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Love Zombies? Thank the Public Domain

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Re: Love Zombies? Thank the Public Domain

#21

Post by SkyBelow »

DrPhish wrote: post #7
Polylactic_acid wrote: post #5

imo copyright should last 30 years from creation. Thats plenty of time to make a profit and it also allows things to fall in to public domain while they are still culturally relevant. Currently anything made within your lifetime will not be public until well after you have died which is a shame. It would be great if all of the past content which is now slipping in to irrelevancy could be revived by the public domain.

I think its fair that renewals would be allowed beyond that, but that the cost of doing so should increase on an exponential scale. That way the value of keeping a thing copyrighted would eventually be eclipsed by its value as a public property, fulfilling the social contract of limited protection in exchange for eventual public ownership.

Wouldn't corporate branding be enough?

Even if Mario entered into public domain, Nintendo Mario games would still be the superior choice. It isn't like people would be allowed to claim their game was an official Nintendo Mario game. Profitable IPs would also be able to grow their IP as a means of protection. For example, there would be a significant time lag between when Mario would enter the public domain and Yoshi would, and as such more recent Nintendo games couldn't be copied because they include Yoshi (replace Yoshi with dozens of even newer characters).

Edit: One way to think of it is that others could only use the cannon as it existed 30 years ago. As long as the IP isn't dropped and fans like where it is going, that provides a significant barrier of protection from others branching off and making their own cannon.

Re: Love Zombies? Thank the Public Domain

#22

Post by bsder »

DrPhish wrote: post #7
Polylactic_acid wrote: post #5

imo copyright should last 30 years from creation. Thats plenty of time to make a profit and it also allows things to fall in to public domain while they are still culturally relevant. Currently anything made within your lifetime will not be public until well after you have died which is a shame. It would be great if all of the past content which is now slipping in to irrelevancy could be revived by the public domain.

I think its fair that renewals would be allowed beyond that, but that the cost of doing so should increase on an exponential scale. That way the value of keeping a thing copyrighted would eventually be eclipsed by its value as a public property, fulfilling the social contract of limited protection in exchange for eventual public ownership.

Original author should probably get one free renewal that should cover most of his lifetime.

After that, renewals should occur every 5 years and get expensive.

The goal is to encourage those who can create to do so--not create a rental property in perpetuity for corporations or estates.

Re: Love Zombies? Thank the Public Domain

#23

Post by Gustomaximus »

Polylactic_acid wrote: post #5

imo copyright should last 30 years from creation. Thats plenty of time to make a profit and it also allows things to fall in to public domain while they are still culturally relevant. Currently anything made within your lifetime will not be public until well after you have died which is a shame. It would be great if all of the past content which is now slipping in to irrelevancy could be revived by the public domain.

I am ok with copywriter being lifetime plus. Often a creator doesn't see benifits of their material til many decades after creation. And they created this so during their life it seems fair they can use.

Patents on the other hand I feel should be dropping in time scale. Technology is advancing more rapidly yet we extend protection no reduce it to match generally faster cycles of development. Shortening patents to 20 years type thing would be a far more important step. Also strengthening the rule that a patent is void where something has been created independently even if second to market so there isn't a race to patent first what is bound to be discovered soon by many.

Re: Love Zombies? Thank the Public Domain

#24

Post by fouc »

Polylactic_acid wrote: post #5

imo copyright should last 30 years from creation. Thats plenty of time to make a profit and it also allows things to fall in to public domain while they are still culturally relevant. Currently anything made within your lifetime will not be public until well after you have died which is a shame. It would be great if all of the past content which is now slipping in to irrelevancy could be revived by the public domain.

A number like 30 is far too arbitrary. How can we come up with a less arbitrary approach?

Don't forget some people might take years of thinking about a story before ever releasing it publicly. So the cost of creation can vary quite a bit, picking a fixed number ends up being somewhat unfair to many of the creators.

Re: Love Zombies? Thank the Public Domain

#25

Post by baddox »

fouc wrote: post #24
Polylactic_acid wrote: post #5

imo copyright should last 30 years from creation. Thats plenty of time to make a profit and it also allows things to fall in to public domain while they are still culturally relevant. Currently anything made within your lifetime will not be public until well after you have died which is a shame. It would be great if all of the past content which is now slipping in to irrelevancy could be revived by the public domain.

A number like 30 is far too arbitrary. How can we come up with a less arbitrary approach? Don't forget some people might take years of thinking about a story before ever releasing it publicly. So the cost of creation can vary quite a bit, picking a fixed number ends up being somewhat unfair to many of the creators.

Isn’t cost of creation just one of many normal inputs to the marketing and pricing of every product? What’s special about copyright? It’s also true for, say, an idea about starting a company, but we don’t have laws to somehow adjust the potential return on investment of a company based on how long the founder was thinking about it.

Re: Love Zombies? Thank the Public Domain

#27

Post by Polylactic_acid »

fouc wrote: post #24
Polylactic_acid wrote: post #5

imo copyright should last 30 years from creation. Thats plenty of time to make a profit and it also allows things to fall in to public domain while they are still culturally relevant. Currently anything made within your lifetime will not be public until well after you have died which is a shame. It would be great if all of the past content which is now slipping in to irrelevancy could be revived by the public domain.

A number like 30 is far too arbitrary. How can we come up with a less arbitrary approach? Don't forget some people might take years of thinking about a story before ever releasing it publicly. So the cost of creation can vary quite a bit, picking a fixed number ends up being somewhat unfair to many of the creators.

The exact number can be tuned but there is nothing wrong with being somewhat arbitrary. The age we let people drink is arbitrary. Why 18, why not 19 or 17. Its just a number picked to be good enough.

>Don't forget some people might take years of thinking about a story before ever releasing it publicly.

It applies as soon as you release it publicly. Copyright doesn't instantly apply as soon as an idea pops in to your head. It only applies as soon as you can prove you created it at a date.

Re: Love Zombies? Thank the Public Domain

#28

Post by Polylactic_acid »

Gustomaximus wrote: post #23
Polylactic_acid wrote: post #5

imo copyright should last 30 years from creation. Thats plenty of time to make a profit and it also allows things to fall in to public domain while they are still culturally relevant. Currently anything made within your lifetime will not be public until well after you have died which is a shame. It would be great if all of the past content which is now slipping in to irrelevancy could be revived by the public domain.

I am ok with copywriter being lifetime plus. Often a creator doesn't see benifits of their material til many decades after creation. And they created this so during their life it seems fair they can use. Patents on the other hand I feel should be dropping in time scale. Technology is advancing more rapidly yet we extend protection no reduce it to match generally faster cycles of development. Shortening patents to 20…

>Often a creator doesn't see benifits of their material til many decades after

Is this the common case? It would seem logical that most content makes the most amount of money soon after it comes out. I think for many kinds of content, the first week makes about as much as the rest of the lifetime of sales.

And even in the rare case where some content becomes rediscovered after the 30 years, the creator simply needs to create a sequel, which by having their name attached to it, will be recognized as the official continuation.

Re: Love Zombies? Thank the Public Domain

#29

Post by numpad0 »

Polylactic_acid wrote: post #19
ghaff wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That probably makes copyright renewals cost-effective for corporations making millions but not so for an author getting a nice $5k/yr annuity. (Or pick your numbers. But making cost a decision point for renewal definitely favors the big guys.)

It makes it cost effective for content which is highly profitable. A corporation isn't going to pay to keep garbage registered at a high fee but an individual will pay to keep something that is raking in mountains of cash. Not that it really matters much because virtually everything stops bringing in any money at all by 30 years. The only things that continue to have value are names and characters.

> A corporation isn't going to pay to keep garbage registered at a high fee

Look at patent registry

Re: Love Zombies? Thank the Public Domain

#30

Post by nine_k »

numpad0 wrote: post #29
Polylactic_acid wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It makes it cost effective for content which is highly profitable. A corporation isn't going to pay to keep garbage registered at a high fee but an individual will pay to keep something that is raking in mountains of cash. Not that it really matters much because virtually everything stops bringing in any money at all by 30 years. The only things that continue to have value are names and characters.

> A corporation isn't going to pay to keep garbage registered at a high fee Look at patent registry

The fees are neither high nor increasing with time.
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