Slashdot Mirror
Supreme Court Accepts Eldred Case
Patrick Fitzgerald writes: "The Supreme Court agreed Tuesday to intervene in a fight over copyrights, deciding whether Congress has sided too heavily with writers and other inventors. The outcome will determine when hundreds of thousands of books, songs and movies will be freely available on the Internet or in digital libraries." Openlaw's Eldred v. Ashcroft page has more information about the case, which seeks to challenge the most recent retroactive extension of copyright terms.
Maybe this will mean copyrights will no longer be enforced after authors are dead, or that the government will no longer try to prevent people from copying a CD for their person use, or maybe even that a computer class could examine source code without having to sign non-disclosure agreements and sell their soul to the devil. Copyright is essential, but it has been taken a bit too seriously lately.
The Constitution authorizes Congress to give authors and inventors the exclusive right to their works for a "limited" time. In 1790, copyrights lasted 14 years. Now it's 70 years after the death of the inventor, if the person is known.
Lawrence Lessig, attorney for the challengers, said the latest 20-year extension approved by Congress in 1998 is ill-timed and unconstitutional.
Key to this is limited times. The current copyright laws are nigh limitless, as far as human lifetimes are concerned. And it only takes an act of Congress to extend terms again, 20 years at a time. (Thanks, Sonny Bono!)
I do believe that authors and artist should profit from their works. But there should be a balance struck between the rights of producers of IP, and the consumers. Reverting to shorter terms (perhaps the original) would fill the bill nicely.
I'm not afraid of falling, it's the sudden stop at the end that frightens me.
...that we're all going to be disappointed by the outcome... there's too much money on the line for it to go the other way....
Wiwi
"I trust in my abilities,
but I want more then they offer"
I am glad that this case will be heard, the application to the sciences will be great. It is unfortunate that there are resources wasted in abundance trying to further lines of research when that research has already been done by other companies or agencies.
I agree that creators should have exclusive rights to their material for a while (everybody needs to make a living) and then it should be pushed out in public domain.
Capitalism is the best system available for the short term allocation of resources, but I believe we need to rethink parts of it if we are going to have better long term goals and plans for the whole of humanity.
Either give it away or get top dollar, but never sell yourself cheap.
Not only am I not a lawyer, but I'm also not American... so take any Supreme Court comments from me with more than a grain of salt.
That being said, I seem to recall Lessig commenting that this is not a Right vs. Left issue, especially in the Supreme Court. He made the comment that the argument to the conservatives of the court (notably Scalia, for whom he clerked I think?) might be the easiest...
Aka: The intention of the Framers (limited time) is being subverted by Congress' perpetually-extending copyright term limits.
(And this is one time Valenti may not have helped his own cause, since he is on the record saying that in his book 'infinity minus a day' is an acceptably limited term)
First, it is 70 years, not 75. Second, here's the real issue: in 1978, the law was changed to extend copyright terms to 50 years after the death of the author. In 1998, the law was changed to extend copyright terms an additional 20 years. What happens if in 2018 the law is changed to extend copyright terms an additional 20 years? Then the idea behind "limited" terms is completely abandoned. That's the grounds for getting this law thrown out.
Why not have a two phase copyright system as follows:
phase 1: full monopoly on terms of distribution and reaping of profits. Lasts 50-60 years for a corporation and 70 years to life for an individual.
phase 2: full credit for the creation must still be given to the creator when distributed, but no monopoly on distribution exists anymore
Isn't this about another group of people that thinks it needs to make a profit?
Most people do need to make money to eat and stuff like that. What's your problem with that? Somebody was needed with clear grounds to press the suit, and they were it. Dover Press help make college affordable, with $1-$2 public domain books (that look like crap sometimes, but the text is all there.)
Also, did you miss the part about "many make their work freely available to others." This isn't just the companies here.
Rest assured, however, they are pressing the loss to society and all that in their case.
Okay...if I was to write a book tomorrow and it had to wait until 75 years after my death, then we're talking (optimistically here) about 110 years. Now, assuming that I am like everything else - just a one-hit wonder flash in the pan - chances are that my book will not still be published 110 years from now, or even 11.0 years from now.
To me it seems that public domain makes works avail to people that would otherwise just be stored in a vault and not avail.
So, perhaps it should become public domain 1-2 years after last sale (sale being the time that a publisher made the item avail to a store for resell). This way if the publisher doesn't think enough of the item to keep trying to move it (ie. a useless item, not profitable) then it becomes public domain and the public can decide if it's worth it or not. This way, one way or another it is avail to the public. If it is a marketable item, then the creator is still making money. If it is not, then nothing is lost.
Books - well, if it hasn't been published, then the text of the book becomes public domain. This way if a book becomes a classic (Lord of the Rings) then every year or two it gets republished. Still avail to the public.
CD's - this would have to be done on a song by song basis - that way "Safety Dance" could be published on a "Greatest Hits" CD every so often, but any other song that noone's heard of (except possibly Pop Goes The World) would fall into the public.
Movies - same as books really - keep it avail to the consumer or let go.
I guess it comes down to shit or get off the pot with the items. Either use it because it is a valuable property like you claim, or let others use it.
Of course there would probably have to be stipulations in there that producing a one-off of a movie, selling it to yourself doesn't count, etc... and there should still be a max limit.
Just my idea. I dunno.
First, the Supreme Court could just as easily side with Copyright holders making the current extension of Copyright legitimate. Many fail to face this reality, assuming their "moral high ground" argument will automatically win the case for them.
Second, when the original framers of the Constitution wrote the copyright clause, 28 years was a lifetime. The average life expectancy wasn't that long and assuming you didn't actually have the funding to create your inventions, scientific discoveries, author books or songs, or paint pictures until you were 30, add 28 years to this and you might expect to live 10 years without copyright protection. Put in this light, the copyright extensions isn't that much of a stretch, we just happen to live longer.
If the Supreme Court sides against copyright holders, it STILL won't be a boon for applications like Napster given that the material transferred over these networks was generally current works and applications, images and music sent over other peer to peer networks would still be protected under original copyright provisions. This will NOT be a free for all, grab the intellectual property you want some here seem to be making it out to be.
My proposal would be to keep the extensions but make them renewable every 15 years after the first 45 or death of the author, whichever comes first. At the beginning of each renewal period, if it can be shown by a third party that the works are no longer profitable and releasing them into the public domain is the only recourse to ensuring the works will be around for the public to benefit from in the future then the works are released.
By placing the burden on third parties to argue for the public, this will hopefully alleviate the pressure on the legal system as each and every copyright will not likely be contested, only the ones there is a strong case for the public to benefit from. After the current copyright period is up (life + 70) there can no longer be any extensions and the intellectual property will be released to the public.
Exactly. If the Supreme Court has a brain (or brains), they'll see these two facts:
Yes, it should have. Maybe if it had, we would have all been spared Ep1 and Jar-Jar Binks.
Besides, the original term was extendible to 28 years wasn't it? Certainly the multiple re-releases of Star Wars in various formats would have assisted mightily in keeping copyright protected versions of the film on the market that consumers would likely prefer to aging VHS copies that have been copied 25 times and watched to death. And can you imagine the poor quality of most copies of Star Wars on film? One reason this copyright law is dangerous is because it prevents preservation as the older media wears out long before the protections do.
As to merchandise, I believe that is more likely to run afoul of trademark issues than copyright laws per se. But I'm guessing you're too busy ranting to sort it out.
Well, it is by way of might.
However, as property rights (and increasingly intellectual rights) are state-enforced, *lawful* posession of property is 9/10 of ownership.
However, if you look back in time, during the feudal system, farmers 'owned' common land to which they had family rights. They used it, they worked it, but they didn't _possess_ it, per se. (That is, there was no need for an authoritative force to control access to it; such details were administered co-operatively by the farmers who used it to suit the needs of the community best. The land was shared, and those who abused the land were punished and shunned.) After Adam Smith did his thing, this 'ownership' was revoked by feudal lords (via the installation of hedges to prevent farmers from using this land), and they 'posessed' it. Then, using Adam Smith and Locke's drabblings, they claimed 'ownership' of it. It is a common misconception that this fundamental shift in social attitudes to property rights was little more than a natural progression of a commodity based economy. (Heck, you wern't even allowed to own land. As with labour, land was considered such a basic right that it was considered by the people of the time as something which should not be left to the market.)
Just don't forget that under capitalism, anything unclaimed can become 'owned' by way of posession. This was not neccessarily the way in which other societies and economies worked, so it's not exactly a truism outside of capitalism.
"Old man yells at systemd"
The so called "Sunny Bono Act" extends copyrights for works that are already existing. Now the people that created these works obviously did not need that 20 year extention as an incentive to create them. In fact that extra 20 years is quite pointless, even for people creating right now. I mean how in the world would any one know wheather your work will be worth squat 20 years after 70 years after the day you die. Thats like between 100- 150 years for most people. You cannot even be sure that people will be cinsuming the same kind of art forms after 150 years. And certainly you will not get a corporation to pay you anything extra for those extra twenty years. Now you think that you should have ownership rights to your works in perpetuity, not only for incentive reasons but for moral ones. Because you created them your grandchildren should own them etc, etc. Well you are free to have that opinion but that is clearly unconstitutional. Congress only has the power to give those right for a limited time. And if congress decides to extend that period indefinately it will not be for a limited time. I think there are good reasons behind this constitutional rule, and it should be given power and not scuttled.
Oh? What about Star Wars? going on 24 years! Should that entire property have just become public domain a decade ago?
YES!!!!
It's truly disturbing to see how many people are all for limiting the ownership of creative properties when all they want is to profit from it themselves.
When Starwars first came out on VHS, I got them for a birthday present. When special edition came out on VHS, I bought them with my hard-earned cash.
If Lucas's copyright expired right now, then it means I would not have to pay again when the DVD's come out for something I already own 2 nearly-identical copies of.
There is absolutely no reason that anyone should EVER profit off of any star wars merchandise without the permission of the copyright holders.
This is pure profitism. You might as well say that no one should be able to profit by a creative use of electricity (Computers, Home Entertainment, Etc..) without the electric company's permission.
Say I made a ray-tracing of R2D2 in a heroic action pose. Then I printed it out, framed it and put it up for sale.
Sure, R2D2 belongs to Lucas, but the picture, pose, content, frame, etc... were all made or assembled by me. Why *shouldn't* I profit off that?
Copyright's original intention was to keep powerful individuals from picking on weak individuals by stealing their ideas and distributing them before the original creator could.
This has been brutally abused by those same powerful individuals (corporations) it was meant to limit. It no longer protects the weak from the strong but ensures that the strong have yet another whip to keep the weak in line. Unless limits are placed on copyright and patent law, this will only get worse.
The next Slashdot story will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and slashdot the links early!
The basis of property ownership is natural law, under which who has a thing owns it. However, under our civil law, we have said that merely taking a thing does not transfer ownership, thus to protect the original owners from unjust siezures of valuable property.
"Intellectual property" is a little different. The natural law right is to use any ideas that you come across. If you have a great idea about how to make a device to catch troublesome pests, I have not stolen from you to use that idea to make such a device. If I steal your book, I've stolen from you, because your property holding has been diminished, while if I simply reprint it, I have not stolen from you, because you still have the book. It was a novel point to our Constitution to allow for any concept of a monopoly on works of creativity or invention. The intent was to spur creative and inventive acts by giving those who created or invented a monopoly to earn money for a limited period. Then, the public would have those ideas and creative works for free use, which they would not have had for any use had the creator or inventor not had an incentive to create them beyond the natural desire to create or invent. The intent was never to reward past creativity or invention.
It is clear to me that the law has become skewed in such a way as to *reduce* the amount of ideas and inventions available for free public use, rather than to enhance it. Why should Disney create new characters and stories, for example, when the existing ones are so profitable, and can be rehashed essentially forever?
-jeff
-- Two men say they're Jesus. One of them must be wrong. - Dire Straits
The briefing a little to nebulas for me to grok, so i googled up this link on copyright extension, this one is regarding Disney.
I think the main problem with IP law is that it is too cut and dry. For example I agree that Disney should be able to hold it's copyright to Mickey Mouse, but disagree that movies made by MGM 70 years ago are still not public domain.
Mickey Mouse is a very important piece of Disneys brand, and Disney is a brand based company, so it's essential to their survival. Where movies from 70 years ago are simply rotting away, and will probably vanish.
I think IP law needs to be based of need. A auction system would work better. Where after a relatively short period, say 20 years. the rights to the IP would become public domain, but are then up for auction. Disney would only have to be the highest bidder, which they could probably do, being that it's more important to them then to anyone else. The public needs to set a price however on buying it back, in case no-one else shows up to bid. I don't know how that would work exactly, but i imagine something based of it's past worth like 20% of the generated revenue from the IP. Of course calculating revenue from an IP isn't cut and dry either.
While IP that companies don't care about are not worth the time or money to renew, and then become public domain. A good example would be old video games, the company that holds the IP have essentially forgotten about them. When the time is up, they either have to buy it back from the public, or give it away.
-Jon
this is my sig.
One of my biggest gripes about our system is the fact that works can completely disappear before they enter the public domain. I would suggest that anyone who wishes to apply for a copyright be required place a high-quality, unencrypted, unrestricted, and preferably digital (or easily digitized) copy of their work (1st-gen film print, HTML for books, 24+ bit audio masters, digital TV masters, etc...) in escrow with the Library of Congress, to be released into the public domain at the end of the copyright. This way, no matter how far they push the copyright, nothing will be truly "lost" in the long run. Under the current system, companies have a nasty habit of locking things away after their marketable life to prevent older stuff from competing with newer stuff-- which results in things disappearing completely.
This is not a solution to the problem of ever-expanding copyright terms, but it does prevent us from losing things irretrievably.
Let's apply some government moderated capitalism here.
Copyrights are obviously valuable, otherwise corporations would not be prepared to spend so much defending them. However, they cost nothing to create. The government is missing an obvious source of revenue here - simply tax the ownership of a published copyrighted work that is itself sold. If you don't pay the tax, it becomes public domain. Copyrights for free items would be free of this tax.
To add spice, double the tax each year the copyright runs. For example:
Tax in year 1 - 1 cent
Tax in year 2 - 2 cents
Tax in year 3 - 4 cents
...you know where this is going.
An up-front fee (or pre-payment of tax) of $10.23 protects your copyright for 10 years.
An up front fee of $327.67 preserves your copyright for 15 years.
But you can see that after 25 years, the next fee is $335,544.32 - you need a serious income to preserve the copyright. If you don't pay, it becomes public domain.
You get the opportunity to profit. The government gets a revenue stream, and items become public domain after a reasonable time.
Obviously, the starting point and the exponential could be varied, but explaining it with a pile of pennies and a chessboard - move one square per year and double the number of pennies - keeps it simple. The fees in the early years are very reasonable, encouraging people to profit from their work quickly.
Problems?
This line intentionally left..uh..blank?
Creative people have an interest in the balance between copyright protection and expiration. Author's life plus twenty, or mayby twenty-five years is reasonable on unassigned copyrights. Corporate copyrights and assigned copyrights should expire in fifteen years, maybe twenty on the outside. What kind of business decision have you ever seen that has a fifteen year horizon? Very, few.
To avoid economic calamity, I'd phase in a change in corporate copyright terms this way: existing corporate copyrights would extend fifteen years from the adoption of copyright reform, and new works would be copyrighted twenty years from their creation.
There is no rational public interest in extending corporate copyrights further.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Interestingly, Disney has been increasingly deriving its works from folklore and myth, since this neatly avoids having to pay any kind of license to a creator.
This is a case of the pigeons coming home to roost. Disney has helped to create a culture of artists that is particularly sensitive to the market for licensing derivative works. As it becomes harder for them to license original work with acceptable margins, they turn to...the public domain.
-- Cerebus
Most everything we do is derivative of the works of others. That's simply how people learn and are influenced.
While a direct rip-off, "The further adventures of Frodo" or similar, might not be very creative, pieces of older works can be used to great effect by skilled authors and especially musicians.
For an example in music, Carl Orf's "O Fortuna" was based on pieces of famous music and blended together to create something new. Later Apotheosis came along, borrowed heavily from Orf, and produced their own sogn, a techno rock version of "O Fortuna". Orf's estate sued them.
Now, it seems that it should have been fair, what goes around comes around, and all. But the copyrights are much longer now meaning that it gets harder to use anything contemporary.
Being that nobody exists, or existed in a bubble, but were shaped by the creativity of those around them, they should let their creativity shape the next generation as well. Seems only fair to me, as long as we ensure that they're also given a chance (though maybe not life + 75 years) to profit from their creativity directly.
I was doing a bit of searching lately (specifically, I was wondering if the classic silent film "Metropolis" had dropped into the public domain yet. According to one "Public Domain Movies for sale" site (LSVideo.com), the answer boils down to "probably"...), and stumbled on a couple of sites offering "public domain" material.
This one, to my surprise, actually offered a number of cartoons that seemed shockingly recent (heck, I think I have some of them on commercial VHS!) - including even a handful of Disney shorts. Apparently, there was a window of time before copyright extension became automatic, where a lot of works evidently didn't get renewed, and therefore hit the public domain.
Unfortunately, that site vehemently denies any availability to normal people (i.e. they are a company tailored for and catering only to broadcasters with professional equipment who want some public domain material to broadcast).
Anyone know if archive.org will be getting any of this material? And for that matter, good pointers to other "public domain material" sites?
Hacker Public Radio is our Friend
"Sonny wanted the term of copyright protection to last forever. I am informed by staff that such a change would violate the Constitution. I invite all of you to work with me to strengthen our copyright laws in all of the ways available to us. As you know, there is also Jack Valenti's [of the MPAA] proposal for term to last forever less one day. Perhaps the Committee may look at that next Congress."
--
Runnin' around, robbin' banks all whacked on the Scooby Snacks...
My hobby is genealogy and a (very elderly, probably now deceased) person wrote a book that covered my family line. I can't purchase the book anywhere, and the family won't acknowledge my requests to either republish the book or make it available free on the internet if I scan in the book (providing I can even get my hands on the book). Currently I have to game the system by doing interlibrary loans requesting a few pages be copied (until I can get the entire book copied.) I say the copyright laws are outdated. If a person has proof that the copyright owner will not republish a work for purchase within 10 years after creation the said intellectual property (IP) should be in the public domain. Yes, this person spent much effort in research. But what good is the research if no one has access to it? I want access to the data and am willing to pay for it, but it is currently unavailable. If an IP is not available for purchase within 10 years after creation it is obviously not generating any monetary revenue for the creator. Some might argue that the creator can't afford a republishing cost. Nonsense, you could make it available via the internet for a nominal fee. Have you heard of free web sites? The copyright holder should lose rights to their work if they have not made any attempt to provide purchase availability 10 years after the copyright date.
My argument is that the CREA96 is that the term granted was not shown "to Promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts" are required by the US Constitution. In fact, it can be fairly shown it hampers said progress since no incentives it gave could possibly have influenced past creativity yet the extention reduces creativity of those who would use the materials once they enter the public domain. Somebody might want to make a competing "Mickey Mouse" comic strip!
IMHO, copyright term should reflect the use of the work, and the likely motive behind creating it. For projects made for commercial exploitation (most mass media), this period should match that used by the company's financial analysts or stockholders. They seldom look beyond 20 years simply because the power of compound interest reduces the value of any future revenues to insignificance. So I would make the copyright period 20 years after first sale. This is generous, because most investors demand 2-5 year pay-back! For unsold works, some of which are potentially private papers, I would make the period longer, say life of the author plus 20-50 years.
Unfortunately, the "takings clause" doesn't apply since that only forbits the uncompensated taking of private property for public use, while CREA96 takes public property for private use