Reason Magazine on Copyright Legislation

Bob Kopp writes "The libertarian magazine Reason is running an article about the clash between corporations that own copyrights and 'grassroots, participatory culture.' The article discusses the effects of the Sonny Bono Copyright Extension Act, which extended the life span of copyrights by 20 years, as well as the dangers of information monopolies in general."

Re:Look at this

At least slashdot allows you to retain copyright for the words your write - most commercial magazines don't!

This has to do with the fact that Slashdot wants to avoid the issues with retaining copyright to submitted posts; namely accountability. Most online magazines wouldn't *dream* of letting the rabble keep their own copyrights because that means they wouldn't be able to censor at a whim!

Thank god for "common carrier" status... otherwise public discussion forum like this would not exist. Imagine what it would be like if all public forum had to be monitored for "content abuses". Private censorship is as bad if not worse than public censorship.

I think you hit the nail on the head though - copyright serves a purpose when it encourages people to be creative (and who would bother if they felt anyone could 'steal' the result of their effort and claim it as their own), but it should prevent the work being used. If a publisher refsues to reissue a book, surely they should not be allowed to retain the copyright - after all copyright is the right to make copies, if the publisher is not exercising that right, why should they be able to withold it from others.

Absolutely.

The only point I disagreed with in the article concerning "old" copyrights is that I have no problem with Disney wanting to retain the copyright on Mickey Mouse. Mickey is still used to promote the company and is important to their public image so for the sake of consistency in my personal opinion I say "more power to them". I have problems, however, in how "fair use" is being bullied into non-existance. If an artist or political cartoonist wanted to use Disney as an icon of overcorporatization by picturing Mickey holding an iron fist over Disneyland, that's something that goes beyond mere copyright issues and enters the realm of political commentary. The hypothetical artist wants to make a statement about corporate power abuses and the "Disneyfication" of the world, but chances are that artist will get contacted by lawyers reaaaally quick (after all they want to protect their corporate image).

Oops, I've strayed off-topic... well, on to the next point...

In general I must say I consider copyright to be a good thing, it allows limited control over your own work, but in general doesn't stop others from using your ideas for themselves.

Ah, and there's the really nasty part about copyright law: It sucks when it applies to major corporate powers, but it's nice when it applies to yourself. I imagine the corporate powers in question feel the same, just the other way around.

And of course, what exactly is "using the ideas for themselves" anyways? For example, just recently I played a couple of songs at an open mike event at a local cafe. One of those songs was my own, but the other was a cover of the Red Hot Chili Peppers song "Breaking the Girl". Now, I don't seriously expect anyone to get riled up about this; I didn't profit from it, and the venue was pretty small (about 40-50 people). In fact I see local bands do this sort of thing all the time at gigs they get paid for. No one bothers them about it.

But now let's say I recorded that event and release it on the internet. Now I've published a copyrighted work. I still don't profit from it, and the audience may or may not be bigger (the potential audience would be huge though). I'd think it much more likely the record companies would be down on my back almost instantly. What's really changed though? The medium, basicly. Instead of using direct communication through sound waves and the like, I'm using electrons and electronic equipment to broadcast my musical talent (nearly null, by the way :^).

Copyright is a nebulous creature. It applies here, but not there. It's okay to copy, but only if you critique or satirize it. And so on. The problems we tend to talk about here is that corporate powers have taken advantage of this nebulosity to their own ends. It's gotten to the point where I don't even know if I'm violating copyright law by playing the cover of a popular song by a well-known band!

But in the end, one thing won't change: human nature. We're all corrupt to some degree. It's just how much that corruption will trample on the rights of others. If I keep control over my copyrights, it's personal freedom in action. If a corporation does it, it's an outrage.

Re:Swallow *THIS*....

The funny thing is, with information travelling so quickly these days, copyrights should be shortening rather than lengthening. A Hit movie can pay for itself in a single weekend. Others may do so in a month. Within 6 months, profits are dwindling to nothing as it enters the dollar matinee showings. Then it hits video/pay-per-view and premium cable. Within 5 years, it's on prime time network TV. Shortly thereafter, it disappears completely (at one time it would be a late-night movie on TV, but that time slot is reserved for infomercials now). Surely the profits from that 5-10 year time slot will be adequate incentive to create. The original 14 years with option to renew would more than cover it.

With the current limits, to anyone living when a work comes out, it will NEVER hit public domain. The animated movie you saw at age five will be under copyright for longer than you could reasonably expect to live. As the article pointed out, by the time it finally does pass into the public domain, it may have crumbled to dust.

Can we truly claim to even HAVE a culture if it's all owned by corperate entities and will stay that way until after we die?

Battle over Bono Act

The site http://www.public.asu.edu/~dkarjala/ [asu.edu] has a lot of information about the Sonny Bono Copyright Act and the disgusting lobbying that went on to get the legislation passed. It also has sample letters to Congress and Congresional addresses.

I urge everyone to write their representatives complaining about the subversion of copyright and intellectual property rights that the industry is in the process of conducting. It is worth also mentioning the Digital Millenium Copyright Act, which allows even the terms of access to copyrighted works to be dictated, and the resulting assault by the MPAA on our rights to view DVDs we purchased.

To those who say your voice is not heard, most members of Congress and people in government are ordinary folk looking to continue in their jobs. Both soft money industry donations and your voice matter. If you think your voice cannot match the lobby funds of industry titans - you are mistaken.

Taking a cynical view that public interest plays no role, in a purely economic analysis, their is a cost to every vote. Given the money spent on campaigns and the number of votes actually up for grabs - that is a significant conversion price, probably comparable to a $500 donation.

A thousand letters from constituents to every representative addressing will make a difference. So please put a fraction of the time spent reading Slashdot into efforts to inform Congress and the media about the abuse of IP laws!

Copyright should be like trademark

It is my understanding that in trademark law, a person or company has to defend the trademark through usage. If a person or company does not 'defend' a trademark by using it, the trademark will expire.

In addition, the trademark authority is local to such a defense. For example, to enforce a federal trademark, a person or company must prove that the trademark is used in advertising or marketing on a national level, and not just in a particular town or state.

A restaurant in Oklahoma named 'Food Palace' couldn't sue a restaurant in Washington state for trademark infringment. However, McDonald's, which operates worldwide, can 'defend' its trademark globally.

I believe copyright should be the same way. Use it or lose it. It is patently wrong, immoral, stupid and counter-intuitive to allow companies to maintain large archives of unused, unpublished materials sealed off forever from public domain.

In this respect, I agree with companies like Disney being able to maintain their copyrights indefinitely. If Disney invests as much time and money on these characters as they do to keep them 'alive', they should be encouraged to do so. That is their business. If they ever give up this business, however, then it should immediately (being a reasonable couple of years, perhaps) go into the public domain.

http://www.nara.gov/exhall/charters/declaration/ declaration.html

Wow, great read

I've got to, ahem, keep a copy of that article - some good, uh, pointers in there!

About redubbing, some of my favorites are "Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid" w/ Steve Martin and "J Men Forever" by Firesign Theatre - old films chopped up with a new, improved soundtrack.

On taking movies out of circulation, I was peeved to hear Bill Cosby bought up all the old "Our Gang - Little Rascal's" movies and taken them private, probably for the same reasons "Song of the South" is out of circulation - This I heard from a guy who does "Amos & Andy" recreations, which ARE in circulation, and, by the way, almost any RADIO programs before 1960 are fair game, free and pubic - you can even set up shop and sell tapes, cd's, etc of those if you want, and many people do. Also, (was going to put this in the 'usenet' article) there are many available in alt.binaries.sounds.(mp3,oldradio something like that) - perfectly legal.

Lastly, I think at some time courts are going to have to address the intentions of the Constitution copyright laws to advance arts and science, not make neverending gold buckets for ancestral estates. Quote,

"... they now can use videotapes, camcorders, Photoshop, digital film editing, recordable CDs, MP3 files, and the Internet. The result has been an explosion of amateur films, fiction, and music, all of which can be "published" for a minimal investment by putting them on the Web."

<SARCASM> Now we wouldn't want THAT now would we?</SARCASM>

Ramen noodle reputation tarnished by Microsoft®

This kills me, about trademarks:

"Under this rule, it is illegal to produce, say, Microsoft brand ramen noodles, even though that other Microsoft isn't in the noodle business, lest the lousiness of your pasta undermine the software company's reputation."

That's backwards - the lousiness of Msft would ruin the noodle business! Everyone would start to think they contained worms or "This noodle product is provided with no warrenty, express or implied, as to merchantability or fitness for human consumption"

Nice to see...

....Reason taking a libertarian view that isn't just a coded form of "if it interferes with profit, it's bad," even when it's the profit of an 800lb gorilla sucking at the public -- not necessarily governmental -- teat. Witness some of the "libertarian" arguments against anti-trust actions.

One of the things that made me turn my back on US Libertarian Party, pwofit-is-your-fwend style libertarianism is how the word "coercion" gets applied only to guvmint, while private coercion doesn't exist -- it's "property rights" and "market forces." The increasingly important struggle over copyright is a beautiful example of freedom being not necessarily aligned with property rights.

This is an old issue that keeps getting worse

Spider Robinson, a fine science fiction writer, author of the Callahan's Crosstime Saloon series wrote a short story back in the early 80's called Melancholy Elephants about precisely this problem. He pointed out that carried to it's ultimate conclusion, extending both the scope and duration of copyright protection would simply result in an environment that stifles creativity rather than promoting it. Every story, every melody, every character name would have the potential to violate the copyright of someone long dead whose heirs could of course sue. He makes his living as an author. He stands to lose royalties for his heirs down the line for opposing longer terms for copyright protection. But he also stands to lose by having copyrights that should long since have expired used against him.

95-70

What kills me is that a corporation has a 95 year copyright while an individual has 70. So that means that John Lennon's imagine is protected for 70 years, but the Old Spice theme song is secure for 95. What warped thinking! I am surprised, if most people in the creative community aren't incorporating themselves. Here's a scenario. You write a song in 2000,and incorporate yourself, protecting your song for 95 years. You die that year, as your first and only son is born. In 2018, your son, has a son, in 2036, he has a son, in 2054, he has a son, 2072, this son has a kid, who has a kid himself in 2090. There is an accident that kills the father. For the next 5 years until the copyright expires, the great great great great grandson has control over your work, making money off of it, and authorizing its public usage. Yes. This is so totally fair. NOT!

Re:Time to stop reassigning copyright

Duh! It was Windows' fault! It ate part of my cut and paste! Yes indeed, I meant OpenLaw [harvard.edu] like that. Please go there now and look up the Eldred v. Reno case [harvard.edu]. I previewed and checked that the links work this time...:o/

Consciousness is not what it thinks it is
Thought exists only as an abstraction

A letter to the editor of "Performing Songwriter"

The following is a letter I wrote several months ago to the editor of "Performing Songwriter" magazine about a column written by Bill Parsons" about the "Sonny Bono Copyright Extension Act" and the "Fairness In Music Licencing Act". I make a number of points that I believe are valid and would like to share them with a larger number of people. The editor never responded.

We've been subscribers to Performing Songwriter for a number of years.

In general, we enjoy the content, especially Janis Ian's column. But one item has always bothered me. Your lack of a letters column. I realize that your publishing schedule and limited editorial space might make this a bit more difficult, but the fact is that you don't do so even on your web site, where space is for all practical purposes unlimited.

This lack has kept me from writing about something else that has annoyed me to no end for quite some time: Bill Parson's "Legislative Update". I realize Parsons is a performing songwriter, but I suspect that is not his primary source of income. He is singing from the RIAA/ASCAP/BMI songbook, and in the interest of full disclosure perhaps you should reveal who he has received a paycheck from this year. My point is, he sounds exactly like a lobbyist. His web page on songs.com states that he is "...a former aide to consumer advocate Ralph Nader". I have no problem with that...just with who is he *currently* aiding?*

Now, I have no problem with political debate, but you have provided no forum for anyone to respond to Parson's ill-considered attacks on the public domain, and passionate defense of the rights of huge publishing empires under the disingenuous guise of "protecting the rights of songwriters".

But this latest, an attack on Eric Eldred is the worst. As the editor, did you bother to visit the Eldred Press web site? Parsons paints Eldred as a commercial publisher, trying to weasel out of paying for work. This is so far from the truth that it verges on libelous.

Here's Eric Eldred's web site:

http://eldred.ne.mediaone.net/ [mediaone.net]

Does this look like the commercial entity that Parson's implies? I quote Parsons:

"Eldrich Press is run by Eric Eldred, who publishes old and lesser known books on the internet. To minimize his costs, Eldred focuses mainly on works whose copyrights have fallen into the public domain and are therefore available to the public to use free of charge."

The implication is that Eldred has a commercial interest (a reasonable assumption from someone I assume to be a lobbyist). The truth is, he does not, and never has. Also, the use of the loaded term "fallen into the public domain". Read the Constitution: the public domain is the intended repository of all creative works. Copyright is a limited right, granted for a limited period of time. For 28 years to be extended to 150 years is a mockery.

Perhaps this is hard to grasp, the intention of the framers that everything should naturally fall into the public domain. I find it useful to imagine that Benjamin Franklin had never invented the public lending library. Imagine that tomorrow, someone tried to do so. Imagine the uproar from copyright holders:

"What! You want to use tax dollars to buy our product and let people use it for free?!? You want to put copy machines in thebuilding?!"

This modern day Franklin would never get away with it...they'dcrucify him.

Also, I'd suggest exercising some editorial discretion and rein in Parson's annoying habit of referring to the "(Un)Fairness In Music Licensing Act". It might have been "cute" the first time, but lacking a balancing opposing viewpoint, it's just childish.

And frankly, childishness is the major issue here. It takes children some years to learn to share, and to realize the greater good for all accomplished by sharing. And that's what this is about - the desire of one man (Eldred) to share works that are no longer producing income for their original creators, as the very grown-up framers of the Constitution intended. Here's the passage fromArticle 1:

"To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to theirrespective Writings and Discoveries"

You can find a lot more about this from the following page:

• http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/eldredvreno/ [harvard.edu]
• http://www.boston.com/globe/magazine/8-29/features tory1.shtml [boston.com]

The Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension act was bought and paid for by a group that contributed more lobbying money than the tobacco companies combined. Parsons claims that it benefits performing songwriters. This is a damned lie. It extends the term of copyright from 50 years after any songwriter is dead and gone to 70 years after their heart has stopped beating. In what possible way does this benefit any songwriter? That, in the unlikely event one of your songs remains popular for 70 years after you're dead, your great-grandchildren rather than your grandchildren will be on the gravy train? And it is a nice train..."Rhapsody In Blue" sold to United Airlines for a cool half-million - providing a lot of money to use to ensure the train keep right on running.

Parsons is appealing to songwriters, none of whom will receive the any benefit from it, that this act is a good thing. Do you believe that there is some great social good accomplished by making a few "trust fund babies" that outweighs the vast social good accomplished by having a large and thriving public domain? Because, that's the ultimate goal of the copyright extensionists. The elimination of the public domain.

Try to imagine a world where Stephen Foster's songs had never entered the public domain. Public domain keeps songs alive, by making it easy for publishers to keep them in print, to provide a world of tunes that songwriters can use to embroider into their own work.

Because the truth is, songwriters do not create melodies. They discover them. In western music, there are a finite number of possible melodies, even fewer in the popular keys. Every songwriter "creates" a melody at some time, only to later find out that Mozart had used it while he was still in diapers. Try to imagine that the basic 4-bar blues riff was copyrighted; that's the world that Parsons wants for us.

A good example of how overly long copyright periods inhibit artists: Kate Bush wrote a song using Molly Bloom's speech from "Ulysses". The song fit the words beautifully and it was nearly ready from release when the Joyce estate refused permission. No amount of bargaining could get Joyce's grandson to relent, and Kate had to "re-write the speech" into her song "The Sensual World". James Joyce didn't refuse Kate permission, his grandson did. He's proven to be the bane of Joyce scholars his entire life, and now will for generations to come.

There's a lot more I could write about this, but the fact that you have no avenue for your readers to respond, to present the opposing side of a political lobbying effort, makes my effort seem pointless. I can only hope that you'll make an effort to see the entire picture, and not just the one that some people are paid to promote. When looking at political issuse, the phrase "follow the money" is apt: look to see which side has a large amount of money to promote it's effort; the side that has less money is the one more likely to have the public's best interest at heart.

Re:Look at this

I find it hard to believe that a discussion such as this is occurring without any reference at all to Project Gutenberg. [promo.net] Right now, there are about 3000 public domain works in the PG library. You can find everything from the Bible to the complete works of Mark Twain.

Because of the explosion of poublishing over the past century, 99% of all works available to the public are currently under copyright! It was never the intention of the founders of the U.S. to have a copyright that was perpetual. The idea was that it provides inducements to the creators of works if they will have a limited time under which they might profit exclusively if they so desired. The very concept of someone's great grandson holding copyright over a work that was written over 60 years previously makes a mockery of the purpose for which the copyright was included in the constitution.

For those of you unaware of the wording of the relevant portion of the constitution, I offer the following from Article 1 Section 8 of same:

Section 8. The Congress shall have power...

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;

I fail to see how withholding a work from the public domain for 90 years could "promote the progress of science and useful arts. Perhaps someone could enlighten me as to the logic?

I further fail to see how one could stretch the phrase "for limited times" to one that could encompass almost a century.

Z

Copyright and the Bible

If todays intellectual property laws were in force at the time of Martin Luthar King, the Catholic church would have been able to prevent the translation of the Bible into local languages (German, later English, etc.) and would have been able to prevent its being published at all.

No Reformation.
No Renaissance.
No Science.
No Industrial Revolution.
No exponential growth of knowledge and technology.[1]

What have we already denied ourselves and our children, in subscribing and adhering to this atrocity? What will the media lobby and our so easilly (and cheaply) sold congress take from us next?

[1] IMHO this is what we are on the cusp of losing now, along with the usual targets of such attack: civil liberties, freedom of speach and expression, and so on. How can you do any science if the cost of "standing on the shoulders of others" eats up the bulk of your research budget? In the areas of applied science and technology we already live with this to a large degree - there is a reason airplanes and automobiles have changed little in the last several decades, and it isn't because we've perfected the technology by a long way.

Re:Swallow *THIS*....

It's sad that so many materials are locked away, hidden and ususable by the general public.

This is an additional, and very serious, problem with current copyright law. For example, movie studios have an economic incentive to not releasing old works. When these titles die, it removes the small competition they pose for your viewing time.

It is hard to know how many other treasures like It's a Wonderful Life (which beacme popular when it entered the public domain before it was stolen by Viacom [msn.com]) are sitting in film vaults in Hollywood slowly deteriorating.

There is a solution to this problem, and it draws on the early copyright law of this country. Two prominent features of the original copyright law where 1) Registration and 2) Renewal.

1. Registration of objects seeking copyright protection insured that a copy of a book, for example, was stored by the government so that it would be available to enter the public domain at the expiration of the copyright. Thus the public was assured that it's public domain interests were not ignored.

2. Renewal required that an author seeking the full length of copyright term request renewal after 14 years. This insured that most works entered the public domain quickly while extremely valuable works could be renewed by their creators. Thus average copyright terms were kept short, yet the incentive to create was maintained because valuable works could have their copyrights renewed (for up to 28 years).

It is clearly evident today how thoughtful our forefathers were in creating a system of intellectual property which spawned innovation and creativity. Current law does not serve that purpose, but only the purpose of monopoly. If we return to a system requiring registration and renewal, we can more fairly balance and protect the intellectual property rights of authors with the public good. Requiring registration (digital submissions of films, music, books, etc.) for a full copyright term would insure that these creations don't disappear from the earth.

Proposal: An intelligent system, I think, would grant a 10 year automatic copyright, with the option for a 50 year renewal provided only that a digital archive was submitted to the Copyright Office.

Robert Wilde