MobileRead Forums - View Single Post - Petition to reduce US copyright to 28 years

DarkScribe · 07-14-2012, 05:36 AM

I fail to grasp how a reduced copyright term is going to create advantage to individuals. Here in Australia we have tens, possibly hundreds of thousands of books that are in the public domain, but copyrighted in the US. How does that translate into an advantage for us? Does the fact that George Orwell's 1984 is not protected here, but is still under copyright in the US really make a difference? A formatted eBook version is still going to cost 99¢, regardless of its status.

I see a degree of resentment of copyright, but no valid argument as to why it should be reduced.

07-14-2012, 05:36 AM	#108
DarkScribe Apprentice Curmudgeon. Posts: 427 Karma: 3286968 Join Date: Apr 2011 Location: Runaway Bay, QLD, , Australia Device: Kindle DX Graphite, Touch, Paperwhite, Sony, and Nook.	I fail to grasp how a reduced copyright term is going to create advantage to individuals. Here in Australia we have tens, possibly hundreds of thousands of books that are in the public domain, but copyrighted in the US. How does that translate into an advantage for us? Does the fact that George Orwell's 1984 is not protected here, but is still under copyright in the US really make a difference? A formatted eBook version is still going to cost 99¢, regardless of its status. I see a degree of resentment of copyright, but no valid argument as to why it should be reduced.