Now that is something I can totally agree with. I'd add that on
further though duration is only one kind of "robustness" in copyright
law. And it's exactly that one troublesome measure that is the
obstacle for historical preservation.


--
Thatcher





On 8/16/2011 2:11 PM, Tom Fine wrote:
> up with an original idea, device, song, book, etc, we deserve strong
> intellectual property protection for a "reasonable" period of time (I
> think a term of 25-30 years is fair, it's more than a generation and
> many books, songs and recordings don't stay in print nearly that long,
> and technology certainly marches forward faster than that). After
> that, no ifs ands or buts about it, it goes into the PD. In the case
> of recordings, in this new digital era, it should be very simple to
> deposit a clone of the master file with the government authority
> issuing the copyright. When the copyright expires, the clone would
> automatically move to a public-access server and be in the PD. Same
> for written words and written music that would gain copyright
> protection. Patents are already publicly-available, more as a
> "warning" to would-be violators that these specific claims are
> protected by this patent number. As for older recordings, I think all
> material older than whatever "reasonable" term should immediately
> become PD but I think that the owners of the master media should get
> some sort of tax break or other incentive to turn the masters over to
> the LOC and fund their proper digitization so they can be readily