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Project Gutenberg Blocks German Users After Outrageous Court Ruling (teleread.org)
Slashdot reader David Rothman writes: The oldest public domain publisher in the world, Project Gutenberg, has blocked German users after an outrageous legal ruling saying this American nonprofit must obey German copyright law... Imagine the technical issues for fragile, cash-strapped public domain organizations -- worrying not only about updated databases covering all the world's countries, but also applying the results to distribution.
TeleRead carries two views on the German case involving a Holtzbrinck subsidiary...
Significantly, older books provide just a tiny fraction of the revenue of megaconglomerates like Holtzbrinck but are essential to students of literature and indeed to students in general. What's more, as illustrated by the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act in the U.S., copyright law in most countries tends to reflect the wishes and power of lobbyists more than it does the commonweal. Ideally the travails of Project Gutenberg will encourage tech companies, students, teachers, librarians and others to step up their efforts against oppressive copyright laws. While writers and publishers deserve fair compensation, let's focus more on the needs of living creators and less on the estates of authors dead for many decades. The three authors involved in the German case are Heinrich Mann (died in 1950), Thomas Mann (1955) and Alfred Döblin (1957).
One solution in the U.S. and elsewhere for modern creators would be national library endowments... Meanwhile, it would be very fitting for Google and other deep-pocketed corporations with an interest in a global Internet and more balanced copyright to help Gutenberg finance its battle. Law schools, other academics, educators and librarians should also offer assistance.
Significantly, older books provide just a tiny fraction of the revenue of megaconglomerates like Holtzbrinck but are essential to students of literature and indeed to students in general. What's more, as illustrated by the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act in the U.S., copyright law in most countries tends to reflect the wishes and power of lobbyists more than it does the commonweal. Ideally the travails of Project Gutenberg will encourage tech companies, students, teachers, librarians and others to step up their efforts against oppressive copyright laws. While writers and publishers deserve fair compensation, let's focus more on the needs of living creators and less on the estates of authors dead for many decades. The three authors involved in the German case are Heinrich Mann (died in 1950), Thomas Mann (1955) and Alfred Döblin (1957).
One solution in the U.S. and elsewhere for modern creators would be national library endowments... Meanwhile, it would be very fitting for Google and other deep-pocketed corporations with an interest in a global Internet and more balanced copyright to help Gutenberg finance its battle. Law schools, other academics, educators and librarians should also offer assistance.
First 20 years free. Then an escalating payment is required for each 20 year renewal afterward. Simply requiring a payment will solve the orphan works problem. This solution also lets Disney keep Mickey under copyright forever if they keep paying the escalating renewal fees. This is a simple solution to keeping commercially profitable works under copyright and letting everything else revert to the public domain.
The outrageous part isn't really the ruling... that's about access, and while it's problematic, the root outrage here should be the ridiculous length of copyright in the western world in general, companies still profiting or restricting access and it's decades after the author has passed
"goodbye and hello, as always" ~Prince Corwin, from Zelazny's Amber series
American courts were first to apply american rules to the whole world for their own benefit. Now when the role are reversed an american website tell us it's now all bad. I say at this point this is only justice an American organisation feel a bit of heat. Also, them thinking they are somehow essential to the whole world is typical american hubris.
*Shrug*
Tell that to Kim Dotcom, a German born New Zealand citizen and resident, about the US copyright.
No, the issue is that every outlying country shouldn't get to determine worldwide copyright law for everyone else on the internet. It's bad enough that the U.S. has such sway on internet copyright. Now Germany wants to take it even further?
So what happens when Botswana decides that copyright lasts forever, huh?
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
"While writers and publishers deserve fair compensation, "
But not their great grand-children.
The authors of these books have been dead for 60+ years. I don't they have valid contacts with anyone, not that the existence of such contacts has anything to do with the enforceability of copyrights.
In this particular case the authors of the books are dead, and have been pushing up daisies for a very long time.
It's ridiculous to keep copyright enforced so long after the authors are gone. Copyright should expire; it's a sad testament to greed that these ridiculous lawsuits aren't thrown out.
Basically, there are a bunch of people who just want stuff for free.
* The Gutenberg crowd wants people to give them their books for nothing.
* The publishers want people to give them money for nothing.
You're all a bunch of wankers.
The US Constitution grants the power to the Government "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries." Note "for a limited Times". It's the right of the creator of a work to get paid for it for awhile, but after a time it is owned by Humanity and yes, everyone should be able to copy it for free. All Project Gutenberg seems to want is for the "limited Times" to not keep getting extended indefinitely, and to be judged under the Constitution of the country in which they live and operate.
E pluribus unum
You've got that the wrong way around...
Imagine having to obey Singapore's littering laws in the United States.
Suppose you bought a brand of tissue available in both Singapore and the United States.
The packaging has a label that contains English, Malay, Tamil, and Mandarin.
You then discarded it in a public area in the United States.
You post videos to Facebook and someone in Singapore notices you discarding a tissue.
You then receive notice that you have a trial date in Singapore because the brand of tissue is available there.
Inheritance is the sincerest form of nepotism.
Leaving aside the obvious truism that by definition *modern* anything didn't exist in the 18th century, corporations certainly existed long before - notably the British & Dutch East India Companies.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."