Quote:
Originally Posted by pdurrant
Harm to the public is not just from works becoming unavailable. The public is harmed by the monopoly causing higher prices. The public is harmed by derivative works being more expensive or forbidden, and by the chilling effect of the possibility of being sued for unintentional infringement.
Copyright is a monopoly. It's there for a good reason (to encourage people to create works) but it should be the minimum length that achieves that goal. IMO it is currently enormously longer than necessary. And retaining a monopoly longer than necessary harms the public almost by definition.
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I don't disagree with that, though I will say that the US fair use exceptions takes care of some of those concerns. My major point is that it's tough to explain to someone why life plus 50 is good, but life plus 70 is bad.