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I am deeply unenthusiastic about Government ownership of copyrights--.
It's already damn near impossible to fight your way through Freedom of Information obstacles (Freedom from information!) to get you hands on something which the taxpayer paid for the the first place.
And the costs can ber staggering.
Like hundreds of bucks for a copy of a 40-page file. If they condescend to let you have it, which you can't bank on.
Cure worse than the disease, methinks. Sir Humphrey Appleby would love it though. Think of ther regiments of bureaucrats you'd need to run the show. Like the soviet union in the 50s, where information was state owned.
Life plus 50 sounds okay to me, but frankly I think a straight period would be simpler. 75 years from date of publication, biblical 3 score years and 10, plus five for the hell of it.
Or death, whichever is longer.
Which takes us back to 1937 I think.
Can't be too many authors who were actively publishing before 1937, and who are still enjoying royalties from sales.
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