Quote:
Originally Posted by mikeloeven
honestly there should be no copyright extension beyond the death of the author. that in and of it'sself is where the exploitation takes place. when a person dies their collective works should be remembered not kept in a corporate vault.
if i ever developed a book or piece of software i wouldn't want some faceless corporation to continue profiting after i died i would want that work distributed
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As you presumably know, if you write the software under the employ of that faceless corporation you have no choice, the copyright is theirs.
Software is quite a different beast to something like a novel. Software only stops evolving when there is no more demand for it (some may still use it, perhaps even for a long time, but very few new participants come to play). It is almost a living thing, it must constantly grow and adapt to survive - when development stops the end is not far away.
Whereas a novel is something that you can actually finish - indeed you are expected to finish, readers don't appreciate you coming back and constantly tweaking the story after they've read it. I think one of the reasons why I like writing is that it makes a very nice change to actually finish something (in software development I have a project that's been going for more than 20 years, and still with no end in sight).
Literature is more on topic for this forum, for obvious reasons. Copyright for literature has a purpose that would not be well served by stopping it at a person's death. That purpose is to provide incentive to artists - and after death, their estates - to make their work available. Publishing literature takes time, effort and money*. Estates may not bother to expend the cost of publishing an artist's work if there was no chance of having those costs recovered (it would be quicker, easier and cost nothing just to toss it in the trash). Publishers would start looking at an author's age and health before accepting works (they invest thousands to publish a book). Artists themselves may decide they are too old or ill to consider the cost of publication worthwhile. Copyright continuing after death can provide the incentive to make works available that might otherwise be lost.
* Publishing software also takes time, effort and money, but there are differences (for example: the iterative nature of software development) that make direct comparison less than ideal.