Petition to reduce US copyright to 28 years

[Andrew H.]

Originally Posted by QuantumIguana

That's not an option. The only reason it was in "folklore" was because it was in the public domain. If your proposal had been adopted in the past, this folklore could not have existed, as it would have been copyrighted the moment someone created it.

Your proposal would mean an end to folklore. Folklore and the public domain are the same thing.

No, folklore and the public domain aren't the same at all...and "Dracula" bears very little resemblance to vampire folklore, in any event.

A lot of "vampire" data is historical: people were killed for being vampires; government investigators looked at alleged cases of vampirism; there were vampire trials; there was public discussion of whether or not they existed. It's pretty much parallel to witchcraft (and almost as old, in some forms). But the existence of the Salem witch trial wouldn't preclude, under any copyright scheme, "Bewitched."

[Andrew H.]

Originally Posted by QuantumIguana

Wrong. Physical property exists without government. To say otherwise is to deny that the lock exists.

No it doesn't. This just shows that you don't understand what property is, at all. Or what weapons are, for that matter.

Try not paying your mortgage and see if a lock protects "your" property.

Land exists without government. Property does not. The ability to forceably keep someone out of a parcel of land is just the opposite side of the ability to forceably take a parcel of land from someone else. Neither of these are property; they are the antithesis of property.

Property is a govermentally recognized right to do certain things with land and other tangible and intangible items.

[QuantumIguana]

Originally Posted by Andrew H.

No, folklore and the public domain aren't the same at all...and "Dracula" bears very little resemblance to vampire folklore, in any event.

A lot of "vampire" data is historical: people were killed for being vampires; government investigators looked at alleged cases of vampirism; there were vampire trials; there was public discussion of whether or not they existed. It's pretty much parallel to witchcraft (and almost as old, in some forms). But the existence of the Salem witch trial wouldn't preclude, under any copyright scheme, "Bewitched."

Folklore is the stories that people have created over time. The public domain is essential to folklore.

[QuantumIguana]

Originally Posted by Andrew H.

No it doesn't. This just shows that you don't understand what property is, at all. Or what weapons are, for that matter.

Try not paying your mortgage and see if a lock protects "your" property.

Land exists without government. Property does not. The ability to forceably keep someone out of a parcel of land is just the opposite side of the ability to forceably take a parcel of land from someone else. Neither of these are property; they are the antithesis of property.

Property is a govermentally recognized right to do certain things with land and other tangible and intangible items.

I understand quite well, thank you. Property law only enhances your ability to protect what you already have. Government uses force to protect property, but that's no more than an extension of the force you can use to protect your property without government. That someone will come along and take your property if you don't pay your mortgage doesn't make your point. Someone can take your property with or without government.

[BearMountainBooks]

Originally Posted by QuantumIguana

Folklore is the stories that people have created over time. The public domain is essential to folklore.

Sometimes folklore is a skull made from an old barn.

http://frank-tuttle.blogspot.com/201...t-goes-on.html




Edited to add: Well, I guess technically it's folk ART, not folklore. But if it were made into a bobblehead, I think it might cause some folklore!!!

[Andrew H.]

Originally Posted by QuantumIguana

I understand quite well, thank you. Property law only enhances your ability to protect what you already have.

No. Property law also allows you obtain that which you don't have, from people who may be using locks to keep it from you. Property law defines what you own without you having to use any force.

Government uses force to protect property, but that's no more than an extension of the force you can use to protect your property without government.

No. You're still not getting it. Property law defines what *your* property is in the first place. The ability to defend a particular piece of land doesn't make that land yours; it doesn't mean you own it. *Anyone* can use force. All you need is a gun or knife or lock or pointy stick. This isn't even limited to physical property - you could use force to beat up or threaten people who copy your intellectual property. Or to take the intellectual property of others. The ability to use force doesn't define what property is.

That someone will come along and take your property if you don't pay your mortgage doesn't make your point. Someone can take your property with or without government.

Some one could steal something from me, sure. But that doesn't mean that they own what they've stolen.

[plib]

Originally Posted by Andrew H.

No. You're still not getting it. Property law defines what *your* property is in the first place. The ability to defend a particular piece of land doesn't make that land yours; it doesn't mean you own it. *Anyone* can use force. All you need is a gun or knife or lock or pointy stick. This isn't even limited to physical property - you could use force to beat up or threaten people who copy your intellectual property. Or to take the intellectual property of others. The ability to use force doesn't define what property is.

Some one could steal something from me, sure. But that doesn't mean that they own what they've stolen.

Force absolutely defines what is owned. The fact that most societies communally delegate that force to the police and the army doesn't make it any less the use of force. It just means the robber barons have to work within different rules from their ancestors who gained/held the land by force in the first place. Lawyers might like to think they define property, but they're just the peripheral minions who codify rules under which force, if necessary, is applied. Try evicting some of the foreclosures now taking place in the US without the backup of the police if someone decides to start shooting the bailiffs. Or, more on topic, try imprisoning or fining copyright offenders without a police force to back up a court judgement.

[Kumabjorn]

Originally Posted by speakingtohe

Many people live of the fruits of their parents labour or success, or of that of their grandparents, greatgrandparents etc.

Fortunes have been passed down for generations that have been made by a person's effort, luck such as having oil discovered on ones land (and owning the appropriate rights when it happened), criminal enterprises such as bootlegging, gambling, slumlording, running a successful bawdy house, or perhaps extortion or robbery.


Helen

The difference, to me, is that the inheritors you mention have to keep up the labor of their predecessors if they want to reap that fruit. The inheritors of authors and musicians don't have to lift a finger. Our societies are built on the premise that we produce, some produce more than others, but still, to have a functional society we are expected to produce. Some of us are physically or mentally not capable, we do our best to take care of those, some societies do more some do less.
So from societies vantage point it seems strange that we would grant some people that are fully capable of being productive members of society a life in perpetual unproductivitiness.

[plib]

What if I die young and have small children? My intent SURELY would be to provide for them. Make it PD too early and those kids could end up on government welfare, when in fact, a parent had the means to provide for them...until that parent died...and copyright expired. I really believe that was the original intent of life Plus. It didn't/doesn't necessarily have to be life plus 70 (as that would be most of the adult life of the child) but what a horrific nightmare for a parent to imagine that her books/income would not be used to support her 3 year old daughter after she died.

You know, before I started frequenting MobileRead I had no idea that being an author was such a high risk career. Half the justifications I have seen on here for life+x copyright are a variation on "but what if the author dies young".

I must admit I have no claims to be an author. In my time, mostly as a student, I have worked construction on a concrete gang, sometimes 30 odd storeys in the air, as a truck driver, a motor bike courier, a house/furniture removal labourer, a warehouseman and a short time on a production line. However I am relieved that when I eventually chose a profession I decided my talents lay in a direction which doesn't seem to carry such risks of early demise.

[Format C:]

Originally Posted by BearMountainBooks

What if I die young and have small children? My intent SURELY would be to provide for them. Make it PD too early and those kids could end up on government welfare, when in fact, a parent had the means to provide for them...until that parent died...and copyright expired. I really believe that was the original intent of life Plus. It didn't/doesn't necessarily have to be life plus 70 (as that would be most of the adult life of the child) but what a horrific nightmare for a parent to imagine that her books/income would not be used to support her 3 year old daughter after she died.

......

Can you please name a few hundreds authors out of the millions who are published, who actually did die young leaving kids behind and had published books good enough to make some money(*) which generated revenues only after the author's death?



(*) just for comparision, let's define "some money" as the amount that a normal average employee or worker in the same country would have earned in the time from the start of writing to the untimely death of the author.

[DarkScribe]

Originally Posted by ficbot

A film about Jimi Hendrix that doesn't feature his music seems absurd to me, and imho proves what many on this thread are saying.

If you keep works locked up by copyright forever, you restrict creativity.

No, you enforce creativity. If they can't copy another person's creative work, they will have develop their own.

[DarkScribe]

Originally Posted by Format C:

Can you please name a few hundreds authors out of the millions who are published, who actually did die young leaving kids behind and had published books good enough to make some money(*) which generated revenues only after the author's death?



(*) just for comparision, let's define "some money" as the amount that a normal average employee or worker in the same country would have earned in the time from the start of writing to the untimely death of the author.

Stieg Larsson was published posthumously. It wasn't his kids who benefited, but it would have been if he had any. His works went to his next of kin, father and brother. I am sure that they appreciate copyright law. As for a few hundreds, most best selling authors had kids - they would have benefited to some degree. I inherited the rights to some potentially extremely valuable intellectual property which I have chosen not to publish until several people who would be hurt by publication have passed on.

[murraypaul]

Originally Posted by Kumabjorn

The difference, to me, is that the inheritors you mention have to keep up the labor of their predecessors if they want to reap that fruit.

Nope.
If you inherit a huge fortune you can just live your entire life on the interest, without ever lifting a finger.
How much labor is Paris Hilton doing?

So from societies vantage point it seems strange that we would grant some people that are fully capable of being productive members of society a life in perpetual unproductivitiness.

You've just defined the idle rich.
They made money the old-fashioned way, they inherited it.

[plib]

Originally Posted by murraypaul

You've just defined the idle rich.
They made money the old-fashioned way, they inherited it.

As compared to their ancestors the not-so-idle rich who made it the truly old-fashioned way. They stole it.

(Although this does seem to be coming back into fashion)

[tompe]

Originally Posted by DarkScribe

Stieg Larsson was published posthumously. It wasn't his kids who benefited, but it would have been if he had any. His works went to his next of kin, father and brother. I am sure that they appreciate copyright law. As for a few hundreds, most best selling authors had kids - they would have benefited to some degree. I inherited the rights to some potentially extremely valuable intellectual property which I have chosen not to publish until several people who would be hurt by publication have passed on.

The request was for a few hundred authors. But Stieg Larsson did not die young and he probably would have hated that his parent and brother got the money so a pretty bad example anyway.