The single biggest fallacy in Randianism is the notion that the great industrialists of the past succeeded by their own genius. They didn’t; every single one got wealthy due to crony deals with politicians, “officially”-granted monopolies, protectionist laws, subsidies, etc; in other words fascism, not the free market. I’m an agorist; I believe all human interactions should be voluntary exchanges, and that nobody has a right to insert themselves into others’ voluntary arrangements. But crony capitalism warps markets with collectivist violence, making them evil. Let’s take one modern example, far more subtle than bailouts, subsidies or “regulations” so complex it takes a full-time legal department (such as big companies have and small ones don’t): the copyright scam. Basic copyright is a good concept; it allows creative people to make a living from their creations. Without it, nobody could afford to be a full-time creator because the unscrupulous would constantly be stealing their work. But look at how collusion between government and giant media corporations (especially Disney) have warped this good concept into a sick means of fascist corporations making billions from the intellectual creations of people who have been dead for decades. Mickey Mouse and many other characters should have entered the public domain years ago, but the collectives which “own” them paid off enough Congresscritters to ensure that won’t happen, and the process will continue indefinitely until something is done about it. But what could be done? Well, If I were dictatrix, I’d set copyright at life plus 21 years, so any minor children of a creator who died young could enjoy those rights until majority. But anything longer stifles future generations from doing new things with those creations (as Disney himself did with public-domain characters created by others). I’d also bar corporations from owning copyright; only human creators (including teams of specifically-named individuals) could have that. Of course, the creator could license his creation to a company, as Charles Moulton licensed Wonder Woman to DC. But 21 years after the creator croaks? It’s all over, including the licenses. Under my system, everything John Lennon did solo (post-Beatles) would’ve come out of copyright a couple of weeks after George Harrison died in ’01, and Harrison’s work would now have only three years left. But the collective Beatles creations would still be protected until 21 years after the last Beatle shuffles off this mortal coil. Superman would’ve entered the public domain two and a half years ago, 21 years after Jerry Siegel’s death (his co-creator, Joe Shuster, died in 1992); imagine what stories new creators could soon write about him or about Batman (out of copyright this coming November in my system).
The “creative team” structure leaves a loophole, but I think it’s a sensible one that could allow a creator to care for loved ones after his death. All a creator would need to do is give equal creative credit (at the time of publication; retroactive attribution would not be allowed) to the person he wanted to protect. So if Lennon had given Yoko Ono official equal credit on all or some of his post-Beatles work, the music so credited would still be under copyright until 21 years after she croaks. A clever creator could even give equal credit to their kids on individual works (one book or album per kid, that sort of thing). And it would last until 21 years after that “co-creator” died, but there would be no such thing as collectives of investors who never even met Walt Disney profiting from his genius 52 years after his death. This wouldn’t kill companies; for example, Disney would still hold rights to all from their ’90s revival, probably for decades to come, and they’ve got plenty of money to keep licensing new characters ad infinitum. But no more resting on laurels, and no more using the power of government to stop other people from doing exactly what 19th and 20th-century creators did.
Even if I think her Flash cartoons are an insult to all those people on Newgrounds who used the program to the fullest, Nina Paley is right to criticize how copyright has gone too far for its own good. Hell, if Walt Disney, the Fleischer brothers, Chuck Jones, Paul Terry, Frank Tashlin, Friz Freleng, Bob Clampett, Bob McKimson, Tex Avery, Bill Hanna, Joe Barbera, Lou Scheimer, Hal Sutherland, Hal Seeger, Seymour Kneitel, Joe Oriolo (who died the very year I was born, I might add), Jay Ward, Ted Eshbaugh, Paul Fennel, Bill Peet, Jack Kirby, etc. came back in spirit form, they would be horrified at what copyright has become.
Hear, hear!
I’d make it a flat thirty years. The point of copyright is to encourage creators; I doubt that much creativity is motivated by the hope of feeding one’s unborn heirs.
Another problem sometimes mentioned is that movies are rotting because no one dares to restore them, lest an unknown rights-holder pop up after the restoration has been done and claim infringement.
I’d like to hear from an expert on the relation between copyright and trademark. DC holds the copyright on all Batman stories and claims Batman’s costume as a trademark; trademarks don’t expire so long as their owner is actively using them, e.g. publishing new Batman stories. Maybe the trademark issue would merely prevent you from putting an image of Batman on your comic’s cover, on movie posters and the like.
This is a lot in line with the Pirate Parties (I support the one here in Massachusetts).
It didn’t make sense to me the first time I learned the current copyright limitation of author’s life plus 70 years. It seemed oddly excessive. But of course, the mega media corporations don’t want to lose their cash cows. You can bet as those expirations loom, there will be a whole lot of lobbying to carve out exceptions. I thought setting the limit at author’s life would be fine, but a short extension for one generation of heirs seems like a good idea. As it stands, copyright is a convoluted mess. I found some good info here for those who are curious: https://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ15a.pdf. The only straightforward part was “all works published in the United States before January 1, 1923, are in the public domain.”
It is interesting to note that there are entire industries which do NOT use copyrights or trademarks. Yet they are still enormous profitable and creative. Fashion design is one such industry — come out with a good design today, someone can make a very similar design under their own brand tomorrow. But that hasn’t kept the industry from being profitable.
To cite a very different example, innovations in the finance industry do not benefit from copyrights or trademark, yet the industry remains very profitable. Specific innovations, such as the Black Scholes Model of options valuation, have made their creators very wealthy, but were not copyrighted.
I read somewhere that Mark Twain was in favor of current copyright laws and he pleaded to Congress to extend their length so that not only his children but grandchildren could enjoy the fruits of his literary labors. They laughed in his face. So why the change of heart? In a word, Hollywood. I don’t think the book publishing industry of the 19th century made anywhere near what the railroad, steel, coal, or petroleum companies who had Congress at their beck and call. But now, books, along with music and video games are all part of the great Entertainment Spectrum that makes billions for corporations that own television networks and motion picture studios. AT&T Time Warner, Comcast, and Disney make more than those old titans of industry, and even newer tech companies like Amazon and Apple are no longer content to merely be pipelines for other companies content but are now producing their own stuff, too.
Mickey Mouse—thanks to both gridlock and the GOP’s current antipathy towards Hollywood—may yet fall into the public domain in a few years, but I don’t think there’s any hope of the copyright length becoming much shorter in my lifetime.
Sensible idea. The details are probably problematic in some situation (for example, computer code is often protected via copyright, here 5…10 years after creation would be far more sensible), but infinite extension is evil. It has to stop.
The fix for computer code should be expiration a few years (say, 7 years) after it goes off the market – and selling a new version will not maintain copyright in the old version. If Microsoft wants to keep Windows XP under copyright, it has to keep selling it alongside the newer versions. And I don’t see any reason to only have this rule for software. Books, movies, and TV shows should become public domain if too much time passes without continuing sales. Disney should not be able to whip up sales for favorite old movies by advertising that now is the last time in your lifetime to buy it – they are free to never sell it again, but in 7 years others should be allowed to duplicate the DVD’s and sell them. (There are also trademark issues here – the seller must make it clear that these copies are not from Disney, and there should be limits to how the titles and characters can be used in advertising.)
As for the rest, Disney holds both a trademark in the character Mickey Mouse (for example) and a copyright in each representation of the character. If it loses that copyright, others should be free to use Mickey Mouse in their own films, but not to sell “Mickey Mouse” films.