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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.
Yes, but doesn't this spawn yet another "industry" of professional copyright maintainers? Sort of like domain name squatters?
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
Seems inherently unfair to me. Unless you are rich, you lose the rights to your work?
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 your work can't bring in enough money to support itself, it might as well be in the public domain, right?
"[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.
Yep, and you tax the hell out of it.
There is a fundamental difference between cheap land that you develop and make productive and cheap land that is just left sitting there.
There is a sort of poetic justice if a book that is out of print is also out of copyright.
...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.
Depends upon the cost of maintaining the copyright.
As a suggestion, an original copyright will last no more than 10 years. If the original copyright holder feels a need to renew the copyright, he must do so before the end of the 10th year. He may renew for no more than 5 years at a time, with renewals happening within the last year.
The cost of the original copyright is the production of the work. The cost of renewals is 10 cents per megabyte of text, image or minute of music, and 1 dollar per minute of motion picture.
Works may be retained in a corporate copyright contract, however corporations are going to be interested in reducing their costs over time, so one of three things will happen. The corporation will recognize that the copyright is still earning them money, and renew the copyright, they will see no return on the copyright and will let it lapse, the company will go bust and the copyricht will lapse.
Personally I do not believe that a copyright should be handed down to heirs. The work will remain under the copyright that the creator maintaines, and the family or other heirs may benifit from that copyright, however they may not renew the copyright.
Any work for which the copyright has lapsed may not be put back into copyright.
That's just my opinion.
-Rusty
You never know...
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.
It is brilliant, and unfortunatly it's also 'illegal' under the terms of the Berne Convention, of which the U.S. is a signatory.
As part of the treaty, a persons right of copyright may not be put in jeopardy even by small formalities. It is one of the problems that arise from the European conception that an artist has a 'moral right' to the work they've produced.
-R
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.
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.
Seems inherently unfair to me. Unless you are rich, you lose the rights to your work?
It wasn't particularly fair to YOU when congress increased the copyright protection period. And your comment is particularly ironic, because it is precisely because large corporations (like Disney) ARE rich that you lost YOUR rights...your right to have the material become part of the public domain after a reasonable time to allow the copyright holder to benefit from his work. Isn't THAT unfair?
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).
In other words, the artists copyright may not put in jeopardy, but when he passes his rights to a second party (e.g. Disney, Time-Warner, Sony, whatever), he already has willfully relinquished some of his rights in favour of said second party.
No one says, that the new owners rights to a piece of work have to be of the same quality as the original author had.
"Between strong and weak, between rich and poor [...], it is freedom which oppresses and the law which sets free"
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
And in case you didn't know, the Constitution is not a small formality.
-- Will program for bandwidth
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.
And what kind of protection do you think you currently get for free?
If you do register and pay a small filing fee you get some additional protection, because it becomes potentially more expensive to violate your copyright. However for 'free' copyright upon creation any violation is much less expensive for the violator which must simply stop using your copyrighted material and are only liable for actual damages (ie your attorney fees are yours and you only can possibly win the infringers profits and your losses if any).
Additionally finding infringement of your copyright can be a difficult proposition unless it's being flagrantly violated in a widely read publication.
So although the small filing fee (not free) provides you with more protection (statutory damages and attorneys fees) there is still the cost of filing and the preparation costs of registering the copyright. Additionally any money you invest in hunting down violators of your copyright. Actively protecting a copyright while not prohibitively expensive does involve some costs even without a small renewal fee.
Finally the fundamental basis for copyright in the US isn't protection of the artist; it's the promotion of new works. So the pertinent question is, would the additional cost of not allowing your photo library to go to the public domain 20 years from its creation cause you not to publish it now?
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