UK Government Order Review of IP Rights 159
quaker5567 writes "The Chancellor of the Exchequer, Gordon Brown, has ordered an independent review of intellectual property rights in the UK. The review will be led by Andrew Gowers, formerly the editor of London newspaper The Financial Times. The review will look into the awarding of IP rights to business, the complexity of current laws and the extent of "fair use" in the current law. Importantly, the review will also examine whether the current term of copyright protection (70 years after the author's death) is appropriate. Andrew Gowers recently criticised the print industry for not realising the true power of the digital platform, comparing them to a record company which specialises in vinyl."
Re:"fair use"? (Score:3, Informative)
Gordon Brown (Score:3, Informative)
For those not up on UK politics ... (Score:4, Informative)
My suspicion is, because he is so desperate to raise more tax revenue, it that he will allow anyone and their dog to patent anything, "fire", "the wheel", for example, and then others will have to fight it down in court.
Remember, you read it here first.
Re:'Review' means 'extend' (Score:4, Informative)
Firstly there's the mechanical copyright - the copyright on an actual recording. In the UK this currently expires 50 years after date that the recording was first released, independant as to where it was released. In all cases the expiration takes place at the end of the calendar year. There are a number of record companies who exploit this by issuing old recordings whose mechanical copyright has lapsed.
Secondly there the publishing copyright - the copyright on the song. This expires 70 years after the authors death. Payments for these are usually managed via a publishing company who collects the rights and passing on a percentage to the authors. So even if the mechanical copyright has lapsed, the publishing copyright still remains in place.
In the Beatles case, Northern Songs which owns the publishing rights to most of their compositions (excluding some of the earlier material, later George Harrison compositions, and Ringo two) is partly owned by Michael Jackson. The publishing company still passes the payments on, Jackson will just get some kind of financial benefit as the co-owner of the company.
So under current UK copyright law anyone will be albe to press up a copy of 'Love Me Do' (their first single, dating from 1962) from January 1st 2013, but publishing will still have to be paid to Lennon's estate until the end of 2050, and to McCartney's estate up to at least 2075.
Re:Intellectual Property is a scam (Score:4, Informative)
In short I think that was a troll comment and readers more locally focused in their knowledge of these things shouldn't fall for it. The UK is neither to be lazy conflated with "Europe" (read: France and Germany, completely different circumstances and economic philosophies) nor America.