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> What if you write a book which only becomes popular 20 years after you first publish it I would thank the Gods because they gave me a second chance when nobo

> What if you write a book which only becomes popular 20 years after you first publish it I would thank the Gods because they gave me a second chance when nobody, including me, expected it and probably other books of mine would be rediscovered as well and I would be contacted to write something new. The point is that after 20 years of producing zero income, anyone would lose interest and if it gets a sudden popularity it's probably someone else's merit. But we are talking about extremely rare conditions. What if you buy a house and sell it the day before its price skyrocket? What if you buy stocks and the day after you sell them they go up 10x? You the author have moral rights over the creation, you'll always be the author, but your rights to an economic compensation over something you created should be limited in time. Especially because most of the time economic rights are sold to entities that only care about profiting from the IPs and nothing else. Publishing a book it's much like publishing an opensource projects, once it's out, it's out, it's no longer yours. A friend of mine is a popular comic book writer in my country, he has been publishing comics for over 20 years, growing his audience over a long span of time. When he suddenly had a spike in popularity, the first thing he did was to publish a collection of all his past works, sell it and make a profit (the comics are all still free on the web for those who wonna read them without paying) He is the author and controls the source material, he owns all the originals he owns (and wrote) all the scripts, they have great value even if the copyright was hypothetically expired. But let's look at it from another angle: what if an unknown book becomes popular 25 years after the author wrote it, because someone saw a great potential in it, a potential that 25 years before wasn't even there and adapted it to make it resonate with the present? Think about disaster stories about climate change or a pandemic, they are much more popular now than 25 years ago. Isn't it the person who did the research and found the book in the first place the real protagonist of this story? Should the author be compensated because there was an outbreak? On the other hand, if you want to adapt a story, wouldn't you contact the original author first? Publishing something that becomes a hit it's always worth it, even if your economic rights on it have expired.

qwytw 5y ago
> What if you buy a house and sell it the day before its price skyrocket > What if you buy stocks and the day after you sell them they go up 10x? I don't see how are these in any way equivalent unless I made an explicit choice to renounce (e.g. by selling it) the ownership of my work unless I was actually legally forced to sell my house 20 years after I bought regardless if I want to or not. > Publishing something that becomes a hit it's always worth it, even if your economic rights on it have expired. But the the author would likely not be the one profiting the most or at all in this case compared to large publishers and other corporations. Talking about the rarity of such situation the Witcher series is a pretty good example. The books were modestly successful in Poland and other Centre or East European countries and only became internationally popular after the video games released. While it did not took exactly 20 years (between 18 and 23 years for individual books) for the series to be translated to English let's assume for the sake of argument the copyright would had expired by then. So the publishing companies that published these books in English would have been able to keep 100% of the profits and wouldn't be required to compensate the author in any way. How is that fair? And how does that benefit anyone besides the international corporations which own these publishing companies? Especially considering that it inherently disadvantages authors writing in languages other English (or any other language with a huge market). Publishers could just wait 20 years before copyright expires before translating anything and avoid paying royalties to the author. Basically how I see it, you're proposing that companies or individuals that are better capable at monetizing someone else's work should have the right to not compensate the author and keep all the profits for themselves. Which is both unfair and disincentivizes creating new content in the first place. Why create something new when you can take something someone else wrote/created in the past improve it and/or invest more into marketing or distribution mechanisms than the original author was able and sell it for a profit. I mean Disney is successful not because they own the copyright of some old movies featuring Mickey Mouse but because they have the capital, the brand and know-how required to create successful new movies and these factor would make large corporations even more dominant if they could just legally make movies/other content based on books or script for free as long they waited for 20/X years (instead of having to wait until the Author dies + X years).
- peoplefromibiza 5y ago
  > I don't see how are these in any way equivalent unless I made an explicit choice to renounce (e.g. by selling it) the ownership of my work unless I was actually legally forced to sell my house 20 years after I bought regardless if I want to or not. you asked WHAT IF it is not like that right now, and it's wrong IMO > But the the author would likely not be the one profiting the most or at all in this case compared to large publishers and other corporations. so, what are you exactly arguing about? > Basically how I see it, you're proposing that companies or individuals that are better capable at monetizing someone else's work should have the right to not compensate the author and keep all the profits for themselves That's exactly how it is now. And it lasts a century (more or less) Do you really think that authors are paid in percentage of the publisher's profits? The majority of them get paid once when they sell their rights, and that's it. Usually it's not even a large amount. But you got it completely backwards, what I wrote is I imagine a system where if the publisher makes a lot more money (with a lot to be defined) than the original author made before the creation went public domain, then __they could be forced to compensate the original author__ > So the publishing companies that published these books in English would have been able to keep 100% of the profits and wouldn't be required to compensate the author in any way. How is that fair? That's exactly what everyone gets wrong. They bought the rights for a relatively unknown story paying peanuts, made it big and profited. Do you really believe they paid a lot of money for something that was relatively obscure even in Poland? Do you really believe that the Witcher could become a HIT on its own merits? Shortening the life of copyright would make this hoarding practices useless, because everybody could make a Witcher after 20 years, now nobody can, because whoever bought the rights will keep renewing them for a century. > I mean Disney is successful not because they own the copyright of some old movies featuring Mickey Mouse but because they have the capital No it's because Mickey mouse is a trademark and they will sue everyone who tries to create whatever fictional mouse. So other large corporations will make a pre-deal with Disney to be safe and smaller ones will avoid the mouse thing entirely. If it really wasn't so important, why spend so much money to defend it? Life long copyright is the root of all evil in the publishing/entertainment business.
  - qwytw 5y ago
    >Do you really think that authors are paid in percentage of the publisher's profits? For books authors generally get a percentage of revenue (with some caveats) which is even better. > They bought the rights for a relatively unknown story paying peanuts, made it big and profited. I assume the the author still made a lot of money from increased book sales. > Do you really believe that the Witcher could become a HIT on its own merits? If it was written in English then perhaps. > I imagine a system where if the publisher makes a lot more money (with a lot to be defined) than the original author made before the creation went public domain, then __they could be forced to compensate the original author__ Sorry I think I missed this bit. However again this would only benefit the publisher and not the author until the threshold is reached. After it's reached I assume authors would get something similar to what they get under the current system? I'm not completely against having some compensation mechanism similar to books royalties for derived works like games or movies under which would be entitled to receive some % of revenue as opposed to whatever they have negotiated with the studio in advance. However I'm afraid this would disincentivize studios from making on movies based on less successful/well-known books altogether. > Shortening the life of copyright would make this hoarding practices useless, because everybody could make a Witcher after 20 years, now nobody can, because whoever bought the rights will keep renewing them for a century. Is that a necessarily positive outcome? Even if you don't believe that authors should have the right to excise creative control over their work why is it any better for the society if anyone can freely make movies, games or sequels based on the Witcher universe? Even if is, wouldn't it better to ban or limit the exclusivity clause in contracts rather ban copyright all together? (e.g. Authors could have the right to sell their rights to multiple companies or any contract would legally be limited to fixed numbers of years after which the author would be able to resell them someone else) >No it's because Mickey mouse is a trademark and they will sue everyone who tries to create whatever fictional mouse. Unless you're suggesting that trademarks should be abolished as well Disney will still be able to do that. >Life long copyright is the root of all evil in the publishing/entertainment business. I disagree, I think overall it's one of the main reasons the current publishing/entertainment industry even exists and the world would have been a much bleaker place without it. I mean yes corporations often abuse the current system and it's flawed in many ways but throwing it out of the window and introducing an arbitrary 20 year (or any other fixed limit) would just further disadvantage individual authors without solving any actual problems.

qwytw 5y ago

> What if you buy a house and sell it the day before its price skyrocket > What if you buy stocks and the day after you sell them they go up 10x? I don't see how are these in any way equivalent unless I made an explicit choice to renounce (e.g. by selling it) the ownership of my work unless I was actually legally forced to sell my house 20 years after I bought regardless if I want to or not. > Publishing something that becomes a hit it's always worth it, even if your economic rights on it have expired. But the the author would likely not be the one profiting the most or at all in this case compared to large publishers and other corporations. Talking about the rarity of such situation the Witcher series is a pretty good example. The books were modestly successful in Poland and other Centre or East European countries and only became internationally popular after the video games released. While it did not took exactly 20 years (between 18 and 23 years for individual books) for the series to be translated to English let's assume for the sake of argument the copyright would had expired by then. So the publishing companies that published these books in English would have been able to keep 100% of the profits and wouldn't be required to compensate the author in any way. How is that fair? And how does that benefit anyone besides the international corporations which own these publishing companies? Especially considering that it inherently disadvantages authors writing in languages other English (or any other language with a huge market). Publishers could just wait 20 years before copyright expires before translating anything and avoid paying royalties to the author. Basically how I see it, you're proposing that companies or individuals that are better capable at monetizing someone else's work should have the right to not compensate the author and keep all the profits for themselves. Which is both unfair and disincentivizes creating new content in the first place. Why create something new when you can take something someone else wrote/created in the past improve it and/or invest more into marketing or distribution mechanisms than the original author was able and sell it for a profit. I mean Disney is successful not because they own the copyright of some old movies featuring Mickey Mouse but because they have the capital, the brand and know-how required to create successful new movies and these factor would make large corporations even more dominant if they could just legally make movies/other content based on books or script for free as long they waited for 20/X years (instead of having to wait until the Author dies + X years).

peoplefromibiza 5y ago
> I don't see how are these in any way equivalent unless I made an explicit choice to renounce (e.g. by selling it) the ownership of my work unless I was actually legally forced to sell my house 20 years after I bought regardless if I want to or not. you asked WHAT IF it is not like that right now, and it's wrong IMO > But the the author would likely not be the one profiting the most or at all in this case compared to large publishers and other corporations. so, what are you exactly arguing about? > Basically how I see it, you're proposing that companies or individuals that are better capable at monetizing someone else's work should have the right to not compensate the author and keep all the profits for themselves That's exactly how it is now. And it lasts a century (more or less) Do you really think that authors are paid in percentage of the publisher's profits? The majority of them get paid once when they sell their rights, and that's it. Usually it's not even a large amount. But you got it completely backwards, what I wrote is I imagine a system where if the publisher makes a lot more money (with a lot to be defined) than the original author made before the creation went public domain, then __they could be forced to compensate the original author__ > So the publishing companies that published these books in English would have been able to keep 100% of the profits and wouldn't be required to compensate the author in any way. How is that fair? That's exactly what everyone gets wrong. They bought the rights for a relatively unknown story paying peanuts, made it big and profited. Do you really believe they paid a lot of money for something that was relatively obscure even in Poland? Do you really believe that the Witcher could become a HIT on its own merits? Shortening the life of copyright would make this hoarding practices useless, because everybody could make a Witcher after 20 years, now nobody can, because whoever bought the rights will keep renewing them for a century. > I mean Disney is successful not because they own the copyright of some old movies featuring Mickey Mouse but because they have the capital No it's because Mickey mouse is a trademark and they will sue everyone who tries to create whatever fictional mouse. So other large corporations will make a pre-deal with Disney to be safe and smaller ones will avoid the mouse thing entirely. If it really wasn't so important, why spend so much money to defend it? Life long copyright is the root of all evil in the publishing/entertainment business.
- qwytw 5y ago
  >Do you really think that authors are paid in percentage of the publisher's profits? For books authors generally get a percentage of revenue (with some caveats) which is even better. > They bought the rights for a relatively unknown story paying peanuts, made it big and profited. I assume the the author still made a lot of money from increased book sales. > Do you really believe that the Witcher could become a HIT on its own merits? If it was written in English then perhaps. > I imagine a system where if the publisher makes a lot more money (with a lot to be defined) than the original author made before the creation went public domain, then __they could be forced to compensate the original author__ Sorry I think I missed this bit. However again this would only benefit the publisher and not the author until the threshold is reached. After it's reached I assume authors would get something similar to what they get under the current system? I'm not completely against having some compensation mechanism similar to books royalties for derived works like games or movies under which would be entitled to receive some % of revenue as opposed to whatever they have negotiated with the studio in advance. However I'm afraid this would disincentivize studios from making on movies based on less successful/well-known books altogether. > Shortening the life of copyright would make this hoarding practices useless, because everybody could make a Witcher after 20 years, now nobody can, because whoever bought the rights will keep renewing them for a century. Is that a necessarily positive outcome? Even if you don't believe that authors should have the right to excise creative control over their work why is it any better for the society if anyone can freely make movies, games or sequels based on the Witcher universe? Even if is, wouldn't it better to ban or limit the exclusivity clause in contracts rather ban copyright all together? (e.g. Authors could have the right to sell their rights to multiple companies or any contract would legally be limited to fixed numbers of years after which the author would be able to resell them someone else) >No it's because Mickey mouse is a trademark and they will sue everyone who tries to create whatever fictional mouse. Unless you're suggesting that trademarks should be abolished as well Disney will still be able to do that. >Life long copyright is the root of all evil in the publishing/entertainment business. I disagree, I think overall it's one of the main reasons the current publishing/entertainment industry even exists and the world would have been a much bleaker place without it. I mean yes corporations often abuse the current system and it's flawed in many ways but throwing it out of the window and introducing an arbitrary 20 year (or any other fixed limit) would just further disadvantage individual authors without solving any actual problems.