Slashdot Mirror
Extending Pop Music Copyrights
InklingBooks writes "According to TimesOnLine, the UK is considering doubling the copyright term for popular music to 100 years. That means the Beatles' "Love Me Do" and "Please Please Me," scheduled to to go into the public domain in 2013, would earn royalties for record companies until 2063."
Disney did it... why not let others do it too? Either everyone gets extensions or no one does... it's only fair...
---
Programming is like sex... Make one mistake and support it the rest of your life.
Why don't they listen to Larry...
I know I'll be modded down for this. Yay for groupthink.
As a record store owner, my business faces ruin. CD sales have dropped through the floor. People aren't buying half as many CDs as they did just a year ago. Revenue is down and costs are up. My store has survived for years, but I now face the prospect of bankruptcy. Every day I ask myself why this is happening.
I bought the store about 12 years ago. It was one of those boutique record stores that sell obscure, independent releases that no-one listens to, not even the people that buy them. I decided that to grow the business I'd need to aim for a different demographic, the family market. My store specialised in family music - stuff that the whole family could listen to. I don't sell sick stuff like Marilyn Manson or cop-killer rap, and I'm proud to have one of the most extensive Christian rock sections that I know of.
The business strategy worked. People flocked to my store, knowing that they (and their children) could safely purchase records without profanity or violent lyrics. Over the years I expanded the business and took on more clean-cut and friendly employees. It took hard work and long hours but I had achieved my dream - owning a profitable business that I had built with my own hands, from the ground up. But now, this dream is turning into a nightmare.
Every day, fewer and fewer customers enter my store to buy fewer and fewer CDs. Why is no one buying CDs? Are people not interested in music? Do people prefer to watch TV, see films, read books? I don't know. But there is one, inescapable truth - Internet piracy is mostly to blame. The statistics speak for themselves - one in three discs world wide is a pirate. On The Internet, you can find and download hundreds of dollars worth of music in just minutes. It has the potential to destroy the music industry, from artists, to record companies to stores like my own. Before you point to the supposed "economic downturn", I'll note that the book store just across from my store is doing great business. Unlike CDs, it's harder to copy books over The Internet.
A week ago, an unpleasant experience with pirates gave me an idea. In my store, I overheard a teenage patron talking to his friend.
"Dude, I'm going to put this CD on the Internet right away."
"Yeah, dude, that's really lete [sic], you'll get lots of respect."
I was fuming. So they were out to destroy the record industry from right under my nose? Fat chance. When they came to the counter to make their purchase, I grabbed the little shit by his shirt. "So...you're going to copy this to your friends over The Internet, punk?" I asked him in my best Clint Eastwood/Dirty Harry voice.
"Uh y-yeh." He mumbled, shocked.
"That's it. What's your name? You're blacklisted. Now take yourself and your little bitch friend out of my store - and don't come back." I barked. Cravenly, they complied and scampered off.
So that's my idea - a national blacklist of pirates. If somebody cannot obey the basic rules of society, then they should be excluded from society. If pirates want to steal from the music industry, then the music industry should exclude them. It's that simple. One strike, and you're out - no reputable record store will allow you to buy another CD. If the pirates can't buy the CDS to begin with, then they won't be able to copy them over The Internet, will they? It's no different to doctors blacklisting drug dealers from buying prescription medicine.
I have just written a letter to the RIAA outlining my proposal. Suing pirates one by one isn't going far enough. Not to mention pirates use the fact that they're being sued to unfairly portray themselves as victims. A national register of pirates would make the problem far easier to deal with. People would be encouraged to give the names of suspected pirates to a hotline, similar to TIPS. Once we know the size of the problem, the police and other law enforcement agencies will be forced to take piracy seriously. They have fought the W
'strawberry fields forever'
:-)
well.. another 50 years feels like forever to me
must be having a hard day's life if they still need royalties from the songs.
The copyright they are talking about is on the performance. So, if you could find a Beatles recording of some old song by someone who died 75 years ago, then that would be affected. Please, Please Me doesn't count.
Why is it that people have to pay land taxes but they don't have to pay copyright taxes? If you own land you are required to pay a tax on it because the state spends a heck of a lot of public resources on protecting that land for you. The same goes for copyright (especially now that copyright violation has become a criminal act in some countries) so why don't the copyright holders have to pay a tax?
How we know is more important than what we know.
This can be seen as giving the record companies more money to generate/find new talent /or/
Giving the record companies more money as they rehash the same old talent.
It's amazing how record companies can make themselves sound like poor orphans with no money, food, heating, or shelter.
Michael Jackson bought the rights to the beatles music way back in the 80's. Thats one reason to not buy beatles CD's. Pirate your beatles music, then buy something else by McCartney or Ringo, that way they'll see the profits. Buying beatles music supports a pedofile.
Bacardi + slashdot = negative karma.
It seems to me that copyrights are turning from a temporary privilege into an actual property right, despite all indications that only a self-interested minority of our society wants that. So when are copyright holders going to pay property tax on their holdings?
because no one ever built a road to allow access to a copyright.
I'd like to launch a slashdot poll to see how many are really surprised about this ...
seriuosly, did anyone expect this NOT to happen ??
We learn from history that we learn nothing from history - Tom Veneziano
unless there will be payouts from the record industry (well, either way this is true), it will only be promoting the mono-culture that is forming.
Wasn't it Michael Jackson who owns the rights to the Beatles songs?
He could sure use the money, if not for damage claims then to keep Neverland running.
On top of that, there's ALREADY a special UK law that means copyright to "Peter Pan" will NEVER run out (no kidding, it really exists!).
Coincidence? I THINK NOT!!
The illegal we do immediately. The unconstitutional takes a little longer.
--Henry Kissinger
That changes everything - it'll stop illegal downloading at a stroke!
AT&ROFLMAO
"Bands like Coldplay will make enough money for their company to help them discover around 50 or 100 bands."
Excuse me? EXCUSE ME??? The point of a band is to make money for its label???
What about the label paying its bands living wages? Or does that just not count?
What about using the internet to develop and promote new bands? That doesn't count either?
Thank god I live in France where my right to download CDs and movies is now protected by "activist judges".
www.eissq.com/BandP.html Ball and Plate System. Amuse your friends. Crush your enemies.
So the content distribution business will churn cover versions forever and we'll forget what a song writer is?
Seems to be a strong disincentive to write new songs because the distribution business finds it cheaper to repackage songs they already own! Why pay a writer?
Or will it become like art museums, where every generation goes to see the Picasso or the Turner and the only new art is weird art that isn't in a Turner style.
Imagine the future: "and here we have the work by the famous artist Kylie who lived two centuries ago and was inspired by the drama of her earlier career as a professional actress".
Let's face it, unless the indsutry starts embracing the future and changing the way they do business, it's only a matter of time before they are rendered obsolete by self-publication and internet distribution by artists themselves.
Why must copyright extensions always be retroactive? Are we afrad that The Beatles won't write Love Me Do in 1963 if he didn't expect royalties for a hundred years? Wait, that doesn't even make sense. The copyright deal back then was given, and works were created as intended; the incentive worked. So why would we need to give a guy in 1963 more incentive to create?
"Oppression and harassment is a small price to pay to live in the land of the free." -- Montgomery Burns.
I am FUCKING furious.
If this goes into force, anything you hear today is unlikely to be returned to the public domain within the lifetime of your GRANDCHILDREN. This is completely fucking unacceptable.
Copyright is already 30 years too long. These media cartels have stolen our public domain and culture, and are renting it back to us in perpetuity.
I'm off to write to my MP.
GRRRRRR
...
It is the greed that never ends...
It just goes on and on my friends...
One day the recording industry started doing it...
and now they'll forever continue doing it because...
whoops... now im gonna get sued.
Shadus
...except the record companies, of course. 100 years is more than likely beyond the lifespan of any given musician, so they can't exactly hide behind the 'it's about the poor artists' on this one. Heck, the Beatles are already halfway there, any bets on whether McCartney will see 2063?
Stasis is death. Embrace change.
Artistic protection! For artists that compose their first evergreen in the womb, write it down immediately after being dried and live to a hundred.
What a load of manure. Like record companies don't have enough money already. And as if classical music is easier to compose and hence needs merely 50 years.
I hadn't the slightest objection to his spending his time planning massacres for the bourgeoisie... (P.G. Wodehouse)
A singer isn't going to live for 100years + the age they were when they made the track. This is not copyright protection for the benefit of the muscian with the distributors making money from distribution, but blatantly for the benefit of the corporates and to the disadvantage of the public. One has to ask oneself - why would a law like this be passed? Politicians have become too corrupt.
Copyright was intended to temporarily reward the artist, to encourage them to produce art.
(s/innovator/innovations/ but it's all the same).
Artists do not commonly live for 100 years. Especially not 100 years from when they produce the work that gets them the most praise.
Even if the artist got 100% of the royalties from the copyright, extending it past the artist's natural lifetime is meaningless.
In addition, even compensating the artist for their entire natural lifetime is counter-productive, since it removes the driving force (according to traditional wisdom, above) behind their production or art. If you're singing to eat, then giving you all the money you'll ever need reduces your need to sing. This is the exact opposite of what copyright is intended for.
Finally, artists commonly don't even get 10% of the profits from their work. Why? Because the copyright is usually owned by a large corporation, which had no hand whatsoever in the creative, artistic work. They simply publicise the artist and distribute the art, and reap 90%+ of the profits from it.
Given this state of affairs, extending copyright does nothing but feed more money to already overcompensated multinationals, while either shutting out the originating artist or (if they own their own copyright and get all the profits) discouraging them from producing further art.
This is fucking obvious. Why don't people see it?
Or are they just blinded by all those dollar bills the entertainment industry keeps piling over their heads?
Everything in moderation, including moderation itself
Love love me doe
I act like a ho
You'll pay me some mo
so pleeeaaaheaaheaheaaaaasssee
Give me doe !!
Personally, I'd like to see copyright terms reduced to seven years. As far as I know, IP producers demand payback on investment in at most 3-5 years. Giving royalties much beyond that timeframe will NOT result in any more IP production, at least at any company I've ever heard of. In a way, I think long copyright terms are a kickback scam: the government gives huge royalty collection rights to IP holders, and then gets a kickback in the form of taxes collected from IP holders' royalty income. As far as I can tell, long copyright terms do nothing for voters. Hopefully voters will rebel soon in the voting booth.
IMagine in the future being the progeny of Rick Astley or Culture Club.... somewhere a culture is going to realize the raw talent and appreciate their music..... and should the descendents (great band) of these 'artists' go unrewarded because the law limited the time their family could own the rights of their music? P-cha!!!!
Very few of the record companies who would stand to make any money from extended copyrights are UK or even EU owned. Essentially our government intends to change the law so that UK consumers can continue to send revenue out of the country to the big five record companies. This will apparently encourage these big, mostly US based companies to seek out new talent here in the UK, and not in any way simply produce yet more US music in the UK charts.
I expect Ms. Jowell doesn't watch much Top of the Pops on a Friday evening and has probably missed the fact that bands such as Coldplay are very much the exception to the rule. They've managed to produce a sound that is acceptable to US audiences, so their record company is going to invest a couple of million dollars into them as a band. However the vast majority of UK music either doesn't come from within the UK or is limited to the UK market only.
The record companies arn't interested in nurturing UK talent; they can make far more money producing boy bands, Brittney Spears knockoffs and Pop [Star|Idol] "singers" who can knock out a few cheap songs and produce a nice little return. But spending millions on a single UK band? Forget it, they're not interested.
Well, I guess now we know those christian music listening, family oriented, clean cut types love to pirate music. So much for family values. Servers you right for targetting your business to such a degenerate crowd.
Open Source Java DAO Generator
so if I am in the UK and I have a song on a CD that is over 50 years old- can I freely distribute it on my website? Is the actual recording itself in the public domain- or just the song- meaning that I can record my own version (with my stellar voice) and not have to pay royalties?
How much money do they make from performances of music that was released in 1955 anyway? And does the record industry need so much extra money? Seems to be doing quite nicely as it is.
Why would the record companies use this extra revenue "to look for new talent and nurture it."? They base the amount of money they invest in this on future projected profits. Will they really spend the extra income on looking for more talent rather than shareholder dividends? Is the cost to the public domain really worth it? Would it be better to allow up and coming bands to release covers of classic songs?
"It sees the move as a way of generating more money for the record industry, which would use it to discover new talent."
The self-reinforcing loop between capital and talent would be more efficient as a self reinforcing loop between consumer and talent. Of course that such a system of direct distribution would obsolate the record companies would violate the #1 tenet of neo-liberalism; More Money for Me!
Michael Jackson owns the publishing rights to a nice chunk of beatles music. If Michael plans on holding out for a few more child molestation lawsuits before he dies he really needs that revenue source to be maintained.
Think of the children! If this musical copyright expires there will be no money for the children to extract from Michael.
Hurting the copyright means hurting Michael Jackson means hurting the children!
From the article: Purnell, who will outline his plans in a speech next week, said: "The music industry is a risky business and finding talent and artists is expensive. There is a view that long-term earners are needed so that the record companies can plough money back into unearthing new talent."
I'm sorry, but paying several of this new talents millions of dollars for every song they screech is expensive. BTW: I haven't seen much real talent since the Beatles split up.
Sig?
In a galaxy near near close.
You may want to contact the wonderful minister for "uncreative industries", James Purnell and let him know what you think...
First the companies complain that the public is stealing their work.
Then the companies steal the public domain right out from under our feet.
Pot - Kettle - Black ?
Just when Michael Jackson may lose Beatles catalog... How convenient for the eventual rights owner!
-truth
I had a steady B+ in my AI class until I failed the Turing test...
While one can argue the cost of creativity, or a product that enriches other people's lives, music corporations seem to have taken the idea a bit too far in their attempt to milk the songs for as much money as they can. One would wonder what research is this based upon? Most songs, if not all, would not have a shelf life of more than a few months (if that), and there are only a few gems that go beyond that. At the same time, there will be songs that are timeless (or considered timeless by a certain generation), which will see a number of repeat buyers, or buyers that are created as a 'spin-off' effect. The clear argument then, is the longevity, after which an artists' work is considered 'paid off', or has generated enough revenue (or the revenue has dried off), for the companies to let go if it and show their collective generosity by making it available for the masses for free. I think when they put up the 50 year term initially, it must have seemed long enough. They certainly didnt expect the market and technology to fluctuate so much, and the rapid changes and the ease of reproduction has made them rethink their strategies. But then, conversely, what music was recorded 100 years ago that ppl still listen to? (i can see a flood of posts enlightening me!) So basically, the recording companies are trying to ensure royalties are paid as long as possible
http://efil.blogspot.com/
considering all the big english hits are at least 30 years old by now ]:)
One advantage of this is that it will be a little more difficult for crappy adds to use beatles tunes to advertise their products. Imagine "strawberry fields forever" to a streets icecream
i almost went to read the article to try to figure out just what a pop song is
Will they be digitally signed ?
The most practical form of this proposal is to reduce the automatic copyright period (i.e. the initial period of protection for all copyrightable works) to something like 10 years, and then charge the copyright owner a certain amount to renew the copyright after the initial period. Variations include increasing the renewal cost for every renewal (so that it costs more to renew the copyight for something that's been copyrighted for 50 years than to renew the copyright for something that's been copyrighted for 20 years).
It's a good idea, as it ensures that all works that the owner didn't consider worthwhile renewing the copyright for automatically go into the public domain after a reasonable period of time - which is what copyright was originally intended to be.
This is about extending the recording rights only. The actual copyright on the song is already protected for 70 years after the artists death.
Why the fuck should musicians be repeatedly paid for the same piece of work. No-one outside the entertainment industry is. If I make a table I can't demand a payment for everytime someone uses it so why should a musician get paid for 100 years everytime someone listens to a song that only took a short while to create. (And you will be paying everytime ou lisen to it if the music industry gets their way.)
If musicians want to make money they should do what musicians have done for thousands of years and play music. People will come to here them play, recordings should just be advertising for the live event and traded freely. If someone wants to commercially exploit a work (say in an advert) then the artist should be compensated but other than that they should earn a living actually working for a living like everyone else, not just making a few recordings in their teens and living off the profits for the rest of their lives.
I said No Text!
I wonder if the real reason for extending the copyright to 100 years is so there won't soon be completely legal rampant sharing of some of the best music ever produced. Why pay money for new crap when you can have a free catalog of all of the music from the 60s?
Now that I think of it, does this mean all of the music up to 1955 is now public domain? If so, someone should start a legal torrent site of public domain albums up through 1955.
Scouse
the record companies will whine to the government that they are entitled to an additional 200 years of protection.
I don't listen to either Beatles or Spice Girls.
He glanced around at the motley collection of thugs, pimps and record company executives that skulked on the edges of the dim pools of light with which the dark shadows of the bar's inner recesses were pitted. They were all very deliberately looking in any direction but his now, carefully picking up the threads of their former conversations about murders, drug rings and music publishing deals.
When you are sure of something, you probably are wrong (search for "Unskilled and Unaware of It").
I dunno about you, but I find the eye patch, wooden peg-leg and parrots on the shoulder to be pretty good give-away that someone is a pirate.
Oh yeah, and liberal use of the word "Arrggh!".
And too much enjoyment in calling things "booty".
~Gildas
First Mickey, now this.
Why is this happening? Surely half a century ago artists/companies had copyrights, and they didn't last 100 years. Did any of those companies fold or artists starve because they couldn't get longer copyrights?
It seems to me that there is a lot of proof out there that prolonged copyrights are not needed for the copyright-owners to survive.
Perhaps somebody with a better historical view of copyrights can shed some light on the matter; is there any evidence in history that prolonged copyrights have such value as to warrant them?
I can understand that a copyright of just 1 year would be a bit too short for the artist to get his "morally right" compensation, but surely after 50 years it should have been enough?
Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
where I live copyright lasts 70 years after the author's death...
this decision might sound bad but there is much worse.
He is sort of getting below his $ 500 mln mark, so if the Beatles rights he owns get extended by 50 years, it will get him way above that mark again.
My wife's sketchblog Blob[p]: Gastrono-me
"So when are copyright holders going to pay property tax on their holdings?"
They do - everytime they make a quid in profit from those holdings they are liable for income or corporate tax, just like everyone else.
The folks in the governments (be it US, EU or UK) seem to have lost sight of why there's been "copy rights" for the past 200 years...
The constitutional basis (at least in the US) is to "to promote the progress of science and useful arts" - US Const. art. 1, 8, cl. 8. And thus gave the exclusive right to the rightholder (ideally, the artist himself, even though this is unlikely nowadays):
- To produce copies
- To import / export the work
- To create derivative works
- To perform / display the work publicly
- To sell / assign rights to others
But since copyright provides a monopoly, there is a limitation in time for it. The main reason is that copyright creates two main incentive -- to create and to diffuse the creative works. If there was no protection provided, creative people might just keep their creations for themselves in fear of being ripped off by other people.Hence, there is no real fear to have about a "unlimited duration" copyright... in theory. Following the Sonny Bono act, the Supreme COurt printed this wonderful opinion where they basically said that even if the copyright duration was set to a million year, it would be constitutional since it was "limited". With such arguments from the highest ranking source of legal authority, I cannot help but feeling hopeless...
Copyright is not a bad system, just like the Communist Republics' constitutions were great civil liberties manifestos...
How about you look to music academy graduates instead of busty plastic surgeon patrons for MUSICAL talent?
I still have to question what they think of themselves, then what they think of themselves in 30 years... should be interesting.
Tom
Someday, I'll have a real sig.
In the words of the soon to be perpetually copyrighted Pink Floyd:
All in all, it's just another brick in the wall...
Except the wall is...like... copyrights forever.
*cough*
Look, I wanted to put a Pink Floyd quote in this comment and I did it, GET OFF MY BACK. If a man can't put a non-sequitur Pink Floyd quote in one of his comments, well...bah.
By summer it was all gone...now shesmovedon. --
Is this supposed to be retroactive or are UK songs from before June 1955 still public domain?
Just go ahead and extent all copyright until the year 999999. At least we then won't have the same discussion every other week.
Oh come on, the guy was joking. The tip-off might have been his suggestion to buy a Ringo record. Have you *heard* a Ringo record? Good God, do we have to start teaching sarcasm in schools?
Simply because that would be insane. For if you ever wrote a poem you'd have to pay for it, which sounds just crap.
Only if you want to hold a monopoly on the creation, which, frankly, is more fair than granting such monopolies free of charge. In fact, it is more than fair. Arguably no one should be granted an outright monopoly on anything--there are other ways to insure an artist is compensated for their work without taking it out of the cultural commons (e.g require x% of any income derived from said creation to go back to the creator, but do not restrict how others may use said creation).
If you go to a publisher, and sell those poems by twelve a dozen, then he's got income, you've got income, and hey, if you don't live on the moon's dark side, you have to pay taxes after all that, don't you.
Just like every other industry on the planet. Unless you want to live without public infrastructure like roads, sewage treatment, libraries, schools, and in more enlightened, developed countries, healthcare and social security, get used to paying taxes. Its the price you pay for being part of a larger society, rather than an isolated hermit or mountain man in the outback of the Rockies somewhere.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
I cannot believe this, it really makes my blood boil. Apparently I'm a "thief" for downloading mp3s because I want to know what music sounds like before I buy the CD, or because I lend a CD or two to my friends. All I'm doing is fairly reasonable, yet if you listen to what the record companies say, I am a villain.
However, if you stop and think for a second, who is depriving whom? I'm depriving them of nothing, if I couldn't download mp3s, I'd never buy CDs, full stop. If the record companies can bribe governments to extend copyright to such a ridiculous degree, then they are preventing the public from having the access they are entitled to without forking out. They are depriving the public of something that should be theirs, and I think that's a whole lot closer to theft than anything any p2p-user can do.
Copyrights expire for a reason. When millions of people have grown up with and grown to love the music of artists as innovative and inspirational as The Beatles, then that music is a deeply ingrained part of our culture. It is morally reprehensible to charge a fee to experience important aspects of our history and social identity.
I've had enough of this bullshit. I could just about stand the debasement of music into some kind of fashion show, some kind of advert for clothing and lifestyle, with near-pornographic videos. I could just about handle the marginalisation of anything even vaguely interesting by the brain-dead pop music of today (and yes, it is worse than it used to be). I hate the sickening marketing focus-group taint that covers all of these "artists", I hate this state of affairs, but it seems to be what people want, so I can live with it... if people genuinely enjoy this kind of music, then fine, I don't have to listen to it. What I cannot take is this theft. Major labels haven't done anything exciting for years, and now they are actually becoming detrimental to society.
Declare war on these companies. Do not do business with them. What they're doing is akin to setting up a toll booth on a public road. Would you stand for that? No? Then don't stand for this. These organisations are criminal, pure and simple.
Watch the documentary "The Corporation". There's no expiry date on greed. F Mickey! F Ringo!
The copyright they are talking about is on the performance.
You mean like The Beatles' performance of that song, as captured on vinyl platter?
"It sees the move as a way of generating more money for the record industry, which would use it to discover new talent."
That's like suggesting legislation that increases Time Warner's revenue by two-fold is an investment in journalism and new talent that might someday appear on their child company CNN.
"Bands like Coldplay will make enough money for their company to help them discover around 50 or 100 bands."
another very important and valid point. although it might make me feel less like killing myself if coldplay didn't suck so much cock. honestly.
Besides, in regards to pop music, the talent isn't so much "discovered" as it is "haphazardly selected based on a modicum of talent and willingness to sell one's soul to be recast through the industry's stock-standard template and becoming part of legitimized prostitution."
"Progress comes from the intelligent use of experience."
Why is is people don't understand how this works? The record companies won't get anything at that point. The repayment from the artist is long over at 50 years (hopefully). The money goes to the artist. The only reason it goes to the record companies at first is because the artists take what amounts to a loan from their record company. They have to pay it back which they do with their royalties and their live performances.
At 50 years, they're likely paid up. That money will go back to them. Is it really that hard to understand or are minds so closed they can't accept the truth over their distorted perception?
Plant a tree in a developing country.
Good, the more insane copyright laws get the better. It's easier to overthrow laws that become so stupid everyone is able to see their uselessnes.
njcoder, Don't pay attention to Mr. Record Store Owner. He's an industry lackey who posts the exact same story for every Slashdot report on anything to do with music or file-sharing.
... and in the DRM, bind them.
Then I decided that ABITW was a better idea. Except it now apparently isn't.
You son of a bitch.
By summer it was all gone...now shesmovedon. --
If you find this unacceptable, then write to your mp! You don't even have to leave your computer if they don't use email-
writetothem.com will do the hard work for you!
...wait.
What was I talking about again? Oh yeah! Now there's another no-talent band who probably won't survive past their second CD.
If you think about it, there have been several people mentioning good points on this. While I'm not saying there hasn't been any good bands since The Beatles, the talent in the popular (US) music industry in dwindling fast. Just a few years ago, I remember when bands put out a good first album, and then the second bombed, or sometimes the first was okay and the second one got much better, but now it's become quite desolate.
So instead of getting roaylties for 50 years, and having 5 albums to collect from, now we have one hit wonders who collect from one song for life+life of next of kin. It all evens out in the end!
Half the bands I'm hearing lately have mediocre first CDs with a lot of hype because their dancy/heavy/tormented/fast/whatever yet their lyrics completely lack any substance. Not only that, but then a good number of them don't even stay together to put out a second album.
Soon we'll have copyrights lasting 200 years, but 'artists' only produce a single and get about as much money from it a year as a debt collector does from garnished wages.
Perfecting Discordia
www.stevenvansickle.com
That could all be well and good as long as their was one slight change to copyright laws.
e.g. The only people who can receive ANY paymenmts in relation to copyrighted works are the original authors and/or the original performers of a work (in the case of people doing the writing and other people doing the performing both would get a share etc.)
The same for inventors. Only the original inventor gets any share of the copyright.
Furthermore these rights cannot be sold, leased or given away
And once all the original copyright holders have died the works become public domain.
That way only the people who are directly resonsible for the work get the credit. And a fucking pox on all middle men whose only purpose is to parasite and fuck up the creative process.
Sky subscribers are morons. They pay to be advertised at !
Someone who walks around with data?
Paediatrician's have been attacked for lesser spelling errors, you could argue that pedants have too...
If memory does not fail me, the first copyright was 25 years. Then about 25 years later it became 50 years. Then again 25 years later it became 75 years and now we are again 25 years on.
Why not give up all the timelines and just say that everything tjought of, made. produced, found or whatever after 1900 is owned by whomever has the most money to pay for it.
That way you can sell your thoughts as well and make money out of it. The downside is that when you thought about having children, these will belong to the company as well, but hey, who cares?
When you look in history, people have always be enslaved in one way or another and I wonder if that might be the nature of humankind that we WANT or NEED this. Indeed a scary thought.
The burst to individual freedom in the last 100 or so years must have been a fluke if you compare it to millions of years where it did not happen.
I am afraid, I am very afraid.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
It's better than lining the pockets of a pervert.
Now, now. Let's wait to pass judgment until, y'know, the trial's over. I, for one, hope he is guilty, because if he's innocent, he'll have gone through hell and a half for no reason other than being really, really weird. And that shouldn't be a crime in America.
--grendel drago
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
Why shouldn't music make money for record companies long after the artists are dead? Didn't they perform it, after all? No? Er. Well, they at least wrote it, right? Not usually? Hmm. Well, they....they....nevermind, this is a stupid idea.
http://xkcd.com/386/
I can sing "Strawberry Fields Forever" any time I want for my own enjoyment. I have yet to hear someone complaining about copyrights say, "I'll show them. I'll learn to play an instrument and compose my own music." There's a certain leech-like quality to the common Slashdot stance that I'm not sure I agree with. It's one thing to not want to pay for the same work over and over. It's another to think you have the right to absolutely any experience made possible by someone elses labor.
It was obviously worth the trade off to the musician to put the copyright into the hands of the record company. It's like selling a winning lottery ticket at a discount. It may seem to an outsider like the winner got short changed, but it may just be that they have a different translation factor for the value of money they won't see for years. Artists are not all slaves of the music industry (even if a few have been ripped off.) If you think they're selling themselves or their artistic integrity too cheaply, its because no one is offering them a better price. If alternative distribution channels gave them the benefits they want, they'd move to them. The fact that these channels aren't comparable is apparent from the fact that they aren't moving to them. It's an economic decision that they have the right to make for themselves.
If you want to control the copyright of music, then create music. Or create an alternative to the current distribution system that meets **ALL** of the artists' needs, so that they will sell their copyrights to you rather than someone else.
Well, can't you guess? They will extend in once again. It is time to protest against it.
Write to your MP. Don't e-mail, fax - write. Especially handwritten letters make a difference. Organise it. Let your mother, father, etc. all write in.
Make a difference.
it lurks in all of us.
Corporate heads would do well to remember that.
I refuse to answer that question on the grounds that you're an idiot!
Money talks loud; loud enough to game the system. I mean, look at all the $$ the copyright holders stand to make vs. not make..
But still they accepted a scheme that put their works into the public domain; that was their devils bargin; they should give the devil his due...
http://www.hawknest.com/
1. You can't stop folk copying audio.
2. 1Mb/s of compressed is good enough for most folk.
3. Storage gets cheaper over time.
4. Profit! ( Or rather Savings! for folk who don't want to pay for music )
How much does it cost to send a blu-ray disk full of encrypted data through the snail mail?
They whose government reduces their essential liberties for temporary security, receive neither liberty nor security.
As Stephen Breyer pointed out during oral argument for the challenge brought to the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act a few years ago, then-current (i.e. pre-Bono Act) copyright terms already convey 99.7% of the present value of the future earnings stream from a work to the copyright holder, assuming a historical average discount rate. No economist seriously believes that the current round of term extensions are anything but government kowtowing to media companies. It's a shame that the SCOTUS didn't overturn the Sonny Bono Act.
beware the jabberwock, my son! the jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Damn, so now we have to wait even longer for the copyright on Happy Birthday to expire? Do they have any idea how terrible For He's a Jolly Good Fellow sounds??
Since Michael Jackson owns the rights to the beatles, he would like to make more money from them so he can pay off his legal fees and expenses.
1) Artist would have leverage of the RIAA, and couldn't be taken advantage of by selling their rights away.
2) What entitles anyone, even your heirs continued support from you long after you die? If you wanted to take care of your widow, plan ahead.
3) Want more money? Here is a novel idea perform!
So does this apply to pop music only, then? Why not anyone that writes contemporary classical music?
Oh, I forgot, this isn't actually about music is it, it's about the moneygrubbing publishers and record companies who try to dictate what we listen to.
Here's an idea for composers: Why not self-publish music under some musical equivalent of (L)GPL, or Creative Commons?
I'm a composer, and whilst I am a member of PRS and collect my pittance from them in royalties each year, I self-publish and make all my music scores and parts available for free download via my website (here, if you're interested).
I urge a revolution! (and not from my bed, either)
The cops arrest people for civil cases? I had no idea!
And if you're talking about criminal copyright infringement, well, when a mugging victim declares that a police officer should go and arrest someone for beating them with a pipe who do they think is paying the police officer? Isn't it absurd to think that the mugger should pay?
I think you have a basic misunderstanding of how these things work.
--grendel drago
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
The music industry tries to protect its old music, since the new music is so bad. If there were good musicians today, raking in mountains of cash, then they would not have cared about the old stuff.
My teenage son and his friends all listen to 1970s and 1980s rock music. When I was his age, I would not have been caught dead listening to my dad's ragtime...
Oh well, what the hell...
... to denounce this, then I'll care. But for now it sounds like a bunch of people whining about what they 'think' artists want... and also how something they have had no hand in creating should be free. Want free music? Write it. Record it. Publish to the public domain and advertise it. Don't want to support non-free music? Stop listening to it. /would love a record contract.
>>> What if it takes longer than 10-20 years to even have your creation become popular?
>>>
Er, that's life? Seriously, if it takes 20 years for your work to become popular, too bad. I realize that popular culture changes, etc, over time, and thus, your work might not be appreciated at first. On the other hand, with anything else except IP, can you expect to be rewarded for work you did two decades earlier? Highly doubtful.
What you can hope for, if your work suddenly becomes popular later on, is that people will also suddenly respect you as an artist - and want more of your respective work. And hopefully you aren't too old to provide it. Again, too bad if you are.
Ultimately, I think you need a better marketing/PR person to make your work more initially salable.
I'm not a hard-core libertarian, but I think a free market with only limited government protections (but certainly some) serves the public best.
A preposition is a terrible thing to end a sentence with.
When I get older losing my hair
...
many years from now
will you still be sending me a royalty check
When I'm hundred twenty-eight
Stop worrying about the risks of nuclear power and start worrying about the risks of not using nuclear power.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't Michael Jackson own the rights to most of the Beatles catalogue?
"You never want a serious crisis to go to waste." - Rahm Emanuel
If this goes into force, anything you hear today is unlikely to be returned to the public domain within the lifetime of your GRANDCHILDREN. This is completely fucking unacceptable.
Actually, unless I'm completely mistaken, the term is even longer than than that.
The usual term of copyright is 50 year after the author's death; not 50 years after the work is created. This term is enshrined in the popular Berne Convention, which has existed for decades. As I understand it, the Berne Convention requires a term of at least 50 years after the author's death, but terms may be higher at a nation's discression.
At life+50, that's 100 years for anything I write, assuming I live to be 80 like my grandfather. That's a long time!
Assume about 25 years between generations. Assume your kids live about as long as you do. One generation after you die, your kids die. One generation later, their kids die. This means when your copyrights finally expire, your grandchildren will be dying of old age. That's the current system.
If the term is extended to 100 years, then your great-great-grandchildren will be dead of old age by the time your work reaches the public domain: if it ever does. No one who ever knew you will be alive after 100 years: so no one can prove that the time is up, except eventually by radio-carbon dating...
Write your MP. Point out that to a voting adult in his 20s, any "creative" intellectual discovery that was found 20 years or more ago has existed all his life. To him, it's no more a modern insight than 2+2=4: it's been around since he can remember. Suggest to him that copyrights shouldn't last longer than people who can remember them.
--
AC
*--BigMan--- Time flies like an arrow.. but personally I prefer a nice glass of wine!
Michael Jackson owns the rights to the beatles catalog, not record companies.
or else!
- What's yellow and lives off dead beetles?
- Yoko Ono.
When I am king, you will be first against the wall.
They can just stop after "more money." No need for "to generate..." or "as they rehash..." The "more money" simply and eloquently says it all.
BTW, I'll bet the record companies really are poor. IMHO it's like the movie industry, where even/especially blockbusters *never* make a profit. They just have costs and salaries through the roof - a big, inefficient machine that leaks money (no doubt unequally) over all of its parts.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
You assume that more legislation isn't forthcoming that will make sure "self-publication and internet distribution by artists themselves" can't happen, or at least can't happen at some sustainable level.I wouldn't be the slightest bit surprised to see some sort of legislation that has the "side effect" of freezing the current RIAA business model in place.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
AOL!
What's the point of protecting "popular" (and what the hell does that mean anyway) music for such a lengthy period of time? Why protect something for so long that its basically irrevelant to 99% of the population? In 100 years, who'll care about the Beatles or whoever, or even know anything of them but a footnote in a history text.
Un-fucking-believable, this better not come to the US.
This is why I have no respect for copyright law.
In 50 years, they are going to extend it again.
If they just came out and said, "We are going to have copyright -FOREVER- people might fight. But by doing it a small chunk at a time, they are going to get the same thing a lot easier.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
It's as if a million voices cried out at once, and kept going for fifty more years than originally planned.
"Imagine a society where an orchestra couldn't play any classical music without acquiring the rights to that performance from a copyright holder that has been passed down through the centuries by inane copyright law and they end up paying a large amount of money for you to enjoy their performance."
... this is OUR society!!!
... because each printing is a new "arrangement", eligible for copyright even if only a few notes are modified. And the royalty is the same for these old compositions as it would be for an original work by a modern composer.
Guess what
Orchestras don't play classical music "by ear", they play from sheet music which is copyrighted by the publisher. They have to pay royalties to the publisher for every public performance, even for works by Beethoven and Bach.
How come?
Sure, the orchestra could play from sheet music published in the USA before 1923, if such could be found. But little of this old sheet music has been preserved that long.
As a point of reference, after the fees they tell you about, Lawn seats to see Coldplay are $42 EACH. Real seats push $90. Now tell me how the hell they need to be charging that kind of money.
stuff |
This is UK copyright law. The comparison is being made with US copyright laws and "leveling the field" by extending UK laws in the appearance of fairness.
Is there a nation that has an infinity expiration on copyright? If so, we should probably extend ours so as to remain competitive.
HOwever, there is surely a greater threat from DRM. In X years time, when copyright has expired and a work is in the public domain, DRM will still be active. There's no preset kill limit within DRM. Maybe, despite the fact we legally have access to works, we will be unable to listen to/watch them. I seriously doubt the publishing companies and record labels of the time will be willing to allow the development of DRM-braking tech, especially if this could damage the effectiveness of work that is not in the public domain.
On a slightly unrelated note, I wonder if work which is now in the PD will return to copyright if the period of copyright is extended?
Wow, you have a lot of faith in the justice system. Just because the jury finds him not guilty doesn't mean he didn't commit a crime, especially given his celebrity status. OJ anyone?
As far as you know, OJ is innocent too. Sounds like you'd prefer the US justice system to be based on trial by media. Clearly you don't believe in innocent until proven guilty.
OJ was found not guilty by a jury of his peers. If you know some reason why he should be convicted, perhaps you should have stepped up during the trial.
And if Michael Jackson is innocent, then he has been taken to trial BECAUSE of his celebrity status. You think anybody would have taken this kind of time and effort - millions of dollars worth - to prosecute a nobody?
Copyright was intended to protect the original artists, not to full record companies' pockets for a century after the artist is dead.
Yuo do know that by doing that, you'd be pretty much ending the existence of most corporations, right? Assuming that's not what you were going for, I think you missa few key steps in your logic.
Let's look at movies, for a start. If there are (say) 100 people invilved in the creative side of a movie, then by your system all revenues from the movie in question would be split 100 ways. Make a blockbuster movie, each of the 100 people get four million dollars a head, and they're happy. So what about the 990 other people involved in the process? The lighting guys, the sound guys, the editors, the makeup guys? So let's add them in, and now each person gets $400K. So now that we've given all the profits out to the individual people, who's going to pay for the next movie? If a movie made $400 million in profits, wh paid for the development of the movie? Who put of the initial cash to pay for the production, until the revenues started coming in? And who's going to do it for the next one? It sure ain't gonna be the movie company, as they (as a company) made no money off the first movie, since it all went to the people involved in it.
Now let's think even more generally - about widgets. WidgetCo spends 12 engineer-years (12 engineers for a year of work) developing the Widget2. Where did the company get the money to pay these engineers? Unless you grant that a corporation (WidgetCo) can be one of the creators of the product - and hence deserving of some of the profits from Widget1 - there would be no product, as there would be no one to pay the developers while they made it. There would be no one to stake the millions on R&D in the bet that a widget may work out.
Explain to me how a company could get any money and get anything done under your plan, and then I'll listen. Until then, it's ridiculous.
Cue The Sun...
This reminds me of a science fiction short story I read once. (I *think* it may have been written by Larry Niven, or may have been in an anthology that he was associated with) The basic plot was of a activist woman, a widow of a incredibly popular recording artist, who attempts to persuade a very powerful politician to vote *against* an upcoming bill that would extend copyright in perpetuity. As far as the back-room pol was concerned, the bill was a done deal, there was too much money behind it, besides, he'd already been bought and concerned it a point of repuattion to stay bought. In the end, the woman was successful and he even offered to nominate her as his political heir. The womans basic argument was that must have a degree of artistic amnesia in order to allow continual creativity. In an era of digital media, any artistic creation can live "forever". In the story, the widow relates how, in the last years before his death, her husband failed to release any new works. The reason for that was that as a standard anti-lawsuit practice, his works would be compared to a huge database of existing musical works. All of his later works, entirely his own, created entirely in ignorance of prior art, ended up being close enough to some older work that it *seemed* derivative. He was a wealthy artist, paying royalties wasn't the issue, maintaining his sense of creativity *as an artist* was. I am not a legal historian, but as far as I know, the basic concept of copyright was intended to protect the artist, allow an artist to benefit from the fruits of that art. It seems to me the problem here is not an artist claiming protection for too long. I think the problem is based on the concept of corporation as a legal person under the law. An individual artist is mortal, and I seriously doubt George Harrison really cares what is done with the Beatles catalog 50 years after he is dead. A corporation on the other hand, can be effectively immortal and as long as it exists, it will seek to make money in any way it can. The problem therefore is in allowing an immortal creation own intellectual property it did not create. My suggestion would be to vest copyright in only the creator, publication rights can be signed over, but not the copyright itself. Allow the copyright expire a set period after the creators death. The basic copyright remains with the creator no matter what, and only the original creator and/or heirs can decide who gets to publish his/her materials until the copyright expires. Any new artists anti-lawsuit check would be then be confined to a finite body of modern work.
I need a wheelchair van for my son. Help me get the word out. https://www.gofundme.com/wheelchair-van-for-jj
Am I the only one who thinks this will accomplish the reverse of the stated goals? The longer a corporation controls the music, the less incentive their is to search for new music. Advertising is all about pushing as little choice to as many people as possible to make money.
If they really want to encourage the music companies to search out new talent they should cut the copyright term for music in half, not double it. Then the music corporations would have to look for new artists to maintain and grow their music libraries.
Fanatically anti-fanatical
"It sees the move as a way of generating more money for the record industry, which would use it to discover new talent."
...I thought the purpose of copyright was to protect the author's ability to earn a wage. Which is why it was originally 75 years [to cover that person's lifespan]. Then it was extended [in the US - see Disney's case], because in the US a corporation = a person in legal terms.
And now the record co's are essentially admitting that copyright law has nothing to do with protecting the artist, but rather protecting the revenue stream of an antiquated business model.
Seems to me, the only one this helps is The Business, not The Artist.
Who put this thing together? Me, that's who.
Just another example of how our governments don't serve us anymore, their primary purpose is to serve corporate interests.
Jeremy
that was a hit before your mother was born,
though she was born a long long time ago,
your mother should know [your mother],
your mother should know.
And I don't know which is more frightening: the fact that media conglomerate corporations want to own the copyrights for that length of time, or the fact that they are raping my childhood comic books looking for the next 'sure fire hit.'
I am sure that the powers that be will remake '20,000 Leagues Under The Sea' simply because it was once a hit, however minor. (It was futuristic a century or so ago. Who cares that all of the tech since then has changed?)
I'm waiting for the mall to musak over... oh wait, they've already done that with the shopping days/holidays.
Eventually I can see 'hit factory software' using digital actors and digital scenery to reproduce digitized old movies (Some of the dialog is StarWars was so bad, delivery by a machine would be an improvement.)
Its all just filler between the ads on TV anyway.
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
He's a trademark.
Each work that features MM is copyrighted. So, (under the grandparent's scheme) if "Steamboat Willie" wasn't bringing in the $$$, Disney could let it go to Public Domain, but still retain the copyright to Fantasia.
They would have to continuously review all the things in their vault and pay to keep them under copyright. Periodically, they would have to then "clean house" and enrich the public domain.
I would extend the scheme by allowing the copyright holder 14 years of payment-free use (besides the original filing fee), and then they have to start paying in year 15. The downside to all of this is the massive bureaucracy that would be required to keep track of the peak annual revenue for each copyrighted work. Granted, it will be somewhat offset by the revenue gained from the additional fees.
Contrast that with Lessig's idea that all copyright holders have to pay a $1 maintenance fee after 50 years.
Yeah, right.
Ah, for fuck's sake. Man, I just read a nice, warm and fuzzy editorial that was all about some fucking obvious commonsense things that should happen and then I hoped on here. Fan-fucking-tastic. So, how many years before the citizens of the world unite to overthrow their piss-poor governments or am I asking a third world war too soon?
My kids are more interested in "Full Metal Alchemist" or "Neon Genesis" than Mickey Mouse. If we go to Walt Disney World it will be for the great rides, not the IP.
I'm confident that the new generation will always be capable of producing new and innovative creative works. The spectre is of guys like Disney going after Pokeman because many of the characters have big ears...
Why should a copyright offer more protection than a patent? The US patent system assumes that 18 years is enough time for you to benefit from your intellectual property.
I am an attorney, but this is not legal advice. If you need legal advice on this type of issue, you're strange even by slashdot standards.
Anyway, there's a big difference between "not guilty" and "innocent." Neither the United States nor any other Common Law (english speaking) country has an "innocent" verdict.
If the jury is pretty sure that someone did it, that isn't enough. In fact, most (all?) of the OJ jury thought he did it, but that the proof didn't meet the standards.
OJ was acquitted due to sloppy legal work, sloppy judging, and the admission of flat out nonsensical quackery as "expert" testimony.
On top of that, Furman's interview in which he uses that word that he'd testified he'd never said a couple of times in each sentence, and in which he acknowledged planting evidence to frame black defendants he "knew" were guilty should have established reasonable doubt as a matter of law--no reasonable person could lack doubts after hearing that.
hawk, esq.
www.jamespurnell.org.uk
There you can email him politely that it is not the business of the UK government to help line the pockets of some of the richest companies in the land.
No but, yeah but, no but...
In the US the Const. says that IP must be for a limited time. Why can't it just be set to some huge amount like 1e6 years? Then Congress can stop spending so much time on copyright laws and spend more on so-called terrorism laws.
Why don't you guys have friends or journals?
Sisters want love, brothers want sex / / / / / / /
Industrial prison complex
White House Move Out is really a game
Republican Democrat really the same
Texas black man electric chair
crackers say that OJ trial wasn't fair
Can't even believe that they would go there
America ain't fair that's why we're here
An iPod full of unauthorized MP3s is not criminal copyright infringement. Trading those MP3s is. A shared eMule folder full of unauthorized MP3s is quite criminal.
But if you leeched those MP3s, or otherwise got them without trading, they're not criminal. And apparently (Slashdot search is down, alas), you actually have to be shown to have uploaded a file for it to be considered distributed.
It's not the having that's criminal; it's not the downloading. It's the sharing.
--grendel drago
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
Let's cryogenically freeze ourselves for 800,696 years. Corporations will have selectively bred the population into sheep, devoid of creativity. The Morlocks will have long forgotten about enforcing copyrights, so we'll be free to rebuild our culture based on principles freedom of thought and expression.
Best disclaimer ever. Sig'd.
Of course, if you're offended by said sig'ing, you must be strange indeed.
You can hold down the "B" button for continuous firing.
...do they download MP3s illegally all the time? Actions speak louder than words.
Copyright terms in the EU are set by EU law. In particular the 50 year limit for phonographs is set by directive 93/98/EEC Article 3(2) as amended by directive 2001/29/EC Article 11(2) (the latter is the infamous EUCD).
At this stage this is 'just' a British minister floating ideas. By all eans write to your MP - if it's sufficiently controversial the UK may not even try to put it through at EU level. However, if it comes to a legislative fight then it's going to be in Brussels, not London.
And instead, whoever owns the rights now can sell the right to use it as such a jingle. Or have you never heard Led Zeppelin on adverts? Pisses me off too, but there's no way to stop it, whether it's copyrighted or public domain.
Besides, your argument is complete bullshit. Your last sentence there is exactly what copyright is supposed to do. And yet you're wanting to prevent that from happening? At least the industry is straight up honest about it - they just want profits. You want to upset the oopyright balance even more, so that you can be charged over and over again for that music? Huh? You're so worried about it being used as
People like you don't deserve to benefit from what copyright is supposed to do. GO fuck off somewhere and quit trying to steal MY public domain from me. If anything, you're the thief.
Actually the question is, why not just make copyright perpetual? Or they just want to give an illusion of fairness? It saves taxpayers' money spent on legislating something that is inevitably done over and over. Wanna bet that in 50 years, the copyright will be extended again to 150 years, and so on? This farce has gone on without considering public rights at all and it'll be the same in the future, unless the voters start punishing these bozos.
These laws are nothing more than the THEFT of the public domain by extending the copyright period.
When you buy something on 'time', you make an agreed number of payments and then the item is yours, you own it. The seller does not have the legal right to decide to extend the number of payments that you have to make whenever you get close to completion.
The copyright period works in the same way. The people agree to let X corporation own the right to demand money for the viewing of an individual work of art or entertainment for a precise and limited amount of time agreed upon when the copyright was granted.
By bribing politicians to extend the copyright period without agreed upon compensation to the public, the corporations are stealing these works of art (or entertainment).
All demanded payments for viewing this title after the original copyright period has ended are improper and illegal extortions of revenue from the people wishing to view this work under their public domain rights.
The entertainment corporations can not claim that people downloading works in copyright are thieves when they are stealing the same works from the public domain for their own profits.
Is that bands who didn't even write the song get the award for it. Two examples. Lenny Kravitz's version of "American Woman" and Metallica's "Whiskey in the Jar" and "Turn the Page."
I don't see the original artists being credited with any awards for having written the song..
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
We don't have to accept it in the short run, either. The problem is that we (the public) don't have the discipline required to reject it. As long as the average denizen can get his/her next McFix, these issues aren't important.
... unlike every other business in the world, the entertainment industry is heading toward infinite profitability. I can think of no other business in which you never, ever have to produce product again.
Build a car, paint a house, sell an orange, and you'll find you have to do it all over again in order to continue making money. You get paid only once. After that, you gotta do something more to make more money.
Write a song, book, or script once, and profit forever and ever and ever.
How bogus.
Mickey Mouse should have entered the public domain in 1935.
+++ATH0
Where we don't put up with this sort of heavy handed government nonsense. You poor Brits.
you'll be telling us a ray is a drop of golden sun next.
Under this system, all music will be considered popular music, where "popular" is redefined to mean at least one person or entity wants royalties for a century.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Speaking words of wisdom,
Let it be.
The value of the copyright to the corporation is the integrated expected future value of all revenues derived from the copyright.
The longer the copyright lasts, the greater the value.
Now, whether or not you think that the aforementioned corporations are paying a reasonable percentage of this expected future value to artists, you have to agree that increasing the value of the copyright in the future increases its value today, which at least has the hope of increasing (or at least avoiding decreasing) the payments to the artists.
uhm innocent *until* proven guilty means that if you are not guilty you are innocent.
I don't get this hatred of Disney for preserving Mickey Mouse. Why do YOU people feel that YOU own Mickey Mouse more than the company the founder started does? WHY should someone's creation be handed over to everyone, other than you desire for "public good". FUCK public good. If you create something it should belong to YOU and/or whoever you decide to sell it to. In perpetuity. What right does society have to make a claim on something that they didn't create? Yeah, they bought the Beatles albums and helped make them a success, that doesn't give them a right to the actual "rights" to the work! Fuck that. I'm so sick of these social leeches always feeling they have some entitlement to the accomplishments of others. If you don't fucking like it, create you OWN tunes/characters/whathaveyou and release it as public domain. Yeah, this IP hoarding may be detrimental to the "public good" but that's bullshit, public good be damned, if you are the creator it's YOURS to do with as you wish. Forever.
Music is everybody's possession.
It's only publishers who think that people own it.
(John Lennon)
and it's not just because Michael Jackson bought out the Beatles song libraries.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
The parent is serious, and I think he/she may have a point. Perhaps MJ's screwed up because a bunch of old predatory pervs did something to him, when he was a child star in the music biz. Think about it. Things like molestation and abuse tend to be cyclical... passing from one generation to the next.
I'm sure there are a lot of sickos in the music biz that take advantage of every little star that comes through their studios... outing them would be sweet justice indeed.
ERROR 144 - REBOOT ?
That means the Beatles' "Love Me Do" and "Please Please Me," scheduled to to go into the public domain in 2013, would earn royalties for record companies until 2063. (Emphasis added.)
In many cases, it would also earn money for the families of the artists. If you produced some hugely popular music like The Beatles, wouldn't you want your children to benefit financially from it? Just a thought.
You have posted a good, sensible reply that actually covers far more than the current topic.
Pity you wasted it on the people at Slashdot.
"My God...it's full of trolls!"
The U.S. Constitution's Article 1 Section 9, C.3 states: 'No Bill of Attainder or ex post facto Law shall be passed,' Does the UK have an equivalent law? Why is it that it IS NOT ok to make penalties harsher after the fact, but it IS ok to make rewards greater after the fact? Am I the only one that sees this as a contradiction in our legal system?
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
The need to extend copyright to 100 years is due to the Golden Rule.
Anyone who needs the Golden Rule explained to them can just sit in the corner and "assume the position"--then wait patiently and a Golden Rule expert will be along to attend to your question. Hint; it's kind of like Charades with one word and one middle finger.
>>"ad space available -- low rates!!!"
"Why is it that people have to pay land taxes but they don't have to pay copyright taxes? If you own land you are required to pay a tax on it because the state spends a heck of a lot of public resources on protecting that land for you. The same goes for copyright (especially now that copyright violation has become a criminal act in some countries) so why don't the copyright holders have to pay a tax?"
That will do wonders for the GPL. Imagine paying taxes to write programs that you're not making money from because you'd rather use GPL than public domain.
Vote for Pedro
I am a musician, and I am really sick of all that BS. I want record companies to die an horrible death. I want to eat low quality hot-dogs for the rest of my life and compose the music I want to hear. I want OpenSource/FreeSoftware to take over the world and Open/FreeMusic too. I am really sick of all that BS and I will do everything to liberate music as much as I can.
They killed music, bastards! Where did the real music go? I wish someday we will be able to listen to something we have never heard before. GASP! Listening to new music? ARGH!
YES! New music! I know it would take many people a little bit of getting used to, but that is the way it always was before the invention of recording. Ever heard of Bach that had to compose new music everyday? Nobody ever thought of playing the same music several times! That would have meant the death penalty, at least! Death penalty + a kick in the nuts!
This new "trend" of selling music has lasted too long now. We should all put an end to it. And if you don't help me, I will do it alone because I can't take it anymore. How can you help? Do what feels right for you, but don't hurt anybody.
Toe of Destiny, musician
They HAVE shot themselves in the foot.
End result: Noone cares, copyright stopped being fair and I WILL copy whatever I feel like and the little voice in my head that felt bad about it is eating its' own words.
I have stopped buying music 2-3 years ago and I feel great about it.
I don't even feel bad about the artistis, they aren't going broke anytime soon. (well, the good ones anyways)
The big bucks record companies realize their inevitable doom, I think. Today's mainstream music isn't cutting it, while smarter, better artists are promoting themselves and joining smaller, fairer labels.
So what do we have left? Yup, the music back catalogue. I'm sure the labels will milk that cash cow until their dying day.
I know that "not guilty" !="innocent", but I thought it was possible for an acquitted person to seek a declaration of innocence from the court, whereupon the burden of proof fell on them to prove that they did NOT commit the crime. I'm not sure whether this has any legal implications (perhaps the charges are completely expunged from one's record?) or if it's simply a good faith gesture intended to help restore the defendant's reputation.
Of course, I might just be misremembering an episode of Law and Order or something...
"everyone knows that unless the Beatles continue to make money from recordings made fifty years ago"
Actually everyone knows that Michael Jackson owns the right to those songs...
There are even talks that he might loose all of those rights in order to pay for his debts.
Seriously. Why just pop?
Tell me again how it's going to "promote innovation" for someone to have copyrights for ONE HUNDRED FUCKING YEARS!
Morons.
Fortunately it won't matter - by 2063, I expect a lot of people will be too busy ducking Transhuman nanotech to give a shit about the Beatles.
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
...but it is always interesting in civil suits in the wake of a court case. Many take a conviction there as a "probably" verdict, in terms of guilt. You really need to be walking on eggshells when describing why they are liable, but not guilty. After all, if they didn't do the deed, why are they liable? And if they did, aren't they then guilty?
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Whoa, skippy. It was more a comment on the amount of attention paid to the man, the fact that his name is used as a synonym for 'child molester' now. Hadn't you ever heard a certain character intone, "You know, I used to think it was awful that life was so unfair. Then I thought, would it be much worse if life were fair, and all the terrible things that happen to us come because we actually deserve them? So, now I take great comfort in the general hostility and unfairness of the universe."?
And anyway, if I wanted to assuage my white guilt about all those dead Injuns, I'd remind myself that filthy white-man disease killed off more natives than all the swords and guns they could muster.
--grendel drago
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
thanks
hawk
We need a world revolution against the rich.
Seriously.
This will allow corporations a better chance to exercise their right to eternal perpetually increasing profits.
Most slashdotters are not in tune with the definition. *duck*
because these song have proven popular and made these companys billions, they feel the need to have the law changed just for them, so they can make a few billion more? oh boo fucking hoo for them.
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
Probably no other big corporation has profited from using works from the public domain than Disney. Things would be different if the modern American copyright system had been in place all along. Currently every sound recording made in the United States before 1972 is copyrighted until 2067. This includes even Edison's original wax cylinder recordings from the 1890s.
There's no reason to think similar copyright terms won't eventually apply to written works as well. If such terms had been in the force in the 1930s when Walt Disney was starting his movie business, the Disney empire as we know it would not exist. Mickey Mouse notwithstanding, Walt's early animated features made free use of public domain work from the likes of Mark Twain, Nathaniel Hawthorne and the brothers Grimm. All of it would still have been under copyright in the 1930s, even the original Grimm's fairy tales, published in 1814. It's pretty tough to argue against the economic benefits that the Disney empire has spread far and wide. It wouldn't have happened if Walt's government had forbidden him to use his own cultural legacy.
People wake up
They're STEALING the Public Domain
What good can possibly come of this except for further lining the pockets of the copyright holder?
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
One could, with the same validity, claim it would be equally fair to revert the extensions, so that all sectors have the same rule.
;-)
Which would make the extension as being unfair, and not the fact that others don't follow in their footsteps.
--- "To pee or not to pee, that is the question." ---
"Even the many GPL'ers here at Slashdot should understand this concept, since GPL'd software (sometimes erroneously called "free" software) is anything but freely given. It is given with strings attached--shared, but in point of fact, not given. This is the precise bargain that copyright sought to achieve. I might even question the virtue of the GPL, but I won't question the sheer volume of it. So I must conclude that the qualified bargain it seeks to achieve is natural to a lot of people."
I do not think that last claim is substantiated (if by 'people' you mean those that use the GPL). In all honesty, we all know why GPL-users use copyright (or -left, if you want), and it's not because they are convinced of its intrinsical worth, nor because they all regard it as 'natural'. It's mostly for a pragmatically reason: we *do* live in a world full of copyright, after all, and thus, this is the only way they see for keeping their works free.
If *NO* copyrights whatsoever would exist, then clearly, there would be no need for the GPL.
So, at best your conclusion is doubtful: it is rather more likely that people using the GPL do not see it as a qualified bargain, but rather as a necessary evil.
--- "To pee or not to pee, that is the question." ---
I disagree. Mickey Mouse is a trademark, not a copyright. Disney currently has the right to renew their trademark for as long as they are using him as such.
Now the story of "Steamboat Willie" (the first Mickey Mouse cartoon) and the Disney version of "Snow White" is another matter. These should have passed into public domain some time back.
anyone else GLAD that anyone inflicting beatles music on anyone else, or even on themselves, should be forced to pay?
He still did okay, though.
The vast majority of copyrighted works do not make a cent for their "owners", and cannot make a cent. They did not ask to retain the monopoly granted by copyright laws. It was forced on them as a "default". If the default was that a work loses protection after a short term unless the "owner" actively extends the monoploly priviledge, then those "owners" wishing to still be able to profit from their works can extend their copyrights, while those who don't think it's worth theeffort do not, and the public can then access those works,
HOWEVER, the big "owners" of copyrights, those whose business model is trading in these state granted privileges, understand perfectly well that to be able to profit more from the privileges granted to them competition has to be avoided. And if the revival of old abandoned works loses the high cost of seeking the legal owners and clearing copyrights, then many of them can reenter profitability and become competitors. As long as an abandoned work can only be reintroduced commercially by the copyright owner who lost interest, or by someone with a big legal department that can handle the job of clearing copyrights properly, they don't create a real threat of competition. But when put in the public domain, the legal costs disappear, and then there are many people, not just one or a few, that can make use of the work, and many of these works would then be reused in many ways.
So it's just a matter of avoiding competition. I have nothing against letting Paul McCartney earn more money from Love Me Do (though I doubt he earns anything from this particular song. At that stage in their careers the Beatles were not in position to actually demand to get a share...) But I think it should be conditional upon active and frequent renewal of the monopoly privilege, so anything that is not a real source of profit or is of no interest to the "owner" passes automatically to the public domain, and is not held hostage by the costs of legalities.
BTW, my opinions on these matters are very much influenced by Prof. Lawrence Lessig (lessig.org). GO read his online books ond learn a lot on these matters. Reading doesn't imply you have to agree. Threre's a lot of historical and legal facts there, not just opinion.
Read "Free Culture" by Lawrence Lessig (lessig.org). One of the most important exmples in this free online book is the way copyrights on Shalkespear's works affected the history of copyright laws (another example is how Disney and Holywood what today is considered infringement to build themselves).
Copyrights/patents/trademarks are more about fame then anything else. Fame could potentially lead to money, but it might not.
Copyrights, Patents, Trademarks: temporary loans from the Public Domain, not real property ("intellectual" or otherwise)
$0 tax on copyright extension after a prescribed period is enough. The act of actively seeking extension has its cost too. Only interested parties would pay for keeping their works inaccessible to the public.
Why not let Bach's heirs profit from their inheritance? Would it make such a big difference?
All you'd have to do to play Bach's music that you don't do today, is locate his 20 children, 400 grandchildren, 8000 great grandchildren etc, contact their zillion lawyers, and just clear the copyright with each of them. And then you can perform the particular piece in a particular time and place. And then of course you financial institution would distrirbute the licensing fees to their Zillion bank accounts. Not too complicated! And then composers would know that their work "stays in the family"!
The only problem with this, is that even with just a few heirs, the costs of legally dealing with all heirs would really mean some other work with less legal issues would be performed. If playing Bach's works meant all his heirs have to agree, Bach's works would have been long gone!
"The Public Domain does not prohibit inclusion of content into commercial programs."
Ah yes, but they couldn't protect it with copyright anymore, so their content/data would be public domain also, and thus, available to all. (I, too, am ignoring the trade secret and patent issue in this discussion).
Besides, the GPL does not prohibit commercial products neither, as you might be aware. So the difference does not lay in the right to make commercial products, the difference is about the freedom of use and the availability to others. Clearly, if no copyright would exist, and everything falls in the public domain, then everyone would have the freedom to use it.
--- "To pee or not to pee, that is the question." ---
This is all besides the point. Copyrightlaw, as most IP laws, explicitly mentiones the fact that it is for a limited time, with the purpose of promoting innovation (new creations); this follows because people are (or at least were) aware that it is a trade-off between what benefits society as a whole and what benefits the creator as an incentive so he can create more works.
That balance has been shifted immer more towards that which only benefits the copyrightholders, thanks to their powerful lobbies (which mostly aren't the real creators anyway). Instead of a balance, it has become an unbalance, and this extra addition of making it last 100 years is yet another huge testimony to that. The term 'for a limited period' has become mere lipservice to those that would deny society it's rights that were originally given to it *within* the same copyrightlaw which the **AA&co are using to amass ever more money.
I refute the anglo-saxon neo-liberal ideology that claims the only worth lies in what financial profit it can bring to a few, regardless of the ramification to society. When such an ideology of 'limitless copyright' would have become true thousands of years ago, then after a while, you couldn't do diddly anymore. And yes, this is double true with patents, but copyright isn't exempt from it. If from the earliest times onwards, every meaningful combination starting with two notes would have been copyrighted, and the copyright would last for ever, then eventually, no music could be made anymore without infringing on hundreds of copyrighted combinations. (And this is not beyond the scope or possibility of copyright, because I remember that even a certain amount of *silence* between notes has been copyrighted already.)
And, mind you, the claim you make of 'You can perform them.' isn't even true (but if it were, then still no one could afford licence fees for hundreds of copyright-owners). In reality, it is completely dependend on the wishes of the copyright owner; if he decides you can't, then you can't. Thus, imagine the first person ever to come up with the combinative notes of do-re-mi and the likes, and having perpetual copyright... what would that have meant for music today?
A disaster, indeed.
Imagine our great literary works, such as those of shakespeare, which have been the source of numerous plays, teachings, movies, etc. still being copyrighted. And imagine one of his grand-grand-grand children decides no one can use it anymore (which would be his right)...can you imagine the loss to society?
Or can't you, and is that the real problem?
--- "To pee or not to pee, that is the question." ---
ermm...because they are supposed to represent the people, and not the industry?
Oh, no, wait...silly me!
--- "To pee or not to pee, that is the question." ---
My peculiar neurosis causes me to achieve orgasm every time I see a question mark. On the other hand, everything after this pales in comparison. I'll probably spend the rest of my life surfing sites written in Kanji with my non-unicode browser rendering everything in question marks in a sad attempt to recapture The Night Of Eleven Times.
IANAL, but I got to see the entire tv coverage of the OJ trial. I know there's plenty of backroom wrangling, but it was better than nothing. I'd been in a severe car accident with a severe concussion. I couldn't read and wasn't allowed to drive. So it was books on tape or tv. I hate listening to books on tape so I watched OJ on trial.
It's too bad this didn't happen: <ESP>OJ, forget the Dream Team...the prosecution is brown-eyed and not blue-eyed. Save yourself some money!</ESP>
________________________
my apologies in advance to Hawk, esq.
It's the way the jokes reads:
What's the difference between a brown-eyed lawyer and a blue-eyed lawyer?
The blue-eyed lawyer is a quart low.
If copyright expires at death, it makes it really hard for old artists to sell their work to publishers. (Ok, it also makes it hard for live-fast-die-young rockers to sell their work too :-) Somebody who's 80 years old has an expected remaining lifetime of 5-10 years if they're in average health, and a non-trivial chance of dying in the next year before the book's even gotten out to the stores, is a bad financial bet compared to somebody who's 20 and has an expected 60-80 years left even if they might not have anything interesting to say. Old people do occasionally write first novels that become best-sellers, and they often write memoirs, and if they've been interesting people their work might be a really good investment for a publisher, but if the copyright vanishes when they die, they're not going to be able to get as much money for them.
Old musicians are in a similar situation - some genres, like jazz and blues and classical, are just fine for old guys with decades of experience, even though they may not still be in shape for the vocals or dancing around the stage. Is there some reason that they should only be able to make money by doing live concerts and not also by selling records, just because they're in worse shape than Keith Richards so copyright-ending-at-death would mean that greedy record companies wouldn't pay them as much?
And what if only the drummer explodes, but the other three band members are fine?
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks