Eldred Attracts Heavyweight Supporters

dipfan writes: "Opening briefs have now been filed with the Supreme Court for the Eldred v Ashcroft copyright case, arguing that the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act is unconstitutional. The anti-extension case has attracted some big name supporters, including Intel, and Nobel prize winning economist Milton Freidman, who argue it is "highly unlikely that the economic benefits from copyright extension" outweigh the additional costs, and that copyright extension reduces consumer welfare. (Previous coverage of the case on /. here and here)"

I love it

"Congress shall have the power... To promote the progress of science and the useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors, the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries."

So a limited time will now far exceed several generations. I can totaly see how this will benefit all the people of the good 'ol USA.

Economic recovery, here we come!

If ever there was a case that should win.

If this doesn't prevail before the Supremes, then all hope may be lost.

The copyright extension can't reasonably be argued to server any Constitutionally argued purpose. After all, to be extended, the works in question had to be produced.

Absent a time machine, how do you encourage the creation of something that's already been created?

The only thing you can do is negate the other side of the deal: transfer of your work into the public domain.

This is not even an issue of being for or against intellectual property. Congress used its Constitutinally provided powers to grant intellectual property to authors, but demanded consideration in return. That consideration was placement of works into the public domain after the author or subsequent copyright holder had been granted an adequate opportunity to exploit the work.

We have delivered on our end of the bargain. The copyright holders must deliver on theirs.

Re:If ever there was a case that should win.

If this doesn't prevail before the Supremes, then all hope may be lost.

Is easy to win the Supremes over, just before they make a bad decision shout:

"Stop! In the name of Love
Before you break my heart"

How could they resist...

Re:If ever there was a case that should win.

From this article [supersphere.com]:

Justice Clarence Thomas had an even more serious conflict of interest which violated federal law. His wife, Virginia Lamp Thomas, was (and is) gathering and processing applications for the Bush cabinet. Perversely, a Bush spokesman implied the charges were nothing more than veiled sexism. "Like many professional women, Mrs. Thomas should not be judged by her spouse," he said.

Mrs. Thomas, a former Republican Congressional aide, works for the Heritage Foundation (www.heritage.org). The conservative think-tank first made its first real mark in 1981 when it's Mandate for Leadership was adopted as the "bible" of the incoming Reagan Administration. Since then, the Heritage Foundation has been a cornerstone of Republican presidencies, strongly influencing everything from domestic policy to national security to the very structure of the government itself.

It also happens to enjoy a revolving-door relationship with US intelligence. Its Board of Trustees includes: Richard Mellon Scaife, the right-wing billionaire and Reagan-era propagandist who has personally bankrolled most of the "Clinton Scandal" industry; Holland H. Coors, beer heiress and trustee of the Adolph Coors Foundation, which helped fund the Contra war; Midge Dector, former chair of the anti-communist Committee for a Free World; and Frank Shakespeare, who served as Reagan's ambassador to the Vatican during the Lodge scandal, and director of Radio Free Europe.

In her own job at the Heritage Foundation, Mrs. Thomas has solicited resumes "for transition purposes" from the government oversight committees of Congress. By press time, no fewer than eight of Bush's top cabinet designees have worked for or have ties to the Heritage Foundation.

Despite all this, Mrs. Thomas sternly told the NY Times, "There is no conflict here." She explained that because she "rarely discusses" Court matters with her husband, there was no reason for Justice Thomas to recuse himself from the landmark Bush cases.

But again, the federal statutes are crystal clear that it is the relationship itself and not whether any "discussions" take place that determines when a justice is required to recuse himself. Despite the clear-cut violation, of course, Justice Thomas heard the case and voted with the majority in favor of his wife's ultimate patron.

So, to summarize: I don't know how much money she was making. But she was making money from a highly political job, where Bush's presidency would have a considerable impact. As someone else pointed out, Scalia's son was in a similar position.

That Thomas and Scalia should have recused themselves is absolutely obvious to me. And I don't say that just that it's Bush involved and I dislike him (as an aside, I never liked Gore either). The fact is that the court acted disgracefully in a very important ruling. You can't forget that -- it's not just the effect of the ruling, but that they have revealed that on truly tough cases (not just subtle, but personally tough for those Justices) they will not act fairly. They do not deserve respect, and they do not deserve to be given the benefit of the doubt. They only deserve that when there is no evidence to the contrary, but evidence has been presented, and we need to look at the evidence whenever it's present.

(Besides this, the volunteer premise is false: Bush's campaign was flush with money. What may have appeared to be volunteer work seldom was. Lots of people worked on that campaign for purely monetary reasons. Get-out-the-vote door-to-door campaigners were being done by employees. Phone soliciters were payed. Everyone was on the payrole. It was not some grassroots campaign done by true supporters. It was a corporate campaign, from top to bottom, for a corporate president. Sure, it had the appearance of legitimacy, but corporations learned to fake that a long time ago.)

GNU files amicus curiae brief

Also, the FSF filed a "friend of the court" brief [gnu.org], though if, like me, you are not a lawyer, you might rather just read the press release [gnu.org].

Open Petition?

This sort of high-profile case is just crying out for a shown of public support. Do you think a couple of free software heavyweights could agree on a middle-of-the-road viewpoint on Copyright law (by which I mean somewhere other than abolish it) in a form that "open IP" supporters everywhere (or just in the US ;) ) could "sign" in an online show of support.

The recent /. article on Copyright would probably been a good place to look for ideas ;)

Re:Open Petition?

The justices had better not be swayed by petitions -- their job description includes interpreting the law as it is written, not as how anybody else (including the justices) thinks it should have been written.

Even if the justices think that a law is a pathetic, weak, idiotic law -- if it's Constitutional and all, they need to uphold it as is. It's the other two branches' job to reflect the populace and consider bending to petitions.

Good quote

Eben Moglen's brief for the FSF [fsf.org] has a great quote:

``Actually, Sonny [Bono] wanted the term of copyright protection to last forever.''
--Rep. Mary Bono
144 Cong. Rec. H9951 (daily ed. Oct. 7, 1998)

Re:Good quote

Which is why it should be obvious that "forever" or Valenti's "forever minus a day" show the *INTENT* of granting copyright for UNLIMITED terms, which are, specifically, unconsitutional.

Sure, it brings US copyright law more into harmony with Euro laws, but then again, Europeans have a history of supporting hereditary privilege, which is what "70 years past the death of the author" amounts to. It creates a trust fund for a select few to inherit, a privilege which they did nothing to earn, and it burdens current creators and entrepeneurs with supporting the children of their predecessors. To paraphrase Jefferson, it is a debt levied on the living by the dead. It's a very un-American and anti-democratic viewpoint. The addition of Milton Friedman's name should be a sign that being a rabid capitalist doesn't mean favoring corporate welfare of this sort; the CTEA takes away from the public domain and gives to the corporations without expecting anything in return.

For the record, I have less of a problem with long terms on works for hire, but the next thing they'll try is "Copyright for as long as the corporation exists", clearly unconsititutional.

I hope copyright extensions get repealed

I have debated this hot topic on the Napster Forum at great length, with people ranging from typical ranters to a small record label owner.

The biggest issue I have is with the duration of copyright. Originally set to last 14 to 28 years from date of creation, it now stands as 95 years from the death of the copyright owner. The latest lengthening (the Sonny Bono Act) might have to do with strong lobbying from Disney, as Mickey Mouse would have lost its copyright in 2004. And to extend it again, 20 years at a time only takes a mere act of Congress.

On one hand, I'd like to see creators get just rewards for their work. But I disagree with a near-eternal guarantee, that might stifle creation in the future because current creative minds can rest on their laurels. In other words, they can stop working and continue to enjoy a revenue stream, while I need to keep working to get my next paycheck.

Re:I hope copyright extensions get repealed

> If something IS so awe-inspiring that it'll really stand the test of time for ninety years, *shrug* I don't have a problem with that, especially with purely artistic works -- there's less public harm in, say, having a nigh-indefinitely copyrighted Mickey Mouse flick than there is in having an indefinitely-patented hypothetical rhinoviral cold vaccine.

Which raises an interesting question.

How come our laws are structured so that the guy who cures cancer has to make back his entire investment in 14 years, but RIAA and MPAA get to sponge for 90 years plus the life of the creator?

If the rationale for these intellectual property "protections" is that they somehow promote innovation and investment, how did we conclude that a fucking cartoon mouse is deserving of 90+ years of protection, but a cure for cancer, only 14?

Re:I hope copyright extensions get repealed

Well, one's a patent and one's a copyright. Patents might get less protection in general because they cover procedures and systems, which in some cases are useful or even critical for derivative work within a section.

A writer, for instance, can probably get away with writing quite a bit without deriving from "Snow White", say -- there's nothing, besides constraints on imagination and effort, stopping a writer from designing his own distinct universe. And if they're REALLY creative, the universe might be so distinct that it won't involve axe-wielding dwarves, fair tree-loving elves with bows, and half-height people not named H*bbits to avoid the dreaded Lawyers of Mordor. Worst case? A creative work falls into oblivion, because the author refuses to license it to anybody else at prices that others will accept.

But systems and methods have to work in reality -- there may not be another satisfactory way around a problem. If, for instance, somebody designs a KSR/RGB Mars-style "treatment" that improves longevity by fixing long-term accumulated genetic damage, restores telomeres, and so forth, then that's a huge amount of IP. Some of the necessary methods may be the only effective solutions. So a long, closely-held patent could be used to throttle potential research in that area. What if, say, a radical anti-"playing God" group set up shell companies to quietly purchase IP, or even set up a biotechnology firm for the sole purpose of blocking applications by winning the research race? Imagine if a group tried to blackmail the world with a patented, 90-year-protected cure to cancer? The threat to society's potential welfare is much worse than that of, say, withholding "Steamboat Willie".

before DMCA what was there

Is it me but ever since mp3's it's like the entire world is an expert on copyright infringment. I remember teh days on slashdot when all teh articles were about supercooling my 300a. interesting paradigm shift.

I'm hopeful

I read the opening brief last night and I'm overwhelmed by the quality of the work. The plaintiffs have, over the course of the trial and appeals, clarified and distilled the essence of their case. Their arguments are very persuasive, and the writing is superb.

This is probably the most important copyright case of our generation. The government has characterized retroactive copyright extension as a "national tradition", and if this case fails, the result will be that Congress will be given the go-ahead to continue the "tradition", and the result will be perpetual copyright. The entire idea of a public domain of ideas will be destroyed.

Eldred is our last, best chance to prevent perpetual copyright. It's a tremendous effort, the best contemporary legal writing that I've EVER seen. I urge all Slashdot readers to read through the opening brief. It should be required reading for anyone interested in the issues behind copyright extension.

Mickey Mouse is not the issue

I think the core of Eldred's case should focus not on Mickey Mouse, because as Valenti said, who cares if Mikey isn't in the public domain for another 1000 years. The argument should focus on the 10,027 books published in 1930, of which only 174 are still in print. Who is being harmed by these works being put into public domain ? Certainly Disney isn't hurt, nor the owners of the copyrights, since they aren't making any money anyway. We the people, thats who, each year there are less and less readable copies of these books. If these books are not put in the public domain, we are in real danger of loosing them. Project Gutenberg certainly isn't going to spend thousands of dollars to find out who owns a copyright, just to be told, no. As Lessig pointed out, it also stifles creativity, because no derivitive works can be done. He also pointed out two instances where an author has written a piece based on an older work, spent real money to find the copyright holder and been told NO, not, I will licence it to you for X amount of money, but NO. If we allow these extensions to stand, we get Mickey Mouse, if we don't let it stand, we get to preserve a whole body work for all time and we get a whole new body of work, which will never happen otherwise. This lawsuit should really be called Humanity vs Disney.

Problem...

In the event of victory, would the law be totally repealed, or just the law applying to already produced works ?

If the latter, then I think we have a long way to go to get it back to a sensible level of say, 20 years from publication, which needs to be a worldwide campaign, or at least one which will get the EU and US to change simultaneously

Siva Vaidhyanathan on the Sonny Bono Act

Now I wish I hadn't snipped what Siva said about the Sonny Bono Act from the interview we did! [slashdot.org] Here it is:

JH: "In your book, you refer to the DMCA as an example of what you call a "thick" copyright law. Can you explain the difference between "thick" copyright law and a "thin" law?"

SV: "...One way to measure the thickness of a copyright law is to look at the duration of protection. If works enter the public domain before an author's life expectancy expires, then it's a thin and democratic system. If the duration of copyright protection is absurdly long and potentially indefinite, then it's way too thick.

"JH: And the DMCA does this?

"SV: Not exactly. The Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act of 1998, which added 20 years to almost all active copyrights, does this. The Copyright Act of 1976 did this as well, but it took people a while to complain about it. Before THE 1976 ACT, copyright terms were for a fixed amouNt of time: 28 years per term, renewable once. Since the 1976 act, the term has been life of the author plus 50 years, and now 70 years. The Supreme Court will hear a case in the fall about the constitutionality of the Sonny Bono Act. And many of us on the public interest side of copyright debates are hoping that the justices revert to the first principles of American copyright: that copyright is meant to promote creativity and expression, not retard it. Copyright has become corrupted to such a degree that it's now an instrument of censorship, as Dmitri Sklyarov and Edward Felten can tell you."

-- haaz, who will think twice before snipped for brevity's sake.

Who's who

It just boggles the mind to look at the list of folks filing AMICI CURIAE briefs in the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act case. Here is just a random sampling of the names:

Eagle Forum/Phyllis Schlafly

Milton Friedman

Hal Roach Studios

Intel

Wendell Berry

Ursula K. Leguin

Barry Lopez

Peter Matthiessen

David Foster Wallace

National Writers Union

The United States Public Policy Committee for the Association of Computing Machinery

Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility

The Apache Software Foundation

The Domain Name Rights Coalition

The Center for The Public Domain

Public Knowledge, The Digital Future Coalition

The Public Domain Research Corporation

The Center for Book Culture

The Computer and Communications Industry Association

The Consumer Electronics Association

Why Bother?

Why is anyone bothering to fight against the copyright extension, anyway? If you listen to the copyright holders, you'd know that everying under the sun is just going to be stolen by copyright thieves anyway. Of course then you also have to wonder why they're so worried about extending the term of copyright if they believe that it's impossible to publish anything without having it stolen. Something doesn't add up here...

Do artists benefit?

It sounds good when people demand that the artists should be paid and all that. But the question is:

Will they?

It's one thing to do SOMETHING in the name of a good cause, and another thing is actually helping this good cause. As I see it, many of the copyrights are, in fact, owned by corporations. So the question is, when did the artist get paid?

We all know the stories of famous painters who NEVER sold a SINGLE painting!!! They died in a state of close starvation, yet today their painting sell for millions of dollars-

The primary problem...

from what I understand, is derivitave works. The works of Motzart, Bethoven, and Shakespear, are all in the public domain. This means that all of their works are "fair game" when developing your own creative works.

If you like the base key changes in a work by Motzart, or Bethoven, you are welcome to use it. Unless someone since then has used that same combination of key changes, and their music is not in the public domain.

We have not seen quite the same situation in written works. Authors regularly steal story concepts from other books, file off the serial numbers, wrap them with new characters and locations, and publish it as a new story.

While I sympathize with musicians who cringe at the thought of finding some other musician taking their song and changing one or two words and re-publishing it. In writing, that would be plagerism.

On the other hand, if the creator of some work does not release the work to the public domain at some time, it will stifle creativity.

I think that Spider Robinson pointed out the problem best, though I do not remember the story or the book I found it in. When musicians can't publish the music they create, because it contains "substantialy similar" parts, we will see a greater loss to society than just about any loss due to war.

Then again, that's just my opinion. I can be wrong.

-Rusty

How will the Supreme Court function in this case?

There are several angles from which a decision can be approached:

First and foremost, there is the one-liner in the Constitution. That one line can be picked apart and the syntax and semantics debated.

Second, one can look for 'obvious' flaws in the existing (extended) law, and see if they (again 'obviously') flout the Constitution.

Essentially, is the focus from the bottom-up or from current-law down. I hear a lot about 'strict constructionism' on the Court, and that would seem to me to favor the first, bottom-up approach.

Beyond that, one can begin reading the thoughts of the framers of the Constitution. Any /. reader will be quite familiar with Thomas Jefferson's thoughts, but Alexander Hamilton's opposing views will also weigh in, here.Then there is also the interesting comparison with patents. AFAIK, patent terms have been 17 years from day 1, and haven't been lengthened. In fact, recent reform put the additional cap of 21 years from date of file, to rein in people who stalled their patents in-office in order to extend protection.

Why Ashcroft?

IANAL, so could someone explain why this case is called Eldred v. Ashcroft? Ashcroft wasn't the attorney general when the act was passed. Is it just common practice to use the name of the attorney general when suing for unconstitutionality?

Severability?

I read about 60% of the opening brief and I find it VERY convincing when it argues that retroactive extensions of copyright are unconstitutional.

Does anyone know whether the various acts extending copyright have severability clauses in them? If not, does that mean that the extensions might be struck down entirely? That could be a bombshell.

I would like to read some arguments submitted by Ashcroft/US on this matter, however.

MM
--

Software Copywrite Act.

Proposal (by me):
You no longer need to send a copy of works to the Library of Congress in order to receive copyright, but it still needs to be done if you plan on publishing a large quantity, especially if you hope to legally protect the work. This is done, so that once it goes out of copyright, a copy will exist at the LOB so that it can be copied when it reaches public domain, and won't get lost.
I propose that any software in which you expect legal protection of your copywrite, needs to not only be submitted to the LOB, but must include the source code. This source will be sealed away, from public view untill the copyright ends of course. But will be also accessable by a court order (not contestable by the copyright owner), to government agencies wishing to examine the security of any systems that are vital to government interest. These security reports then (excluding any source code, and given reasonable time for the copyright owners to fix the security hole) will be available to the public. The source code will also be accessable by a court order during any court cases involving the copyright holder in which it is deemed nesseary.

Does the public care?

I think a very important question to ask here is, "Does anyone care?" I mean, seriously, ask Joe Schmoe on the street if this matters to them and chances are they will say no.

To the STRONG majority of the world's population, Disney and Mickey Mouse go hand in hand. They wouldn't want to see the creators of South Park begin marketing Mickey Mouse cartoons. People draw an association between a work (be it a song, movie, etc.) and the creator of that work. That connection is important on a cultural level, even if people don't realize it. I'm sure if you asked people on the street, a majority of them would say that yes, a company/individual who creates something should retain ownership of it. It's human nature. If I build a deck on my house, I wouldn't want my neighbors thinking they could hold parties on it. It's MY deck. I created it, therefore I should retain ownership of it. Human nature tends to this belief.

Would Disney (and other companies as well) have had much of its early material if it werent for the Brothers Grimm and other public-domain stories? No. But, that's not to say that 100 years from now the Earth will be devoid of any culture unless Disney releases Steamboat Willie into the public domain.

DMCA and technologicly enforced copyright

Being NAL as I am, I would like to see some discussion of how limited term copyright is expected to work in a future where copyright is enforced by perpetual technological means.

As more information is published on digital media, DRM is becoming a means of enforcing the copyright on the information. However, I know of no DRM systems which provide for expriation of protection. So, while the legal protection may go away after the granted term, the data is still protected technologically. I wonder, what are the legal implications of this?

Copyright was granted on the grounds that after the granted term, the information was to enter the public domain. If the information is designed by the distributors to never enter the public domain, does it still deserve copyright protection? It seems like this is analogous to patents vs. trade secrets where trade secrets have no legal protection because there is no obligation to disclose the way they work. You have to trade one for the other.

"Original intent" disparagers should be ashamed

I hope that the same people who mocked the doctrine of "original intent", particularly with regards to the Second Amendment, aren't the ones promoting the Supreme Court's striking down copyright extension, an interpretation that relies precisely on the philosophy of ascertaining the intent of the framemakers of the Constitution. The "facts on the ground" are that the elected representatives of the people of the United States, both Congress and the President, have repeatedly within the past few decades agreed to extend copyright without any manifestation of widespread public protest. The opponents of copyright extension need to come up with something a little more substantial than an opinion that copyright extension damages the "public good".

I suspect that of the groups and people submitting amicus briefs about the only ones with "clean hands" are Phyllis Schlafly and the Eagle Forum and Milton Friedman. Love them or hate them, people such as Phyllis Schlafly and Milton Friedman at least have consistency in their viewpoints, a true worldview and not opinions that bend with each passing intellectual fad.

Phyllis Schlafly and Milton Friedman can argue with clear conscience that they have always been in the fight to limit the role of the federal government over the lives of the people, regardless of the issues. In contrast all of the NIMBY environmentalists and gun control advocates are merely carpetbaggers, passengers of convenience who the moment the issue is gone will revert to readvocating increased expansion of governmental authority and regulation. In essence the left-wing supporters of the movement to strike down the opinion of the elected representatives of the people are merely seeking to steal property for their own purposes, because they have no intellectual foundation for their critique of the current system.

If the Constitution is merely a piece of paper to be reinterpreted as each generation sees fit, why shouldn't eternal copyright extension be a legitimate interpretation of this generation? If it is just as legitimate to question the applicability of the Second Amendment to today's society, why isn't it legitimate to question whether an 18th century understanding of copyright is not applicable to today's reality of mass media corporations continuously producing new works in new formats that the people have no problem paying for without visible public protest? See what happens once you decide to jettison the entire opinion of the past for the sake of expediency, it might just come back to bite you.

Not only Milton Friedman but 5(!) Nobel prizes

From the list of signatories to the brief :

George A. Akerlof
Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, 2001

Kenneth J. Arrow
Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, 1972

James M. Buchanan
Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, 1986

Ronald H. Coase
Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, 1991

Milton Friedman
Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, 1976

Impressing!!!

Why not short but many times renewable copyrights?

Seems to me that the super long copyrights are causing works to be lost because the original author etc. no longer cares about them, probably because they are dead.
However to use the example of Mickey Mouse, Disney as a corporate individual still very much cares about it's characters and is likely to for quite a long time.
Rather than have works be lost in the extremely long copyright term we have now, why can't we just let copyright holders who DO care about their works renew the copyright until they no longer care about them? This would take care of the work of dead authors and companies that have gone out of business, while allowing Long standing companies protect their "classics."
Just a thought that seems to make too much sense to me.

Cheers,
Jonathan

The Power of Compound Interest - Einstein

Expost facto incentives like retroactive copyright extention obviously cannot influence creation. Even long copyright periods do little.

I can add some quantification by running the numbers. A publisher is investing when they buy a copyright, and expects a return on their investment, usually expressed as a percentage per annum to compare with other investments like bonds or stocks.

Consider a publisher who wants a 10% return rate, and is willing to pay 100 for a 20 year copyright on a given work. Then 25yrs is only 106, 40yrs 115, 100yrs and forever 117. But tastes change, and work may become irrelevant by events, so sales 20 years hence are very uncertain. The usual way of coping with the risk is to increase the rate of return. So try 30%, with 100 still for 20 years then even 100 years is only worth 100.5!

Note that these analyses assume flat sales through the period, like for established continual sellers. For heavily front-loaded sales like most modern works, the premia fall by a large factor (5-10 times). And more for risky (high rates of return required) authors.

and if the court decides in favor of eldred...

i'll be wearing a mickey giving the finger tshirt!

___

Big difference in quality of arguments

Is it just me or do others see a big difference in the quality of the aguments being put forth, pro and con. Salon has an interview [salon.com] with Morton David Goldberg, who is a top copyright lawyer and partner with Cowan Liebowitz and Latman in New York. He feels the Supreme Court shouldn't have even heard the case. His arguments don't seem very insightful or well thought out to me. At one point he makes the statement: "And the court, in another case from the 19th century -- there was a claim that a circus poster was not original, because originality is a requirement of the Constitution..." but actually originality is not explicitly required by the Constitution, but is inferred by the verbage "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts...". He also throws around a big scare about "creat[ing] a dangerous precedent by shifting power away from Congress and toward the judiciary". Baloney.

On the pro Eldred side, the opening brief [harvard.edu] filed by Lawrence Lessig, et al seems to make alot more sense. It basically says that the authors of the Constitution used specific language in the copyright clause to limit the length of time that a monopoly would be given to authors of creative works. By regularly extending that time, Congress is, in effect, circumventing the "limited time" in a piecemeal fashion and, in effect, creating unlimited copyright terms. They also do a good job of showing how the reversion of a copyrighted work to the public domain helps to further scientific and artistic progress and bring up interesting First Amendment issues surrounding it. Good read.

It's a matter of simple calculus

Its all about the strictly mathematical definition of the word limited. In case the sequence of increments to the copyright is right, the resulting sum might be finite and thus the copyright will be limited term. But let's look at the sequence.

One of the conditions for sum to be finite is for the sequence to converge to zero. But the sequence is not. Its not even constant, by all means it seems that its divergent and this means the resulting sum will be inifinite.

This hints on intention, past record and dangerous trend in the congress that extrapolates into an infinite copyright if it won't be checked at some point.

Excellent read on copyright at k5

A while back, there was an excellent article [kuro5hin.org] on Lord Macaulay's speech to the British Parliament. Macaulay lays out both a solid case for copyright and against unreasonable extensions to copyrights.

The speech was made over 160 years ago.

Can't... Take... It... ARGH!!!

Why the hell would it be a good thing for heavyweights to to have briefs that are opening, especially in court?!

Sorry.

The fundamental issue

The constitution is about the individual, and not the corporation. Corporations can't vote, individuals can. Corporations are not protected by the "Bill of Rights." Indviduals are. It would be nice if political people remembered these facts. Copyright policy was supposed to be about protecting the revenue stream of works for the individuals that created them.

Current copyright law is about protecting the corporation, and not protecting the individual.

Hopefully, the court will see it this way and fix this situation.

Fuckin A.

Hahaah...I had that record when I was like 3 years old.
You rule.

Reno v. ACLU

Or see Reno v. ACLU [aclu.org]. This was originally ACLU v. Reno, but when the ACLU won in a lower court, the Justice Department appealed. The name's where therefore swtiched.

This is how the case looks whenever a private party brings suit against the federal government over the constitutionality of a law.

Re:This is a good thing

Sorry but it should be 15 year from the date of creation. no more no less,..

companies will piss their pants hearing that, but I highly doubt that microsoft or ANY company that made a program in 1992 is still selling it. versions made thereafter? yes... that exact one? no.. they milked all the cash out of it possible, quit being greedy bastard children and give it up.

Re:Mickey Rat Protection Act

My memory may be at fault, but Mickey Rat could be a reference to a lead character in Air Pirates Funnies, an underground comic as widely distributed (well, through the same head shop channels) as Zap Comics or The Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers.

The depraved and violent things those cartoon animals did to each other, well, perhaps they could have been ignored if Walt hadn't seen them and enforced trademarks and copyright, which is why nobody much has seen Air Pirate Funnies for decades.

Re:support the fight

Thanks for the info. Just donated $20. Not much I know, but hey if everybody here does that...

"Melancholy Elephants"

Yes, this is good reading about this very issue. Go read it [baen.com] right now.

" '[Endless copyright would be the] worst psychic trauma the race has yet suffered.... There are eighty-eight notes. ...I do not know the figure for the maximum possible number of melodies-- too many variables-- but I am sure it is quite high. I am certain that it is not infinity..... Do you know what it is like to be a composer these days, Senator?' "

Re:Interesting... (and OT)

IANAL, but...

You can't sue the United States Federal Government directly (unless it gives you permission to do so). But you can sue officials of said government. In this case, the suit is agaist the John Ashcroft the Attourny General, not John Ashcroft the private citizen. The legal documents usually clarify this with something along the lines of "in the capacity of attourney general" when naming Ashcroft.