Doing my best to type through all the red.
While the idea that the weakening of the copyrights will hurt the corporations may have some truth to it, it also makes theft much easier for them.
I have been a professional photographer, and in my training, I have been warned about the shit that clients pull. To clear up one mistaken idea that I have seen and heard many times, (and taking it personally) If someone buys an image from me, they are not purchasing that piece of pretty paper, or the digital information, they are buying my services as a trained professional, yes, there are millions of cameras out there, but how many people can actually take a decent picture? or how many people have the expensive specialized cameras and equipment that I have had to purchase to pursue this path? I have no problem with people who follow the open source idea, as long as they do not assume that since a certain group of individuals has presented their hard work as a gift to the public (hard work, but is the open source work more than a way to spend free time?) means that all creators of original work must therefore present all their accumulated works that they wish to make a living creating up as a gift since they sold the rights to a specific usage of a work. That is a good way to make a signifigant and important group of people into a signifigant bunch of the homeless.
A better reworking of the copyrights would be to actually toughen them in defense of the Actual Creator- to stop the unscrupulous practice of requiring all future rights to an original creation by traded over for no extra cost to the buyer. If this nonsense about copying of "purchased property" is passed all that means is that companies will start paying the lowest rate for the highest return projects (using a photo example, buying an image at the price for use in a small pamphlet, a relatively low priced job, and then turning around and using it in an international media campaign, about as high a cost as it can go. They already push the limits to get away with what they can hoping the creator of the image doesn't notice,Why make it legal for them to abuse the creative community?)
And for the constitutional questions, does the phrase "...securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the EXCLUSIVE (my caps) Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries" mean, exclusive right to the etc. unless of course it means it might inconvenience somebody who wants to use it?
And in regards to the UN document, I saw nothing within the selected portions that state that you cannot hold copyright to something you have created, or that others are allowed to copy those works for their own benefit, I saw a statement protecting the original work of creators, and a statement encouraging the enjoyment of those works. Does enjoyment mean that since you really love how, let's say, Rodan's The Gates of Hell looks, that you are given the right to cart it off and mount it on your wall? No, it means you go off to a museum somewhere, find an image of it and enjoy the aesthetic creation of an artist.
Yes, corporations have abused the copyright laws in some ways, but those laws protect those of us who make a living by creating something original.
Well, to sum up my statement - A gift is something that is freely given, but when you make someone give you a gift, that's called robbery.
Slashdot Mirror
Doing my best to type through all the red. While the idea that the weakening of the copyrights will hurt the corporations may have some truth to it, it also makes theft much easier for them. I have been a professional photographer, and in my training, I have been warned about the shit that clients pull. To clear up one mistaken idea that I have seen and heard many times, (and taking it personally) If someone buys an image from me, they are not purchasing that piece of pretty paper, or the digital information, they are buying my services as a trained professional, yes, there are millions of cameras out there, but how many people can actually take a decent picture? or how many people have the expensive specialized cameras and equipment that I have had to purchase to pursue this path? I have no problem with people who follow the open source idea, as long as they do not assume that since a certain group of individuals has presented their hard work as a gift to the public (hard work, but is the open source work more than a way to spend free time?) means that all creators of original work must therefore present all their accumulated works that they wish to make a living creating up as a gift since they sold the rights to a specific usage of a work. That is a good way to make a signifigant and important group of people into a signifigant bunch of the homeless. A better reworking of the copyrights would be to actually toughen them in defense of the Actual Creator- to stop the unscrupulous practice of requiring all future rights to an original creation by traded over for no extra cost to the buyer. If this nonsense about copying of "purchased property" is passed all that means is that companies will start paying the lowest rate for the highest return projects (using a photo example, buying an image at the price for use in a small pamphlet, a relatively low priced job, and then turning around and using it in an international media campaign, about as high a cost as it can go. They already push the limits to get away with what they can hoping the creator of the image doesn't notice,Why make it legal for them to abuse the creative community?) And for the constitutional questions, does the phrase "...securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the EXCLUSIVE (my caps) Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries" mean, exclusive right to the etc. unless of course it means it might inconvenience somebody who wants to use it? And in regards to the UN document, I saw nothing within the selected portions that state that you cannot hold copyright to something you have created, or that others are allowed to copy those works for their own benefit, I saw a statement protecting the original work of creators, and a statement encouraging the enjoyment of those works. Does enjoyment mean that since you really love how, let's say, Rodan's The Gates of Hell looks, that you are given the right to cart it off and mount it on your wall? No, it means you go off to a museum somewhere, find an image of it and enjoy the aesthetic creation of an artist. Yes, corporations have abused the copyright laws in some ways, but those laws protect those of us who make a living by creating something original. Well, to sum up my statement - A gift is something that is freely given, but when you make someone give you a gift, that's called robbery.