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Forbes on Lessig and Eldred
scubacuda writes "In the Forbes editorial, Fact and Comment , Steve Forbes voices his support for Lessig and the Eldred case: 'Maybe Congress should just be done with it and declare that a copyright is forever....Stanford Law School professor Lawrence Lessig has proposed a sensible compromise..."[I]f Congress is listening to the frustration that the court's decision has created, [paying to maintain copyright extensions] would be a simple and effective way for the First Branch to respond." He's absolutely right.'"
In fact, Lessig was trying to argue the fact that since they keep extending it, it basically it is forever. The reason they can not do this is the Constitution specifically says a "limited time." Forever is not a "limited time" by anyone's definition.
Let's hope they actually listen to that. That proposal, to have copyrights expire unless some token amount is paid in (ie someone clearly takes an interest) would put enormous amounts of material into the public domain. It would be brilliant!
Daniel
Carpe Diem
Of course he's right. It seems that the new era, money for lobbying gets you just the right laws if you can pull some wool over the right eyes. Piggyback it onto another bill, say it's to fight a certain crime, or just be one of the top supporters to the right Congressman and you got your bill on its way.
The only one the long copyrights really benefit are the large corporations. So why not just leave it that these corporations, who are making money off someone else's creative effort, have to pay to keep making money off this long after the creator's death? Makes sense, and it won't put items that need to be in the public domain because no one knows who rightfully owns the rights to it, into an unnecessary protection.
Human nature is the same everywhere; the modes only are different. -- Earl of Chesterfield
The money should go towards enriching the public domain. The priveledge of extending copyright is at the public domain's expense, so that is the only thing that makes sense. I fear the money would just become part of the US military budget the way things are going.
Congress is really between a rock and a hard place. On the one hand, the Constitution of our United States says copyright can't be forever. On the other hand, Disney is giving many members lots of cash and nubile young fluffers to make their jobs less dreary.
They have an obligation to pass laws for their paying constituents, but the highest law of the land (Constitution) says they can't do it.
So they have to play this game whereby they pretend they're doing something good for the people of the United States when in fact they're loser lawmakers taking bribes.
On top of all that, they have to maintain a thin sense of professionality so people won't just vote someone else in the next election.
You gotta really feel sorry for those guys. What a tough job. I could never be a bottom-feeding liar for a living, personally.
fifth sigma, inc.
All a solution like this would do is protect large companies like Disney which have the money to pay for copyright extention. Frankly, Disney can also afford to compete in the public domain, and I don't think they are the people copyright really needs to protect.
The folks I worry about with copyright are small artists who either themselves make a living off of their work, or who have living relatives who do so. These are the people that copyright needs to protect, and these are the same people who cannot afford to pay to extend that protection.
Law, in general, should help those who cannot help themselves. In my view, large corporations have the ability to compete successfully in a free, public domain market. Unless the sums required to extend copyright are tiny (and therefore useless), the people who need protection won't be able to get it. For the most part, Forbes' solution would just maintain the status quo.
Narrative
If we end up with this deal with the devil, at least we should try to have the monopoly-maintenance fee double on each round.
"[paying to maintain copyright extensions]"
it's already done. They call it 'lobbying'.
Fleur de Sel
Too bad it's not a good way to respond. Consolidated publishing will simply pass the cost of renewal to the reading public. Too large a body of information is owned by too few people for too long a time frame. They have the power, thanks to the DMCA, and now the technology to put us on the road to Tycho.
The only real solution is the original one, reasonably time limited protection of publication 14 to 28 years. The costs of publishing have only decreased since that original deal was made and so the incentives should have decreased since. How absolutly absurd it is that Einstine's orginal papers are still protected by copyright! What use are 100 year old technical publications beside historical research?
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
...disallowing corporations from holding copyrights of anything. reserve copyright for individuals only. that would protect the small time artist, enrich public domain, and do many other things i cant think of right now. it is four in the morning.
philanthropists need to realize there is a need for philanthropy in the first place
IANAL, but here's a suggestion. Consider what happened in the software world. Lot of people wanted to share their code, but for things really took off only due to the ease of adopting the GPL. In a similar vein, perhaps we should have a well-defined legal framework for artists to release their work into the PD after 5 years, and work towards getting it acceptance among publishers? (Essentially, the legal and technical details should be worked out and implemented by someone else instead of forcing the individual artists to deal with it). Sure the *AA can be counted out, but I can imagine several book publishers and smaller music groups being not averse to the idea. If disney wants to keep the mouse, let them, forget it. Let's do the best we can to ensure that content that is yet to be produced comes with a less draconian copyright.
Many of you are misguided about what Lessig plans to get out of the Eldred Act. He's given up on Mickey, and rightfully so. There is no way he can fight the money and power that is Disney. He is prepared to ceed the 2% of economically worthwhile copyrights that remain after the current term inorder to get access to the 98% that no longer have any protector. He's decided to compromise and accept the orphans, and that's what the Eldred Act gives him.
Lessig's motivation has always been the flourishing of the commons, and while a win in Eldred v. Ashcroft would have give him 100% of what he wanted, passing the Eldred Act will still give him 98%...and that's close enough.
-R
Steve Forbes takes a position I agree with.
I believe that charging a steadily INCREASING amount would be a better idea. That way there is increasing incentive to allow the copyright to revert to the public domain.
Recent changes to the timelines are clearly Faustian deals by politicians to sell out to copyright holders. In my mind the public clearly loses. The original idea of limiting the time one can claim intellectual property was sound and still has merit. The notion that ideas and information can permanently be surrounded by barbed wire and denied to all seems intuitively wrong. It should be clear that the institution of a fee to maintain the copyright amounts to another tax. So politicians would treat it as another endless source of funds to be milked to finance their pet projects. Perhaps you can see where this would lead.
Ultimately, I think the better idea is to put heavy pressure on congress to roll back the copyright protection period. Then we need some working campaign finance reform.
Why not make it a constantly increasing amount after 15 years. $1 the first year. $5 the second, and $25 the third. Keep up the multiples by 5 or whatever number you want and eventually everything passes into the public domain when its value is exceeded by the fees.
Sounds great, except why allow people other than the current rightholder to extend? For that matter, why allow anyone but the original author to extend?
The first U.S. copyright laws restricted renewals to the original author. Going back to that idea would remove some of the "property" connotations that have appeared since then.
I'm usually not one to question Lessig's ideas, but I do see that this solution can either be 1) exploited by bodies with large amounts of capital (i.e. companies can pay the large continuation fee, whereas smaller fries cannot) or 2) useless if the price to extend copyrights is too low.
I really feel this is one area where compromise won't cut it - copyrights need to be limited, plain and simple. Sometimes to innovate you need to build on other's works, and Congress' bent to continually extend copyright is unjustified.
smd4985
Instead of paying lobbyists for copyright extension for everyone, Disney pays the government to only extend their own. This is stupid.
How about instead of having time limits, we have profit limits? The copyright expires once your work has turned a 1,000% profit or after 50 years, whichever is less.
The purpose of intellectual property protection should be to foster creativity, not maximize profit. Disney will still create the next Pocohantas movie if they 'only' expect a 10x return, as opposed to the drag-it-out-for-50-years -get-40x-return thing they've done with Snow White, and the consumers will be far better served.
Copyright should be viewed as the minimum incentive necessary to maintain a productive, creative environment, no more.
Yes, but doesn't this spawn yet another "industry" of professional copyright maintainers? Sort of like domain name squatters?
It wouldn't create freelance copyright squatters. If I were to pay the copyright fee on, for instance, Star Wars, that would not give me the right to the Star Wars copyright. It would merely extend George Lucas' copyright.
However, it most certainly would create copyright fee maintenance companies, which is a problem.
People would pay the initial copyright fee, but no one would want to run the risk of forgetting to renew a copyright on any non-trivial published work, so they would look to hire someone to do the job for them.
For instance, let's say that copyright renewal costs $100 every 20 years, and there's 4 renewal periods. (80 year max) I could easily go into the business of submitting copyright renewals, and I could do it for $100 per copyright for the duration of the copyright (plus my up-front fee)
I invest the $100 conservatively, and receive 5.75% interest, compounded annually. By the time 20 years rolls around, that $100 has become $205. Now I withdraw $100 of that, and pay the copyright fee to extend the copyright, leaving $105. Repeat every 20 years until the copyright reaches the statutory maximum.
In other words, the company that produced the work could be out of business, the copyright ownership could be impossible to determine, but so long as the original copyright holder made arrangement with such a copyright renewal processing company, the unknown copyright would continue to be renewed decade after decade.
The problem is that modern copyright terms are so incredibly long that even a large fee 80 or 100 years in the future translates to a small investment now. For instance, if the fee to renew a copyright will be $1,000 100 years from now, I can cover that now by investing $3.00 at 6%, compounded annually, and placing that investment in the hands of a corporation that contractually agrees to pay the copyright fee for me 100 years from now.
In other words, regular renewal requirements don't necessarily solve the problem.
>>>They[congress] have an obligation to pass laws for their paying constituents, but the highest law of the land (Constitution) says they can't do it.
WTF
Congress has no obligation to be corrupt and do what "paying constituents" want them to do. Their real obligation is to do what is right for the people of the USA.
We have this problem with IP law out of control because congress is being corrupt instead of doing what is right.
Religion is the main cause of atheism.
So much for the intelligence of the net. This is on a par with saying money is speech. /br>
In either case you get those with money warping literature, or politics, for their benefit, rather than the benefit of the public, as I believe was intended by the original copyright law.
The exercise extending this principle to current music monopolies is left to the student...;)
First, one of the nice things about copyright, for the little guy, is that you do not have to register to be entitled to some copyright protection. You author something, and there is some protection you are entitled to without registration. Copyright registrations are inexpensive, and can usually be done without the assistance of an attorney. Requring a registration after 5, 10, or even 20 years to have a continuing copyright could make good sense -- the author would have a fair chance to assess what needed protecting versus what was not going to be worth paying a fee.
Second, because of the Berne Convention, we cannot burden copyrights resulting from publications in foreign countries in certain ways. For example, you have to register a domestic work before you file a lawsuit in the U.S., but the foreign work does not have to file a U.S. registration prior to a lawsuit. If done in a way such that the effect were to be to force Disney and Hollywood to move to Canada or Mexico, I can't say it would be a victory.
Third, is used in a way like present fee systems, the fees would not distinguish between big money works that pay for themselves in a year, and the rest is gravy, versus the smaller circulation works that need 10 or 20 years to gather a good income. In some ways a tax would work better -- it could be proportional to the financial value.
I think that copyright should be easy and cheap for short periods, cost money to maintain for long periods (although shorter than the current limits), be consistent internationally, and have an easy way for the public to figure out what is or is not copyrighted (E.g. not having to figure out when Joe Obscure Author kicked the bucket).
No, I'm certain these are "top feeders". Just *one* of there many bribes is several times my yearly wage. While it is for certain that their actions are dispicable calling them "bottom feeders" is like (Bush) calling the 9/11 terrorists "cowards"; it's cos(pi) (the complete opposite) of 1 (the truth).
Didn't you hear about the Disney amendment? Congress sold^H^H^H^H passed it last year!
"Amendment 28: Article one, Section eight shall be amended to read as follows: To promote the profits of corporations, and to fight the evils of terrorism, the exclusive right of authors and inventors to their respective writings, recordings, video and audio discs, and discoveries shall be guaranteed in perpetuity.
Additionally, article three, section three shall be amended as follows: " Treason against the United States shall consist only in levying war against them, or in adhering to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort, being a terrorist or drug dealer, or by violating the patents and copyrights of any corporation. No person shall be convicted of treason except upon the secret testimony of the Attorney General or his deputies."
0 1 - just my two bits
Firstly, Congress has no authority to change the US Constitution. (Even if that does seem to be legislative fashion these days
Secondly, Lessig's compromise also violates the US Constitution. According to this link, the document says in Article I Section 8:
Note it says "for limited Times". Allowing patent, copyright and trademark holders to retain their works as long as they pay for them, is not limited time.
The only two fixes that are moral and legal are to either amend the Constitution to allow for unlimited works rights, or to never again extend such rights. In fact, the time limits should be reduced
The remaining fix is to lob mortar shells at the US Capitol building until the Congresspeople begin to see the light. Myself, I prefer this option. The US Constitution is a body of rules, not guidelines, but the use of opinion and lassitude are making it a piece of paper. Is there any mystery as to why the populace has so little regard for the rule of law?
[You have a stable society when some nut guns down a schoolyard and the law doesn't change.]
The purpose of intellectual property laws should be to encourage innovation, not to protect intellectual property forever. The Mickey Mouse character has been lots of fun for a long time. Disney has earned lots of money from the character. Disney should now create something new rather than trying to protect Mickey forever.
What would happen to Disney without copyright protection continuing for Mickey? Would someone else start using a mouse character to promote a theme park? I doubt it. Would someone try to make some knock-off cartoons? Maybe, but would Disney suffer? I don't think Disney would lose much.
20 years is a nice duration for a copyright. An author or artist could live off a creation for about 1/3 of a long adult life-span. During that time the artist could create some more copyrighted material and have a productive life.
Our country has gone overboard with copyrights and patents. Extending patents and awarding patents for software do not encourage creativity. Instead they encourage defensive copyright/patent claims and litigation. We need to create an environment which encourages creativity rather than stifling it.
Ray Seyfarth, ray.seyfarth@gmail.com, http://rayseyfarth.blogspot.com
They entered into an unwritten contract with their parties. Without party support they wouldnt be where they are, they owe more to their parties than they ever did to the american sheepdom.
Did anyone notice that Forbes first basically calls for a monarchy in Iraq, headed by an appointed de facto rule from the US? At first I thought it was satire (honest) but I was just being too generous in my reading. Oh great, a racist imperialist agrees with my view on patent/copyright reform.What next, endorsing Stallman and calling for apartheid?
because he's the only one that's right
Until our children are no longer molded into castrated sheep democracy remains a fake and a danger. -A. S. Neill
This is somewhat OT, but I'm really curious about it. In '98, when Forbes was running for President, my family supported him because they'd met him, my dad worked with him a little bit many years ago, and they were big fans of 'that kind' of republican-ism. I disagree with them on most everything, but I found it much more difficult to argue against several of Forbes' platforms. I was also 18 at the time, so not really in a position to be able to.
What do slashdotters think of the flat tax, especially? I understand the principles but am not very well educated in the specifics of the pros and cons (the cons, mostly). It certainly sounds like a good idea on paper.
Many of you are misguided about what Lessig plans to get out of the Eldred Act. He's given up on Mickey, and rightfully so.
Clarity through editing:
Many of you are misguided about what Lessig plans to get out of the Eldred Act. He's given up.
As another AC pointed out, you missed that Forbes was showing some sarcasm, and it was nice to see Forbes Magazine, The Capitalist Tool come out and speak the truth about Disney and the Congress that falls over itself for them.
But I didn't post to say "me too", I posted because you've mentioned something I personally think should have been the grounds for throwing out not just the DMCA, but most of the extensions.
The notion that a "limited time" can exceed the human lifespan is a wild, baseless leap the Supreme Court should have not tolerated. It defies reason and common sense. If the founders intended copyright to span many decades (soon to be centuries), they would not have used the word "limited".
By allowing this unconstitutional abuse to continue, the Supreme Court has disgracefully failed to fulfill it's obligations. Precedent set, is almost never undone.
... yeah, and he also suggests installing a Monarchy in Irag.
Does anybody believe that the power-elite in the US are holders of the democratic ideal?
OK, experiment over, time for the post mortem to explain it's failure.
-pyrrho
Congress will love the pay for copyright solution, since they're always looking for new events that require a tax. It won't be long before the govt. taxes me to use the restroom. Either I own the copyright, or I don't. But I shouldn't have to pay the govt. to keep it. What next? Am I going to have to pay a fee for free speech? If a company can hold a copyright forever, however, by paying fees every so often, that is unconstitutional.
Vote for Pedro
How does Congress ratifying a treaty that limits its own Constitutionally granted powers qualify as an example of a foreign Treaty extending the powers of Government beyond the scope of the Constitution?
Of all the works that might enter the public domain under Lessig's proposal, those works that offer the most value to society are precisely the ones that copyright holders would like to prevent from entering the public domain.
If there's anything to be learned from corporations and the estates of the famous deceased is that both tend to be very protective of their intellectual "property". You can bet that as long as it is possible for these and other groups to renew the copyright to valuable works, they will likely continue to do so.
All that would happen under Lessig's proposal is that the least valuable works would enter the public domain, while the most valuable works would forever remain copy-restricted.
"In prison you just have to shut your eyes and take it. Here you have to shut your eyes and give it."
After searching google for the "Eldred Act" it seems that Lessig is not proposing that copyrights be renewable forever, as Forbes' statements seemed to suggest, but rather that copyrights should still be granted for limited times with the added restriction of an extension fee every so-many years. That's not as bad as I thought, although I still think it would do little to free up the most valuable works.
"In prison you just have to shut your eyes and take it. Here you have to shut your eyes and give it."
Hm. Suddenly, the fact that Steve Forbes, of all people, supports more limited copyright laws makes me suspect that I might be wrong about my advocacy of Lessig's ideas.
:)
Kind of like how knowing that Pat Buchanan is against the war in Iraq makes me wonder whether it might actually be a good idea, after all.
Regretfully, I have to disagree with Mr. Forbes there. I can't think of one situation where it's justifiable to extend a copyright beyond some standard and fixed length of time.
Maybe not alone (they need 3/4 of the states to approve the change), but Congress ceratinly can try to change it. I do kind of wonder how well that would be received, since a lot of people I talk to don't even know what the public domain is. Not that I want an amendment like that tried, though
Also, IMO (which doesn't count for squat legally
I do agree with your assesment that the length of copyrights are way too long. I find it disturbing that nothing copyrighted today will ever enter the public domain within my lifetime. I agree that that's not right. I wish we could get some Congress-people to agree.
"Save the whales, feed the hungry, free the mallocs" -- author unknown
If Congress wants to subvert the spirit of the Consitution in this regard, but stay within the letter of limited terms, all it has to do is extend the term of copyright for a really really long time. 300 million years after the death of the author seems like a nice, round, very large yet still finite number.
Seriously, the entire difficulty with the Supremes maintaining that as long as the term is finite it is not their problem is that there are ways to have finite yet effectively unlimited terms. Repeated small extension is one, and one-time obscenely large extension is another. If Congress is being auctioned off with respect to this kind of legislation, then the courts must eventually summon up the will to draw some line that makes the copyright extension power limited in reality, not just in its syntax.
I think you're missing the point.
"It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once." -David Hume
They think they owe their parties and their contributors, but they really owe us the public at large.
But the pols who do the wrong thing get the money. They can put on lots of ads on TV. The "american sheepdom" responds well to advertising and re-elects the wrong people.
Religion is the main cause of atheism.
...by making substantial reelection campaign contributions. Seriously, why else would most legislators care about this issue one way or the other? I am perhaps being more than a bit cynical here, but politicians must raise money to remain in office, and they have a tendency to listen to those who contribute to them (those that aren't outright 0wn3d by their contributors).
The courts were our best shot at stopping this. And it didn't work.
144l. ph34r my 133t l3g4l 5k1lz!
--or just perhaps, you have noticed that the old left/right paradigm is really a too-generic description to be used for automatic "I agree with such and such because they are left wing" or right wing, and etc? Perhaps ideas are inherently more "human" than a direction or geographical area and those pre conceived constructs are not relevant any longer? Like right and wrong might be a better way to look at things than right and left.
I know you got a funny mod on it and it was funny, but it's funny because it's true. I frequently find myself agreeing with a point some pol made, after which I don't agree much with them, and it goes across the political spectrum.
As I get older I am less enamored of labels-applied, as I am of consistenency and results and logic and reason as pertains individuals. I guess that means removing one's self from the herd more and being more independent in thinking, using the right tool rather than some clique's currently "popular" tool. Something like that anyway.
Simpler, party labels or identifying as a political "side" or "wing" are forced and artificial, and usually promoted from places that have an agenda that is primarily designed to keep people in general from unifying around their common ground. For instance, the "left wing" lately is becoming alarmed over the first amendment, some strict traditional right wing have long been alarmed over the second and the 4th, both wings are alarmed over the 5th, both should be alarmed over the 10th and 13th, so there exists enough common ground to stop and for both sides to look around and see if perhaps there is a commonality of agreement to see where these threats come from,and to note that the "other side" has had a valid point all along,that a lot of the supposed differences were induced rather than naturally occuring, and maybe it's time to cooperate instead of squabble.
What I like to term "the goons", those of whom really control the planet and adhere to no particular bloc or wing outside of power and profit outside of their virtual congame labels, love to continue the charade game of "divide and conquer" because it is so immensely profitable for them, and because it is so easy for them to perpetuate this congame.
That "game" is why they have been so successful. Now, that means, the more people who can admit to a certain amount of personal fake-out,just accept it and deal with it rationally, and who can then step outside the box and stop playing that game with "the goons", the better off all of us who are being exploited will be, no matter language, race, nationality, etc.
Just my O there, hope it makes some sense.
I can see this bill doing good, as a baby step. Basically it works like this, you increase the public domain with this bill, right? More recent works can be public domain, and people can enjoy the benefit of a larger base of works in the commons.
Suddenly, the public can remember how copyright was originally supposed to work, and they can actually enjoy some of the public domain work again. A decade passes, and the public begins to realize that the Disney corporation and thier ilk don't have an automatic right to make money off thier work from 100 years ago. They can see what good public domain can do to a work, and will begin to want change.
This might sound unrealistic, but think about it, how many interesting and useful things like Project Gutenberg will be created and flourish if the number of works in public domain increases? If there are several "killer apps" for the public domain, showing what the internet can do to information distribution, suddenly everyone will want thier stuff in the public domain.
An analogy would be open-source. The "killer apps" are things like Linux, Apache and Sendmail. They haven't changed copyright law, but what they are doing is making several businesses think about giving thier code away under the GPL, which is similar to the public domain in this analogy. This is helping to increase the amount of code being shared, and helping people understand the change that the internet has brought to intellectual property.
All we need are a few "killer apps", profitable and popular works of art that are either given away freely or where the copyrights have expired, in order to start changing peoples minds.
Maybe because it came from Steve Forbes, you're assuming that the costs will be high. They needn't be much more than the cost of registering the item in a database. Maybe $10 every ten years, or less.
I don't see this bankrupting the reading public. Any work that sells more than a dozen copies is hardly going to be significantly over-priced because of this.
Wow, you really have no concept of irony on your planet...
Don't forget that Sony thinks that Spider-Man made no profit... Profits, like any stats, can be fudged in any way people see fit.
Human nature is the same everywhere; the modes only are different. -- Earl of Chesterfield
Many of those people would be out of work if the (admittedly ridiculous) Copyright industry were to fall. That's why being responsible for political decisions is such a tough and thankless job.
Don't get me wrong; those who have read my posts on the subject know that I think the concept of Intellectual Property is completely contrary to the Constitution and needs to go away. At the same time, however, a lot of people are putting food on the table because of this twisting of the Constitution. And I'm not just talking about CEOs and CFOs (though I certainly care just as much for their financial well-being as for others--they're not necessarily the terrible ogres or idle playboys that some people fashion them to be).
It's not what it costs the publisher, it's what the information is worth to you. People already spend the equivalent of a life savings on higher education. Eternal copyrights will move a larger chunk of that money to publishers. Publishers will also be able to extort more money from public university students. It's already happened in technical journal publishing and the practice will continue to expand given the powers granted in the name of "unimportant" publications such as movies and music. I don't care who said it or what their intentions are, the consequenses are clear and beter deals can be had.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Form a P2P network that places all works 75 years after date of publication free for download. Base servers in countries that are not Berne-signatories. Let anyone host unofficial servers.
ObProblem: anyone wanting the latest pop hit will try to get it hosted on the servers.
ObBastards: How few non-copyright-expired animated films has Disney made? Can the Brothers-Grimms' kids sue?
Rick
I love to read all of the self-righteous anti-Disney/anti-Microsoft/anti-copyright-extensio n posts here on Slashdot.
Let's face it: most of you are NOT creative enough to write anything-- be it a song, book, or script -- worth copyrighting. Nobody will remember anything you wrote 20 years from now. That's why you are against copyrights and Disney, etc. etc. ad nauseum . In fact, this explains why most of you like the endless KDE and Gnome ripoffs of the look-and-feel of the Windows GUI's, while simultaneously bashing Microsoft's interface as a rip-off of the Macintosh. You aren't creative, you aren't innovative, and you only know how to duplicate other people's work.
Folks, this is a THIRD WORLD MENTALITY and I'm sure a large share of Slashdotters are from the Third World. (This might explain the frequent anti-Americanisms/anti-captitalistic posts on this board). There's a reason you folks are in the "Third World"; it's because the majority of your society, or the people in power, have this mentality.
I'm not going to say that all captialism is good; indeed, it needs to be restrained, especially when it destroys the environment, or endangers lives. Extending a copyright does none of these things.
Imagine good things. Imagine an evironmental activist writes an e-book that sells in the millions. Movies are made based on the book, and the royalties for the work are plowed back into environmental research -- FOREVER. Wouldn't that be a great thing? You may say, "Yeah, well no Big-Evil-Corporation (TM) does that." Maybe it's because they have never felt the pressure. Maybe this is an unconventional thing to do. Maybe it's because technology has never advanced -- until now -- where affordable off the shelf equipment can compete with the Big Boys (TM). In many areas, the little guy can compete with the big guys, but the little guy has to be smart about watching those pennies. One way to keep the pennies coming is to respect creative work and to respect those copyrights, because they can work IN YOUR FAVOR, and allow you to be philanthropic with your profits. You can never become a Big-Benevolent-Corporation (TM) that can fight the Big-Evil-Corporation (TM) otherwise.
Back to Lessig. Lessig is a self-promotional publicity hound and hypocrite. If he believes so feverently in copyright limitations, why does he publish books for payment, instead of releasing them for free on the Web? Is he really fighting for the rights of the "common person"? If so, why is drawing a huge salary at Stanford Univesrity, a private university, rather than working at a public university, where he could serve a larger, and less wealthy, audience?
Yeah, go ahead: Call this a troll. But don't tell me that Forbes' article, and Lessig's constant railings (aka LAWSUITS) aren't trolls either.
Hey Straw Man. In return for the state protecting your exclusive rights for a given amount of time, you give up all rights after that time in order for all to bask in the glow of your genius.
Geez, why are people so dense. It's not Disney that pisses people off, it's their hypocrasy. And their version of the Jungle Book sucks. Let's hope they don't try to turn Kim in to a cute ragamuffin story.
Rick
Later, they sell this article to a magazine that's probably less known, and doesn't mind selling things that have already been published. They make less money, but if they can do this once or twice with every article, it really helps their income.
The problem turns up when you look at how much work a true freelance writer produces. It's already a large task keeping track of a dozen magazine articles, and even more newspaper articles, all at the same time. (And this is at one go. They have to keep track of much more over time...)Now they have to tag all their dozens, if not hundreds of articles and file for copyright renewal as well, each one expiring at different times?
If we were to do something like this, I'd put the onus on a company that buys rights to publish material X indefinately. (Not first time rights. That already has a more or less set timeframe on it.) I wouldn't make it the onus of individuals. Those who truly rely on the system for their bread and butter would be hurt by it.
Of course, neither of those are real people, so by your narrow perspective, perhaps they can't really disagree with you.
My definition of tard would be: someone who criticizes that which he does not understand, thus entering a sad, self-perpetuating cycle of tardhood. Open your mind.
You forgot this famous quote:
"I am a goat fucker."
George Washington Bush
like a true imperialist. Yeah, maybe Afghanistan will be a good place for a vacation.
Germans were more militaristic? Totalitarianism was far more popular? How do you measure this? Hitler's uniforms for the military? This is not political analysis, man. Sounds like a high school history teacher.
If you kick out Hussein "and his oligarchy" without a sense of the future, you'll get exactly what happened in Afghanistan in the eighties and nineties. The US financed Bin Laden to fight against the government, in the following power vacuum the incredibly reactionary Taliban assumes control. Oh, forget it...
Dear Emily:
I collected replies to an article I wrote, and now it's time to
summarize. What should I do?
-- Editor
Dear Editor:
Simply concatenate all the articles together into a big file and post
that. On USENET, this is known as a summary. It lets people read all the
replies without annoying newsreaders getting in the way. Do the same when
summarizing a vote.
-- Emily Postnews Answers Your Questions on Netiquette
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