How Long Should Copyright Last?

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by HamsterRage

No it's not. It's an artificial construct, a play on words really, designed to make it less ridiculous to assert "ownership" over ideas.

An "idea" is not intellectual property, and is not protected by law.

[Sweetpea]

Originally Posted by tubemonkey

That's correct. Whoever holds the copyright gets to collect the profits.

Should a company like Disney go into public domain 70 years after the death of Roy Disney? He and his brother (Walt) built this company up and turned it into a valuable piece of property. Why should their work be allowed to be passed on forever and an author's work not?

Like I said, I make no distinction between physical and intellectual property.

The right shouldn't belong to the person, but to the company. If it doesn't, they're stupid. The company lives on, even if the person dies. Once the company dies, the copyright should die with it.


My vote goes for 10-20 years with the option of renewal. Though, I would make it a bit longer than 20 years, let's say 40 (the average working life or a person), with an option of renewal of another 30. But only by the original writer, not his or her heirs. That means that a book will most likely last at least the lifetime of the writer, and not much further.

[gmw]

I chose 50+ years for want of a better option. I think copyright should extend at least for the life of the author. Beyond that I'm open to argument, but inclined toward something between 20 and 50 years - BUT only with respect to items that were have previously been published (formally made available to the public). Anything that has not been published should maintain copyright in perpetuity ...

I do think that special provisions for orphaned items is appropriate - but by this I mean items for which there is no identifiable owner (not simply that the owner has been unable to find a publisher that will publish the works). I'd say 20 years from the death/termination of the last identifiable owner would be a suitable protection in such cases.

[astra]

As long as the creator or their spouse lives.

[HamsterRage]

Originally Posted by HarryT

An "idea" is not intellectual property, and is not protected by law.

OK. I was trying to distill my thought down into one tiny little nugget to get my point across, and my first response to that response was, "Well, I can concede that point even though I think it's just being nitpicky". But upon reflection, I'm going to stand behind it 100%. We're talking about ideas here. Sure, they may be long, complicated ideas, and they may be expressed as music, writing, performance, software or whatever, but it's still the idea itself - and the ability to profit from it - that people are talking about when they mention IP.

So, since my attempt a brevity to make my point failed, I'll try quoting from Wikipedia:

Free Software Foundation founder Richard Stallman argues that, although the term intellectual property is in wide use, it should be rejected altogether, because it "systematically distorts and confuses these issues, and its use was and is promoted by those who gain from this confusion." He claims that the term "operates as a catch-all to lump together disparate laws [which] originated separately, evolved differently, cover different activities, have different rules, and raise different public policy issues" and that it creates a "bias" by confusing these monopolies with ownership of limited physical things, likening them to "property rights".[16] Stallman advocates referring to copyrights, patents and trademarks in the singular and warns against abstracting disparate laws into a collective term.

That says it better than I ever could. The bolding is mine, just to emphasize the point that I was originally trying to make.

And, BTW, I think quoting Wikipedia in a debate about the value of copyright as it pertains to the encouragement of the creation of new content and the enrichment of our society makes a point, too.

[avantman42]

Originally Posted by HamsterRage

And, BTW, I think quoting Wikipedia in a debate about the value of copyright as it pertains to the encouragement of the creation of new content and the enrichment of our society makes a point, too.

It's also worth noting that Wikipedia's content is protected by copyright. The authors grant a licence to the public to copy that content, as long as they obey certain conditions.

I am sure that some of those authors wouldn't make their work available if they weren't able to impose those conditions. Copyright isn't always about money.

[Andrew H.]

Originally Posted by HamsterRage

No it's not. It's an artificial construct, a play on words really, designed to make it less ridiculous to assert "ownership" over ideas.

All property is an artificial construct. The house I "own" sits on a piece of land surrounded by invisible, magical boundaries. But the government has given me the ability to make people stay outside these "boundaries," and will, if necessary, give me the power to push people outside of these special lines. But if someone is standing just one foot outside of the "boundaries," well, suddenly I have no power to make them move.

In fact, in some states, you can even shoot people who cross these special lines, despite the fact that they exist nowhere in nature.

All property is an artificial, human construct.

[Giggleton]

Originally Posted by Andrew H.

All property is an artificial, human construct.

All constructs are natural, made by humans.

"If there is nothing to steal, there can be no thieves."

[HamsterRage]

Originally Posted by Andrew H.

All property is an artificial construct. The house I "own" sits on a piece of land surrounded by invisible, magical boundaries. But the government has given me the ability to make people stay outside these "boundaries," and will, if necessary, give me the power to push people outside of these special lines. But if someone is standing just one foot outside of the "boundaries," well, suddenly I have no power to make them move.

In fact, in some states, you can even shoot people who cross these special lines, despite the fact that they exist nowhere in nature.

All property is an artificial, human construct.

I know that you're just taking that to absurd metaphysical extremes, but I think you're making my point for me.

Using the term "Intellectual Property" is just a semantic twist designed to confuse the ownership of ideas with that of physical property so that the same moral and ethical concepts can be applied across the board. Try to pull the same trick from the other direction (that physical property is really just an artificial concept) and you're obviously....well...just pulling the same trick.

As a practical matter, physical property and ideas are completely different things, and society's motivation for protecting them are also completely different. I'm having difficulty seeing how trying to blur the line between them is going to help further any discussion on the subject.

[sircastor]

In modern western society, we define property as being a natural right. That property right starts with yourself, your physical body and what you choose to do with your time, your labor. From there we extend that property right out: You have right to the work that you do in a field. If you labor to build a house, it is yours by virtue of the effort and agency that went into its construction.

On the precept, we base the concept of intellectual property. Just as you can build a house and it's yours, you can write a book and it's yours.

Intellectual property is real because we make it so, and we base it on the concept of physical property because it has the same foundation: Work and effort of and individual.

We establish governments for the sake of protecting these natural rights and that's where the support comes from in terms of a magical barrier, the rules about what you can and cannot do within said barrier. My government (in particular; USA) has grown quite a lot and established a lot of rules which make for complex property right. These rules don't make property less real, but they do make it easier to argue about its non-existence.

Property, both physical and intellectual is definitely real.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by HamsterRage

I know that you're just taking that to absurd metaphysical extremes, but I think you're making my point for me.

Using the term "Intellectual Property" is just a semantic twist designed to confuse the ownership of ideas with that of physical property so that the same moral and ethical concepts can be applied across the board. Try to pull the same trick from the other direction (that physical property is really just an artificial concept) and you're obviously....well...just pulling the same trick.

As a practical matter, physical property and ideas are completely different things, and society's motivation for protecting them are also completely different. I'm having difficulty seeing how trying to blur the line between them is going to help further any discussion on the subject.

As I said before, an "idea" is not intellectual property, and is not protected. An idea of a building is not a building; an idea of a picture is not a painting; an idea of a story is not a book. It's only when those ideas take concrete form - in the shape of the building, the painting, or the book, that they become something that is "protectable".

[HamsterRage]

Originally Posted by sircastor

In modern western society, we define property as being a natural right. That property right starts with yourself, your physical body and what you choose to do with your time, your labor. From there we extend that property right out: You have right to the work that you do in a field. If you labor to build a house, it is yours by virtue of the effort and agency that went into its construction.

The foundation of this argument feels like it's on shaky ground to me. First off, I'm not sure what is meant by a "natural" right, and I'm even less sure that "property" would be considered one of them.

I'd also really doubt that your body would be considered as part of your "property rights". That would be covered under some other natural right. So the rest of that extension out to your time and labour has to go too.

As to "owning" a house because you built it? I'd say that you own the house more because you purchased the raw materials and the land than anything else. If you took the raw material off my neighbour's front lawn, and built the house on my front lawn, you'd have a hard time claiming the house as your own - legally, at least. Conversely, if you bought the land, the raw materials and had someone else build the house for you on your land, it would still be your house.

Physical property ownership stands by itself, and it fairly easy to grasp. You don't need to re-interpret it as some extension of a god-given human right in order to justify it and make reasonable. The only reason I can see for doing that is to make it mystical and therefore easier to drag "ideas" into the realm of "property".

I'll repeat this again, since someone has already quoted the section of the US constitution that deals with this: Copyright laws exist to foster an environment that encourages creators to create new creations and therefore enrich society. NOT to defend some "natural right" of property ownership.

So the question about copyright should never be, "What's good or fair for the authors?", but "What's best for society?", or "What's the best way to enrich our society with new creations?".

[HamsterRage]

Originally Posted by HarryT

As I said before, an "idea" is not intellectual property, and is not protected. An idea of a building is not a building; an idea of a picture is not a painting; an idea of a story is not a book. It's only when those ideas take concrete form - in the shape of the building, the painting, or the book, that they become something that is "protectable".

The building and the painting seem to be spurious arguments to me. Clearly these are physical things and ownership falls under physical ownership rights. The idea behind them is important, but it's their physical manifestation that is protected.

Now let's say that I came up with a cool idea to build a house that made it bigger on the inside than on the outside (kind of a Tardis house). That would be something that I would use IP laws to protect. The idea. Not the house after I built it, but against the happening of someone visiting my house and going, "Oh! That's how he does it", and making and selling his own houses bigger on the inside than the outside.

IP is most definitely about ideas. And it's about protecting the ability to profit from those ideas.

I'll go out on a limb here. I'd say that most people are happy with the idea of using laws to prevent someone from using somebody else's idea and making profit from it to the detriment of the person that had the original idea. That's what the GNU and Creative Commons license stuff is all about - "Hey! Take this. Have fun with this. Use this. Enjoy this. But don't try to sell this."

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by HamsterRage

Now let's say that I came up with a cool idea to build a house that made it bigger on the inside than on the outside (kind of a Tardis house). That would be something that I would use IP laws to protect. The idea. Not the house after I built it, but against the happening of someone visiting my house and going, "Oh! That's how he does it", and making and selling his own houses bigger on the inside than the outside.

No, again that's not an idea; it's a PROCESS, and that's what patent law (as opposed to copyright law) is there to protect. And once again, you can't patent an idea. You can't protect the idea the it would be cool to have a house that's bigger on the inside that on the outside, but you can patent a practical method of building such houses.

We always end up at the same end result: that it's only concrete things: stories written down as books, or practical methods for building Tardis houses, that are legally-protectable intellectual property. Mere ideas are not IP.

This has become an interesting discussion ranging far beyond the narrow author's copyright discussion.

Originally Posted by HarryT

No, again that's not an idea; it's a PROCESS, and that's what patent law (as opposed to copyright law) is there to protect. And once again, you can't patent an idea. You can't protect the idea the it would be cool to have a house that's bigger on the inside that on the outside, but you can patent a practical method of building such houses.

We always end up at the same end result: that it's only concrete things: stories written down as books, or practical methods for building Tardis houses, that are legally-protectable intellectual property. Mere ideas are not IP.

Though the idea vs. practical method distinction does not always seem so clear, at least with regard to patents. I am thinking of some of the lawsuits Apple has brought against other companies for supposed infringement of patents that certainly appear to be patents for ideas or concepts, not practical implementations.

Originally Posted by HamsterRage

I'd also really doubt that your body would be considered as part of your "property rights". That would be covered under some other natural right. So the rest of that extension out to your time and labour has to go too.

Just to add in another facet to that I wonder where lies the, I believe still unsettled, question of who has what property rights to new medical advances based on cells or genetic material taken from an individual during medical treatment, in particular when that individual was never made aware of the potential for such money making discoveries?