Quote:
Originally Posted by pwalker8
That, of course, is your personal opinion of how it should be, though so far you haven't been able to articulate a rational for it other than because you say so.
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You not agreeing with my rationale is quite different from me not putting one forth. And I have done so, over and over again.
If I create wealth or property it is mine. Society may, through taxes, appropriate some of that wealth. But society doesn't just grab my property or put a limit to my ownership.
Intellectual property of the "non scarce type" should follow the same. Scarce types would be medicines, mechanics and the like where there is only going to be so many viable solutions. Therefore, patents have reasonable time limits such that the inventor gets a monopoly for a time and society gets it afterward.
This only makes sense for those things where there is scarcity.
There is no scarcity in fiction. There is never a time when society should own Mickey Mouse. Anybody can create their own cartoon mouse.
Giving Mickey Mouse to society is no different at all than a government deciding to take ownership of oil or banking or any other commercial concern.
At least with "imminent domain" the government makes a case that a particular piece of private property is so important for another use (like a highway or railroad or commercial development).
Location, location, location. There is no such thing as "society needing to own Mickey Mouse to build a free way".
It is to society's benefit to not have books just disappear. Therefore, in Lee's Rules of How Things Should Be - non-economically active works should, after a time, fall into the public domain. So someday you'd be able to write a HR Puffinstuff story, but you're probably never going to be able to write your own Harry Potter book without securing rights.
Money your kids inherit from you doesn't disappear 20 years after you are dead. Do well enough, and generations of your progeny can benefit from your money...as well as any charities YOU direct the money towards.
Don't like it? Use taxes like the inheritance tax to grab that money for society rather than treating an author's work as somehow less worth than a farmer's work.
Desiring the time to come when a book you like falls into public domain so you can get a free copy is no different than waiting for a coup to occur to take away your neighbor's Sugar cane farm "for society"