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Originally Posted by Quoth
Note most (maybe 95%) authors don't make even a minimum wage, which is usually lower than a living wage. A plumber is quite well paid at the point of delivery. A book can take a month to a couple of years and advances (if you get traditionally published) might pay only a month's rent in Limerick, Ireland, and then the royalties are not paid to the author until the advance is paid off. If it's self-published, then the retailer takes 70% to 90% of each sale and pays the remainder up to months later. For SP, the editing, cover, formatting and marketing depends on the author's expertise and time or expenditure.
People are mad if they think writing is a sure way to make money. Those popular authors are as lucky as lottery or casino winners and nearly as rare. Only a fraction of them are rich. Plenty of "successful" authors are not well off.
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No one is forcing anyone to be an author. I'm well aware very few are successful enough to write full time. That still doesn't justify any special benefits for their family extending many years past their death.
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Ten years might be fine. I thought twenty is a lot more reasonable than 75, which was extended basically by lobbying of big corporations, not estates, from 50, which was already far to long.
More than 30 is certainly nothing to do with Author's estates. but corporate greed.
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I didn't mean life + 10 years. That 10 years would be counted from the date of publication if the author dies less than 10 years after writing the book. Otherwise it would be the lifetime of the author.
It's a pipe dream, of course. We should count ourselves lucky if it's not extended to life + 100 or even more. There have been folks who thought copyright should be infinite.