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Here is the USA copyright was designed "for a limited time" that is why your copyright should expire. The question becomes "what is a limited time?" My belief

Here is the USA copyright was designed "for a limited time" that is why your copyright should expire. The question becomes "what is a limited time?" My belief is that the artists lifetime is too long, and the artist it isn't really limited. I also dont believe you want copyrights to end with the artists death. So pick a limited time, good for everyone. I say 25 years.

dahart 5y ago
> copyright was designed “for a limited time” that is why your copyright should expire. That’s just circular, not a reason. The explanation & philosophy behind limited terms isn’t justified with “because it was designed with limited terms”. The rationale was stated in the article, and is written into copyright law. I don’t have any beef with your opinion, but so far it’s only an opinion and not backed up by clear reasoning or evidence. 25 years is shorter than copyright has ever been in the US, even in 1790, more than 200 years ago. If you believe creator lifetime is too long, part of the question is whether you would really stick to that if you were making money from your own work. Imagine, if you will, that you write software for your employer. Your software is currently protected by copyrights. But if that software copyright protection expires in 25 years, then any software you write can be legally taken by a brand new startup that doesn’t write code, it only sells code other people wrote, even using other people’s marketing material, including videos and imagery your company built. They offer your product for cheaper than your employer can, because their operating expenses are one hundredth of yours. Can your product & employer survive this, will your job last? If your job were actually on the line and might disappear suddenly anytime the company you work for has their work expire, do you still stick to your opinion that 25 years is enough?
- HWR_14 5y ago
  Ironically, we have excellent examples of your ideas in practice. Video games from 1995 are lost to time because they cannot be legally duplicated and delivered and even if they were the os to run them is under copyright and no longer sold. Meanwhile, the source code to all MSFT oses before XP leaked and it hasn't hurt them at all. Might it hurt them a bit if DosBOX used that leaked code to make a better emulator? I don't see how, they're already no longer selling that code.
- Ekaros 5y ago
  I don't see issue. 25 years sounds entirely reasonable copy right protection period for software. Meaning that you can freely sell 25 year old versions of software. If you haven't upgraded or released new versions under new term, you really don't deserve protections. Sell version 1 in 1995, it would be now free. On other hand the version 2 with more features as non-free upgrade released in 2000 would still have some protections left. Trademarks are also different from copyright. It gets complicated, but you shouldn't be able to do confusing things with them.
- CRConrad 5y ago
  >> copyright was designed “for a limited time” that is why your copyright should expire. > That’s just circular, not a reason. Oh, sure -- but no more circular than: >>> I was talking about within a society that already has copyright. Let me ask it another way: assuming that we have a copyright system, why should my copyrights ever expire? ...now is it? The obvious counter-question is, why should you have any copyright at all; why should we assume that we have a copyright system in the first place? > The explanation & philosophy behind limited terms isn’t justified with “because it was designed with limited terms” No, exactly. So, as the article says: Limited terms are a practical compromise between the per se equally unjustifiable extremes of "no copyright at all" and "eternal copyright". So what's the use of even asking for some principled a-priori-rationable reason in response to an article that explains why precisely that is not attainable?

dahart 5y ago

> copyright was designed “for a limited time” that is why your copyright should expire. That’s just circular, not a reason. The explanation & philosophy behind limited terms isn’t justified with “because it was designed with limited terms”. The rationale was stated in the article, and is written into copyright law. I don’t have any beef with your opinion, but so far it’s only an opinion and not backed up by clear reasoning or evidence. 25 years is shorter than copyright has ever been in the US, even in 1790, more than 200 years ago. If you believe creator lifetime is too long, part of the question is whether you would really stick to that if you were making money from your own work. Imagine, if you will, that you write software for your employer. Your software is currently protected by copyrights. But if that software copyright protection expires in 25 years, then any software you write can be legally taken by a brand new startup that doesn’t write code, it only sells code other people wrote, even using other people’s marketing material, including videos and imagery your company built. They offer your product for cheaper than your employer can, because their operating expenses are one hundredth of yours. Can your product & employer survive this, will your job last? If your job were actually on the line and might disappear suddenly anytime the company you work for has their work expire, do you still stick to your opinion that 25 years is enough?

HWR_14 5y ago
Ironically, we have excellent examples of your ideas in practice. Video games from 1995 are lost to time because they cannot be legally duplicated and delivered and even if they were the os to run them is under copyright and no longer sold. Meanwhile, the source code to all MSFT oses before XP leaked and it hasn't hurt them at all. Might it hurt them a bit if DosBOX used that leaked code to make a better emulator? I don't see how, they're already no longer selling that code.
Ekaros 5y ago
I don't see issue. 25 years sounds entirely reasonable copy right protection period for software. Meaning that you can freely sell 25 year old versions of software. If you haven't upgraded or released new versions under new term, you really don't deserve protections. Sell version 1 in 1995, it would be now free. On other hand the version 2 with more features as non-free upgrade released in 2000 would still have some protections left. Trademarks are also different from copyright. It gets complicated, but you shouldn't be able to do confusing things with them.
CRConrad 5y ago
>> copyright was designed “for a limited time” that is why your copyright should expire. > That’s just circular, not a reason. Oh, sure -- but no more circular than: >>> I was talking about within a society that already has copyright. Let me ask it another way: assuming that we have a copyright system, why should my copyrights ever expire? ...now is it? The obvious counter-question is, why should you have any copyright at all; why should we assume that we have a copyright system in the first place? > The explanation & philosophy behind limited terms isn’t justified with “because it was designed with limited terms” No, exactly. So, as the article says: Limited terms are a practical compromise between the per se equally unjustifiable extremes of "no copyright at all" and "eternal copyright". So what's the use of even asking for some principled a-priori-rationable reason in response to an article that explains why precisely that is not attainable?