4 ms·

Does the legal justification for copyright differ in the EU vs the USA? In the USA, the nominal basis is to give a creator a monopoly over reproduction for a t

by bediger 15y ago

Does the legal justification for copyright differ in the EU vs the USA? In the USA, the nominal basis is to give a creator a monopoly over reproduction for a time, to encourage that creator to make more.

waitwhat 15y ago
That might have been true about the USA once upon a time, but ... The [Copyright Term Extension] Act extended these terms to life of the author plus 70 years and for works of corporate authorship to 120 years after creation or 95 years after publication, whichever endpoint is earlier. -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_Term_Extension_Act http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_Term_Extension_Act I'm not sure that extending copyright from lifetime+50years to lifetime+70years was really aimed at encouraging creators to create more.
- EdiX 15y ago
  It has also been regularly extended every time Mickey Mouse was about to enter public domain, the realistic expectation is that copyright in the USA will never expire.
  - waitwhat 15y ago
    I actually googled for "Mickey Mouse protection act" to find the name of the legislation. Steamboat Willy was released in 1928, so expect the next extension in around ten years time. There have only been 3 Mickey Mouse cartoons in the last 56 years and the cynic in me suspects that they are only being made to boost their moral justification for continually extending the copyright on the character. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Mickey_Mouse_cartoons http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Mickey_Mouse_cartoons
    - waitwhat 15y ago
      And maybe I was a touch too cynical. If she were here, my niece would be jumping about and down right now to remind me about http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mickey_Mouse_Clubhouse http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mickey_Mouse_Clubhouse in which Mickey has had a starring role for years.
- nkassis 15y ago
  What is sad about this is a lot of things that were created in the early 1900s will now be lost forever since copies cannot be made and archiving the works on a different medium would infringe copyright. Trying to get the rights for those things is impossible since the owners are dead. So we are going to loose a lot of early music recordings, film and books from that period.
  - wyungwhn 15y ago
    Whenever a revolution was successful in ancient China, the winner would burn the historical and cultural records of the loser, to prevent the old order from reorganizing and reviving. I see this as a slower version of that tactic, letting context and criticisms rot away, while your own carefully cultivated "history" becomes all that remains.
rmc 15y ago
No, the EU just recognised that intellectual property should be respected. Alas, unlike the USA, there is no offical reason why it should be protected.
- bediger 15y ago
  How does this "respect" account for independent invention? Many things (telegraph, telephone, Tee Vee, automobiles, Knuth-Morris-Pratt pattern matching) are invented nearly simultaneously by several inventors. If "intellectual property" is property, how can more than 1 person own it? If you don't account for independent invention, your "respect" is fake, and doesn't take into account the labor of the independent inventor.
tzs 15y ago
I recall some discussion of this in the copyright class I took in law school, and it was pretty interesting--hopefully I'll not misremember too much in what follows. It had something to do with the differences between the philosophies of Locke and Hegel, and how the former had more influence over American political philosophy, and the later had more influence over European political philosophy. Anyway, the net result is that in the US, the philosophical view of IP is tied to the idea that you should own the fruits of your labor, including mental labor. In Europe, the philosophical view is that the works of an author are an extension of the author's personality, and so you should have rights over them for the same reason you have rights over your mind. This is why European copyright law has much stronger recognition for so called "moral" rights than does the US, such as rights of attribution, rights of artists to prevent defacements of their works, and so on.

by bediger 15y ago

waitwhat 15y ago

That might have been true about the USA once upon a time, but ... The [Copyright Term Extension] Act extended these terms to life of the author plus 70 years and for works of corporate authorship to 120 years after creation or 95 years after publication, whichever endpoint is earlier. -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_Term_Extension_Act http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_Term_Extension_Act I'm not sure that extending copyright from lifetime+50years to lifetime+70years was really aimed at encouraging creators to create more.

EdiX 15y ago
It has also been regularly extended every time Mickey Mouse was about to enter public domain, the realistic expectation is that copyright in the USA will never expire.
- waitwhat 15y ago
  I actually googled for "Mickey Mouse protection act" to find the name of the legislation. Steamboat Willy was released in 1928, so expect the next extension in around ten years time. There have only been 3 Mickey Mouse cartoons in the last 56 years and the cynic in me suspects that they are only being made to boost their moral justification for continually extending the copyright on the character. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Mickey_Mouse_cartoons http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Mickey_Mouse_cartoons
  - waitwhat 15y ago
    And maybe I was a touch too cynical. If she were here, my niece would be jumping about and down right now to remind me about http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mickey_Mouse_Clubhouse http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mickey_Mouse_Clubhouse in which Mickey has had a starring role for years.
nkassis 15y ago
What is sad about this is a lot of things that were created in the early 1900s will now be lost forever since copies cannot be made and archiving the works on a different medium would infringe copyright. Trying to get the rights for those things is impossible since the owners are dead. So we are going to loose a lot of early music recordings, film and books from that period.
- wyungwhn 15y ago
  Whenever a revolution was successful in ancient China, the winner would burn the historical and cultural records of the loser, to prevent the old order from reorganizing and reviving. I see this as a slower version of that tactic, letting context and criticisms rot away, while your own carefully cultivated "history" becomes all that remains.

rmc 15y ago

No, the EU just recognised that intellectual property should be respected. Alas, unlike the USA, there is no offical reason why it should be protected.

bediger 15y ago
How does this "respect" account for independent invention? Many things (telegraph, telephone, Tee Vee, automobiles, Knuth-Morris-Pratt pattern matching) are invented nearly simultaneously by several inventors. If "intellectual property" is property, how can more than 1 person own it? If you don't account for independent invention, your "respect" is fake, and doesn't take into account the labor of the independent inventor.

tzs 15y ago

I recall some discussion of this in the copyright class I took in law school, and it was pretty interesting--hopefully I'll not misremember too much in what follows. It had something to do with the differences between the philosophies of Locke and Hegel, and how the former had more influence over American political philosophy, and the later had more influence over European political philosophy. Anyway, the net result is that in the US, the philosophical view of IP is tied to the idea that you should own the fruits of your labor, including mental labor. In Europe, the philosophical view is that the works of an author are an extension of the author's personality, and so you should have rights over them for the same reason you have rights over your mind. This is why European copyright law has much stronger recognition for so called "moral" rights than does the US, such as rights of attribution, rights of artists to prevent defacements of their works, and so on.