EU Proposes Retroactive Copyright Extension

I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "EU Commissioner Charlie McCreevy has unveiled a plan to retroactively extend musical copyrights by 45 years, which would make EU musical copyrights last 95 years total. Why? They're worried that musicians won't continue to collect royalties when they retire and this will give them an additional 45 years during which they won't have to produce any new music. Perhaps the only good point is that the retroactive extensions won't take effect for any works which aren't marketed in the first year after the extension. Additionally, while there are many non-musical retirees wishing they could get paid for 95 years after they finish working, McCreevy has not announced any new plans to help them."

Comments

Who really gets paid?

[clang_jangle]

Plain old "musicians" rarely recieve royalties; royalties are generally paid to songwriters and publishers. Of course usually those royalties end up getting paid to the Big Media companies that manage to obtain ownership of the copyrights and publishing, not to the artists. But "think of the poor, aging artists!" probably elicits a bit more sympathy than "think of the record companies!".

Re:Who really gets paid?

[TRRosen]

Exactly. Artists never get any money from royalties after the first few years because the labels take most of it through creative bookkeeping. The artists only get money when there's a lot coming in.

Add to that the fact that most new artists lose all there copyrights to the labels by contract and you'll find the only ones not getting screwed by the extension is the labels. Infact for the most part many artists will lose more money since the labels "own" most of their songs they will have to pay royalties to the labels every time the perform them!!!

Re:Who really gets paid?

[DrEldarion]

As the internet changes the face of music distribution and marketing and artists start to distribute independently of the major labels, this will be a good thing. Artists should continue to receive compensation for their creations for as long as people are enjoying them (though copyrights should probably be released after the artists' deaths).

Re:Who really gets paid?

[theheadlessrabbit]

but without copyright, the creative commons and GPL wouldn't work, these things rely on copyright law.

personally, have no problem with an automatic 14 year copyright term being applied to any creative endeavor, hell, maybe even throw in a one-time-only 14 year extension for a fee. but after that, everything should enter public domain.

I can't be the 1st person to think of this system...

Re:Who really gets paid?

[CRCulver]

Artists should continue to receive compensation for their creations for as long as people are enjoying them?

Why? Copyright is not some kind of inalienable natural right. It was never even thought up until a couple of hundred years ago. In ancient Rome, when poets' recitations were transcribed, mass-copied by amanuenses, and sold in the marketplace, they never saw a dime in royalties, but it didn't bother them. The only protest we hear from antiquity is when Martial lampooned a talentless aristocrat who was putting his own name on copies of Martial's verse. The American Founding Fathers enshrined copyright in law because they thought it was good for the public, not because people have some absolute right to it. And the concept is very eurocentric, for outside the West, to this very day, copyright makes absolutely no sense. Try explaining to a person in Eastern Europe, Asia, or South America that they are doing something wrong by downloading or copying a CD, and they will look at you like you're a lunatic.

Re:Who really gets paid?

[CRCulver]

but without copyright, the creative commons and GPL wouldn't work, these things rely on copyright law.

If there were no copyright of software, RMS would have never needed to create the GPL to begin with. It's well documentation that through the GPL Stallman was only trying to restore the state of affairs that existed before copyright on code became an issue.

Re:Who really gets paid?

[Anonymous Coward]

Should this apply to fundamental truths as well, like mathematical theorems? You're insane if you think that.

Re:Who really gets paid?

[robbak]

If you create something, you have a choice whether to show somebody else. You have the choice to distribute it, or not to distribute it.

Once you give a copy to somebody else, then, for all intents and purposes, you no longer have any control over it.

Copyright gives you an artificial limited monopoly over distribution - nothing more - simply because this encourages persons to create and distribute works. Once works have been distributed, copyright has done its work. It is then a liability to society.

Copyright's purpose is to increase the amount of works in the public domain. Anything that reduces the flow of works to the public domain (like copyright extensions) is against the purpose of copyright.

(With regard to software - for any protection under copyright, I believe that the source code for the work should have to be released. Otherwise, copyright makes no sense, as the works have very limited use when they hit the public domain.)

Re:Who really gets paid?

[Potor]

Math may be creative in the sense of thinking of new approaches, etc., but I would hold that this creative process only leads to discoveries, not creations. In other words, something that was already there, waiting to be discovered, a truth as you call it. That's different than artistic creation, which does add something that was not there in the first place.

Re:Who really gets paid?

[Znork]

for as long as people are enjoying them

Why? Chairmakers don't receive compensations for as long as people are enjoying their chairs. Builders don't receive compensation for as long as people enjoy their houses.

How about this; people get paid for working, and the state interfering in the market to create monopolies favouring certain classes of work is a particularly bad idea.

If you want to argue for why certain groups need extra support, be intellectually honest and handle it as an ordinary welfare system. If you think creative work is particularly heavy and dangerous, or particularly valuable to society, perhaps they should get a lower retirement age? Argue the case and fund it through ordinary state budgets, not hidden away in the uncounted taxation of intellectual monopoly rights.

Re:Who really gets paid?

[Godji]

Who the hell modded you funny of all things?

Re:Who really gets paid?

[Anonymous Coward]

Please explain how "discovering" certain numbers / symbols work well in certain situations is any different to "discovering" certain notes / words work well in certain situations, to the extent that the "artist" is entitled to free-load for the rest of their lives, while the mathematician is not.

Re:Who really gets paid?

[robbak]

This is interesting. If Ms. mathematician produces a novel-length mathematical model that predicts airflow over North America with unprecedented accuracy, I would like for copyright to exist in that mathematical model. It is a useful science, will be very useful to all humanity when it hits the public domain, and she should become rich on it, as thanks for her useful work.

However, there is no real difference between her model and E=mc^2, or G=Mm/r^2 - just complexity - a continuous scale of complexity, as well as accuracy (remember, E=mc^2 tells us that G=Mm/r^2 is wrong!) - who is to say that this deserves a copyright, but that doesn't?
 

Re:Who really gets paid?

[robbak]

Interesting point: One of the reasons for copyrights (and patents too) is to reduce reliance on trade secrets. Reveal your secrets and get (limited) government protection for them.

Remembering things like that can make patents and copyrights make sense. Not the current implementations, mind you.....

(I'm commenting a bit much in this discussion)

Re:Who really gets paid?

[Potor]

You'll note I said nothing about copyright in my post: I suspect we're on the same page there (i.e., I think this proposed plan is insane).

As a scientific realist, I simply don't want art and science to be seen as aiming at the same end. But anyway, the effects of certain notes will always end in unpredicable results, since the goal is to make people react, and nobody knows how anyone will react. If you read the reviews linked in my sig, you'll discover I have no idea how anyone can listen to top 40 music, and yet that music is made precisely to be universally loved. Nevertheless, it's not, and thus it is a good example of the unpredictability of musical effects.

On the other hand, the effects that science strives for do not depend on subjective reaction, and thus, at the level of their aim, are predictable, reproduceable, etc.

So, that is the basis for difference between the two. And thus, whereas the scientist is discovering what is already there (and hence universal), the artist is creating something new - and to that extent offers something novel to the world. Copyright, for better or for worse, is designed to protect and stimulate that use of the notes and scales (etc.) already in the public domain, just as patents are to stimulate and protect commerical applications of scientific discoveries.

Re:Who really gets paid?

[MrNaz]

I disagree. There should be a short period of protection, after which the product of your creativity is put into the public domain. The period should be set based on things like how valuable to the wider public that kind of thing is versus the need to create incentives in the first place.

Pharma for example, does and rightly should, only be protected for a relatively short period, 6 years or so. Beyond that, it's in everybody's interests for medicine to be available at the lowest possible delivery price.

I don't see why music and movies need such an insanely long period of protection. There should be a short period of exclusivity (say 5 to 10 years) after which it is in the public domain. If your music is good enough that people want it and you can't make a profit in a decade then bad luck.

You know what you get when you try to set up a complex set of rules protecting the output of human creativity? Modern copyright and intellectual property laws.

Re:Who really gets paid?

[Katchina'404]

Musician's right to retirement is pretty much the same as anybody else's :
* Public (state) welfare if existing in country of legal residence (and usually paid for with taxes on Musician's incomes during working years).
* Any sort of private savings.

I'm an IT consultant. When I retire I'll be paid according to the rules above. Why should it be different for other professions ?

Or shall I invoice, 40 years from now, "maintenance fees" for systems I installed in the last years.

Re:Who really gets paid?

[hostyle]

And this is what they think of you: http://newsfeed.tcm.ie/media/images/n/nicolassarkozyfingerap.jpg

Re:Who really gets paid?

[Sique]

But also Mathematics gets designed by mathematicians to "somehow work". And it takes some time until the "works somehow" settles down to a nice, elegant theorem or a small lemma you teach your students.
Look at the different attempts to pinpoint the continuity of the Real Numbers (Dirichlet, Bolzano-Weierstrass, Cauchy...). All those approaches were not discovered, but obviously created to generalize the idea, that infinite fractures are Real Numbers. The discovery lies in the fact that all three approaches are equivalent.
Similarly you could look at the approaches to define computability. How many different definitions for computability are there? 10? 30? But nevertheless all are equivalent and boil down to the same set of functions. Each of them is a creation, and the discovery is just the fact that the newly created version of computability is equivalent to the already known ones.

Re:Who really gets paid?

[Mr2001]

The only reason I can't use your car or house when you aren't using it is because of artificial laws saying I can't and granting you protection from such actions - whats the difference? I deprive you of something?

Yes, that's the difference. A pretty important one.

Why is that important?

Because if you take my car, I won't be able to use it. I will have been harmed by your actions. Harming people is bad.

On the other hand, if you copy my song/program/movie, I won't have been harmed: I'll still have everything I had before you made that copy. (I might wish you had given me some money for it, but that money was never mine anyway, no matter how hard I was wishing. I might be sad about that, but I won't have suffered any actual loss.)

Surely sharing is a good thing?

Sharing is usually a good thing, but not when someone is harmed in the process. Surely you already knew that?

Re:Who really gets paid?

[Benaiah]

Well music really is maths then isnt it.
If you add up all the number of timings and all of the different notes... There are only so many different chorus's and melodies that you can come up with. Sure its probably more than the possible number of chess games but hell, you can't copyright an opener in chess now can you? or can you?

Sorry Kasperov, you cant move there, that's the Coke(tm) opener and you haven't paid appropriate royalties. Nope not their either. That's Pepsi's(tm).

Re:Who really gets paid?

[Knuckles]

Okay Muscians actually do get paid and this isn't about record companies. This is the poor sap playing his ass off.

Read this and this. Thank you.

Re:Who really gets paid?

[I cant believe its n]

If you have a right to a retirement then why don't they?

As a developer I don't have the right to retirement any more than you do. I earn my pension by having part of what I make put aside for later use. (Not the code, the money)

If you are anything like me, you do what you do not in order to make the money, but because you have to, because you love it. I don't mind the money I make, but if all I wanted was a lot of money, I would go and do something else. Since I don't want my soul to die, I'm staying with software. I suppose you would still create your music?

It is my understanding that the copyright laws where made, not to help artists make a living, but to advance the arts. In my opinion, the proposed law would only hinder new artists in creating what they need/love to do, and not advance the arts in any way at all.

Re:Who really gets paid?

[CRCulver]

Right and we should have our Intellectual Property rules inspired by society where rich aristocrats tossed a few crumbs to artists and then had slaves mass produce their works.

Poets were funded quite well in Rome. The slaves mass-producing their works were not those of the patron, but of whatever enterprising fellow decided to transcribe recitals, much like the guy responsible for several early Shakespeare editions.

Ancient Rome [is] not exactly [an example] of cultures that were noted for their artistic achievements

You're joking, right? The B.A. Classics is one of the oldest academic degrees around. A fine arts track at most universities involves at least some study of Roman arts. The Aeneid, the poetry of Catullus and the dramas of Seneca are evidentally assigned often enough to encourage new translations to come on the market every few years.

You can see this in Asia. Back when they were tyrannical third world shit holes where the ultra rich employed gangs of people on low wages to mass produce crap, they were no IP laws. Once local companies and artists started to make things that could sell, IP laws started to be tightened up.

We obviously are thinking of very different parts of Asia. In China and SE Asia, finding legitimate media for purchase can be a hassle. Everything sold on the street is pirated. Nonetheless, Hong Kong has a flourishing film and music scene because the local industry has adapted to a post-copyright set of affairs.

Re:Who really gets paid?

[TheRaven64]

Oh and the rest of the world understands the concept of copyright, especially the creators themselves.

I make a living from copyright as a writer, and a 95 year term seems ludicrous to me. In China, copyright is not respected because, traditionally, taking credit for great works was not considered polite - the greatest honour you a philosopher or poet could receive was having their works distributed anonymously (or pseudonymously). In Europe, attribution is considered more important. The text of copyright law in the UK contains the phrase 'the natural right of the author to be identified with this work' - being able to take credit for your own work is viewed as a natural right. Even when copyright expires, this right typically persists: prints of public domain works are almost always attributed.

But the issue is not whether the world understands copyright, it's whether society will benefit from a 95 year copyright term. Copyright (as a government-enforced monopoly) exists as a bargain between creators and the rest of society. I agree to release my works immediately to the public at large and society agrees to enforce my right to charge for them for a limited time. Society benefits because they have immediate (but limited) access to things I create and long-term total access when copyright expires. I, conversely, benefit from being paid.

I quite like being paid, and I'd like it even more if I could be paid in perpetuity for things I create now. In fact, it would be really great if I just needed to write one thing and could live off it for the rest of my life. Well, maybe not so great for society, because it completely removes the incentive for me to write any more[1]. Ideally, copyright would ensure that I was paid enough to live (comfortably!) while I worked on my next project, and put a little aside for when I eventually retired. I believe something in the seven to fourteen year range would be ample for this, and possibly even shorter. Once a work falls into the public domain, then it can be distributed by anyone to anyone, and as long as the 'natural right' of attribution is preserved then it serves as advertising for my later works. I would, therefore, be in favour of two copyright terms: a short-term monopoly and a longer-term legally-enforced attribution.

[1] I enjoy writing, as you can see from the hundreds of thousands of words I've posted on Slashdot, but without a financial incentive there is very little reason for me to go to the effort of getting things edited and published.

Re:Who really gets paid?

[Lumpy]

But their artists! we must protect them! and coddle them!

and pet their long fur and tell them of greener pastures where all the other artists get to romp and play...

Yup. The entire world has gone nuts. I was expecting europe to have some sanity, as some of you are living in houses that were standing when most musicians made their money by playing in the streets, or by selling their copyright to some rich nutjob that collects sonnets.

Re:Who really gets paid?

[Nerdfest]

COBOL developers still seem to be pulling that off.

Re:Who really gets paid?

[jd]

In general, artists get paid well below other professions (and well below what they contracted for). Work is intermittent (Jon Pertwee used to say actors spend 95% of their time unemployed). And, let's be blunt, American state pensions might possibly feed a squirrel, but nothing much bigger. I do not believe they should be paid unreasonably large sums, but neither do I believe they should be paid unreasonably small sums. (Unlike the music and film industries, I think artists would be happier and better-able to do their jobs with good food and sensible living conditions. Also unlike the music and film industries, I don't think you can substitute those with sex and drugs and get the same results. All you are likely to get are dead artists.)

Re:Who really gets paid?

[S.O.B.]

In general, artists get paid well below other professions (and well below what they contracted for). Work is intermittent (Jon Pertwee used to say actors spend 95% of their time unemployed).

Well they did choose that line of work didn't they. No one forced them into it.

And if an artist is still getting royalties after 95 years they're not likely one of the artists on the bottom end of the pay scale that need protecting. As has been mentioned here by others, this extension is to protect the record labels and copyright holders who are very likely not the original artists.

A 95 year protection would be acceptable to me only if it was to the original artist and not transferable. If you buy the rights maybe you only get 25 years protection.

Re:Who really gets paid?

[sm62704]

Well, when Blair exptresses what he thinks about British voters, he's more polite than what Bush thinks about American voters.

Re:Who really gets paid?

[smallfries]

In general, dishwashers get paid well below other professions (and well below what they contracted for). Work is intermittent (A local used to say dishwashers spend 95% of their time unemployed).

So, sob story aside. Why should musicians get special treatment? They already get to ride one piece of work for 50 years, if that isn't enough then maybe it's time to put the guitar down and get a real job?

Re:Who really gets paid?

[monxrtr]

Work is intermittent (Jon Pertwee used to say actors spend 95% of their time unemployed)

Then that means they can simultaneously work other jobs 95% of the time instead of sleeping, sitting on their asses, or partying. Only the most successful richest artists are going to have people still interested in their music decades later. This is pure welfare for the richest musicians, musicians that live in mansions, ride around in limousines, and snort and fuck everything that moves.

Re:Who really gets paid?

[Mr. Slippery]

A 95 year protection would be acceptable to me only if it was to the original artist and not transferable.

Exactly. Under the U.S. Constitution, copyright can be granted to authors of works - there is no power for Congress to grant copyright to their heir or employers or anyone else. We'd all be a lot better off if this was held to.

Re:Who really gets paid?

[alexgieg]

No, it couldn't, sorry. Explaining why would require a full Philosophy course, so I cannot provide the details here as needed to properly show you why this is so. Suffice it to say that all, rigorously all, devices developed in the ancient world that resemble what in Modernity became productive machines (vapor power, for example), were looked at as interesting natural anomalies, cool to interact with as a hobby but unworthy of serious intellectual pursuit. Why? Because intellectual pursuit proper, back then, was discovering and cataloging general properties.

As for the Enlightenment, it depends on Descartes and Hume, who in turn depended on Occam, who depended on the extreme developments in Logics that happened during the "Dark Ages" and until the end of the Middle Age (notice that the expression "Dark Ages" isn't used anymore among serious scholars of either History of Philosophy or History of Science, there were lots of developments in all intellectual fields in that period). Remove the Middle Age logicians, go back to Aristotelian and Stoic logics, and you won't have any of the advanced intellectual tools used by the 15th century folks to in turn develop the intellectual tools used by the 18th century ones to produce the Enlightenment.

Carl Sagan, not being an Historian of either Philosophy of Sciences, isn't a good reference in this regards. A good reference on this whole subject is actually Ernst Cassirer. He has a HUGE multi-volume book on the development of the modern scientific method (sorry, I don't remember its title right now), covering in minute details all the ground between the natural sciences of the Middle Ages to the physics of the first half of the 20th century. Try to find it. It's worth reading.

Re:Who really gets paid?

[TheLink]

Anyone who needs a 95 year monopoly in order to survive in this day and age is crap at what they do and should get another job.

Same goes for companies.

If some songwriter/composer can't write something better in 95 years, I don't see why society should encourage such people to continue in their line of work. The economists can tell you that.

It is bad that copyright and patent terms are getting longer and longer instead of getting shorter.

Nowadays communications and distribution is supposed to be so good - so terms should get shorter.
If you assume a faster pace of progress, then terms should be getting shorter.

How about 7 years? Too short? Well I think most people should see that even 50 years is way too long.

95 years is ridiculous.

Enforce it how?

[damburger]

They can claim copyright for a bazillion years, still won't address the issue that it is impossible to enforce without crushing peoples freedom of speech. Knowing the EU, which is every bit as much a tool of business as the US government, they will do exactly that.

Re:Enforce it how?

[Per Wigren]

Stop complaining about the "anti-americanism". Personally I'm not at all against Americans but very much against American politics (black curtain authorian corporatism and fear mongering). Except for a few nutcases I'm pretty sure that applies to most people you call "anti-american". Putting aside the non-stop war mongering, the biggest reason is that USA (the government, not the people) send armies of lobbyists to Europe trying to close down our freedoms to chase ghosts.

This law proposal is an obvious result of heavy American lobbyism, and it's just an example out of thousands. Yes, I blame European politicians just as much (if not more) for falling into the trap.

Thank you for stopping communism, bla bla bla, in the past. Whatever. That doesn't change what is happening right now.

I know a lot of Americans and they are all fantastic persons. It's all about the government and politics, not the people.

The summary overlooked the other reason

[antifoidulus]

since if music is freely available to everyone, the government cannot tax the sales or the income of the artist.

Re:The summary overlooked the other reason

[Anonymous Coward]

I reside in the European Union and listen mainly to recordings of contemporary art music that were produced with the aid of state subsidies, since they probably wouldn't be profitable on their own. Even if the government taxes the sale of the CD, it's still a net loss for them. Governments here have no qualm with offering free music. Their support of the arts is one thing that keeps quality of life constantly high here.

50 years wasn't long enough?!?

[feedayeen]

With a 50 year long copyright, if I produced a song as a teenager, I would still own the rights even after the time that I am eligible for my pension. With a 95 year long copyright, if I produced a song, the recording industry would be profiting off of my works for decades after I am dead.

Re:50 years wasn't long enough?!?

[malkavian]

Hmm.. I worked for an independent label many a year ago. It's not that the larger industry is effective at marketing their best, it's that they're effective at marketing what makes them the most profit.
If you don't sign up, you don't get the deal, and don't get advertising and distribution. If you do sign up, it's on the large label's terms (they get most, if not all, and sometimes all and more from the artist too, to cover 'production costs').
What the recording industry is good at doing is exploiting the wish of people to be famous, and leading them with promises of fame and fortune (by presenting images of the 'successful' pop idols) to sign on the dotted line. Once they do that, they're more often than not pretty screwed.

Retirement

[Deltaspectre]

Dang, I wish I could make money for free after my retirement :(

I should see if my boss wants to consider paying me after I go so I have an extra 45 years I won't have to do any sysadmin work

Obviously not for the musicians' sake

[NoobixCube]

Your average musician would attain fame close to 20 or later (unless they're child-stars). 95 years after that extends revenue to the age of 115, while most people don't live past 80 or 90; if the much-publicised lives of today's musicians are anything to go by, a lot of them won't make it past 50. I refuse to pay just because someone's arrogant-bastard children think they deserve money because their father wrote a song that sold well.

What's different from physical property though?

[cliffski]

In other news, people whose great great grandfathers fenced off land and invested in *property* retain the ownership to it still, despite having died many years ago.
Nobody shows any sign of caring that they can inherit property which they contributed *nothing* towards, and have full expectation of leaving that same property to their children.
yet if that property is intellectual rather than physical, there is huge outcry.
Why the double standard?

because a big chunk of many populations expect to benefit from inheriting daddy's house, whereas the people who benefit from IP are a smaller number, and thus easily attacked.

All earnings from old IP are taxed. All earnings from property are taxed. What is the difference here?

Re:What's different from physical property though?

[TorKlingberg]

The concept of "intellectual property" is the problem. The phrase was made up to make it seem like a right rather than a temporary government granted monopoly.

Re:What's different from physical property though?

[Baldur_of_Asgard]

Difference 1: If I graze my cattle on your ranch, you will not be able to make use of your ranch - but if I sing a song that you wrote, you will still be able to sing that song.

Difference 2: If you sell me your ranch, the ranch is mine to do with as I please. If you sell me your song, shouldn't the song be mine to do with as I please? After some profitability, songs and other intellectual property should go into the public domain, especially if a large portion of the public have paid for it.

Re:What's different from physical property though?

[theheadlessrabbit]

the difference is, if i take your physical property, you have less.

if i take your intellectual property, you lose nothing.

bytes are not atoms.

Re:What's different from physical property though?

[silentbozo]

I don't know how it is where you are, but physical property here in the US is taxed apart from the income you earn from that income.

In other words, even if the land is just sitting there, you still get taxed on it. If you don't pay the tax, the government seizes the property and sells it off to someone who will. Remember, this is completely apart from the income tax applied to any revenue you generate from the property, whether it's from building a house and renting it out, farming it, grazing animals on it, or paving it over and charging people to park on it.

There is no double standard because intellectual "property" isn't real property. There's a lot of impetus to treat it that way because there are a lot of business models built on being able to buy, sell, rent, and re-exploit movies, music, and writing, completely ignoring the fact that:

1. While they like to treat it as real property, real property doesn't expire after a set period of time. Anyone stupid enough to build a business model assuming an asset that is supposed to become free after a set period of time is going to retain value forever deserves to lose their investment.

2. The ability to control the property exclusively is a monopoly (generally a bad thing) granted by the government, as a trade off - we give you a monopoly for the time being, in exchange for you making the property available to the public, and ultimately part of the public domain when the monopoly ends.

3. Traditionally, there was no such thing as "intellectual property". If you saw some something cool and wanted your own copy, you'd copy it or hire someone to make you a copy. If you heard a great story, you'd retell it. This is why guilds formed - to protect "guild secrets", and create a competitive advantage for guild members. The problem is, anyone who was really innovative would more often than not, refuse to share their new process, forcing other people to have to rediscover the secret, a horrible waste of time and energy. To get rid of this waste, promote innovation, and enable those innovations to become public so that they're not lost, the idea of patents and copyrights was born.

4. Patents and copyrights are used today to print money, quash innovation by other people, and bribe politicians to extend monopolies (generally a bad thing) indefinitely, at the expense of the public. Because they don't have to pay property tax, they can sit indefinitely on IP and just sue anyone who starts making money on something that does or might infringe on it. You should either get a limited monopoly to exploit your work, or if you want to hold onto it forever, you should be required to pay property taxes on it as a royalty to the public who are guaranteeing your monopoly. Consider all the governmental resources that have been diverted by private parties to enforcing ever longer copyrights in court, and on the streets.

So to answer your question, there's a huge difference between how IP and real property are treated. There is no double standard. The fact that you think there is one is a strong indication of how badly the public has been misled about how copyrights and patents are supposed to work.

Re:What's different from physical property though?

[seifried]

Actually you don't own your property in the truest sense of the word (yes technically I acknowledge that you own and possibly have possession of it). Ultimately the government owns your land. Just stop paying the land or property taxes and this point will be made abundantly clear. Now if a copyright holder had to pay a yearly fee based on the value (either intrinsic, or perhaps market or realized, something along those lines) of the work in question to keep the copyright I'd be a lot more supportive of copyright laws.

Re:What's different from physical property though?

[KDR_11k]

If I graze my cattle on your ranch, you will not be able to make use of your ranch - but if I sing a song that you wrote, you will still be able to sing that song.

Depends on what you see as the purpose of the property. If the purpose of the ranch is to graze cattle, yes, it's being denied to you but if you just use it as a vacation home where's the damage? If the purpose of the song is that you just want to sing it there's no damage but if the purpose was to make money then someone else sharing free copies of it make you unable to do so.

Re:What's different from physical property though?

[laffer1]

Even a yearly renewal after a certain point would be nice. The artist (not the record company) would have to fill out some form every year to retain rights.

Re:What's different from physical property though?

[Tom]

yet if that property is intellectual rather than physical, there is huge outcry.
Why the double standard?

Because intellectual "property" isn't. It has none of the elements that make up "property" in physical things. Most importantly, it is not exclusive.

People fend off, fight for and die for land because if you use it, then I can't. That's not true of music, we can both have a copy of the same song and be happy.

That's why the double standard.

Who really gets paid?

[symbolset]

Here's a novel idea: abolish copyright.. We should act now before this gets even more dumb.

This is all about Ireland

[Kupfernigk]

Ireland had a declining population for years (not owing to the Troubles; it was the South that was declining, not the North) due to the endemic corruption, lack of personal freedom, and poor educational opportunities. Think Iran without funny hats, and with the Catholic Church in the Shia role, and you about have it. Then they came up with two wheezes: no tax for artists, to try and encourage them to live (or more correctly officially live) there, and a complete free for all based on EU money, which transferred taxpayers money from the rest of the EU to some very, very nasty criminal gangs with connections at the highest level of government. If you doubt this, look at what happened to investigative journalists like Guerin and Taoiseachs like Bertie Ahearn.

The upshot is that shills like McCreevy are trying to keep the artists on board by proposing that they get something which no other professional gets, (if 95 years copyright for a writer, why not 95 years for a patent?) hoping that Ireland will benefit in some way from tax collection. Apple is also strongly represented In Ireland and can presumably afford lobbyists.

The economic downturn and the gradual ending of EU structural funding (supposedly for building railways and roads but actually diverted to building country houses for the rich Irish) is putting a strain on the Irish economy. They need the money

Re:What happens when its the Penguins turn?

[Chrisq]

Yes, If commercial companies want to use 45 year old technology that was GPL'd why not? Just think, Fortran iv would just be out of copyright now. Next year we can look forward to DEC PDP-8 becoming public domain. See timeline of computing.

No pensions?

[Zog The Undeniable]

So they should have invested some of the money while they were making it, instead of spending it on Colombian marching powder, groupies and hotel room repairs.

Everyone else has to save for a pension or end up on income support. Why not musicians?

Re:What happens when its the Penguins turn?

[meringuoid]

Then Tux and Linux reach the end of their copyright term will people be happy that the GPL just stops?

Sure. If someone wants to use a suddenly public-domain Linux 0.1, they can go right ahead. The current version will still be under copyright and available only under the terms of the GPL. Oh, and the Linux name is trademarked, not copyrighted, so Linus and his successors retain that indefinitely.

Re:Retroactive ?

[jabuzz]

No it means that it applies to works that are already in existence. So for example I own a number of audio books of classic works. The words spoken by the actors on the CD's are long out of copyright. However the recording itself has a 50 year term. When I purchased that audio book I entered into a contract, part of which was based on the fact that the copyright in the recording would expire within my lifetime.

This proposal would change the existing contract of purchase to make me materially worse off. This makes it retroactive.

This proposal however has to get approval from all 27 member countries, which is a tall order given that some, such as the UK have expressed previously that they saw no reason to extend copyrights on recordings.

Re:The Plan!

[robbak]

Just an addendum: You can use the music to "Happy Birthday" - that is a folk tune, and anonymous' copyrights have expired. (Just be sure to credit the music under the name of that forgotten folk tune.)

All that it copyrighted are the words. All 5 of them:
"Happy birthday to you... dear _________"

How ingenious.

Retroactive extension = breaking the deal

[archeopterix]

Hey, this wasn't in the deal. The artists produced artwork, the society, represented by the government, granted them X years temporary monopoly as reward/incentive to contribute to the public domain.

Now they (the copyright lobby) want to break that deal by lobbying the gov't to retroactively extend the monopoly by Y years. Now tell me again, why should I respect the deal when the other side doesn't?

Re:Retroactive extension = breaking the deal

[Tim C]

bingo. that's what kids today see.

I very much doubt that the average kid sees anything other than the chance to get stuff for free with little or no fear of being caught. In fact given that it's so prevalent, I expect they don't even consciously register that they're doing anything wrong (in any sense, morally or legally)

Honestly, in my experience very few people outside of slashdot think about it *at all*. As much as we like to think that most people are sticking it to the man because of industry corruption and deal-breaking, it really isn't like that.

Thieves and Scoundrels

[Detritus]

Who is going to benefit from this? From what I've read, this was the era in which it was common for record producers to acquire all rights to the song in exchange for a flat fee.

This is why I voted against the constitution ...

[Aceticon]

... it would give even more power to the European Commission.

They're a bunch of unelected bureaucrats which do not in any way consider the interests of the EU citizens but instead bend over backwards to serve the interests of those corporation which will give them well paid jobs once they've done their time in the European Commission.

(notice how all help-the-industry-f**k-the-consumers proposals of late have come from the commission)

Good thing the Irish brought down the sham attempt at bringing back the EU constitution through the back door that was the Lisbon Treaty.

The funny part is that I'm actual pro-EU and actually feel European. The concept is good, it's just that some EU institutions are degraded and corrupt and need to be eliminated or thoroughly remade.

We need elected legislators instead of these puppets.

The Difference Is Psychological

[NickFortune]

The only reason I can't use your car or house when you aren't using it is because of artificial laws saying I can't and granting you protection from such actions - whats the difference?

I suspect the difference is that laws regarding physical property are strongly tied to the human territorial imperative. Like many other creatures on this planet, we have a strong urge to claim territory as our own, and territorial disputes when they do occur are frequently violent and sometime bloody.

Having a legal structure that helps minimise such disputes makes sense, since it means that we spend less time organising blood vendettas against our neighbours, and more time on constructive activities. Of course, that may depend on what you consider a constructive activity.

On the other hand, there doesn't seem to be any similar deep root territoriality to ideas. In fact, I would argue that converse seems to be true. Human beings have a strong urge to propagate information in all its forms. From jokes and stories, to music, to software - sharing abstractions seems to be a part of our make up.

Which, in my opinion, is why the record labels and studios and software houses are having such a hard time with this. They've coined the term "intellectual property" to try and make it seem as if the human territorial response should apply to information in the same way as it does to tangible assets. But it doesn't; not at the level of human psychology.

And that, so far as I can see, is the major difference. Property laws for tangible assets work with human psychology, and are respected for that reason. Trying to apply those same principles to information is working against human psychology which is why the practice is so widely opposed. Put another way, the first case has a basis in human behaviour, the second one lacks any such basis, and is more of an attempt at social engineering seeking to change human behaviour to suit a relatively small number of people.

Reduce copyrights to 20 years

[bestinshow]

Why can someone sit down, drink, take drugs, have groupies and make money for 95 years from a few songs, whilst other people educate themselves, invent something, and only get the right to make money on their invention for 15-20 years afterwards?

Long copyright terms don't encourage the people with the skills to continually create artistic works of benefit to society and culture. Copyright doesn't exist to benefit the creator of a work of art, it exists to benefit society as a whole by giving incentive to create art.

The actual truth of the matter is that people would actually still create music, art, stories, etc if there was no copyright concept. In addition, the creators would still benefit a lot from creating - people still prefer to see Iron Maiden live rather than tribute bands like High On Maiden, for example. Performances are where the money is for full time bands as well.

All of these people who raked in money from when they were big should have put some aside for their retirement, like EVERYBODY ELSE has to.

"stealing" music

[seeker_1us]

The big music companies are always complaining about "stealing" music.

The purpose of copyright was to give a limited monopoly to the creator for a certain time, after which the work was to become public domain.

So by paying the politicians to extend copyright lengths over and over, aren't they using the legal system to steal the public domain music from us?

They need to go further ...

[MacTO]

Why not have indefinite copyright?

Many people are exploiting the works of the greats, like Chaucer and Shakespeare, without offering a nickle to their estates. Some of the worse offenders are theaters and schools, who greedily steal this work to enrich the lives of theatergoers and teenagers. Such self-centred and exploitive behaviours have to stop. Copyrights must be extended eternally, and it must be done retroactively so that the estates of great writers from any member of the EU can seek damages for decades, centuries, and even millenia. /sarcasm

This is nothing to do with Ireland

[PinkyDead]

The facts that you've bundled together there are about as completely wrong as you could get.

Ireland had a declining population for years (not owing to the Troubles; it was the South that was declining, not the North) due to the endemic corruption, lack of personal freedom, and poor educational opportunities.

The corruption was a symptom of a high tax economy which was in turn a symptom of bad economic management during hard times. As far as educational opportunities were concerned Ireland had, in spite of itself and taking into account its size, one of the best education systems in the world - which is seen as one of the major contributors to its recent success.

I'll give you the Iran thing. It's probably not completely far from the truth - certainly up to late '80s.

The two schemes that you mention have absolutely nothing to do with Ireland's success. If I may, I would suggest that it was caused by (1) Technically educated workforce at the same time as the Internet got big (2) Low corporate tax rate (3) English speaking (4) Heavily committed to EU and Euro (5) Very business friendly politically (6) Zero tolerance of corruption and (7) the Good weather?.

If you doubt this, look at what happened to investigative journalists like Guerin and Taoiseachs like Bertie Ahearn.

The criminal gangs in Ireland existed like in any other country. And like in other countries Veronica Guerin was shot because she was investigating them - nothing special there.

Bertie on the other hand had no criminal connections. His problems came because he divorced his wife and was basically taken to the cleaners. Individual businessmen gave him a ton of cash to help him out - unfortunately at the same time Bertie pontificated in the Dail (parliment) that it was reprehensible that any politician should be beholden to outside interests. And unfortunately he got caught - it was illegal, but not in the 'Criminal gangs' sense.

The upshot is that shills like McCreevy are trying to keep the artists on board by proposing that they get something which no other professional gets, (if 95 years copyright for a writer, why not 95 years for a patent?) hoping that Ireland will benefit in some way from tax collection. Apple is also strongly represented In Ireland and can presumably afford lobbyists.

Charlie McCreevy is just doing his job - as Commissioner for Internal Markets, and most other countries reckon he's doing OK at it. He's applying his own philosophy to it which is very much pro IP rights - which is why he's a darling of Microsoft and the Record Companies. (I'm not saying I agree with him).

As you say in Ireland there is no tax for artists - but that means no revenue for government, so that point is a contradiction. There also aren't any record companies her - so you're 0 for 2 there.

The economic downturn and the gradual ending of EU structural funding (supposedly for building railways and roads but actually diverted to building country houses for the rich Irish) is putting a strain on the Irish economy. They need the money.

The downturn in Ireland is, like everywhere else, caused by a combination of High Oil Prices, Low Consumer Confidence and a Global Credit Crunch. Nothing to do with structural funding, which did make a lot of people rich, as you would expect - but not in the corrupt way you are suggesting.

Ireland needs to pay for a very high public service bill - but that will need to be achieved by cutting the bill, not by getting a few more quid off an aging Bono.

Different slant

[smoker2]

The Register had this yesterday, but with a different slant on the proceedings.
In summary, this is not about the songs but the performers themselves.See here, here and here

It's people like you

[Lars T.]

It's people like you who force the Rolling Stones to stay in business until Jagger has to come on stage with a walker.

Re:Undeserved

[lancejjj]

The whole point of copyright is to encourage the creative arts. Retroactively extending copyright creates nothing. We get no new works for it.

The whole point of copyright was to encourage the creative arts. Now it is all about Asia. Asia is a huge emerging market for the EU and the US. Extending intellectual property is a reaction to the new wealth found in that region.

The US and the EU cannot compete with the now-strong manufacturing base of Asia. The only thing we can sell to that region is Mickey Mouse (copyright), Coca Cola (trademark), and Boeing (patents).

Asia does not need the US or the EU to create any of those products. So if they do, we want them to "license the rights" from us.

Copyright is not a right, it's a carrot on a stick

[Badmovies]

From a fair use essay I wrote:

Society benefits the most when something that is created is in the public domain, meaning that nobody holds a copyright. Society, as a whole, owns the work. Shakespeare's plays, most of the writings of Mark Twain, and music composed by Johann Sebastian Bach are in the public domain. Everyone is free to create alternate versions, perform them, or even make a movie with them without getting permission or paying royalties.

However, society also recognizes that people might not have any reason to write books, make movies, or sing songs if everyone else can immediately copy their work. Copyright is a carrot offered by society to help promote the creation of new works. When you get down to it, society is saying, "We understand that there must be some reason for you to create. If you create something, then cannot benefit from it, you will not have a reason to create more works. So, to encourage you, here is a limited period of protection so that you might benefit."

Emphasis on the limited.

Re:The Plan!

[quantumplacet]

Happy Birthday is indeed not a folk song, it is a ripoff of Good Morning To You, which was written by the Hill sisters in the 19th century. The Hills then used copyright law to claim ownership of Happy Birthday, and the copyrights are now in fact owned by Time Warner.

http://www.snopes.com/music/songs/birthday.asp

95 years from the copyright date.

[Comboman]

The summory[sic] makes a stupid statement about getting royalties 95 years after they stop working. Did they even read their own summory[sic]???? It's about extending it 45 years because say you work 60 years, common with musicians, then retire you still get paid for your earlier work.

Your math is as bad as your spelling. Let's be generous and say a musician starts his professional career at the age of 15. If he works for 60 years as you say, then he retires at 75 (possible I guess). The 45 year extension means he can still collect royalties when he's 110 (despite advances in medical science, I can't imagine most hard-living musicians are going to live that long). Of course that's just for the work they did at 15. They can collect royalties on the work they did at age 40 when they're 135, and they can collect on the work they did just before their retirement when they're 170. Tell me again how this makes sense?

Ahem. I would like to address Mr. McCreevy.

[Greyfox]

Copyright was never meant to be a permanent meal ticket. Especially not for some corporation. You fucking fucker.

That is all.