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Beyond Eldred v. Ashcroft
I thought I'd grab up some of the many commentaries and responses to the Eldred decision. If you read only one of these links, see Lessig's blog. Jack Balkin, another law professor who contributed to the case, is discussing it in his blog. The NYTimes has two distinct news stories on the decision (NYT1, NYT2), plus a biting editorial about the decision. Copyright scholar Siva Vaidhyanathan has a piece in Salon. The LA Times posts one of the very few stories to present the decision in a positive light. Reason is one of several to mock the mouse.
What boggles the mind is how little this really benefits the corporations. With rare exceptions (Snow White, Happy Birthday, and Gershwin), what percentage of content revenues come from old material? For record companies, a good year comes from a big hit created that year, not the old stuff.
Ooh, a sarcasm detector. Oh, that's a real useful invention.
When your really think about it, the fact that they are trying to prevent stories from enterring the public domain is even more hypocritical.
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1st off, the moral and historical foundation of property derives from the fact that not everybody can use something at the same time, not from monopolies granted by a king in return for not publishing bad things about the monarchy
2nd, copyrights are a fraud in that they don't help creators that much. Often you'll hear it cried from the rooftops that the artist is king and that anybody who finds a need to copy is a self centered brat that offers nothing of value to society. Perhaps this is intentional as to distract from the fact that for every artist that makes it big, 10000 are in dirt poverty.
3rd, they are worthless as a free market property right. If I said I had no incentive to grow apples unless I could plant them in your yard, or I said that I had no incentive to grow cotton without owning slaves on the plantation - people would see it as the worthless arguments that they are, but if I say I have no incentive to bring things into the public domain without a copyright monopoly - they just take it on faith, they don't even question it. If the govt gave someone a monopoly on growing peaches and then called it free market because he could buy and sell shares of that monopoly - people would see it for what it is, a fraud. The same is true with copyrights. Since peoples activities have a natural limit in supply and demand, and not information, it is the activities that should be equated to market value and not information.
4th, information is so easy to copy and manipulate that we are quickly reaching a point where either all of it must be controlled or none of it. The copyright industries know that and so should you.
The "other" CTEA challange is Golan v. Ashcroft which has been on hold while Eldred v. Ashcroft was being decided.
The CTEA took some works which were previously in the Public Domain in the US and restored their Copyright. Golan, a conductor, lost the use of some compositions which were formerly in the PD in the US. This case will now procede.
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I've had some brushed with asshole IP a few times in my travels. Notably, I once worked on a set of commercial CD-ROMs for some classic rock bands. We had a spectacular - nay, epic - struggle with Jimi Hendrix's sister, who for all intents and purposes lives off the ghost of her dead brother. She has all rights, and doesn't actually *do* anything. Long story short, we spent weeks and weeks bending over backwards, crossing and dotting all letters, only to have her change her mind at the last minute.
Another example: Grateful Dead. There are exactly 2 approachable sources for interview footage of Jerry Garcia: the BBC, and Some Guy in the States. Some Guy purposefully bought up all this footage, and now that's his job. He lives off Jerry's ghost.
Even if you are the rightful descendant/heir to some great artist, I don't, in my opinion, think you have the slightest shred of 'rights' to that work. None. Son, daughter, whatever. The only cocnession that makes sense is a wife/partner, and even then it just seems unjust. The LA Times article crowed about how this woman can now 'lovingly restore' her ancestor's works at her own personal expense, but she's selling tapes on eBay. Better than it dissappearing, but what if she was the one misrepresenting, defiling, or otherwise tainting the name of her ancester? No recourse.
It just makes no sense to me. Someone tell me why its a good idea to 'inherit' copyrights. If they made a ton of money with those rights, fine, let the children inherit that money. Rights, I don't think so.
If Jesus wants me it knows where to find me.