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New Zealand Officials To Scrap Copyright Law; Start From Scratch

13 points by vaksel 18y ago

anigbrowl 18y ago
While New Zealand is not a world hub of IP, this should be closely watched. It will be extremely interesting to compare the terms of the 'rebooted' legislation with the existing incrementally altered system. I can't guess whether it will cut down the typical 'function creep' of incremental legislative extension or result in a major rebalancing in the same direction as the function creep (ie on behalf of copyright holders). I'll be surprised if it results in a tilt in favor of consumers. To the extent that HN has members or members have contacts over there, I hope someone will advocate alternative models such as Creative Commons licenses and similar, and argue on behalf of their legal utility. Another copyright issue that is little discussed is that of authorship. In Europe, if I write a book and you buy it, I may sell the copyright to you outright but I retain the right to be identified as the author. In the US no such right exists. I'm kinda stating the obvious here, but I hope people will pay close attention to this. It's not often the legal codebase is thrown out and rewritten, and this is a 'use it or lose it' situation for NZ citizens, whose participation and reaction will be closely studied by legislators and copyright holders elsewhere. Given the depressing manner in which US legislators have catered only to large copyright holders to undermine the original intention of the copyright process and basically cut off the natural flow of IP into the public domain, this has long-term implications for all of us.
spectre 18y ago
John Key (Prime Minister) and the National party have a history of selling out to business interests (especially overseas). Never the less the music and film industries here aren't as powerful as in the US (think of a NZ musician or movie other than LOTR). The ISP's blocked the last copyright legislation they tried to get through, hopefully they will continue to have a backbone.

13 points by vaksel 18y ago

While New Zealand is not a world hub of IP, this should be closely watched. It will be extremely interesting to compare the terms of the 'rebooted' legislation with the existing incrementally altered system. I can't guess whether it will cut down the typical 'function creep' of incremental legislative extension or result in a major rebalancing in the same direction as the function creep (ie on behalf of copyright holders). I'll be surprised if it results in a tilt in favor of consumers. To the extent that HN has members or members have contacts over there, I hope someone will advocate alternative models such as Creative Commons licenses and similar, and argue on behalf of their legal utility. Another copyright issue that is little discussed is that of authorship. In Europe, if I write a book and you buy it, I may sell the copyright to you outright but I retain the right to be identified as the author. In the US no such right exists. I'm kinda stating the obvious here, but I hope people will pay close attention to this. It's not often the legal codebase is thrown out and rewritten, and this is a 'use it or lose it' situation for NZ citizens, whose participation and reaction will be closely studied by legislators and copyright holders elsewhere. Given the depressing manner in which US legislators have catered only to large copyright holders to undermine the original intention of the copyright process and basically cut off the natural flow of IP into the public domain, this has long-term implications for all of us.

spectre 18y ago

John Key (Prime Minister) and the National party have a history of selling out to business interests (especially overseas). Never the less the music and film industries here aren't as powerful as in the US (think of a NZ musician or movie other than LOTR). The ISP's blocked the last copyright legislation they tried to get through, hopefully they will continue to have a backbone.