Galileo achieved his great fame as the father of modern science, often promise women at local taverns he would name stars and planets after them. The mathematician, scientist, philosopher, and all-around know-it-all made waves when he supported the theories of nut job Nicolaus Copernicus, claiming the Earth revolved around the Sun rather than the other way around. The Catholic Church charged Galileo with heresy for his beliefs, but let him off easy cause of his age, punished with house arrest for the remainder of his life. But Galileo had the last laugh. Almost 350 years later, Pope John Paul II admitted Galileo might have been right.

William Stepp from Against Monopoly has an interesting take on the Wall Street Journal article I just wrote about.  Responding to movie companies flooding the market with too many movies, Stepp cites economist Arnold Plant 1934 article on “The Economic Aspects of Copyright in Books.”  He explains that because of the monopolies granted by copyrights, publishers make excessive amounts of money off a few blockbusters, which they use to fund a long string of duds no one wants to read.

Julio Cole tackles this issue in “Controversy: Would the Absence of Copyright Laws Significantly Affect the Quality and Quantity of Literary Output?” In the paper, Cole recognizes the lottery aspect of publisher, but criticizes copyrights for increasing the payout of larger titles, distorting the marketplace.

Movie companies seem to think if they make it, we will come. Unfortunately, they’re making too many movies with too few ways to see them.  The Wall Street Journal writes how movie companies are flooding theaters with more new releases than audiences can handle. Almost every weekend this summer from April through July features a major blockbuster, leaving many with disappointing and embarrassing box office returns.

The Wall Street Journal ignores, however, the potential movie companies are squandering.  There are more avenues to release content and make money than ever before, but movie companies are focused on obsolete business models built around weekend box offices and distance DVD releases.  Not every movie has to be released in movie theaters. There’s online downloads, streaming services, direct-to-DVD, etc. giving any movie maker a huge audience to market to.

Digital distribution allows for more content to reach more people. You’re not taking up limited number of theaters or shelf space in a DVD store, so more content can be offered.  Unfortunately, Hollywood remains focused on a box office mentality, meaning it would rather lose money a $60 million George Clooney film rather than use technology to make more money.

Comcast announced 250 gigabyte caps per month on all its customers.  While the cap is much higher than Time Warner’s 5 gig cap and more than 99 percent of its subscribers use, the precedent is scary for all interest users.

Much of internet innovation has unlimited usage to thank.  Web video, VOIP, online video games, and more have enjoyed years of breathing room to enter people’s homes.  With bandwidth caps, however high, every YouTube video comes with a price tag.

Comcast technically has a right to limit its network. The problem is a lack real competition.  I could only get Comcast in my last apartment. In my new apartment, I can choose between content filtering and slower AT&T DSL or Comcast. No other company is allowed in my building. So Comcast gets away with bandwidth caps. Time Warner gets away with it.  And the tiny few remaining cable providers get away with it too.  It’s a competition to taking away value from customers, not adding value.

Further, should Comcast and Time Warner want customers using more bandwidth? That would make us more reliant on their services. Already I’d pay a premium for speed (if I could find a place that offered FIOS) and as more people find use in online video and services, more people will want faster speeds with more bandwidth. Instead, Comcast wants to offer you less, charge you the same, and ignore the future. Never a good business strategy, unless you have no competition.

Before we could convince our parents to buy us those awfully violent comic books, fairy tales dominated bed time reading. Thanks to the creative genius of Hans Christian Andersen and the Brothers Grimm, children around the world have had classic stories to read and see turned into Disney cartoons. The Grimm Brothers wrote “Cinderella,” “Snow White”, and “Rapunzel” around the same time as Andersen wrote “The Little Mermaid,” “Emperor’s New Clothes,” and “The Princess and the Pea.” Think where we’d be if Disney didn’t have these guys to copy and not pay royalties to.

The abacus and slide rule were good starts, but Wilhelm Schickard invented the first automatic calculator called the “Calculating Clock” in 1623. The Calculating Clock is basically the first, known computer and could perform basic arithmetic with user input. Sadly the Clock was not programmable, forcing geeks to wait until 1941 for a system to port Linux to.

Aside from being creepily prophetic, Jules Verne wrote some great novels. One of the fathers of science fiction, Verne is best known for classics like Journey into the Center of the Earth, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, and Around the World in Eighty Days. Verne introduced many fantastic concepts related to space travel, flight, and underwater travel all still a glimmer in the patent office’s eye. Verne also predicts the Apollo program with great accuracy, including the Florida location of its launch site. He also foresaw the invention of the helicopter, submarine, and jukebox which I can only attribute to witchcraft.

From Hercules to Ra, ancient mythology has dominated storytelling for most of human civilization, and today is no different. From the Lord of the Rings to Superman to Disney cartoons owe everything to Norse, Hebrew, and Greek mythology just to scratch the surface. Many stories, characters, monsters, and heroes adapted and stole from other mythologies (the Romans copied the Greek almost word for word) and writers continued to draw inspiration even to the present.

The invention of paper is credited to ancient China, as far back as the 2nd century. While earlier forms of paper-type material existed earlier, China’s developed paper from wood pulp still used today. Without China’s invention, where would we be - no books, comics, video game manuals. Letter writing on stone tablets would be slow, cumbersome, and unwieldy. The invention of paper, even in its early and expensive stages, improved communication (for writing), economy (with paper bills), and even health. China invented toilet paper in 6th century after relying for far too long on panda fur.

Dinosaurs rule and Jurassic Park brought them to life.  Steven Speilberg adapted Michael Crichton’s novel about an island amusement park filled with living dinosaurs cloned from a fossilized mosquito’s blood. The film unleashed eye-popping special effects in computers and robotics, bringing to the screen realistic fake things like never before.  This inspired many directors from Peter Jackson to James Cameron to George Lucas, all who went to push the technological envelope of film (though not all for the better).