Re: Author's Rights

Peter Brudenall <peterb[_at_]copyright.com.au> wrote:
> >
> > Martha Luehrmann writes:
> >>
> >> We need some way to control and charge for minor uses of
> >> materials or portions of materials, like picking up a quote off the
> >> internet, playing a soundbite, running a piece of software, or
> >> showing some or all of a picture.
> >>
> *************
>
> I would be interested in your views on whether you think controlling
> and charging for minor uses of copyright material could work to the
> detriment of creators.

The way I see it is this:

1. As a writer of hypertext, I regard myself as free to quote minor parts of another's work (though I will probably seek consent for politeness' sake). I give links to substantial work on which mine is based. I may ask for reciprocal links. People follow those links and, where appropriate, pay.
2. If I were a producer of work which incorporates others' work -- say, an interactive entertainment which includes a segment of the 1999 digitised Royal Court Theatre production of the play _Look Back in Anger_, I'd negotiate micro-payments to the rights holders in that work. This is no different in principle to the existing legal position.

2.1) Presented with the script for the 2001 multimedia sequel to _Look Back in Anger_, which is unlikely to attract Hollywood development money, I'd consider producing it as a profit-share. The lead actors each get 5% of gross, the carpenter gets 0.5%... (numbers illustrative only). Of course, the participants negotiate a clause forbidding me to hire a Hollywood accountant: they don't want the kind of situation where _Terminator 2_ made a loss on the books. That's why we do % of gross. This kind of arrangement, as I see it, increases both the potential market for creators, and increases the variety of "creation" available to the public.

3) Academia ia an _interesting_ case under these assumptions. I have here a piece of science-fantasy -- a Devil's Advocate position on how it might work -- but I'm going to make some money selling it on paper before I put it up here. Offers? :-)

> Copyright laws generally place restrictions on the use (that is,
> exercising one of the copyright owner's exclusive rights) of
> substantial portions of works. Controlling the use of insubstantial
> portions of works has generally been seen as not coming within the
> ambit of copyright law or policy. I recognise that substance in this
> context is to be judged on the basis of the quality of what is used,
> not the quantity.

Martha wrote of "controlling and charging". I see no problem with the charging part, so long as creators' rights are protected, not _only_ publishers'. So is Peter's question about the spectre of "control" -- of people forbidding the use of their (academic) work? In what way is this different from the assembled acolytes of Sylvia Plath -vs- Ted Hughes? Or, for that matter, the Royal Hospital for Sick Children preventing publication of a pornographic version of _Peter Pan_ (in which it owns the rights, by a wonderful quirk in UK law)?

Mike Holderness?
<mch[_at_]cix.compulink.co.uk> Received on Mon Apr 15 1996 - 12:47:07 GMT