The Glade 4.0

The release of The Avengers has stoked a few small fires of outrage, with people seizing on it as proof positive of the unfair treatment of legends like Jack Kirby. Interesting op-eds can be found littered about, like "The Ethical Rot Behind 'Before Watchmen' & 'The Avengers'" (which I recommend reading, whether you agree with its premise by the end or not).

I completely agree the creators should be treated with more respect and rewarded justly. This excerpt, however, brings to bear a question:



Why do we do this? Should the estate see the royalties? What right does (or should) the family have to part of these profits?

The idea of rewarding the family of a creator, particularly when the creator himself is dead, irks some part of me. I'm more of the opinion that a creator's works should fall into public domain upon his death, or after X number of years after, if they 'belong' to a corporation (a duration which cannot be extended). Even in my head, it seems unworkable, yes...but not unjust.

Thoughts?

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Corolinth brought this to my attention a while back:

Under US law, a patent expires 14 years after it is filed. It cannot be renewed or extended. The family of the filer get nothing afterward.

The innovative and creative thinking for invention is no less valid or or special as that required for artistic works. Copyright law, however, keeps getting extended. It's gone from 50 years from creation, to 50 years past the life of the author, to 75 years past the life of the author. Now it can be extended into perpetuity -- today's copyrighted works will never enter public domain.

Frankly, **** copyright. It is destroying creativity and innovation. An entire generation of literature will disappear because, unlike previous works, it will never be free. Entire libraries of human artistic endeavor will be lost forever.

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Well Ali Baba had them forty thieves, Scheherezade had a thousand tales
But master you in luck 'cause up your sleeves you got a brand of magic never fails...
...Mister Aladdin, sir, What will your pleasure be?
Let me take your order, Jot it down -You ain't never had a friend like me
█ ♣ █

I think copyrights should expire like patents. However, without any kind of protection over creativity, we disincentivize such creativity.

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I prefer to think of them as "Fighting evil in another dimension"

Copyright doesn't destroy creativity or innovation. Creators gonna create. In the short-term, copyright is good for the consumer; very few companies would (or even could) bankroll a project like, say, The Avengers without copyright to back them up and secure profits.

Now, that said...copyright should never be extended in perpetuity. In fact, it should never be extended, period. Creator creates, copyright is granted for 50 years from creation. Sunrise, sunset.

That's what I mean

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I prefer to think of them as "Fighting evil in another dimension"

I didn't mean to sound disagreeable. I wrote my response before you posted, and then I got called away from my desk before I could hit submit.

This is the story of my life.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

It's also rather what I said.

Copyright, like Patent law, needs to exist. However, in its current form, copyright stifles rather than encourages creativity.

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Well Ali Baba had them forty thieves, Scheherezade had a thousand tales
But master you in luck 'cause up your sleeves you got a brand of magic never fails...
...Mister Aladdin, sir, What will your pleasure be?
Let me take your order, Jot it down -You ain't never had a friend like me
█ ♣ █

Serious one-word answer: Disney.

Whenever it looks like Ye Olde Mickey Mouse Cartoones are about to come out from under copyright, they make a full-court lobbying press to have copyright extended for another billion years. The irony is pretty sickening, really. Much of Disney's profits have come from their remakes of old works by the likes of Hans Christian Andersen which had long since fallen into public domain. What's good for the goose is apparently not good for the gander, though, and now they're devoted to making sure that they retain rights to whatever they've created until the heat death of the universe.

This might not be quite so infuriating if Disney weren't guilty of blatant plagiarism in the first place.

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Sail forth! steer for the deep waters only!
Reckless, O soul, exploring, I with thee, and thou with me;
For we are bound where mariner has not yet dared to go,
And we will risk the ship, ourselves and all.

Yeah. Disney's not the only driving force behind it, but they certainly were the most vocal. (Most of the MPAA was up there. Sony rather forcefully argued for perpetual copyright, which was rejected as being unconsitutional.)

The big corps are all guilty for their stance on copyright. That said, you can't blame them for trying. They'll make their money any way they can. They're not burdened by morals or principles or social obligation.

The problem is, neither is government, and it should be. Lobbying, once again, puts the robber-barons in charge of the country.

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Well Ali Baba had them forty thieves, Scheherezade had a thousand tales
But master you in luck 'cause up your sleeves you got a brand of magic never fails...
...Mister Aladdin, sir, What will your pleasure be?
Let me take your order, Jot it down -You ain't never had a friend like me
█ ♣ █

As a man of science, where the fruits of my labor will be turned over to the public domain either for innovation or simple reproduction, the idea that an artist's children and grandchildren should receive royalties for their ancestor's work is quite possibly the most offensive notion that humanity has conceived. If you want to make money off of art, make your own damn art. My children will have to continue to innovate new technology, or go broke.

I can appreciate the desire to make money off of your own work, and not have it copied immediately. However, just as my work gets turned over to the masses, so should that of the artist. I am a creator, too. I am absolutely sick and tired of the double standard applied to the fine arts.

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Buckle your pants or they might fall down.

Copyrights and patents are property and irregardless of the lifespan of the creator, it should be treated as such. When the length of time has passed for the copyright or patent to expire, it expires.

Some can be extended for another length of time by refiling. I would suggest that only a living creator can file an extension. The family has to live with the original length of license.

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The U. S. Constitution doesn't guarantee happiness, only the pursuit of it. You have to catch up with it yourself. B. Franklin

"A mind needs books like a sword needs a whetstone." -- Tyrion Lannister, A Game of Thrones

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Ezekiel 23:19-20 

Currently the family can file the extensions. I can see that changed. I have no clue what your clip means Rynar.

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The U. S. Constitution doesn't guarantee happiness, only the pursuit of it. You have to catch up with it yourself. B. Franklin

"A mind needs books like a sword needs a whetstone." -- Tyrion Lannister, A Game of Thrones

The idea is my property. if I decide to give my property to my heirs why would be any different than something physical? Why would we tell creators that they are only entitled to their property for as long as the public sees fit?

So what if the heirs are just along for the ride. There may come a point where that idea no longer generates revenue for them, and their failure to keep working and innovating will come back on them.

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A man who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself. ~ John Stuart Mill

Ideas cannot be property. I realize many of you have been snowed by recent history, but maybe do some research.

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When you take the idea and turn it into a product, you can copyright or patent it and make it property for a limited amount of time. It isn't even just an American concept, it is done that way over most of the non-communist world.

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The U. S. Constitution doesn't guarantee happiness, only the pursuit of it. You have to catch up with it yourself. B. Franklin

"A mind needs books like a sword needs a whetstone." -- Tyrion Lannister, A Game of Thrones

You can patent the implementation of an idea. You can copyright the expression of an idea. Somebody can later implement the idea differently, or express the idea differently. The idea itself, however, remains.

It is also important for those implementations and expressions to become public domain, this is how advancements are seeded. The part of copyrights and patents that is important is not securing for the creator certain monopolies to exploit, it is only securing those rights for a limited time.

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You know what? **** them. They want ideas to be owned in perpetuity. Let's extend patent law to the same length as copyright law. We'll spend the next twenty years sorting out exactly who owns what so that everyone can pay money to the appropriate inventor each time a piece of modern technology is used. Just **** them.

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Buckle your pants or they might fall down.

That would basically make Nikola Tesla the ultimate recipient of all monies. I'm fine with that.

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