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Lawrence Lessig Criticizes Proposed 140-Year Copyright Protections (techcrunch.com)
EqualCitizens.US reports on growing opposition to the CLASSICS Act proposed by the U.S. Congress, which grants blanket copyright protection to all audio works created before 1972, leaving some of them copyrighted until 2067.
Importantly, the Act doesn't require artists or the rights holder to register for the copyright. Rather, any and all pre-1972 sound recordings would be copyrighted, greatly limiting the public's access to these works. Various organizations and scholars have responded. Equal Citizens along with a coalition of internet freedom and democracy reform organizations, is sending this letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee to urge its members to reject this Act in its entirety, or at a minimum, at least require registration of pre-1972 works. Otherwise, if the Act passes as is, famous artists and wealthy corporations will benefit greatly while the public will get absolutely nothing in return, as Professor Lawrence Lessig notes in Wired....
This act will limit access to past works and stifle creativity for new works. It would effectively remove many existing works, including some popular documentaries, podcasts, etc., from the public arena. The Coalition recommends adding a registration requirement to secure the extended copyright term, such that works that nobody claimed could be allowed to enter the public domain. As this TechCrunch report on the coalition letter explains:
By having artists and rights owners register, it solves the problem for everyone. Anyone who wants to have their pre-1972 works brought into the new scheme can easily achieve that, but orphan works will enter the public domain as they ought to.
"Either way," Lessig writes, "it is finally clear that the Supreme Court's prediction that the copyright owners would be satisfied with the copyright protection provided by the Sonny Bono Act turns out not to be true."
This act will limit access to past works and stifle creativity for new works. It would effectively remove many existing works, including some popular documentaries, podcasts, etc., from the public arena. The Coalition recommends adding a registration requirement to secure the extended copyright term, such that works that nobody claimed could be allowed to enter the public domain. As this TechCrunch report on the coalition letter explains:
By having artists and rights owners register, it solves the problem for everyone. Anyone who wants to have their pre-1972 works brought into the new scheme can easily achieve that, but orphan works will enter the public domain as they ought to.
"Either way," Lessig writes, "it is finally clear that the Supreme Court's prediction that the copyright owners would be satisfied with the copyright protection provided by the Sonny Bono Act turns out not to be true."
Copyright protection that lasts until 2112 for works that are ALREADY 45 years old "solves the problem for everyone"?
Lawrence Lessig, like the rest of us, is merely a citizen and therefore has the same amount of influence as you or me.
Which is to say, none whatsoever.
Go on, citizen, stamp the vote card. R or D, your choice.
you choose not to exercise it. Show up to your primary. Also, and this isn't popular to say, but join the Democratic party. The Republicans are too far too the corporate side to redeem at this point. They shifted right in response to Bill Clinton and the Democrats followed them. Today's Democrats are Regan Republicans, but there's a core of progressives who oppose pro-corporate crap like this. They run candidates every year in the primary and they lose because nobody shows up expect old, economic right wingers. But there's _very_ few of them. If folks would just show up to vote for things that benefit them they'd be drowned out.
Sorry to get so partisan, but there's no other way to fix this. We need to move the country left, and the best place to do that is in the Democratic party's primaries.
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With the precedent set by the Gaye vs. Thicke court case (ruling upheld by 9th circuit court of appeals this year), you are committing copyright infringement when you write a song that "feels" like some other song. Because it would be very difficult for a songwriter to listen to every song ever written and ensure that his new song does not sound anything like them, this effectively criminializes songwriting in general. If you are a songwriter in the 9th circuit, the case is already settled precedent, and anything you write may be illiegal.
Read the Constitution on the subject, and you will conclude that this is the appropriate response.
he answer is simple.
STOP consuming copyrighted works. STOP going to movies, STOP steaming music, STOP going to concerts, STOP the support of these 'artists'.
That is, I am afraid, the only solution at this point.
The social contract of copyright has been violated so completely that it should now be seen as void, however as the force of state will still uphold it,
the only other choice is to avoid it altogether. Violate as you want and at your own risk, but stop giving money to these companies.
Society does not need THESE 'arts', they are not contributing.
Seriously, this smells like the crap music publishers would write themselves to try and keep a tight hold onto their meager profits from old songs that very few people even still buy today, other than certain movies, media and what not.
Politics is the art of the possible. I have a modest proposal that I think is possible: Allow unlimited copyright extensions that are not automatic or free.
Given how much money Disney and other big content-owning companies are going to spend on this, our elected representatives are going to roll over again... so it is not possible to roll back copyright protection to anything like the original short terms. It's pretty much certain that the terms are getting extended again. So my question is whether we can get the deal changed in some way that makes it better for us.
Disney is very motivated to keep the copyrights going forever on old cartoons like "Steamboat Willy". To them, it's just collateral damage that nothing else ever falls into the public domain... I don't think they care that old black-and-white movies not owned by Disney also aren't falling into the public domain.
So my modest proposal is that a corporation can extend the copyright on any property by filing a form and paying a nominal fee. For the sake of argument I propose $5 to be the fee and for the form to get a 5-year extension. A dollar per year! Cheap!
But if you fail to list some piece of content and file the form, it lapses into the public domain.
This fixes the murky issues around a lot of content, such as obscure video games from three decades ago. In many cases it would take lawsuits to figure out who is the current owner, so it's not possible to get a license for the content... so nobody is going to file the paperwork to extend the copyright, and the old forgotten content will lapse into the public domain.
This is still a screaming good deal for the content owners. The US government still acts as an enforcer to go after people infringing on the copyrights, and it would cost way more than $1 to hire private detectives or whatever to do the same thing without government.
But I don't see why the content owners should get endlessly-extended copyright terms where nothing ever falls into the public domain automatically for free and without even lifting a finger.
Copyright is supposed to be a three-cornered deal between the content owners, the government, and the people. The people are supposed to benefit by things falling into the public domain; that's why the phrase "for limited times" appears in the Constitution. The people would get nothing from a 140-year extension, but would get something from my proposal.
lf(1): it's like ls(1) but sorts filenames by extension, tersely
Maybe try a patent for a concept or method. Copyright doesn't work that way, although stupid does.
I don't get it, who gets the royalties of a copyrighted work that no one's claiming or register?
Lawrence Lessig, like the rest of us, is merely a citizen and therefore has the same amount of influence as you or me.
Which is to say, none whatsoever.
Your trite little comment seems to have opened up the can of worms. I disagree. Even if I saw a mod point to give, no mod point for you [GlennC].
Let me start with the logical fallacy. The Koch brothers are citizens, too, just like "you or me" and Lawrence Lessig, too, but they have LOTS of influence. The difference is the money, at least until they die with the most toys, at which point the TRULY influential entities, the giant corporate cancers they ostensibly "own", will have to get new human placeholders. The underlying FAKE problem of insufficient profits will never be solved because there is always a bigger number for the next profit report.
The abuse of copyright and patent law are merely symptoms of the underlying problems. The original goal was to ENCOURAGE creativity and innovation for society, but the current goal is to MAXIMIZE profits for YUGE corporate cancers. Actually, the corporate cancers at the top always fear new ideas and innovation. Change from the top tends to be downward, which threatens the growth of profit.
Solution approaches to the problems of corporate cancerism exist, but for now ADSAuPR, atAJG.
Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
When everything is copyrighted until Oblivion, you might as well just violate the law and copy the shit out of it. Fuck em. If they shut you down, you move and start up again.
Hollywood does not run this country. Fight back or become their slave.
famous artists and wealthy corporations will benefit greatly while the public will get absolutely nothing in return
They're the ones who buy your "elected" officials, so of COURSE they're the ones who benefit, and you who have been DUPED into voting these corrupt, bought-and-paid-for assholes into office, you of course get nothing, which is what you deserve, for voting these Republicrats into office, despite the obvious fact that BOTH halves of the "two" part"ies" are owned by the same group of people. Let me quote Willie Wonka:
"It's all there, in black and white, clear as crystal. You get NOTHING. You LOSE! Good DAY, sir." Or watch here...
Next time, instead of voting for a phony "Democrat" or a corrupt "Republican," consider voting for a REAL candidate for office, not one of these puppets of the super-rich and corporations.
Our reign has gone on long enough. Indeed. Summon the meteors.
Copyright is supposed to be for a LIMITED time. As understood by the Framers of the Constitution, over 100 years is not limited.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
What utter bollocks, the artists will have been dead half a century, explain how they'll benefit when worms are eating them.
Waterfox - a Firefox fork with legacy extension support, security updates and better privacy by default.
because she won the primary. If folks had showed up to vote we'd have President Bernie Sanders now.
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they're not Progressives. Being a Progressive doesn't just mean you're tolerant of gays and abortion. Those are social issues. The folks you're referring to are Hollywood, and to a man they're economically right wing.
The Democratic party is being run by economically right wing and socially moderate (the Hillary wing didn't support Gay Marriage until forced to by the base) conservatives. Being Progressive means being _economically_ progressive too. That means these things:
1. Medicare for all.
2. Living Wage.
3. College for all.
4. New New Deal (google it).
5. End the Wars.
Disney, the most Hollywood of Hollywood definitely opposes #1-#4 and I'm guessing if forced to answer would oppose #5 (their board of directors owns stock in the defense industry along with everybody else at the top).
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it's too small an issue. You run on a pro worker platform, which incidentally includes copyright reform because 140 year copyright is anti-working class. It drives up the cost of mass market entertainment, which is one of the few pleasures the working class have.
And nobody's saying today's Dems are much good. Whether it's Joe Manchin, Nancy Pelosi or that bastard Chuck Schumer they're all selling us out. But my point is there's something to salvage in the Democratic party. I don't feel that way about the Republicans. They've gone all in on oligarchy.
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....that LL saying anything is pretty much the DEFINITION of "preaching to the choir". The only people who know who he is likely already agree.
For the other 7 billion people in the world, it's "Larry who?"
-Styopa
"There has grown up in the minds of certain groups in this country the notion that because a man or a corporation has made a profit out of the public for a number of years, the government and the courts are charged with the duty of guaranteeing such profit in the future, even in the face of changing circumstances and contrary public interest. This strange doctrine is not supported by statute nor common law. Neither individuals nor corporations have any right to come into court and ask that the clock of history be stopped, or turned back, for their private benefit."
- The Judge, "Life-Line"
Robert A. Heinlein, 1939 Astounding Magazine
... as to precisely why I care?
I have no intention of making money off someone else's work, ever.
I'm the public domain. Why do I need copyright to expire?
Seriously: Why?
It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
sonny bono actually wanted perpetual (as in forever) copyright. he was advised that would be unconstitutional, and the joke (we hope it was just a joke) was then that it should be 'forever less a day'
They won't stop until it is forever less the smallest quantum unit of time.
Suppose some of my buddies and I pooled our money together and bought the U.S. Congress for one billion dollars. We then pay congress to enact a law which transfers a 100 billion dollars from the U.S. Treasury to us. We would earn 100 times what we invested, which is an excellent return, so this would be a fantastic business plan.
Would it work? Probably not. It is too overt and brazen, just intolerably offensive. Judges would find some law which disallowed it or, if none actually existed, would detect some applicable penumbras and emanations. Also, the public would be outraged, and nothing terrifies incumbent politicians more than the prospect of not being re-elected. Futhermore, the fact that this is not known to have ever actually occurred suggests that it is not feasible.
But suppose we tweak the plan just slightly. Under the previous plan, Congress would confiscate currency from the public and transfer it to me. Under the new plan, Congress instead confiscates property from the public, in the form of extended intellectual property rights, and transfers it to me.
Would that work? Certainly. Why? Because people are idiots; They are easily befuddled by a direct transfer of wealth from the public to a small group who has paid to influence Congress, if the form of the wealth transferred is any more abstract than cash.
Generally, with any scheme where corporations make monetary contributions to politicians in exchange for those politicians using the coercive powers of government to transfer wealth from the public to the corporations, the form of that wealth must be abstract and represent a sacred political cause. For example, allegedly to protect the environment, Congress enacted law governing ethanol mandates and agriculture price supports instead directly handing taxpayer cash over to agribusiness. Targeted tax breaks are the stand-by when executives and lobbyists are too uncreative to finesse a compelling custom rationale.
Politicians of both major political parties are in the same business, accepting money from special interests in exchange for giving them larger sums of taxpayer money. The only difference between the parties are their justifications. Whereas right-wing taxpayers like to hear things like "We gave these millionaires and billionaires your money to help the economy", left-wing taxpayer prefer rationales such as, "We gave these millionaires and billionaires your money to save the environment."
Ceci n'est pas une signature.
140 years is roughly 6 generations.
If a work was copyrighted the day you were born, you would die halfway through the copyright period, having never been able to use that IP.
You children would die, having never been able to use that IP.
Your the majority of your grandchildren would die, having never been able to use that IP.
Your great grandchildren - born 80-90 years after the copyright was granted - would be able to the use IP during the end of their working lives.
Only your great-great grandchildren would be able to use the IP during the prime of their working careers.
Considering that three entire generations would be born, live, and die before it expires - to them, what's the difference between a copyright 140 years and forever?
Incidentally, by the same tables, the author will be dead for roughly a century before the copyright expires.
The author's children will be dead.
The author's grandchildren will mostly be dead.
There is no justification for making these extensions retroactive. The purpose of copyright is to promote the creation of new works. You cannot encourage the creation of something which has already been created. So there is absolutely zero benefit to extending the copyright term of existing works. Since the only rationale given in the Constitution for copyright is the promotion of the creation of new works, extending the copyright term for existing works is unconstitutional.
If Congress wants to make copyright last 140 years, fine. But the lengthened term should only apply to works created after the term is changed. Those are the only works whose creation could have been encouraged by a lengthened copyright term, and thus fall under the justification outlined in the Constitution.
Make copyright duration the average (mean) life expectancy in the country minus 15 years. Update the duration each census.
If copyright provides a net positive, then society and content creators gain opportunities for mutual benefits.
If there's no effect, or a detrimental effect... why the hell is copyright legally protected using tax dollars in the first place? Tax dollars shouldn't be spent on something worse than a placebo.
Music, literature, movies, etc. should be rewarded copyright protection according to the quality of life, and consequently duration of life, improvements to society.
Inheritance is the sincerest form of nepotism.
"By having artists and rights owners register, it solves the problem for everyone. Anyone who wants to have their pre-1972 works brought into the new scheme can easily achieve that, but orphan works will enter the public domain as they ought to."
This.
Give automatic, free protection for a limited period. Make it the same as a patent, for simplicity's sake. After that, you have to register.
I'd add on top that you have to pay to register. If you think your holiday snapshot is worth protecting, but all means, pay $250 for that privilege.
...THIS is the reason for this new round of Copyright Extension BS.
Starting in 2024, Mickey Mouse will no longer be treated with the "Kid Glove Care" he has enjoyed for a FREAKING CENTURY, and as time progresses and Dis-SkyNet's copyrights expire, more and more of his puerile antics will become public domain.
The underlying cause is the fact that the copyright owners know they haven't produced anything of value in the LAST 50 years. Particularly corporate entities, which already get an EXTRA 50 years above private entities with this BS, so you KNOW it was NEVER about protecting the original artist's IP rights.
This was the real reason for Senator Sonny Bono's original bill, and it worked so well for Coprolite America they couldn't NOT try for ANOTHER round, DUH.
mnem
Follow. The. Money.
Many years ago I bought a house from BuCoLIc (Building Contractors & Landscaping Incorporated). It is a nice house and I really like it. The masonry by Nicholas Hartens is exquisitely unique, the electrical cabling by Ezekiel Sparks is of singular quality, Quentin Baumgarten's carpentry represents artistic perfection and the flow of Leonard Vandmand's plumbing is out of this world.
I am so lucky that BuCoLIc chose to only employ the very best craftsmen within their field.
I had 20 people around for a party the other day and it went really well. My neighbour, who had not been invited as the party was for friends and family, had apparently informed BBB (British Buildingrights Bureau) about the party as I received the following letter:
Dear Sir/Madam,
We are the proprietors of all buildingright in the building at 9673 Longroad Close (The "House"). We have reserved all rights in the House, which was first expressed in material form on 12 October 1922.
A neighbour has brought to our attention that people, apart from yourself, (The "Guests") have entered the House and used the facilities within on 20 November 2017 (The "Day"). Permission was neither asked nor granted to share the House and therefore constitutes infringement of our rights. In terms of the Buildingright Statutes, we are entitled to an injunction against your continued infringement, as well as to recover damages from you for the loss we have suffered as a result of your infringing conduct.
In the circumstances, we demand that you immediately:
1. stop all infringing conduct and notify us in writing that you have done so;
2. pay a licensing fee in the amount of £2,000 for the general use of the House;
3. pay a licensing fee in the amount 12 x £500 = £6,000 as we have been informed that the toilet was used by Guests on 12 occasions on the Day;
4. pay a licensing fee in the amount 4 x £500 = £2,000 as we have been informed that the kitchen counter was used by Guests on 4 occasions on the Day;
5. pay a licensing fee in the amount 20 x £250 = £5,000 as we have been informed that 20 Guests were present on the Day and used electricity directly or indirectly for a number of purposes including but not limited to lighting and phone charging;
6. undertake in writing that you in the future, without prior written authority from us, desist from sharing any part of the House to which we own the buildingright.
We would like to inform you that building work is an important industry and sustains many people through production and licensing, and a fraction of the proceeds extracted from you will be passed on to the relevant craftsmen or their estate.
This is written without prejudice to our rights, all of which are hereby expressly reserved and we look forward to receiving the sum of £15,000 within 28 days of this letter.
Yours faithfully,
Esther Westman
Extortion LLC, Buildingright Experts
I don't need a signature to draw attention to myself.
This act, or one very much like it, will sooner or later pass. Frankly, given existing law, it hardly matters. If you want to consume or publish existing material whether original or modified, merged, reexamined, or what have you without giving a cut to rent-seekers, you're just going to have to go old skool, like Soviet-bloc "reactionaries" used to.
Naturally, it's a bit harder if you're putting a MAC, IP, or URL out there... so I guess there's a future in physical media after all, and non-pr0n uses for the dark web.
Luke, help me take this mask off