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0 pointsAdieuToLogic10y ago0 comments

> The big problem -- in the U.S. anyway -- is that there are huge companies with a vested interest in maintaining something like the late-ish 20th century copyright regime.

Agreed. For a poster-child of this one need look no further than the Disney corporation. By US copyright laws existing up until 1978[1], "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" should have entered into the public domain sometime around 1993. Now? It's locked up until at least 2032 and will likely be "protected" by further copyright law modifications.

1 - http://www.ivanhoffman.com/expiration.html

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3 comments · 1 top-level

anon410y ago· 2 in thread

I'm expecting Disney to change the law to allow for authorship reassignment, so the "until death of author+70 years" effectively becomes "until dissolution of The Disney Corporation+70 years", after which we can drop the "+70 years", and expand the public domain retroactively with the works of many recently-deceased artists. That would be, on the whole, a net gain for the public domain.

ggchappell10y ago

> That would be, on the whole, a net gain for the public domain.

Now that is an interesting thought. Let Disney have Mickey Mouse forever, in exchange for lots of recent stuff.

However, I'm not sure it would work. Say I'm an artist. I know that my heirs will have to right to control my works until doomsday if I assign the authorship to a corporation. So I form a trust for that purpose. This sounds like a simple thing to do. It is also very reasonable, from my POV; I'm providing for my children. And if it were commonly done, then it would negate the benefits of this change in the law.

anon410y ago

You could combine it with annual payments. Free copyright for the first 20 years, then annual payments until death of author (person or other legal entity). Disney will still like it, because it will be less money than lobbying, but it will allow older now-unprofitable works to enter the public domain.

Or outright require that the corporation in question shows continuing profit from the work. If they're not profiting, then they're not using it, or are outright misusing it, so everyone else should be allowed a go at it.

Or allow for this transition of authorship to only happen when the corporation itself is inextricably tied with the work in question and would be severely damaged by its passing in the public domain (yes, this is in effect "do you have enough lawyer money" - kind of the same principle as above). Maybe require that the corporation was funded no more than delta(Disney creates Mickey Mouse, Disney creates the Disney corporation) + 1 years after the work in question. This will prevent for example book publishers getting perpetual rights to a book.

However it is formulated, I do think we can afford to cede certain corporate icons to their respective corporations in exchange of saner laws for the common cases.

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