New IFPI Boss Vows to Extend Recording Copyrights

JamesD_UK writes "John Kennedy, President and COO of Universal Music is to succeed Jay Berman as Chairman of the IFPI, the worldwide equivalent to the RIAA. Andrew Orlowski of The Register has written an article covering John Kennedy's views on copyright infringement and the public domain. Although Kennedy's thoughts on the former are predictable, he has vowed to fight hard to extend European recording copyrights past the current fifty year term. An extension of the European term to match the US would be particularly damaging to the public domain and efforts such as the Internet Archive as well as increasing the control that the recording industry holds over performers. For those interested, I run a small blog of articles regarding copyright recordings."

Comments

Re:What I don't understand is...

[real_smiff]

I know someone who works as an accountant in BMG NZ (or rather did, before they laid off most of their staff). I can confirm Elvis is one of their biggest sellers, and certainly most profitable. it costs the label almost nothing to put out a new compilation/greatest hits. I'm not even talking about remixes! She often joked that all their biggest earners are dead. Mind you, this could also be something to do with why BMG were having problems..

Founder's Copyright?

[MenTaLguY]

You mean something just like this?

O'Reilly has released a number of titles under this arrangement.

Re:What I don't understand is...

[cpt kangarooski]

That's incorrect. Trademarks are not functional equivalents for copyrights. Thus, it can't prevent you from creating derivatives. There was a case that dealt a little bit with this. You can read it here. It doesn't come up much, however, since the situation is rare.