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Egypt to Copyright Pyramids and Sphynx
empaler writes "We all know the usual pro-copyright arguments. Most of them hinge on the fact that the individual or company that has a copyright needs an incentive to make something that is copyrightable, and therefore ensure a revenue stream in a period after the copyright has been granted. In a never-surpassed move, Egypt is working on legislation to extend copyright well above 3000 years — they are going to start claiming royalties for using likenesses of the Sphynx and the Pyramids. It is still unclear whether the original intent of the Pyramids included 'making sure them bastards pay for a plastic copy in 3000 years' alongside 'securing a pathway to the heavens for the God King.' Speaking as a Greenlandic national, I want dibs on ice cubes." It sounds straight out of The Onion, but instead you can read another story on the BBC.
"This bit of accepted wisdom, that "...the Pyramids [were] built by slaves who were Jews.." (as stated in your message of 1 September), is a canard that does not deserve repetition. First, it is anachronistic and illogical. The "Pyramids" -- presumably the three great pyramids of Gizah and perhaps the earlier pyramids to the south, including the Step Pyramid of Sakkara -- were built in the Third and Fourth Dynasties, 2650-2575 BC and 2575-2467 BC. The Jews did not exist at that time. The ancestors of the Jews, the Hebrews or "Children of Israel" -- Bene Yisra'el -- did not enter Egypt until centuries later. If one looks at the biblical narrative, Joseph, son of Jacob aka Israel, who brought the people of Israel into Egypt to settle in the land of Goshen, was driven in a chariot just behind Pharaoh's. The Egyptians did not have the wheel when the great pyramids were built. By the time the Egyptians had wheels, and horses and chariots, the great pyramids were ancient. Even if one were to determine that the migration of the Sumerian/Chaldean Abraham from the Sumerian city of Ur to the land of the Canaanites took place around the predynastic or early dynastic periods of ancient Egypt, there would still have been no Jews in Egypt at the time -- or anywhere else for that matter. Second, recent scholarship on ancient Egypt has suggested -- concluded, perhaps -- that the pyramids were built by corvees of native Egyptians and undoubtedly of slaves as well, conscripted into temporary service on the pyramids, probably during the flood season when their labor on the farm could be spared. Those who were not actually slaves through warfare or other reasons were subjects of Pharaoh who were made to give their time and effort to a great national cause. Managing these labor gangs were professional craftsmen whose villages near the pyramids have been under excavation and study". Ronald Hilton - 9/6/01
No, he's right on. The Jews were certainly slaves for other projects, just not the pyramids. There were quite a lot of buildings going up around the time of Ramesses II (who was possibly the antagonist to Moses), but the Egyptians had long since switched to burying important people in the Valley of the Kings.
Not a typewriter
No, international treaty means that your copyright will be honored under the laws of the other country in that country. To prosecute someone in the United States, you have to file a case in US District Court under Title 17, not under the Berne Convention.
If Egypt retaliates for something like this, they would be viewed as violating the treaties by every other state, and be subject to significant sanctions. Not to mention, they are still trying to get back lots of antiquities from all those other countries.
It was called the DMCA, and contained provisions to extend copyright indefinitely (even though nobody seems to realize it.)
See, legally the copyright expires, of course. But technically it doesn't. If a copyright holder places "technological measures" to prevent someone from copying/accessing a work, then as long as the measures continue to function, you are legally prevented from using the material once is has entered the public domain, because the "technological measures" are given force of law.
Prior art doesn't matter in copyright. You are thinking of patents. If I preform Hamlet on stage, my performance is copyrighted the moment I do it. If I don't want you to video tape it, then copyright would be on my side. Nothing stops you from performing it yourself though because Shakespeare's copyright on the play has expired. Of course it wouldn't be expired in Egypt if this law passes.
This is a sig. This is only a sig. Had this been an actual sig you would have been informed where to tune for more sigs.
You trademark Mickey Mouse. You copyright particular examples of work containing him.
If I preform Hamlet on stage, my performance is copyrighted the moment I do it.
In the US a performance must be "fixed in a tangible medium." It isn't copyrighted unless you film it, record it, or write it down.
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest