'Should auld copyrights be forgot ?'

Subject: RE: BS: 'Should auld copyrights be forgot ?'
From: AKS
Date: 12 Jan 00 - 06:41 AM

I am growing more and more convinced that copyright protection period should not be else than the author's lifetime - if not less - ever.

And further, copyright should not be considered as 'transferrable property' (I mean that the author could choose to declare 'a product' as pd, perhaps to rent out or to licence it temporarily to someone else, but NOT to SELL it away). So the author, always, would be the one to say the final word whether her/his 'intellectual property' can or can not be used without paying royalties.

wishful thinking, I know, but still ...

AKS, Joensuu, Finland

Subject: RE: BS: 'Should auld copyrights be forgot ?'
From: Okiemockbird
Date: 12 Jan 00 - 12:44 PM

AKS, you just gave your location as "Joensuu". Once, at least, you gave it as "Pohjois-Karjala". Are these compatible references ? I guess that Karjala = Karelia. Is that right?. Is Joensuu a town in Karelia, or have you moved?

Speaking of Karjala, here is a link to the website of Prof. Dennis Karjala, an American law professor whose surname apparently derives from the place-name in AKS's country.

T.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Should auld copyrights be forgot ?'
From: Okiemockbird
Date: 12 Jan 00 - 01:31 PM

sophocleese, here is an article about a recent termination-of-transfer filed by the heirs of one of the creators of the character Superman. Most of what the article says about the termination process is accurate, as far as I can tell. There is one point in the article, however, where an interviewee seems to imply that authors' heirs have termination rights for each of the two extensions (19 years + 20 years) of the renewal term. This is not the case. Heirs of authors of old works get exactly one chance to exercise termination rights, as far as I can make out. In any case, those who have already terminated to recapture a bite of the 19-year extension of 1978 have no right to terminate a second time to recapture the full value of the new 20-year extension, though they might arguably be able to capture a share of the last four years.

T.

Subject: RE: BS: 'Should auld copyrights be forgot ?'
From: Okiemockbird
Date: 14 Jan 00 - 09:35 AM

In light of SEAROSS's comments concerning the copyright and the WIPO treaty, the following might be of interest:

David Nimmer, coauthor with his late father of the influential treatise Nimmer on Copyright, some years ago wrote an article entitled "The End of Copyright", 48 Vanderbilt Law Review, October 1995, pages 1385-1420. In his article he states

"If indeed the new master of copyright is the world of international trade, if the events of last December [the enactment of the Uruguay Round Agreements Act] are sustained in a broad construction, then the Constitution must simply follow compliantly behind. Copyright today serves not the needs of authors nor even the popular good, whereby works are relegated to the public domain to become the heritage of all humanity and copyrigh is simply a temporary way station to reward authors on the road to that greater good. Instead of those goals, the balance of payments has become all-decisive. Whatever bows to that god is now worthy of implementation." (page 1416).

"Because copyright now serves as an adjunct of trade, were my father composing his treatise today, instead of in 1963, the most accurate title he could choose would be Nimmer on the Implementation withing the United States of Annex 1C to the Agreement Establishing the World Trade Organization. Mired in notions of marketing and reader recognition, the publisher has unaccountably refused to budge from the current title, Nimmer on Copyright, notwithstanding that it has become an anachronism." (page 1412).