press, special taxes on the
               | press, and prosecution for criminal libel.
               | 
               | The unconstitutionality of licensing, which the American
               | courts referred to as "previous" or "prior restraint,"
               | was decided as early as 1825. The tradition against
               | special taxes on the press, which British protestors such
               | as Richard Cobden called "taxes on knowledge," was
               | reaffirmed by the Supreme Court in 1936 And the
               | prohibition against criminal libel suits became an
               | American tradition in the 1735 trial of Peter Zenger,
               | accused of libeling the governor of New York.
               | 
               | The colonial jury, disregarding the judge's instructions
               | on the law, acquitted Zenger and thus made the law. Since
               | 1964, libel suits brought by public officials or public
               | figures against their critics, even when brought in their
               | own capacity and not by the state, have been greatly
               | restricted by the courts.
               | 
               | The colonists' rejection of the various British attempts
               | to impose government authority over the press were
               | incorporated into the American Constitution by the First
               | Amendment. This amendment creates a domain- of speech,
               | religion, and press in which the activities of private
               | citizens shall be unregulated by government. "Con-gress,"
               | it says, "shall make no law ... abridging freedom of
               | speech or of the press."
               | 
               | But the First Amendment is just one of three clauses in
               | the Constitution that deal specifically with
               | communications. Another is the copyright provision in
               | Article 1, Section 8: "Congress shall have the power ...
               | _To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by
               | securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the
               | exclusive Right to their respective Writings and
               | Discoveries._ " In Britain the practice of copyright,
               | though not the word, began at the founding of the
               | Stationers' Company when, for enforcement, the company
               | was given the right to search for and seize anything
               | printed contrary to statute or proclamation. Eight years
               | later the company, under this power, created a system of
               | copyright for its members. In 1709 the first copyright
               | act for authors was passed by Parliament. The new notion
               | of intellectual property represented by copyright was
               | rooted in the technology of print. The printing press was
               | a bottleneck where copies could be examined and
               | controlled. In the passage from the author's pen to the
               | reader's hand, the press was the logical place to apply
               | controls, be it to censor sacrilege or sedition or to
               | protect the author's intellectual property.
               | 
               | For modes of reproduction where such an easy locus of
               | control as the printing press did not exist, the concept
               | of copyright was not ap-plied. It was not applied to
               | conversation, or to speeches, or to the singing of songs
               | whether in private or in public. Copyright was a specific
               | adaption to a specific technology. The common law
               | recognized this fact. The landmark case in the United
               | States denied copyright protection to piano rolls because
               | they were not "writings" in a tangible form readable by a
               | human being.
               | 
               | This concept of copyright excluded from protection many
               | new technologies of communi-cation. But the motion
               | picture industry, the recording industry, and more
               | recently the broadcasting industry have all persuaded
               | Congress to give them the protection that the courts
               | proved unwilling to give.
               | 
               | The third provision in the Constitution dealing with
               | communications gives Congress the power "To establish
               | Post Offices and post Roads. 23 This provision put the
               | federal government into the common carrier business. Only
               | one of today's carrier systems then ex-isted, the mails.
               | A post office had been permanently established in Britain
               | in 1656 and in the colonies in 1711.
               | 
               | Before that, the crown had farmed out grants and patents
               | to private entrepreneurs to carry government
               | correspondence. To make these franchises attractive, the
               | franchisees were also allowed to carry letters for the
               | general public for a fee, and others were forbidden to
               | compete with the chosen carriers in doing so. This scheme
               | for providing government with cheap communication was the
               | origin of the postal monopoly. When governments started
               | carrying the mails themselves, the monopoly principle was
               | further reinforced.
               | 
               | After American independence, the fiscal tradition of the
               | post as a source of revenue was retained, and so was the
               | practice of monop-oly. In the 1820s the balance of public
               | policy shifted from one of subordinating the post office
               | to the treasury department as a producer of revenue, to
               | promoting it to a full-fledged department of government,
               | consecrated above all to extending the benefits of
               | development to remote parts of the country at a rapid
               | pace. _Still another important as well as expensive
               | social goal pursued through the post office in the
               | nineteenth century was the diffusion of knowledge._
               | 
               | Newspapers, and later books and magazines, were given
               | large subsidies in mail rates. The constitutional
               | injunctions to the federal government with regard to
               | communications were thus in appearance somewhat contra-
               | dictory, though in fact their goals were quite
               | consistent. In one clause the government was told to keep
               | its legislative hands off of speech and press, while in
               | two others it was told to promote the conveyance of
               | knowledge by means of copyright and postal service. _But
               | both the injunctions to restraint and the injunction to
               | governmental activism had the common goal of facilitating
               | autonomous communication by private individuals._
        
               | nashashmi wrote:
               | Take every rant with lots of salt (unless it is labeled
               | as a rant).
               | 
               | (Edit: Jest removed in favor of discussion)
        
               | such12 wrote:
               | It seems like your goal here is to deliberately prevent
               | curious inquiry.
        
               | jfengel wrote:
               | [Ignore this post; not who I intended it to address.
               | Leaving it for context.]
               | 
               | No, his goal is to point out that you've failed to engage
               | in any.
        
               | such12 wrote:
               | You honestly don't believe there could be historical
               | information about how _a law_ came into being?
        
               | nashashmi wrote:
               | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Index_Librorum_Prohibitorum
               | ?wp...
               | 
               | "Modern copyright law has been influenced by an array of
               | older legal rights that have been recognized throughout
               | history, including the moral rights of the author who
               | created a work, the economic rights of a benefactor who
               | paid to have a copy made, the property rights of the
               | individual owner of a copy, and a sovereign's right to
               | censor and to regulate the printing industry. The origins
               | of some of these rights can be traced back to ancient
               | Greek culture, ancient Jewish law, and ancient Roman law.
               | In Greek society, during the sixth century B.C.E., there
               | emerged the notion of the individual self, including
               | personal ideals, ambition, and creativity. The individual
               | self is important in copyright because it distinguishes
               | the creativity produced by an individual from the rest of
               | society.[citation needed] In ancient Jewish Talmudic law
               | there can be found recognition of the moral rights of the
               | author and the economic or property rights of an author."
        
               | such12 wrote:
               | Very helpful - also contradicts the claim of the person I
               | originally asked the question of.
        
               | jfengel wrote:
               | Whoops; I apologize. I thought you were the OP. I was
               | replying to the wrong person.
        
               | M2Ys4U wrote:
               | The Licensing of the Press Act 1662, entitled "An Act for
               | preventing the frequent Abuses in printing seditious
               | treasonable and unlicensed Books and Pamphlets and for
               | regulating of Printing and Printing Presses",[0] gave the
               | Stationers' Company a monopoly on printing - only people
               | licensed by the Company could operate printing presses,
               | and similarly nobody was allowed to _sell_ books unless
               | licensed. The Company also had the power, under its royal
               | charter, to make regulations about printing, effectively
               | creating a private system of copyright controlled by the
               | Company.
               | 
               | The Licensing of the Press Act 1662 had to be continually
               | renewed, but eventually it lapsed in 1692. Publishers
               | lobbied hard for the act to be reinstated but all
               | attempts failed to pass through the House of Commons.
               | 
               | It wasn't until 1710 that authors gained a time-limited
               | exclusive statutory right to control the printing of
               | their books (and only books), with what would be the
               | first "modern" public copyright law in the Copyright Act
               | 1710 (also known as the Statute of Anne), and naturally
               | this right was exploited by publishers (just as it is
               | today) who refused to publish without acquiring the
               | rights along with the manuscript.
               | 
               | [0] https://www.british-history.ac.uk/statutes-
               | realm/vol5/pp428-...
        
               | such12 wrote:
               | Very helpful history, thank you, however it contradicts
               | your claim.
        
         | marginalia_nu wrote:
         | Later, when Oracle acquires Shakespeare, you'd be billed not by
         | how many words you use, but how many people hear or read your
         | words. If they mishear your words, you're double billed because
         | otherwise they're getting words for free.
        
         | D13Fd wrote:
         | I agree completely. But don't blame the lawyers -- that's like
         | blaming guns for the war in Ukraine. Blame the companies that
         | lobby for the laws and treaties that set these kinds of IP
         | protection, and then use those laws to come after people who
         | actually try to create something.
        
           | mandmandam wrote:
           | Sir, lawyers identify the possibly loopholes to lobby into,
           | write the laws that are lobbied, and work the loopholes that
           | exist.
           | 
           | They are 100% culpable at every step. They do it for money,
           | and the broad culture is one of scoffing at ethics or
           | honesty, which are seen as weaknesses.
           | 
           | Guns aren't conscious. Lawyers are (at least on some level).
        
             | bawolff wrote:
             | You could probably say the same thing about computer
             | programmers. They write algorithms with questionable
             | outcomes. There is a culture that generally scoffs at
             | ethical questions (at least in some segments).
             | 
             | But i dont think you will see that here, because we are
             | programmers and lawyers are the other.
        
             | D13Fd wrote:
             | There are lawyers on both sides, fighting each other.
             | That's how the system works. The winner is largely
             | determined by the laws. The laws are set by legislators,
             | and those legislators are heavily influenced by
             | corporations.
             | 
             | The lawyers aren't the ones deciding what the laws are.
        
               | mandmandam wrote:
               | > The lawyers aren't the ones deciding what the laws are.
               | 
               | Lol. As you say, the wealthy decide the laws, and the
               | lawyers write them. The vast majority of lawyers work for
               | whoever pays them the most.
               | 
               | In today's world, in today's system, that's generally
               | whoever can fuck over the most people, or extract the
               | most from nature while externalizing the cost, and get
               | away with it. Almost by definition, the wealthiest are
               | the literal worst. Public defenders get paid beans, and
               | are overworked with no respect, while fossil fuel and
               | banker's lawyers live in mansions with a fraction of the
               | effort.
               | 
               | Damn near every aspect of our society and the world we
               | live in has been tainted by this.
               | 
               | Environmental groups don't have the funds that Exxon do,
               | and the response to oil spills and climate change
               | reflects this. Look at Donziger. Look at Deepwater
               | Horizon.
               | 
               | Peace groups don't have the funds Raytheon do, and the
               | response to people like Assange and Snowden reflects
               | that.
               | 
               | Poor people and groups who advocate for them don't have
               | the funds available that the .01% do. Our tax code and
               | social supports reflect this fact in ten thousand ways,
               | each grotesque.
               | 
               | And in all of this, the lawyers are culpable. They work
               | to attack the peaceniks, the whistleblowers, the tax
               | reformists, the journalists seeking accountability. They
               | sue for libel, they make shit up and make it stick, they
               | find the obscure laws and loopholes, they stack the
               | court, stack the deck, all for a tiny portion of the
               | wealth 'saved' for the yacht class.
               | 
               | Lawyers enable a rather unimaginable amount of evil by
               | doing these things. I don't understand how the fact
               | they're told to do this by the evil corporations paying
               | them obscene amounts to enable their evil acts absolves
               | them of anything - can you explain it to me?
        
               | bawolff wrote:
               | > The vast majority of lawyers work for whoever pays them
               | the most.
               | 
               | Unlike the rest of us?
               | 
               | Seems like the real issue you have is capitalism not
               | lawyers. Capitalism allows rich people to hire skilled
               | workers to do their bidding. I don't see what lawyers as
               | a class of people, have to do with that. Some work for
               | ethically questionable rich people, some dont. How does
               | that set them apart from say accountants, corporate
               | strategists, etc?
        
         | pc86 wrote:
         | Not everyone has the right software for pro.
        
         | pessimizer wrote:
         | I learned recently that if this were actually how language
         | worked, Chomsky would be living off of "counterintuitive."
        
         | matthewmacleod wrote:
         | One of the first things he did was kill all the lawyers.
        
       | nayuki wrote:
       | Some additional info linked in the Twitter thread:
       | https://www.printweek.com/features/article/colour-confusion
        
       | User23 wrote:
       | It's interesting that they mangle the file. I can see how pantone
       | might be able to control licensing the interpreting and display
       | of the colors, but surely they can't legally prevent the storage
       | of a simple numeric code.
        
       | philjohn wrote:
       | Sounds like Adobe decided they could save some $$$ and make a
       | bigger profit not renewing the Pantone license, and instead force
       | people to pay extra, and cream a % off the top of those monthly
       | fees.
        
         | moolcool wrote:
         | The future promised by the Windows XP era was so optimistic.
         | Multimedia editing was truly becoming mainstream and
         | democratized, and the future for independently created media
         | was bright. "If this is what iMovie and Windows Movie Maker can
         | do, what does the future hold?"
         | 
         | Now we're talking about making colours DLC for Photoshop.
        
           | ghaff wrote:
           | I'd say it's pretty amazing. You can shoot very credible
           | video and pics on a phone. And basically pro-level stuff
           | using gear that's incredibly cheap by historical standards.
           | Lots of good inexpensive editors out there. You can even use
           | Gimp and Blender which are IMO a bit rough relative to
           | commercial options but I have colleagues who create amazing
           | work with them.
        
         | petesergeant wrote:
         | Taking a different side on that, Adobe decided that the small
         | number of professional users who really need Pantone colours
         | shouldn't be subsidised by those who do not.
        
           | torstenvl wrote:
           | If this decision was driven by concern about the median
           | customer paying more than their fair share, there would be a
           | corresponding reduction in price. Has there been?
        
             | cpach wrote:
             | That's not how market works.
             | 
             | The price of Adobe Creative Suite isn't based on cost, it's
             | an attempt to reflect the _value_ of the product.
             | 
             | For me, an amateur with very basic image editing needs, it
             | would be silly to pay $250+/year for using Photoshop. So
             | instead, I use Acorn, which is $40. One-time fee.
             | 
             | And if you want a FOSS alternative, there's always Gimp
             | and/or Krita. No payment required at all.
             | 
             | It's not as if people are forced to buy Adobe. I'd say the
             | market works just fine here.
        
               | tough wrote:
               | Is not like you were not able to pirate photoshop 20y
               | ago, or just now.
        
               | [deleted]
        
               | torstenvl wrote:
               | I think you're confused about the conversation that's
               | being had.
               | 
               | Nobody is suggesting (reduction in production costs) -
               | (reduction in median consumer price)
               | 
               | We are only suggesting (reduction in production costs _as
               | a way to reduce median consumer price_ ) - (reduction in
               | median consumer price)
               | 
               | If there was no reduction in median consumer price, then,
               | contrary to GGP's position, it is fair to conclude that
               | it's not part of Adobe's intent.
        
             | wongarsu wrote:
             | Classic shrinkflation. Normally Adobe would raise prices
             | due to inflation, but they decided that cutting costly
             | features and keeping the price the same is received better
             | by the market.
        
             | petesergeant wrote:
             | > If this decision was driven by concern about the median
             | customer paying more than their fair share, there would be
             | a corresponding reduction in price
             | 
             | That's not a logically sound. Adobe may have decided they
             | can only continue to support the current price-point by
             | reducing costs, for example.
        
               | [deleted]
        
           | richbell wrote:
           | I'm sure Adobe will announce price reductions any day now.
           | 
           | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mnrMhbWG0Pc
        
           | madsbuch wrote:
           | Do you have a source for this price reduction after november?
        
             | petesergeant wrote:
             | Why do you think there will be a price reduction?
        
       | pxx wrote:
       | Why is everybody insisting that the lookup table isn't 1:1? Can't
       | you do a reverse mapping of "closest Pantone color to this CMYK"?
       | There are only thousands of Pantone colors and as many CMYKs as
       | you have bit resolution. So if you know your file previously used
       | Pantone colors, you can have it in a "preview" mode with CMYK and
       | then a "production" mode where you convert it back.
       | 
       | I am not a lawyer, but I don't see how the process of reverse-
       | engineering a map is copyrightable. Sure, I might not sell a tool
       | to convert to/from Pantone colors in Illustrator files as Adobe
       | (who might want continuous business and/or a bite at the revenue
       | apple), but somebody else can certainly fill this space. The only
       | problem is that the names of the colors themselves are probably
       | trademarked, but that's not a copyright problem, and the
       | utilization of another's trademark to identify a good seems
       | within typical fair use.
        
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