What Would You Ask For in Copyright Law? 659
BlastM asks: "The Australian Attorney General's Department, as reported recently on Slashdot, is accepting public input in a review of fair use exceptions (or lack thereof) in our copyright laws. Being an Australian citizen, I'll be directly affected by any reforms that are made, and under the Copyright Act in it's current form it's hard to avoid breaking the law nearly every day, whether format shifting music, recording broadcast TV shows or sharing movies via P2P or with friends. The question I pose to the freethinking minds, here: What fair use rights should be defined under copyright law? Is the use of a static, defined set of rights too restrictive? What's right/wrong with the copyright laws where you live?"
5 years (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:5 years (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:5 years (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:5 years (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:5 years (Score:2, Insightful)
If you want copyright protection on the binary, you have to reveal the source code.
Re:5 years (Score:3, Insightful)
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Re:5 years (Score:5, Insightful)
You can't get a patent without disclosing the workings of your invention in a manner that a person having ordinary skill in that field can understand.
And copyright traditionally has required deposit of best copies, i.e. high quality copies placed into government libraries so that they, at least, can preserve the work and act as a seed from which more copies could later be made. (It also helped make the Library of Congress the best library in the world)
Requiring people applying for a copyright on software to comment their code sufficiently that an ordinarily skilled programmer can understand it, and to deposit that source as well as whatever other information is needed to produce the working binaries doesn't seem like a tough thing. People still can't copy it during the term -- but they can study it to learn from it, which is a good thing in the meantime.
It invalidates trade secrets within the work, but this is standard practice in the patent field, and it's not the end of the world.
Plus, there's always the option for developers of not getting a copyright at all, but then they'd lack many legal protections which would probably discourage this. We might further discourage it by having the government fund projects to break DRM (which also should be prohibited as a condition of copyright).
Re:5 years (Score:3, Interesting)
It isn't the biggest, it has 128m items, British has 150m - check the websites. Does it have the best librarians or something? Best coffee machines, perhaps?
What makes it the best library in the world? Please reply, I genuinely want to know what makes you think that.
Re:5 years (Score:3, Informative)
Re:5 years (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:5 years (Score:3, Interesting)
I used to believe that. Then I read up on the history and found out that that belief is just the spin on the idea that the publishers used back 300 years ago when their crown monopolies names were dirt and they needed a less politically sensitive way of retaining their power. Solution; say it's really the 'authors rights', but leave the rights
Re:5 years (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:5 years (Score:4, Insightful)
As things are now, we reinvent the wheel way too much because of the way Intellectual Property is implemented. It hinders progress and innovation.
Re:5 years (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:5 years (Score:5, Insightful)
If your product is so good that you make a billion, great! If you only make a $1.50 that's just too bad. The market will tell you if you made enough or not given a set time frame. The problem with Copyrights now is that we no longer have a time frame anymore. They are forever so long as they are allowed to change the laws every time Mickey Mouse comes up for release to the public domain.
The biggest problems with our Copyright laws is that we keep changing 'em.
Re:5 years (Score:2)
Re:5 years (Score:3, Insightful)
Is one dollar enough? A million, a billion? hmm. And what If I am in a third world nation? A million dollars is an insane amount oversees yet is a modest amount today in the US. Cash limits are pointless what if inflation happens in the third year of your copyright? What is deflation happens?
Re:5 years (Score:4, Insightful)
They are forever so long as they are allowed to change the laws every time Mickey Mouse comes up for release to the public domain.
And I would argue that they're "forever" so long as they're long enough that the average person will never see a copyright expire on a work that they saw created.
Copyright terms are now so long that the average person doesn't know they do expire. Many people think that "Who own's the copyright on William Shakespeare's plays" is a sensible question. That's a very bad thing, because people who believe that copyrights are eternal are not likely to feel that copyrights provide them with much value, and are therefore not likely to feel obligated to abide by their restrictions.
I think that if people realized that a movie that was just released would be in the public domain in 20 years, they would be more likely to understand that copyright is beneficial to the public, and should therefore be honored.
Re:5 years (Score:3, Insightful)
Trademarks cannot be used to attain copyright-like protection. When a work enters the public domain, that work becomes a generic good. Since a mark can only be protected where it indicates the source of the good, and now anyone can be the source of this good, the mark suffers genericide.
The Shredded Wheat case is a good example of this in the patent field (the trademark on that name died when the patent on shredded wheat expired).
There have been some exampl
Re:5 years (Score:2)
What you've done is cap the amount that a producer can get. Not a smart idea for big-ticket productions.
What I think we're looking for is a way to take stuff to PD when the author has "made enough." A not unreasonable way to do that is to say that there's a point of diminishing returns where the time value of future sales is heading into the noise.
Counter suggestion: 10 years minimum, then take it PD when the sales for the
Re:5 years (Score:3)
Re:5 years (Score:4, Interesting)
The after X millions is asking for trouble. Who is to determine what a "pile of money" is? How often does that need to be updated due to inflation or in reference to the "pile of money" that was invested in said copyright?
My thoughts on copyright are it should not be transferable. Meaning that the creator is the soul owner of the copyright, not the record company or their family hundreds of years after the original creator is dead. I also believe that it should last the lifetime of the creator, but they can waive it and put their creation into the public domain at any time.
The only problem is that copyright could then be circumvented via patents or trademarks or some other legal tricks. Although Walt Disney is dead. Even if the copyright were to disappear for Mickey Mouse, I doubt any Mickey Mouse cartoons would be able to be in the public domain due to trademarks on the Mickey Mouse name and image, so we are still stuck.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I'll second that. (Score:2)
Yeah, seems catchy at first glance, but I guess some people who actually do have some intellect might kill you for that - because they could no longer WILLINGLY SELL their rights to corporations. If you were a succesful coder, wouldn't you really NEVER EVER regret having lost the possibility of selling your code to some corporation for an obsc
Re:I'll second that. (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm not arguing for either side here, just playing devil's advocate.
Copyrights are an ALL or NOTHING game (Score:5, Insightful)
Although when I'm feeling idealistic I like to declare that all copyright laws should be thrown out, I'm willing to take the pragmatic approach.
I think the problem here is that the "pragmatic" approach here has already been tried 200 years ago, and it failed miserably just as society hit the information age. And that makes allot of sense. You can't go telling people that they have this "moral right" to restrict what people copy, and then expect them not to try and secure this "right" by using every resource they can to push it to the extremes.
With regular physical property, you have natural limiting factors that limit those extremes, with copyrights you don't because they are not a natural law creation. Copyrights are simply people coercing limits on things that have no natural limit for the sake of greed and monopoly.
If someone said "lets limit food to the 3rd world more than it already is because we want to get more profit" most people would see this as the pure evil that it is. But when they do the same thing with the worlds information, then oh my God - it's a RIGHT!?
Re:Copyrights are an ALL or NOTHING game (Score:3, Interesting)
We probably wouldn't be in the information age yet without IP protection. Throw out Patents, Trademarks, and Copyright and you enter a very slow moving generic world. The implementation of the current system is too restrictive, but you don't have to scrap it completely.
If someone said "lets limit food to the 3rd world more than it already
Re:5 years (Score:2)
I kind of like "until the publishing author dies +10 years. If the author dies abruptly (i.e. 5 years after the copyright was made) then it i
Re:5 years (Score:5, Insightful)
Why? I've been thinking 5 year terms from a more broadly defined publication, where the terms can be renewed in their last year, four times. (i.e. 25 year maximum) But no renewals for works consisting of, or to the degree that they consist of, software.
We can optimize things for different kinds of works, you know. God knows, most of the statutory exemptions already only apply for particular kinds of subject matter already.
What happens if a person copyrights something that he does not have the capital to go-live in the first five years
Then I guess they won't bother. Right now the copyright system is just as uncaring towards people that need a few centuries or more. Who cares?
We want to encourage the creation of works in order to benefit the public, and we want to get those works into the public domain as rapidly as possible, again to benefit the public.
Whenever a work is not in the public domain, there is a cost to the public -- their liberty is restrained. This cost may be acceptable if the benefit is greater than the cost. But at a certain point, we get into the realm of diminishing returns. Eventually, the harm caused by having something copyrighted outweighs the benefit of having it exist in the first place.
So look for how we can get the best deal for the public overall, rather than mindlessly trying to encourage creation (which, btw, doesn't keep increasing as terms do, and may even start going down, since established authors don't like competition)
I kind of like "until the publishing author dies +10 years.
I don't. That's too long and the length is highly unpredictable. Fixed spans are superior. And it should be the minimum length to get the greatest return in creation. Any longer is wasteful. Since virtually all profits from copyrighted works are made in the first days to months of publication, and virtually never beyond the first year, even very short terms will still result in lots of stimulus of creation. After all, that's where the money is, and copyright only deals with that one stimulus.
If the author dies abruptly (i.e. 5 years after the copyright was made) then it is XX years for the survivors of the copyright" XX is a double digit number.
Why do you care about them? Virtually no works have any economic value with regards to copyright anyway. Of the fraction of a percent that do, it's virtually all up front as mentioned. Only the teeniest tiniest few works have continuing value.
For those works, the author is likely already quite wealthy (or had their chance), and could provide for their survivors. For most, a copyright won't help the survivors anyway, but still hurts the public.
If you want to help survivors, I suggest using systems that EVERYONE can take advantage of -- life insurance, social welfare systems, etc. To even imagine copyright as a way to provide for survivors is reprehensible. You have better odds betting junior's college fund at the track!
Some may disagree - but then again, why should *my* works be subject to *your* whims?
Well, you have no natural right to a copyright. I OTOH have a natural right of free speech and press, encompassing repeating what you said.
So if you want me -- by which I mean everyone else in the world (we outnumber you, n.b.) -- to be very kind and deign to give you a copyright, i.e. to voluntarily refrain from doing things we have every right to do, then you're going to make us want to do so.
You want a copyright because you're self interested -- you want to make money from the work. Well, we don't want to give you a copyri
Re:5 years (Score:3)
The law is supposed to balance the public good with the individual good. This is the 'deal' struck with copyright-- The public benefits when works go into the public domain (they may not -ever- be put up commercially for various economic reasons) after a reasonably short amount of time (i.e. while the works are still topical), and the author is compenstated b
Second that. (Score:2)
Re:5 years (Score:4, Insightful)
Suppose somebody self-publishes a work. It could take five years for it to get noticed. Five years is also is within the practical planning horizons of man businesses, which reduces the value of a creator's work on the market.
I'd like to see a round twenty years from the date of initial publication. If a work does not make money within twenty years, it never will. Also the discount rate means that the income twenty plus years out has a present value, practically speaking, of nil. Further extension of the copyright does not benefit authors in a material sense.
Re:5 years (Score:3, Interesting)
If a work does not make money within twenty years, it never will.
Set it to five years, and let's use something big for an example - say Windows 95. It was released in Aug 1995, regular support ended after 5 years, 4 months, extended lasted another year (source [microsoft.com]). I'm pretty sure the sales revenue on windows 95 was zero by august 2000, and if it were to have open-sourced itself I can't see that enabling other companies to provide better support than MS
Mandatory Source code release. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Mandatory Source code release. (Score:3, Interesting)
This would protect works that are still generating income for the owner, while preventing the problem of having all our culture locked up in vaults forever, unavailable to anyone.
This has particularly been suggested for software, but usually with the concept of "support" thrown in. Imagine if, when a company's CS people told you that their p
The only 'fair use' (Score:2, Insightful)
I mean, otherwise what are they going to do with people with an eidetic memory? Give them memory suppressing drugs? Lobotomies? Develop a mind wipe ray??
Re:The only 'fair use' (Score:5, Funny)
Re:The only 'fair use' - SPOILER WARNING (Score:2)
Killed for being above average.
well for one... (Score:4, Insightful)
These (Score:5, Informative)
Less of it! (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Less of it! (Score:5, Informative)
Not really. The famous Girl-Scout case was years before the DMCA was passed. This was the case in which the Scouts were sued for permitting their members to sing copyrighted songs around a campfire. And note that all the negative publicity didn't work in this case. The Girl Scouts are paying an annual fee for the right to sing around their campfires.
Then there are the explanations of how it comes to be that Happy Birthday is still under copyright, although it was written in the 1880's. The current owner gets several million US dollars per year for permissions to sing the song.
None of this is the fault of the DMCA.
My $.02 (Score:5, Insightful)
2) the ability of a media consumer, having paid for a legit copy of a movie or a cd, to manipulate it in any way he/she sees fit short of redistribution for profit.
Re:My $.02 (Score:5, Interesting)
So redistribution for no profit, no matter at what scale it occurs, should be legal? What if this means that a large studio (that can afford the bandwidth) could just host a copy of any indie film so that the makers see no profit?
Re:My $.02 (Score:3, Interesting)
Remember when the RIAA said cassettes were going to kill vinyl, and no recording artist would ever make a penny again, and won't somebody please think of the set designers, and the sky is falling?
I do. I remember when consumer grade tape recorders of any kind were illegal in the US, thanks to the RIAA's lobbying clout. Ever see an 8-track cartridge recorder? Ever wonder why not? And gee, in some blinding coincidence, 8-trac
Me? (Score:5, Insightful)
2. All sufficient quotation to talk about a specific copyrighted material allowed.
3. All parody allowed, even if it violates trade dress, or any other contrived notion of property
4. Limited copying for immediate friends and family allowed
5. No EULA's allowed (unless specifically signed by both parties, in person)
6. You can't copyright something that is already in the public domain (silence for example), merely you're specific version of it. (Someone makes a story based of a centuries old fairy tale, you can do the same, even if they get all sorts of trademarks from it)
You don't get 2-6 if I don't get number 1.
Re:Me? (Score:3, Interesting)
With regards to point 6; there needs to be a form of protection for those kind of things. For example, if someone makes a film of Macbeth, that interpretation is subject to copyrights, but the original work isn't and someone else can put on a play
Re:Me? (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm sorry, everything in the public domain should be fair game. A film with an expired copyright falls in this category. As far as I know, there is no such thing right now. Keep in mind, up until the 20th century in the US, copyrights actually expired. This is exactly how Disney was able to get it's start. It borrowed heavily from material in the public domain, and arguable our culture has seen benifit from this. 20 years is mor
Re:Me? (Score:4, Insightful)
Congradulations you just made the GPL unenforcable. Slashbotters simply amaze me.
Re:Me? (Score:5, Insightful)
FALSE.
Copyright is a kind of "default" contract.
EULAs ADD restrictons to that default contract.
The GPL SUBTRACTS restrictions from that contract.
Thus, at a minimum, if no EULAs are allowed, then the default contract is still in place. Thus the GPL remains JUST as enforceable as it is today, but instead of being protected by the GPL, users would be at the mercy of the copyright owner to not prosecute based on restrictions that the GPL removes.
[i]Slashbotters simply amaze me.[/i]
You are, apparently, easily entertained.
Region Free (Score:2)
Re:Region Free (Score:2)
Unlimited on-demand should be the way of the future. We own none of it, but as long as we own the box, we can watch anything!
Re:Region Free (Score:2)
Commercial availability? Or something? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Commercial availability? Or something? (Score:2)
http://www.copyright.gov/orphan/ [copyright.gov]
Abandonware and orphaned works (Score:4, Interesting)
At a minimum, this guarantees that works don't vanish from existence before their copyright expires, denying the public domain their content.
Additionally, you could add criteria to address abandonware-- if a work is not produced or sold for a period of 10 years, it becomes available from the copyright office for a small copying fee, and has becomes part of the public domain.
Alternatively, this could act as a form of "mandatory licensing," where you can purchase the work for a nominal fee from the copyright office, and the proceeds are split between the office (for maintaining this library of works) and the copyright holder. This way, even people who are no longer able to sell their works could make a modest sum from the sale until the copyright expires, and people would have access to works that would have otherwise disappeared.
Copyright registration and statutory damages (Score:3, Insightful)
Something doesn't actually have to be registered to be copyrighted.
In the United States, you already have to register a copyright before you use it to sue someone, and you already have to register before infringement in order to collect (ridiculous) statutory damages and (less ridiculous) attorney's fees unless the alleged infringement occurred within three months of first publication.
Don't stifle creativity (Score:5, Insightful)
In both cases, these are driven not by the creators, but by the greedy businessmen who are selling their creative works. The problem is that they are the ones who have been essentially dictating copyright law for the last 40 years or so, and their only purpose is to maximize their monopoly profits.
Mickey Mouse should have died and been replaced a LONG time ago. Preserving the Disney franchise is *NOT* the primary goal of copyright.
Already Sensible (Score:5, Interesting)
"Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 106 and 106A, the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other means specified by that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright. In determining whether the use made of a work in any particular case is a fair use the factors to be considered shall include --
(1) the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
(2) the nature of the copyrighted work;
(3) the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and
(4) the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work."
The fact that a work is unpublished shall not itself bar a finding of fair use if such finding is made upon consideration of all the above factors.
If we'd actually enforce this doctrine and not pass things to circumvent it, like the DMCA, I think oftentimes we'd find the law on our side. How does Australian law differ from these provisions?
I think alot of the bickering about IP rights comes from industries using money to skew the issues and interpret the law in their favor, and no strong voice stating what the law actually is or moving that it should be enforced fairly.
WTF? (Score:2)
Yeah, in general it's hard to avoid breaking the law nearly every day, whether stealing milk trucks or burglarizing orphanages. (Yes, I elided two-thirds of that. Is it really impossible to tape TV shows or rip CDs in Australia without breaking the law?
Hmmm.. Let me think about it... (Score:2)
How about... Oh, I don't know: Fairness? Balance? Reasonable limits?
Copyrighted works must not vanish. (Score:5, Interesting)
My main problem with copyright in the U.S. is that it is used to basically remove works from the populace. The vast majority of works are tossed in storage after they don't become hugely successful and are never seen again and often become completely unavailable. If I were rewriting copyright laws I'd require that all copyrighted works must be available for sale at a reasonable market rate or the copyright on them expires immediately (with an exception for works still in progress or about to released) and cannot be reinstated. I'd also require that two copies of every work to be copyrighted be provided free of charge to a national archive, thus ensuring that they will not disappear. (This used to be law in the U.S. but was repealed at the same time most of the rest of our copyright laws were rewritten by lobbyists.)
This still allows artists and publishers to make money on works, but also preserves them for the public when those companies stop offering them.
If I got to rewrite it (Score:5, Insightful)
1) Do nothing and allow it to fall in to public domain.
2) Reregister for an additonal 5 years under the same terms.
3) Reregister for 25 years, but under different terms that included compulsory licensing for derivitive works with reasonable and non-discriminitory fees.
This would ensure that the ability to make money is there, but that the public gets the work in a timely fashion. If you creat it and just abandon it, the public gets it in 5 years. If after 5 years you still find you are cashing in, you can have another 5 to continue to do so. A decade is more than enough to cash in on a work. However if you find that you aren't selling a lot, but there's interest from others in licensing it, you can get a quater century where you are gaurenteed royalties for any derivitives.
I'd also mandidate fair use clauses making illegal to implement any technology that interferes with fair use. You are free to work out a copyprotection, if you like, however it must be one such that all fair use rights are protected.
However, that's a pipe dream and I know it.
Limited term (Score:2)
Other than that, cut out this crap about the medium. I bought a song, and it's simply not relevant if I bought it on a CD or whatever - I can listen to it anywhere anyhow.
TWW
Re:Limited term (Score:2)
When is the death of a corporation?
Reflection of Society (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Reflection of Society (Score:3, Insightful)
I'd say really, short of changing the mindset of the society in which we live, there's nothing that really "should" be changed about copyright.
Lets see the vast majority of books, music, movies, video games, and TV shows published from 1976-2000 are completely unavailable to anyone. So it is illegal for me to make a copy of a very rare book, and entirely possible no other copies exist. That means it is erased from the public consciousness. And you think there is nothing wrong with copyright? You're ver
First sale (Score:2)
No, you don't get all of them, but at least you get the most utterly critical ones like being able to make private copies for markup etc, trade or sell the works, and so forth.
Uses such as excerpt for parody, commentary, etc.
A Filmmaker's Perspective (Score:3, Informative)
This allows the artist the opportunity to choose what licence the work will be distributed in.
All licences are free for personal use. Restrictions can be added for commercial use, sampling and other derivatives.
I personally use Creative Commons for my releases.
Easy to enter public domain (Score:3, Informative)
By application only (Score:4, Interesting)
What would I ask for (Score:2)
--
That said, I am also pro-fair use. The end user who (for example) bought the final product should be able
Education (Score:4, Interesting)
As much as I loved books like Tom Sawyer, I hated having to pay for them out of pocket.
And I know something has been written in the last 100 years that students SHOULD be reading, but can't because of copyright.
This should include music (sheet for the band members and performances for appretiation classes), movies, books, software, etc. Basicly anything that can be copyrighted should be avalible at no cost to students.
There would be an exception for books written specifically to be used as textbooks.
the right question? (Score:3, Insightful)
No extensions (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:No extensions (Score:3, Interesting)
Though as a compromise I would propose an intellectual property tax in return for shorter (than current) copyright durations. If the tax isn't paid then the work enters the public domain from where it can't be retrieved.
The deal is copyright protection for any published work and lasts a maximum of 25 years from the date of publication. If an individual or business entity wishes to hold on to the copyright after that period then they have to pay a yearly tax for that privilege.
People don't realis
copyrights (Score:2)
Copyrights can be sold, but only the original author can elect to renew the copyright.
One more point... (Score:2)
Australia doesn't have a constitutional right to freedom of speech. (Merely political speech.) This is a counterbalance to copyright law which the USA has but we don't. You should mention this at least once.
To promote science and the useful arts... (Score:2)
I think that the emphasis of any copyright legislation should be based on promoting the production of scientific and artistic works. That should be the guiding principle behind any law and any enforcement, not profit.
Intellectual property is about the government granting someone a temporary monopoly on something, in the hopes that it will have a net benefit for the society. The monopoly is not a right that a creator has, it's a tradeoff. The government will permit you a temporary monopoly in exchange
Non-profit uses are fair (Score:3, Insightful)
(C'mon, this is what we really want, right?)
Re:Non-profit uses are fair (Score:3, Insightful)
This would let somebody sabotage somebody else's market for a copyrighted work by selling at cost. You might see a publishing house retalliating against another publisher's star author (which refused a deal with the first one) by simply distributing that star's works online for no cost. Want to hurt Adobe? Put every version of Photoshop online for free. You'd force the entire creative market to shift to service contracts -- and in some cases, such as just about anything creative except softw
Lots of things. (Score:2)
All works copyrighted at creation (generally already true), renewable through registration.
Reset the lifetime of the monopoly. That could be 5-10 years, renewable a few times.
Repository of all works that are renewed, with public release of all content at the end of the renewal. Expired content is made available at no cost, or perhaps for a very small annual usage fee. In the case of computer programs,
Public Input, Fair Rights (Score:2)
That said, "fair use" and copyright law can and should be defined as follows:
Every person has the right to transfer (to/from any storage medium), transform (to/from any format, regardless of any intellectual property restrictions pertaining to the formats), or duplicate (an unlimited number of times), any content t
I know, I know! (Score:2)
Lowest total costs of ownership (Score:2)
By using existing P2P technologies and allowing a person who paid X dollars for media content, they could essentially cut out a step in the supply chain by removing marketing, or perhaps shipping and distribution channels.
There would be a rise in the number of units sold due to the lower cost to produce and distribute, consumers are happy because they pay less for the content.
Lower prices
Repeal Derivative Works (Score:3, Interesting)
Bad idea (Score:3, Insightful)
Kjella
Fixing Copyright (Score:4, Insightful)
http://www.garfieldtech.com/copyright/ [garfieldtech.com]
First Sale is Final (Score:3, Interesting)
Copyright for the lifetime for the creator, period (Score:3, Insightful)
I see a lot of people in this discussion throw out "5 years from date of creation" and similar time frames. I find that to be ridiculous. It could take five, ten, fifteen years or even longer for a creative type to find success. Someone could write a book or song in their twenties, release it in relative obscurity and then find success with the next generation (or two generations later, it happens.) Why shouldn't they be entitled to reap the rewards?
Look, if you create something, a property, a song, a character, whatever, it should be YOURS. As long as you are alive. This isn't patent law, where an invention and variations of the technology could be good for society. Nobody needs Mickey Mouse, it doesn't benefit the world for "I Can't Get No Satisfaction" to be free for everyone to use, and Steven King should be always be the first to profit when an edition of "Christine" is published. This has nothing to do with digital rights, Bittorent and all that... It has to do with who owns the rights and says what can be done with his or her intellectual property.
Of course, many if not most properties are in the hands of corporations, and I would suggest that copyright law be changed so that only individuals, not companies can own a copyright-- otherwise it's "leased" for a specific period of time (and here is where the five years figure could come in.) After which, the creator can renegotiate for a fair value or take it back. No more cases of Marvel screwing Kirby or Nickelodeon dumping Kricfalusi from his own show.
I would further suggest that copyrights cannot be owned by an estate. Public domain happens when the artist dies, period-- and then the work is released to the ages to be remembered or forgotten. Anyway, wives, children and grandchildren are notorious for "selling out", caring more for cash than any integrity.
Shelter from punitive damages (Score:3, Interesting)
This would allow a business to form enabling a work-for-hire model without fear that an accidental inclusion of an "old-style" copyrighted work would destroy the business.
For example, you record a song and it happens to include a bass-line that has been copyrighted by some music label 20 years ago. Studio time, etc costs you $600 to get the recording mixed and ready for production qualit release. You charge $1000 to release it to the public domain - 500 fans each pay $2 and so you relase it. Said big music label decides to file suit for copyright infringement, the most they can get are two things:
1) Song is "withdrawn" from the public domain.
2) $600 in damages because that was net revenue generated by the sale
This avoids the ability of the sudio to sue for $150,000 or so for every copy of the song ever made which is about what the current (USA) copyright laws allow for. $150,000 x millions of downloads would totally bankrupt any business.
So, if alternate business models are going to get off the ground, they need to be protected from legal attacks designed more to protect the current business model than to protect the artist. Changes to the law should enable creativity in art and in business, not fight it.
While I might like... (Score:4, Interesting)
1. It should be illegal for any copyright protection scheme to enforce restrictions on non-reproductive use.
Examples:
Fast forward disabled, protected by CSS: Illegal
Fast forward in an "open" bit: Legal.
Region restrictions, protected by CSS: Illegal
Region restrictions in an "open" bit: Legal.
2. Copyright must be granted under the Berne convention. But protection of a copyright protection scheme is only granted on the condition that decryption keys are placed in escrow with the government, to be released into the public domain at the same time as copyright expires. If this key is protecting several works, it will be released when the first work enters the public domain.
Example:
[Movie company] releases a DVD. The symmetric key is placed in escrow with the government. When the copyright expires, that specific key is released.
[Music company] releases a compilation CD with a single key. When the first track enters public domain, the key is released (which would quickly lead to a system where each object is protected by its own key).
The public/private key pair in CD/DVD/TV players are never released, only the specific instances of keys.
3. All DRM systems which have the characteristics of a sale must allow resale under the first sale doctrine free of any comission, even if a license can not be reliably revoked (i.e. the buyer gets his copy, the seller keeps his). However, after invoking this the old original is considered an illegal copy, subject to relevant copyright law.
4. If the work is protected by a DRM system, the company must provide replacements at cost. Proof of ownership may be either damaged media, or reciept if the content is uniquely tied to the user. (As medialess content is).
Example:
DVD broken: Replacement.
iTMS tunes lost in disk crash: Replacement
DVD gets stolen: Car/home insurance case. Too easy to commit fraud otherwise.
These are areas where DRM is threatening to undermine basic consumer rights. While this is not nearly enough, I fear it will be hard enough to save even this much.
Kjella
Re:While I might like... (Score:3, Insightful)
Copyright Suggestion (Score:3, Insightful)
That's all.
No extensions for the company.
No extensions for the family.
5 guys develop it, last guy of the 5 dies. Public domain. Period.
I bet you company health care programs will improve.
Read Lessig's book (Score:3, Insightful)
One great idea he suggests is to have an online registration that costs (say) $1 per year to register, with a maximum life of (IIRC) 50 years. If the copyright owner doesn't register it every year, it's in the public domain. If it's not worth $1 to register, then it shouldn't be copyrighted anyway.
Acknowledge doctrine of first sale and private use (Score:4, Informative)
1) Acknowledge the supremacy of the doctrine of first sale [google.com] : When you purchase an instance of a copy of copyrighted work, your rights to view,use,modify,combine,interoperate with, dispose or resell that one instance are not impeded by either legislation or technology. This fact has been recognized time and again by the US courts.
2) The doctrine of first sale applies to both physical media and digital content where the receiver pays a transaction for an instance of a copyrighted work: When you purchase an instance of a copy of copyrighted work that involves the buyer making a choice for that instance of copyrighted work and entering into a transaction with the seller, then the buyer has the rights to that instance under the doctrine of first sale. Sellers of instances of copyrighted work cannot hide behind provision as a service, when you pay for an instance, you own that instance.
3) You do not have the right to record content without permission of the copyright holders of a live performance ( play, concert etc ) or private performance ( Film theater ) on private property or venue. You pay to attend a performance at a physical venue, not for a copy of an instance of that performance.
4) Broadcasted ( as apposed to downloaded ) copyrighted works as content received into a household or to device held by individual person or on that persons property, may not be redistributed outside of that person's household to anyone who does not receive the content though the same service. You may record a instance of copyrighted work for later viewing ( timeshifting ) and distribute a copy along to any person whos household also receives that same broadcast service ( Samaritan clause ). You many not redistribute or resell content recorded from a broadcast service to anyone not receiving that same broadcast service content.
5) Although you may not redistibute recorded copies of broadcasted copyrighted content outside of the terms of (4), there should be no limit to what you may do with instances of those works within your household. You should have the right to modify the works, combine with other works and interoperate with other works.
6) Copyright protection extends only to the particular work copyrighted. The Copyright holder's exclusive rights should not extend to the right to deny other combining an instance of copyright holder work with other works. You should have the right to distribute and/or sell, patches, recipes and addon components that refer and link to the content of the copyrighted work, but do not contain content from the original copyrighted work. The resulting combined and/or transformed work that contains content from the copyrighted work sources can not be legally redistributed without the permission of all the copyright holders.
It seems so goddamn simple... (Score:3, Interesting)
People sharing music P2P for FREE should be legal. Nobody's making money off of your works, INCLUDING YOU. Probably because YOU SUCK THE BIG ONE at marketing.
I should have every right to do whatever I want with any signal that enters my home. IE, if Hughes insists on radiating my brain with their digital television signal, then I insist on decoding it and using it as I see fit. What if tomorrow, I fall on a pile of radioactive waste, and can suddenly decode the signal in my head? Are you gonna chop it off and use it as evidence against me in a DMCA Act lawsuit? IF YOU DON'T WANT ME TO TIME SHIFT OR FORMAT SHIFT OR SHARE OR EVEN SELL YOUR CONTENT, DO NOT SEND IT OVER PUBLIC AIRWAVES. If I threw a giant wad of cash at you, I'm sure you'd be much obliged to take it. So don't throw your EMR at me, because I'm going to do the same.
Musicians? I will pay to see you in person. I will pay a very small fee to cover your costs for the media and recording of your music. If you want me to give you a glamorous lifestyle because you can play repetitive, shitty music, FUCK YOU. I will NOT be poor so you can drive a fucking Porsche. It is ART, a PASSION, not a FUCKING CAREER.
I'm 18, and a student. For a living, I clean floors. The only laws that protect my living protect yours too. When I get a contract, it isn't for life. It's until I FUCK UP. I don't need no fucking laws to protect my livelihood, so you pussies shouldn't either. Metallica, BURN IN HELL. Unless you would enjoy that, that is, if that is the case, may fluffy white bunnies rape you all day long.
What Would I Ask For? (Score:3, Interesting)
I will start with the questions in the article and then continue with some other additions:
Your question points out a very obvious problem: every time rights are defined, they are restricted. The Founding Fathers, the authors of the US Constitiution, probably would have found the idea of locking up a book ludicrous, but today we have DRM where publishers have fine tuned control of how we, the owners, use our own books. I am pretty certain the Right of Access would have been assumed by the Founding Fathers. Now that it cannot be assumed, many people claim it is not a right.
Having said that, if you are going to create enumerated rights, they should be as broad as possible. Things like: You may do anything with the copyrighted material except sell it for such and such a term.
The entire idea of derivative works should be eliminated. If I translate a book, that is a new book. If I want to make a better Star Wars, let the public choose whether or not I have beaten Lucas at his own game. If I want to annotate or critisize a book that I agree or disagree with, I should be able to. And I should be able to sell that book with same protections as the original author got even if it contains the bulk or the entirety of the original text.
Where I currently live, the Republic of China, copyright is imposed by another culture. Europe is taking its ideas of censorship and exporting them to the rest of the world. These information control laws have been imposed on every Asian country, and the US government is constantly putting pressure on the ROC government to extend and enhance enforcement of these foreign (barbaric?) copyright laws. The USA is even a victim of this exportation of European feudalism. The 1976 Copyright Act imposed the "moral rights" provisions of the Berne Convention which altered the entire face of copyright. It increased copyright terms, added derivative works, and made copyright automatic. The last addition, when applied to the Internet makes copyright an enemy of free speech.
China has a long history of annotation going back thousands of years. Many editions of books have extensive and very useful commentary added by subsequent authors all throughout Chinese history. While the original author's words were often preserved, other educated people were able to contribute to their works without fear of any sort of punishment. Chinese society for centuries was the most educated society on earth for precisely this reason.
This was the first society to have paper and printing, and the prices of books here have always been lower. People here read way more than people in the West. Text is such a part of life that it is impossible to watch a movie without subtitles. In the USA, people complain if the movie has subtitles because "It's too much work". This is in large part a result of the lack of restrictions with respect to the exchange of information here.
The cost of information access in the West is staggering. The best example of this is college text book "business". Ten years ago, some books cost up to US$80. They were updated -- rarely noticably -- every two years or so. Often, a student could not sell the book back because the new edition was out. By contrast, when I studied in Taiwan, I never paid more than about US$8 for a book. In addition to that, the language books were better than any language book I ever had for any Western language I ever studied.
Another good example is Joseph Needham's Science and Civilization in China. In the USA, each volume is about US$120. In the ROC, each volume is around US$30. It is exactly the same book. Here, I can afford it, in the USA, I cannot.
Copyright, in this case, se
Re:As for me (Score:2)
I don't want any form of copyright laws .
That's stupid. That will mean anything anyone creates is part of the public. Sure, copyright laws can be a pain in the ass, but if you look at it rationally, if someone who creates something (say, for example, a musician) wants money for it, what right do we have to claim it as ours for free ?
Re:As for me (Score:2)
To awnser your question on work , well I am an IT Director(by title) and Systems Admin(by trade) so yes i have worked more than a single day in my life.