A proposal (was Re: "Against Intellectual Property")

"Jeroen Hellingman" <jehe[_at_]kabelfoon.nl> wrote:

>Of course, we will need some way to renumerate the very valuable work
>of authors, etc., as otherwise society will be deprived of these works,
>and copyright may be a good way to do that, but, I think a term of
>say 25 years would be well enough to cover 99% of the economic returns
>of 99% of the works, and probably provide more than enough incentive
>for all works produced. If a work cannot earn back its initial
>investment within that term, probably few investors will be interested
>anyway. (Please name me some outside government investments in
>infrastructure).

My thoughts are that free copyright right protection should last only a decade or two after publication (copyright should not be used for nonpublished  works -- use a different vehicle for that). If the copyright owner wishes to extend the term, he can do so by paying a yearly fee, the fee being high enough (say $100) that the owner will pause and think if it is worth it, but not enough to make it prohibitive. The fees are divied up between the Copyright Office and the Federal courts which administer and enforce copyright (which at this time is supported by the taxpayer.)

How long the optional fee period lasts is open to argument. I would not oppose them being for the life of the author plus 70, with a *much higher fee* (e.g., $100,000/year adjusted for inflation) for indefinite extension beyond that. But I do believe even the fee period should not last more than 40 years before the work reverts to the Public Domain.

If the work is generating income, or the author wishes to protect it for some other reason, then paying the yearly fee in the $100/year range for continued copyright protection will gladly be done.

Now, the "copyright is a right" purists who believe copyright terms should be in perpetuity and free will oppose this. However, one aspect of this they will support, and which solves another problem, is copyright ownership tracking. Under the current "born copyrighted" system, there is really no requirement, as far as I know, for tracking of copyright ownership (sure, registration is still done in the U.S. but there's no requirement to keep the registration current to maintain copyright ownership). Thus, it is not uncommon for the ownership information of works to be lost to the general public, which results in difficulties in others using the work (other than Fair Use.) Oftentimes it is the owner (or the owner's heirs) who lose out because others cannot determine they own a particular work.

With a yearly fee system, and formalism to transfer copyright ownership, it will be easy and unambiguous to track the owner of any work (the database should be accessible via the Internet). Of course, the fees will help fund this tracking system. It's actually a win-win system for all concerned, and I think even the "copyright is a right" people will see the pragmatic advantages of it towards copyright owners.

Just some ideas this Monday morning.

Jon Noring Received on Mon Aug 07 2000 - 13:11:17 GMT