08-28-2013, 03:21 PM | #16 | ||
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And even if it were true that you could access anything you like for free, that's not enough. For culture and society to flourish, you really need people to be able to remix, perform and sell works, and not just the original creator of those works. Consider how detrimental it would be if the estate of the next Shakespeare could prevent anyone else from ever reperforming or reimagining those plays? Finally, I underlined a bit of text in your quote above so I could ask a question: Do you actually think there are people that hold off from creating written works because copyright only gives them a monopoly for decades rather than hundreds or thousands of years? If the answer is "no", then perpetual copyright makes no sense; if a forever-copyright doesn't actually encourage more works, then it is worse than useless. Just to beat a dead horse, below is an excerpt from Adrian Hon's modest proposal for eternal copyright (here): Quote:
Last edited by Ninjalawyer; 08-28-2013 at 03:24 PM. |
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08-28-2013, 05:47 PM | #17 | |
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08-28-2013, 06:46 PM | #18 | |
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http://www.archives.gov/press/exhibits/dream-speech.pdf http://www.thekingcenter.org/archive...i-have-dream-2 Last edited by AnemicOak; 08-28-2013 at 06:50 PM. |
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08-28-2013, 07:02 PM | #19 | |
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08-28-2013, 08:36 PM | #20 | |
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Here are the most populous Life + 50 nations: China Indonesia Bangladesh Pakistan Japan Philippines Vietnam Ethiopia Egypt Iran I realize that the idea of the US harmonizing its laws with those of countries on the above list is a political loser. But, on copyright length, I'd be for it. |
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08-28-2013, 08:57 PM | #21 |
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I still like the idea of a renewable copyright. It keeps the corporations like Disney from constantly lobbying for longer copyrights (and isn't ironic based on how much of Disney's stuff is based on public domain works?) - and it allows those who really are profiting from the copyright to continue to do so.
I know there are problems with this style as well - those diligent King heirs would still be protecting their rights to the Dream speech - but it allows all those orphaned or "forgotten" works to drop out of copyright sooner. |
08-28-2013, 09:08 PM | #22 |
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How about if copyright could only be held by human persons? (With the exception of a trust in the case of an estate.)
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08-28-2013, 09:08 PM | #23 |
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I doubt that many people are worrying about how to provide for the grandchildren of their grandchildren.
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08-28-2013, 09:16 PM | #24 | |
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I could read a reference copy at a university library, spending dozens of hours there. But, selfish me, I would find that highly inconvenient. Within a year after The World Crisis goes out of copyright in the US (not that I'll live so long!), it will likely be available as a free eBook from Project Gutenberg or successor. There are lots of other award-winning mid-twentieth-century books that are unlikely to be available as corrected eBooks before copyright expires. Most of them I could get out of the main Philadelphia library, in paper. But not everyone lives near a big library. Mobileread is dedicated to the idea that there's an advantage to mobile reading, so all the post-1922 Pulitzer prize winners not available as eBooks should also count heavily against the current copyright length, regardless of whether they are still in print (some are, some are not). P.S. If I could afford it, which I cannot, I could also buy the Churchill set for a mere $448 plus shipping used: http://www.abebooks.com/servlet/Sear...c-_-ats-_-used Last edited by SteveEisenberg; 08-28-2013 at 09:40 PM. |
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08-28-2013, 10:30 PM | #25 | |
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08-29-2013, 10:14 AM | #26 | |||
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One example of a shortcoming of such a formula is that it only takes into account aggregate results. It is likely that for a number of popular authors, if they made $50,000 per book instead of $1,000,000 per book, they would be incented to write more, creating more "Welfare" to the world. A very, very short copyright would limit the amount of profit they could get from any one book, so they would be forced to continuously produce more books in order to make a living. But, would it be right for us to prematurely remove their revenue stream from a profitable book in order to (in effect) coerce them to be more prolific, even if it did create more value for the rest of us? I would argue no, even if it did create more value for society as a whole. All copyright terms are arbitrary in nature. You can argue that one term is "better" than another, but there isn't any that is uniformly better, and there will be winners and losers from any change. And the "best" length is entirely dependent on how you measure it. That's practically the definition of arbitrary. |
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08-29-2013, 11:03 AM | #27 |
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Just to throw in my 2 cents (why the heck not):
1) I see copyright and patents as very different things. US patents are screwed up and way too "conceptual" in many cases; not to get too deep into this side issue, I think patents should be short and there need to be strictly enforced rules about compulsory licensing of basic patents. 2) As for copyright length: for me life + 20 years seems adequate. That covers the creator and accounts for providing for any minor children, without giving an estate a stranglehold for decades. Newly published posthumous works should get a flat 20 years, but I'm sure that's a side issue for any but the most prolific and popular authors. 3) Eliminate corporate ownership of all copyrights, except in very narrowly defined work-for-hire situations. So, say, if I create a brochure for a company that can only ever be relevant to their needs, that's fine to assign full copyright as work for hire. However, if I create something that is not business-specific or dependent on the context of that business to function (Superman, Mickey Mouse, Teletubbies), the work-for-hire agreement should only have a limited duration license. Say, 10 years. If, after 10 years, the business wants to continue the license, they must renegotiate a new license for another 10 years. This can go on for the life of the (human) creator + 20 years. After that, neither the corporation or estate can claim copyright. 3) Obviously this gets slightly more complicated with joint creators (Superman) and if you throw in multiple collaborators in a work-for-hire/staff situation. But I think it would be time better spent adjudicating that than with Disney's lawyers going after preschools for painting their own Mickey Mouse on their classroom walls. Are these ideas and numbers arbitrary? Sure. But other than the concept that personal property is what I'm strong enough to take and keep others from taking from me (which, I hope, humanity has mostly progressed beyond) "personal property" --intellectual or otherwise-- is fairly arbitrary as a concept itself. Last edited by RHWright; 08-29-2013 at 11:05 AM. |
08-29-2013, 12:19 PM | #28 | |
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A hard copy book that sells more than 500 copies per year, sells more than the mean of hard copy books. For books that do not use POD printing, the average print run is under 5,000 copies. If your title is a fiction mass market, it has three weeks to prove itself in bookstores, before being returned. If it is a hardcover, it has one month to prove itself, before being returned. For non-fiction, unless the bookseller wants to convey depth of coverage, books have two months to prove themselves, before being returned. All of which is a round about way of saying that for the overwhelming majority of books, there is no revenue stream a year after it has been published. Amber |
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08-29-2013, 12:54 PM | #29 |
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Is that a roundabout way of saying that if an author writes a book that sells for more than a year, they don't deserve any more copyright protection, since they already sold more than average?
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08-29-2013, 12:56 PM | #30 |
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By the way, I would love for copyright to be based on some of the schemes that are discussed on MobileRead, e.g. 20 years with fee-based renewals. Still arbitrary, but it benefits me more.
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