Petition to reduce US copyright to 28 years

[HansTWN]

Originally Posted by rkomar

The famous response to this argument is that the same holds true for people going around smashing windows and generating business for glaziers. You're not factoring in the cost to the others.

You are not factoring in that you must replace broken windows, but you can choose to read something else. And under point 1 I did account for cost to the others.

[plib]

Originally Posted by HansTWN

Let us examine the benefits for society. Let us say an author dies and at the time of his death the book is still selling really well.

...
2.)If the copyright continues after the author's death the book will generate real income for the author, jobs for the people who work at his publishers and at retailers selling the books. All those people will pay taxes on their incomes.

Which scenario is better for society?

If the potential purchasers of the deceased author's work spend their money on his books then they will not have that income to spend on a new aspiring author, who as a result will starve to death in poverty in a garret, enduring what seems to be the usual fate of authors to die young leaving their children penniless and a charge upon the state, while society will not benefit from the expression of the new and unique ideas which died with him. Meanwhile the sales of the expired author will inevitably taper off as market saturation is reached, leaving the employees of the publishers and retailers unemployed and paying no taxes.

Which scenario is better for society?

[HansTWN]

Originally Posted by plib

If the potential purchasers of the deceased author's work spend their money on his books then they will not have that income to spend on a new aspiring author

If the new aspiring author can't persuade them to buy his books with others still being in copyright he will never make it anyway.

[Format C:]

Originally Posted by HansTWN

...
the least society can do is protect the author's interests.

I agree.

And copyright is by far the worst method to achieve it.
The longer the copyright, the worse it is.

[Greg Anos]

Originally Posted by HansTWN

Let us examine the benefits for society. Let us say an author dies and at the time of his death the book is still selling really well.

1.)If the copyright expired what would be the be benefits for society? People could download it for free, and they could make a movie out of it without paying any royalties. (Fair use for educational purposes, parodies, etc are covered already).

2.)If the copyright continues after the author's death the book will generate real income for the author, jobs for the people who work at his publishers and at retailers selling the books. All those people will pay taxes on their incomes.

Which scenario is better for society?

You may have covered the .1 percent of works but what about the 99.9% who are out-of-print before the end of the copyright period. If the media they are distributed on disintergrates before they ever reach public domain, who benefits? Which scenario is better for society?

Also, to follow your quote above - If the copyright continues after the author's death the book will generate real income for the author - how does income benefit a dead author? Is he going to create more new works? I don't think so....

[Greg Anos]

Originally Posted by Kali Yuga

Not really. The government provides you with protection over something you created.

If you write a book, the government does not sieze ownership and then give you back rights. Rather, when you put something into a fixed form, they protect your work for a finite duration. When that protection expires, your work goes into public domain.



Actually, they do. It's called "taxes."

Governments can charge additional fees afaik, but Berne specifies that as soon as content is in a "fixed form," it is considered protected by copyright. You do not need to fill out any forms or pay any fees. This is actually highly beneficial to content creators, especially small scale artists like photographers.

What taxes? Income taxes? Not the point. I own a piece of land. I have to pay taxes on that piece of land whether or not it produces income. Each year, every year, or the government takes it away from me.

So what taxes does a holder of copyright pay on their copyright. None. If you want it to be treated like property, then it ought to be taxed like property. It would solve the public domain problem quite nicely. You don't pay your taxes, the property gets seized, and placed into the public domain.

Cost of enforcement of copyright? Paid for out of those property taxes....

That garrett that an artist is starving in has property taxes paid by someone...

But a free ride is sooo seductive...Until somebody else starts taking it from you for themselves....

[HansTWN]

Originally Posted by Ralph Sir Edward

Also, to follow your quote above - If the copyright continues after the author's death the book will generate real income for the author - how does income benefit a dead author? Is he going to create more new works? I don't think so....

I guess everybody has figured out that I meant to say "benefits the author's family"

[ficbot]

Originally Posted by HansTWN

The author created the resource, not nature or society.

But that is my point, society partly DID create the resource, because the author invariably draws on common culture in the creation of their work. It is impossible to create a completely original work that draws on nothing else. Even the structure of the novel itself as an art form comes from the public domain. Society does have a stake in that new authors are producing.

However, you are right that the new work would not exist without the author. That is why the author gets exclusive exploitation of it for a time. But after that time has passed, the work should return to the public domain so that others can benefit from it as the author benefited from the work of others.

As for the author's heirs, as it has been pointed out already, they have ample opportunity to benefit. Since in most countries, copyright exceeds the author's death, they have exclusive rights to the work for 50-75 years. And then after that, they can create new derivative works or other items as they wish. They no longer have *exclusive* rights---others can then create works too---but the right to do so remains for them.

[Kali Yuga]

Originally Posted by QuantumIguana

What the government does is basically to give the author a lease. The government doesn't "seize ownership" because without copyright, it is meaningless to say the author owns it. The property isn't really the book itself, but the right to copy it.

No, this isn't how it works at all.

In order for the government to lease something to you, they need to own it in the first place. They don't own your content, thus they are not leasing it to you.

E.g. I can't lease a car to you if I don't own it. The government can't lease mineral rights unless they own those mineral rights.

What is happening is that when you put your content into a fixed form, the government provides you with a set of protections, and outlines legal methods of transferring and managing the content.

The idea behind calling it "intellectual property" is that, like physical property, we do consider the content creator to be the owner. The rights holder can then dispense with the copyright as they see fit; e.g. they can transfer it to someone else, or they can publicly eschew some or all protections.

Nowhere in the Copyright Law does it say "the government is giving you a lease to your intellectual property."

The idea of intellectual property as a "lease from the government" is deeply flawed.

[Kali Yuga]

Originally Posted by Ralph Sir Edward

What taxes? Income taxes?

Yes, taxes.

When I call the police, they don't hand me a bill for their services. When I call the fire department, I don't receive an invoice. The costs for those protections are distributed across the society.

If I sell copies of my intellectual property, then I'm paying taxes on it.

And the companies that sell intellectual content, and content creators who collect royalties on those sales, are also paying taxes on that content.

Originally Posted by RSE

But a free ride is sooo seductive...Until somebody else starts taking it from you for themselves....

No one is getting a "free ride."

The actual costs of enforcement often fall on those seeking protection. E.g. when James Brown asserted that various hip-hop artists were sampling his music without his permission and without compensating him, he had to pay the lawyers, pay the researchers and expert witnesses. The state even charges for court costs.

There are instances when the government will get law enforcement involved. In those cases, it's usually to protect the interests of companies that sell content -- and pay taxes on those sales.

No one is forcing anyone to transfer their rights. A publisher cannot force an author to sign a contract, period. No one is "taking it for themselves" unless you signed on the dotted line. If you don't understand the implications of what you're signing, and/or didn't get a lawyer to read it to help you protect your interests, then that's your own fault.

[QuantumIguana]

Nowhere in the Copyright Law does it say "the government is giving you a lease to your intellectual property."

That's begging the question. Without copyright, there is no intellectual property. Without copyright, the author owns nothing. The Copyright clause says:

The Congress shall have Power ... To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries.

That limited time exclusivity looks just like a lease. The only reason that intellectual property exists is because this granted lease can be bought and sold as if it was property.

The government wouldn't say "the government is giving you a lease to your intellectual property" because that intellectual property is a government creation. If you don't want to call it a lease, fine, but it works just like one.

[Greg Anos]

Originally Posted by Kali Yuga

Yes, taxes.

When I call the police, they don't hand me a bill for their services. When I call the fire department, I don't receive an invoice. The costs for those protections are distributed across the society.

If I sell copies of my intellectual property, then I'm paying taxes on it.

And the companies that sell intellectual content, and content creators who collect royalties on those sales, are also paying taxes on that content.



No one is getting a "free ride."

The actual costs of enforcement often fall on those seeking protection. E.g. when James Brown asserted that various hip-hop artists were sampling his music without his permission and without compensating him, he had to pay the lawyers, pay the researchers and expert witnesses. The state even charges for court costs.

There are instances when the government will get law enforcement involved. In those cases, it's usually to protect the interests of companies that sell content -- and pay taxes on those sales.

No one is forcing anyone to transfer their rights. A publisher cannot force an author to sign a contract, period. No one is "taking it for themselves" unless you signed on the dotted line. If you don't understand the implications of what you're signing, and/or didn't get a lawyer to read it to help you protect your interests, then that's your own fault.

As usual, you miss the point I was making. If I own a piece of real estate (real property), I pay taxes on it, whether I make any money off of it or not. If I make money off of it, I pay income taxes off the profit I make, in addition to the property taxes I have to pay either way.

I.P. pays no property taxes! They get the right to own "property" without paying any taxes on it, separate from making any money off of sales. They can wait for no cost. No wonder they want to extend copyright. It's a free option.

And that's free riding. Getting something (property without taxes), while everybody else pays for your free ride (by having to pay taxes on real property, to fund general benefits that everybody, including the free rider uses.)

[speakingtohe]

Originally Posted by plib

If the potential purchasers of the deceased author's work spend their money on his books then they will not have that income to spend on a new aspiring author, who as a result will starve to death in poverty in a garret, enduring what seems to be the usual fate of authors to die young leaving their children penniless and a charge upon the state, while society will not benefit from the expression of the new and unique ideas which died with him. Meanwhile the sales of the expired author will inevitably taper off as market saturation is reached, leaving the employees of the publishers and retailers unemployed and paying no taxes.

Which scenario is better for society?

So better for the already deceased and existing authors to have died young, starving to death in a garret, leaving their children a drain on the state than survive to pose a threat to the new aspiring authors who will in many cases take note of the fate of their predecessors and opt for a different career?

Perhaps we should just remove all the bankers, or street cleaners and research scientists and take away their future assets, thus paving the way for the new generation. Any volunteers?

Helen

[DarkScribe]

Originally Posted by plib

If the potential purchasers of the deceased author's work spend their money on his books then they will not have that income to spend on a new aspiring author, who as a result will starve to death in poverty in a garret, enduring what seems to be the usual fate of authors to die young leaving their children penniless and a charge upon the state, while society will not benefit from the expression of the new and unique ideas which died with him. Meanwhile the sales of the expired author will inevitably taper off as market saturation is reached, leaving the employees of the publishers and retailers unemployed and paying no taxes.

Which scenario is better for society?

People buy books based on the interest they have in the story, not the interest they have in the writer. How many garrets had the corpses of "aspiring authors" in them as a result of the huge demand for Stieg Larsson's posthumously published Millennium trilogy? (It must be hard to rent a garret nowadays, the smell of decomposition is really hard to remove.)

[SteveEisenberg]

Originally Posted by Ralph Sir Edward

Cost of enforcement of copyright? Paid for out of those property taxes....

Right now, there is virtually no enforcement of book copyrights. By contrast, a big chunk of my home property taxes go to pay for township police, prosecutors, and the county jail in which a substantial number of small-time burglars and shoplifters are locked up. Are you suggesting that book copyright holder pay the government to defend intellectual property the way it defends the physical property of rate-payers?

I would rather keep the enforcement at a low level and mostly in the hands of copyright holders themselves, who are free to sue pirates, with losers paying court costs. Governmental action against pirates should exist, but be minimal, and attempt to self-finance through fines -- no jail.

It would only be fair to charge a copyright property tax if the police are going to protect intellectual property the way they protect physical property. And that would be too extreme.