The Privatization of Copyright Lawmaking 213
An anonymous reader writes with this excerpt from TorrentFreak:
"The biggest misperception about [the Stop Online Piracy Act] is that it is somehow unprecedented or extraordinary. It is not. SOPA represents just the latest example of copyright law defined and controlled not by the government but by private entities. Copyright owners will deploy SOPA in the same way they have behaved in the past: to extend out their rights. They will disrupt sites that do not infringe a copyright, interfere with fair uses of copyrighted works, and take other steps that evade the limits that the Copyright Act sets on a copyright owner's actual rights."
This isn't news (Score:5, Informative)
Re:America is NOT a democracy (Score:4, Informative)
America is totally corrupt...
I'm not sure you know what that means. [wikipedia.org] In fact look at any african country....
There's a reason pirates exist. (Score:5, Informative)
The Constitution of the United States of America [wikipedia.org] had a nod to a limited copyright, with the idea that it would promote the arts and sciences for there to be a period of time in which the original creator of an idea would be able to profit from it. (Article 1, Section 8 of the United States Constitution [usconstitution.net], wherein it states as a goal "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;")
Here's an article entitled The Founding Fathers Had Copyright Right [indyweek.com], explaining how and why copyright was first introduced (back when the U.S.A. was just a twinkle in the founding fathers' eyes). It bears little resemblance to the convoluted and draconian system we now have in place.
As of 1790 [wikipedia.org], that "limited time" was a period of 14 years, with a possible 14 year extension (assuming the author was still alive), for a possible maximum of 28 years from date of creation. Those periods were more than double those originally specified in earlier documents, which ranged from 5 to 7 years.
More recently, the Copyright Term Extension Act [wikipedia.org] has shoved everything in quite the wrong direction for anything to ever reach the public domain.
For example:
Mickey Mouse was created in 1928. Mickey Mouse's likeness will not be legal to reproduce without a license until 2036, or maybe even 2047 (there is some legalistic ambiguity). And that's assuming that the copyright laws are not changed yet again to suit corporate greed... Because, you know, Disney hasn't had enough time to properly profit from Mickey Mouse yet, since he's only 83 years old!
If that example isn't broken enough for you, have a look at this list of when things enter the public domain [cornell.edu], and note that the current copyright law ensures that a book published on 15 March 1923 will enter the public domain on 1 January 2019, despite nearly everyone who was alive when it was published being dead now - nevermind 7 more years. It also shows that a sound recording published in 1978 will enter the public domain no earlier than 2049. If it was recorded prior to 1972, then it won't become public domain until at least 2067. This literally means that music recorded before I was born will not be in the public domain before I die. I expect this holds true for most of us, actually, and not just me. As an aside, this is also why restaurants do not sing "Happy Birthday [wikipedia.org]" with the lyrics and melody you learned growing up.
Re:The flaw in democracy. (Score:2, Informative)
the free market has ALWAYS had the nanny state to protect it.
That's a strange definition of a free market.
Re:The flaw in democracy. (Score:4, Informative)
If the shareholders want the CEO to pay the judgment, they can put that in his employment contract before it happens, or they can condition his future employment on him paying it. It's completely between the CEO and the shareholders.
The problem is that "the shareholders" (of any voting block size) are all "in the club" and would never ask a potential new CEO to accept anything as *shudder* gauche as liability. The things that are deemed acceptable, even for owners of tiny little $10M companies, wouldn't pass the "do unto others as you would have them do unto you" fairness test of an 8 year old.
Apparently, it is accepted as fair and reasonable for an owner to offer a block of restricted shares to the employees for purchase to help the company during a time of crisis. These shares are priced at 1/2 current market and may not be sold for a period of one year. The year represents risk, and the 1/2 market price represents reward... sound fair so far? At the same time, the owner (secretly) offers himself a block of shares four times as large as the employees at 1/4 market price, restricted for a period of 6 months. This only comes out after 6 months have passed and the owner's sale of a portion of these shares is made public. The deal was "approved" by a paid "ethics consultant." Pure genius.
He who has the gold makes the rules, indeed, and those rules invariably give him more gold in the end.