My view is that it is unethical to carbon copy someone's work without crediting the author. I should hope that we all share this view.
And that was the point of my original comment. And there's evidence that this view is
not shared by (at least some of) the power players in the current film industry.
I'm
not arguing against the money flow of a film going to "big time composer inc." because they are a lot like the employer of a patent inventor.
But withholding attribution and creating a willfully false value creation narrative, it actively suppresses the future value of the employee composer. Very much like our time traveler has actively suppressed the future value of the real composer. Attribution also has value. As has the opportunity to compete.
I very much agree with you, that the money flowing the way it is, is defensible, not only bcause of the contract, but also since getting a score into a big time film is a lot more than just writing some notes. From relationship building to project management to subcontracting to marketing - it's not that dissimilar to actually having a final product on shelves created from a patented idea. So all the future money staying with the patent holding company company or the "big time composer inc." is fine in principle, since they are paying salary (assuming the salary is somewhat "fair" but that's a different can of worms).
However, I submit, that forcing attribution NDAs on employee generated IP is a willful act of worker and competitor suppression. It prevents competitors or customers from identifying (often up and coming) value creators in the full chain of value creation.
In that sense, future value suppressing attribution NDAs are quite similar to non-compete clauses. And non-compete clauses were perfectly fine and contractually done all the time all over the U.S. But lately, they are coming under all kinds of legislative and regulatory pressure, because maybe they are really mostly shitty worker suppression and actually a violation of basic human decency/rights, and the immoral behavior needs to be curtailed. And they hurt society more than they benefit.
My original intention was to use the opportunity of this thread to go beyond a mere theoretical thought exercise to highlight that some of the same shitty misbehavior by our imaginary time traveler is actively happening in current days - it's just wrapped into a (currently still legal) contractual NDA envelope. But legal doesn't mean moral and it may very well be illegal under a different system than the U.S. or in the future U.S.
And I generally agree that crime A(attribution) + crime B(money) seems worse than just crime A(attribution), so on that angle take the win in the argument.
But that was never my original point. I was summing up the misdeeds of the time traveller and (some of) the current "big time composer inc." behaviour into "future value suppression".
Both, the time traveller and the "big time composer inc." are suppressing the future value of the real creators. And if these attribution NDAs cut 10 years from an employee composer's more lucrative opportunities that can equate to quite a lot of money.
