Quote:
Originally Posted by pwalker8
Using the government to set the rules so that you make money is called rent seeking in economic terms. A whole lot of people do this, but it doesn't exactly make them noble. To a great extent, you are using the red herring argument. The issue isn't letting authors make money for their works, no one here has advocated abolishing copyright. The issue at hand is the extremely long copyright period that rich authors (Victor Hugo, who sired the Berne Convention was very wealthy) and corporations (i.e Disney) have pushed. Copyright is a bargain between society and artists, not a one way street. There has to be balance.
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Actually, the
thread is about
piracy--not the duration of copyright. The duration of copyright is a side-argument--a red herring, if you will, as well, as if the duration of the copyright somehow negates the rights that attorn to the author and publisher via copyright.
The discussion question about pirated works raised says nothing whatsoever, I believe, about those books being copyrighted 70 or 65 or
however many years ago. Thus, the discussion about whether or not authors and publishers have rights, and should be paid for their work, is directly relevant. The argument about whether or not copyright in the USA lasts too long is a different argument--unless we're going to conflate the two, to argue that
somehow, an opinion that copyright lasts too long confers upon the person so opining some right to
not pay authors and publishers? At what point does that "right" kick in? 5 years post-publishing? At what point does the author and publisher no longer deserve their money?
Hitch