Re: copyright expiration as a spur to creativity

Albert Henderson <noblestation[_at_]compuserve.com> wrote:
>
> Your argument jumped the track when you claimed "works ... are
> public property." That is not true. My creations are not public
> property. My creations are mine. I can destroy them without penalty.
> I can determine if, when, how many copies may be published and how
> many times they may be performed. I have no obligation to the public.
> The public has no say.

This is true until the work is published. Patent very clearly gives a monopoly to exploit your creation, but only in return for you publishing the details. Copyright less clearly but just as effectively provides the incentive for you to make your creation more widely available, by recognizing your limited exclusive rights to exploit your creation. Sure you could protect your property by keeping it to yourself or destroying it, but the public pays you (with a limited monopoly) for access to your creation.

Therefore publication of a creation is a process whereby immediate (fair use) and future (reversion to public domain) proprietry rights are transferred to the public in return for protection of the residual rights retained by the creator for the term of the copyright. This is the only reasonable basis for protecting unpublished works in perpetuity and published works for a limited period.

-- 
| Tim Arnold-Moore, LL.B., B.Sc. (Hons)
| Postal address:  Multimedia Database Systems, RMIT
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|	simul iustus et peccator
<tja[_at_]mds.rmit.edu.au>