Quote:
Originally Posted by HarryT
I don't like longer copyright terms as an individual, that goes without saying, but when you're talking about international commerce, parity in such things is important.
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Harry, thinking about what Ralph Sir Edward wrote, maybe there is a better answer to this than the one I first gave (other than agreeing with you, which might be better yet even though I'm not going to do it).
Here's the answer: TPP does not harmonize copyright terms between the US and previously Life + 50 countries until 71 years after the last author of a book published in 1977 has died. That means no full harmonization until well into the
22nd century. That's so far in the future as to be beyond any TPP objective and virtually meaningless.
Take the example of this 1924 novel which won the a 1925 Pulitzer prize, and which I hope to e-read one day:
So Big by Edna Ferber
Edna Ferber died on April 16, 1968.
In the UK, or another Life + 70 country -- like TPP signatory Singapore --
So Big passes into public domain on January 1, 2039. (NEXT DAY EDIT: On waking, I realize that, because of the
rule of the shorter term, I may have been mistaken about Singapore, and the UK, for this title. But I would still be correct for Life + 70 countries without the rule of the shorter term, and for titles with the same release year, and author death year, and first published outside the US. I will have to examine the TPP text for possible rule-of-the-shorter-term implications later and consider any responses to this post.)
But in the US, it passes into public domain at the end of the calendar year 95 years after publication -- midnight on December 31, 2019.* Because Ferber wrote young and lived long, this still-in-print book will remain in copyright for twenty years longer in Life + 70 countries without the rule of the shorter term than in the US.**
How does TPP change this? Not at all, because of this carefully worded Wikileaked sentence identical to
language from the 2004 US-Australia Free Trade Agreement:
Quote:
Each Party shall provide that, where the term of protection of a work (including a photographic work), performance, or phonogram is to be calculated:
(a) on the basis of the life of a natural person, the term shall be not less than the life of the author and 70 years after the author’s death
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Note the words I bolded. Because copyright of books published before 1978, is, by US law,
not usually calculated on the basis of the life of a person, but rather on length of time after publication, the US - Australia agreement to lengthen copyright only applied to Australia! No harmonization with the US there. TPP has the same disgraceful language which exempts just one country -- the United States.
Want to wait until the official text comes out? That's fine. I predict Wikileaks has it right.
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* Ralph Sir Edward might say this is just theoretical, since US law will, he thinks, change before our next public domain day. I'm basing this post on the idea that won't happen.
** For most major-publisher authors, whose book was first released between 1923 and 1977, and died shortly after publication, the effect goes the other way -- in those cases, US copyright is longer.