Quote:
Originally Posted by Krystian Galaj
. If "Rozenkrantz and Guildenstern" were created not long after "Hamlet", and Shakespeare chose to act on his copyright, would it be good for the world? How many such works are not created today for fear of paying legal fees? The loss is immeasurable  |
He didn't have a copyright, the statute of Anne wasn't till 1709, a good thing too since Shakespeare freely borrowed form past works and his contemporaries like Christopher Marlowe. Modern copyright laws would have pretty much stopped him dead the same way they would have stopped Disney.
The problem here is people who've decided copyright existis for them to have money and control. They call anyone who believes different greedy a thief a freeloader. They care about money, and hey money is good. I like money I wish I had more of it but do you know what else I like? Seeing Shakespeare in the park, Going to the art museum and since those old masters aren't covered by copyright I like that I can find a photo of them if i can't afford to go where they are. I like that I could paint my own version that i can change the colors and could make the Mona Lisa a black woman, that I could write a story about the painting and I can format the text to resemble the painting and that's the part that really matters, I can draw anything i want from that iconic symbol and use it to make something new and then the next person can add to my changes and build make expand to the limits of human imagination.
Now some people here on mobileread will give you the speech from Wall Street about greed being good, about having a right to be paid, about what's being taken from them, but never about what they're taking, to use their word, what they are
stealing. They don't pay a fee to maintain their copyrights, there's no property tax for it, no estate tax. This bunch of
freeloaders just expect the world to hand it to them and we obliged them, we said you starving artists don't worry about it up front. We'll ofer you a bit of a carrot go make something, have fun maybe get lucky make a few dollars and in a few years let go so someone else can have a turn. You took a penny now leave a penny.
To all of you I say you do not own culture you will never own it. The world has paid for everything you used to make what you make and YOU OWE THEM, not the other way around.