4 ms·

I notice every artist on this list is dead. These long copyright terms do not help artists, programmers, or anyone else who creates intellectual property. They

by oofabz 11y ago

I notice every artist on this list is dead. These long copyright terms do not help artists, programmers, or anyone else who creates intellectual property. They only benefit capital holders - people who purchased the rights and want a return on their benefit. Such people are wealthy already, they do not need government handouts. Companies like Disney do not require regulations like this in order to survive; they would do fine with less onerous copyright terms, and everyone else in society would benefit.

avar 11y ago
I don't agree with the current state of copyright, but I think pointing out that every one of these people are dead is a nonsensical argument. The question is what incentives should we give people to create creative works, and what should the cost to society be? If you're a smart guy with Robert Heinlein and copyright is more limited to a few years would you ever have written Starship Troopers? Or would you have gone into something like the real estate business which can last generations and keep your children and grandchildren happy & fed after you're long dead? Would the 1998 Starship Troopers movie have been released based on the 1959 book if copyright had been at its original 14 years? How about a lot of the "cult classic" works of today that only became really popular and earned money tens of years after their original release? I don't know what the right answer is, but it's a fallacy to assume that we'd have the same state of affairs if the incentives we can gave people to create creative works automatically expired after their death.
- Turbo_hedgehog 11y ago
  Let's assume Lord of the Rings was out of term and then a bunch of shoddily made movies got made based on the story and didn't reap much. Would New Line Cinema have laid out the budget for Peter Jackson to make the quality LOTR film trilogy if they didn't have exclusive rights to produce the movies? Those films generated huge amounts of revenue - would we have missed out on that if the books were in the public domain, or would the same revenue have been produced by now with it in the public domain?
  - gauravagarwalr 11y ago
    I am very sure if someone else even had made the movies, unless they were good, it wouldn't have mattered. Look at Fox churning out Fantastic Four movies, which are best to say the least about. Copyrights and IP does not necessarily produce a better content for society. On the contrary, better content does win in the long run.
  - josho 11y ago
    The answer is yes. Because Disney did it with Snow White, Cinderella, etc. A more recent example is Tangled--all those stories are derived from public domain characters. Don't even try to make the case that Disney wouldn't have made Tangled if the length of copyright was rolled back to the previous standard.
  - cobaltblue 11y ago
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_films_about_the_RMS_Titanic https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_films_about_the_RMS_Ti... You give a director a big budget from their past successes, not necessarily because the underlying thing is somehow easier or harder to make money off of due to copyright. That's icing, not cake.
  - Eric_WVGG 11y ago
    Yeah what kind of idiot would make a movie about Robin Hood, the Wizard of Oz, or Alice in Wonderland?
  - deleted 11y ago
    [deleted]
  - burkaman 11y ago
    Great point, or can you imagine Warner Bros. or Miramax taking a bet on a Sherlock Holmes movie without getting exclusive rights? The mere idea is absurd.
  - fenomas 11y ago
    > would we have missed out on that [revenue] if the books were in the public domain.. Why focus on that, instead of (say) the revenue not made by the Silmarillion movies Peter Jackson can't make because the books aren't in the public domain?
- oofabz 11y ago
  When Robert Heinlein wrote Starship Troopers, copyright was 28 years, or 56 if you are approved for an extension. I'm not advocating 14 years; I think 28-56 is fair. Clearly Heinlein would have written the book under those terms, because he did. Yes, a Starship Troopers movie would have been released with shorter copyright terms. It is cheaper to make a movie if you do not have to pay for the IP. Movies based on expired works are common, like Disney's movies based on books by Lewis Carroll, Hans Christian Andersen, and the Brothers Grimm. Derivative works can be very profitable.
  - avar 11y ago
    > I'm not advocating 14 years; I think 28-56 is fair. As I said I don't agree with the current state of copyright and think it should probably be much shorter, but it's interesting that discussions on this matter are rarely backed up with data. Why do you prefer 28-56 over 14, or 28-56 over 18-46? Before you mentioned that "every artist on this list is dead" as if it were patently absurd for copyright to survive the author. Maybe it is, but to use my previous example why would a talented author is his 80s with young children write another novel if that were the case instead of going into the real estate business? > Yes, a Starship Troopers movie would have been released with > shorter copyright terms. It is cheaper to make a movie if you do > not have to pay for the IP. You have to factor in movie studios being reluctant to base their works on public domain work because it makes it harder to create a franchise out of it. With a big hit like Starship Troopers being in the public domain nothing's stopping some other studio from releasing Starship Troopers 2, or selling action figures with that name etc. It's sometimes advantageous that a work you want to use is copyrighted, because that means you can secure exclusive rights to publish a derived work based on it.
    - viraptor 11y ago
      > why would a talented author is his 80s with young children write another novel I know this is HN and money is the name of the game, but... some people like creating things and if they want to do it in their 80s, they will. (Also it's extremely unlikely you'll have young children in your 80s) I doubt anyone publishes their first book with high expectation of success and huge income. So why would it be the case for the last one?
- deciplex 11y ago
  > If you're a smart guy with Robert Heinlein and copyright is more limited to a few years would you ever have written Starship Troopers? Or would you have gone into something like the real estate business which can last generations and keep your children and grandchildren happy & fed after you're long dead? Uh, you know you still get to keep the money you make, right? Like, we're not going to confiscate any unspent proceeds from a work after the copyright term is up. If you produce a work which is a huge success and makes you rich, then you're still going to be rich.
- zanny 11y ago
  > Would the 1998 Starship Troopers movie have been released based on the 1959 book if copyright had been at its original 14 years? Certainly, and it might have been made sooner, but not having to pay royalties to create a derivative work would definitely not stop someone from making it. > How about a lot of the "cult classic" works of today that only became really popular and earned money tens of years after their original release? These later creations would attract new audiences to the original authors newer works. Its not a void where your public domain creations are gone and no longer influential. > we'd have the same state of affairs if the incentives we can gave people to create creative works automatically expired after their death. Can you find any evidence of independent IP creators exclusively working under the pretense of being able to will their IP to descendants for profit? The vast majority of writers, musicians, photographers - any creative profession - are never in it for money. Because very few people can make money from these professions even with draconian IP, because its a popularity contest. You get one in a thousand that become popular successes, while the rest create out of passion with no expectation of profit. When the vast majority of creative IP is being made without profit motive, obviously copyright terms are uninfluencial upon all those except the successful - it goes as far as the existence of IP hurts the hobbyist creator because they have to navigate a minefield of how derivative their ideas are.

by oofabz 11y ago

avar 11y ago

I don't agree with the current state of copyright, but I think pointing out that every one of these people are dead is a nonsensical argument. The question is what incentives should we give people to create creative works, and what should the cost to society be? If you're a smart guy with Robert Heinlein and copyright is more limited to a few years would you ever have written Starship Troopers? Or would you have gone into something like the real estate business which can last generations and keep your children and grandchildren happy & fed after you're long dead? Would the 1998 Starship Troopers movie have been released based on the 1959 book if copyright had been at its original 14 years? How about a lot of the "cult classic" works of today that only became really popular and earned money tens of years after their original release? I don't know what the right answer is, but it's a fallacy to assume that we'd have the same state of affairs if the incentives we can gave people to create creative works automatically expired after their death.

Turbo_hedgehog 11y ago
Let's assume Lord of the Rings was out of term and then a bunch of shoddily made movies got made based on the story and didn't reap much. Would New Line Cinema have laid out the budget for Peter Jackson to make the quality LOTR film trilogy if they didn't have exclusive rights to produce the movies? Those films generated huge amounts of revenue - would we have missed out on that if the books were in the public domain, or would the same revenue have been produced by now with it in the public domain?
- gauravagarwalr 11y ago
  I am very sure if someone else even had made the movies, unless they were good, it wouldn't have mattered. Look at Fox churning out Fantastic Four movies, which are best to say the least about. Copyrights and IP does not necessarily produce a better content for society. On the contrary, better content does win in the long run.
- josho 11y ago
  The answer is yes. Because Disney did it with Snow White, Cinderella, etc. A more recent example is Tangled--all those stories are derived from public domain characters. Don't even try to make the case that Disney wouldn't have made Tangled if the length of copyright was rolled back to the previous standard.
- cobaltblue 11y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_films_about_the_RMS_Titanic https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_films_about_the_RMS_Ti... You give a director a big budget from their past successes, not necessarily because the underlying thing is somehow easier or harder to make money off of due to copyright. That's icing, not cake.
- Eric_WVGG 11y ago
  Yeah what kind of idiot would make a movie about Robin Hood, the Wizard of Oz, or Alice in Wonderland?
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- burkaman 11y ago
  Great point, or can you imagine Warner Bros. or Miramax taking a bet on a Sherlock Holmes movie without getting exclusive rights? The mere idea is absurd.
- fenomas 11y ago
  > would we have missed out on that [revenue] if the books were in the public domain.. Why focus on that, instead of (say) the revenue not made by the Silmarillion movies Peter Jackson can't make because the books aren't in the public domain?
oofabz 11y ago
When Robert Heinlein wrote Starship Troopers, copyright was 28 years, or 56 if you are approved for an extension. I'm not advocating 14 years; I think 28-56 is fair. Clearly Heinlein would have written the book under those terms, because he did. Yes, a Starship Troopers movie would have been released with shorter copyright terms. It is cheaper to make a movie if you do not have to pay for the IP. Movies based on expired works are common, like Disney's movies based on books by Lewis Carroll, Hans Christian Andersen, and the Brothers Grimm. Derivative works can be very profitable.
- avar 11y ago
  > I'm not advocating 14 years; I think 28-56 is fair. As I said I don't agree with the current state of copyright and think it should probably be much shorter, but it's interesting that discussions on this matter are rarely backed up with data. Why do you prefer 28-56 over 14, or 28-56 over 18-46? Before you mentioned that "every artist on this list is dead" as if it were patently absurd for copyright to survive the author. Maybe it is, but to use my previous example why would a talented author is his 80s with young children write another novel if that were the case instead of going into the real estate business? > Yes, a Starship Troopers movie would have been released with > shorter copyright terms. It is cheaper to make a movie if you do > not have to pay for the IP. You have to factor in movie studios being reluctant to base their works on public domain work because it makes it harder to create a franchise out of it. With a big hit like Starship Troopers being in the public domain nothing's stopping some other studio from releasing Starship Troopers 2, or selling action figures with that name etc. It's sometimes advantageous that a work you want to use is copyrighted, because that means you can secure exclusive rights to publish a derived work based on it.
  - viraptor 11y ago
    > why would a talented author is his 80s with young children write another novel I know this is HN and money is the name of the game, but... some people like creating things and if they want to do it in their 80s, they will. (Also it's extremely unlikely you'll have young children in your 80s) I doubt anyone publishes their first book with high expectation of success and huge income. So why would it be the case for the last one?
deciplex 11y ago
> If you're a smart guy with Robert Heinlein and copyright is more limited to a few years would you ever have written Starship Troopers? Or would you have gone into something like the real estate business which can last generations and keep your children and grandchildren happy & fed after you're long dead? Uh, you know you still get to keep the money you make, right? Like, we're not going to confiscate any unspent proceeds from a work after the copyright term is up. If you produce a work which is a huge success and makes you rich, then you're still going to be rich.
zanny 11y ago
> Would the 1998 Starship Troopers movie have been released based on the 1959 book if copyright had been at its original 14 years? Certainly, and it might have been made sooner, but not having to pay royalties to create a derivative work would definitely not stop someone from making it. > How about a lot of the "cult classic" works of today that only became really popular and earned money tens of years after their original release? These later creations would attract new audiences to the original authors newer works. Its not a void where your public domain creations are gone and no longer influential. > we'd have the same state of affairs if the incentives we can gave people to create creative works automatically expired after their death. Can you find any evidence of independent IP creators exclusively working under the pretense of being able to will their IP to descendants for profit? The vast majority of writers, musicians, photographers - any creative profession - are never in it for money. Because very few people can make money from these professions even with draconian IP, because its a popularity contest. You get one in a thousand that become popular successes, while the rest create out of passion with no expectation of profit. When the vast majority of creative IP is being made without profit motive, obviously copyright terms are uninfluencial upon all those except the successful - it goes as far as the existence of IP hurts the hobbyist creator because they have to navigate a minefield of how derivative their ideas are.