The Eldred Act - toward a restoration of the public domain [LWN.net]

Changes to copyright law over the years have (in the U.S. and, increasingly, elsewhere) brought the growth of the public domain to a complete halt. In the U.S., no works have entered the public domain since 1930, with the tiny exception of those put there explicitly by their creators. The extension of copyright terms, with the approval of the Supreme Court, means that the public domain will remain frozen indefinitely.

But the public domain is the ultimate source of almost everything found in new creative works. Whether the subject is fiction, film, or free software, our culture depends on a common pool of ideas. The starvation of the public domain can only serve to dry up that pool. But attempts to cut back on absolute copyright protection via the court system have not been successful. The word from the courts is that this is a matter which must be decided by Congress.

Enter the Eldred Act (or "Public Domain Enhancement Act"). This act would not reduce the period of copyright protection available to anyone. What it would do is require that, after 50 years, copyrights be renewed through the payment of a (very) small fee. Renewal would be required every five years thereafter. The renewal burden would be negligible for anybody who is making any sort of commercial use of copyrighted material. Mickey Mouse would be preserved for generations of Disney stockholders yet unborn.

But the fact is that very little copyrighted material is still being commercially exploited after 50 years. Under current law, all those works remain protected, and almost all of them simply vanish from sight. The Eldred Act would release it all into the public domain, where it can become a common resource.

The proposed law makes a great deal of sense; why maintain copyright protection on works that the copyright holder cannot be bothered to renew? Yet the bill is apparently already being opposed by lobbyist activity in Washington. As part of an effort to show that the lobbyists do not speak for a lot of people, the bill's promoters (including Lawrence Lessig) have set up an online petition where people can show their support. Signing it is a small act, but one which might help restore a more rational direction to copyright law.

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The Eldred Act - toward a restoration of the public domain

Posted Jun 6, 2003 14:59 UTC (Fri) by iabervon (subscriber, #722) [Link]

That won't work, because most works take a substantial amount of time between when they are copyrighted and the time they become commercially available initially. Other works (private mail, for instance) is copyrighted and that right is important to the holders, but the work is not intended to become commercially available at all; the right is used, if at all, to prevent this. The point of copyright is not exclusively to protect commercial use of a work of art, but to let the owner decide what becomes of the work. If I write something and then decide I don't like it, I can suppress it (to the extent that others haven't been granted licenses to it).

The Eldred Act - toward a restoration of the public domain

Posted Jun 9, 2003 17:10 UTC (Mon) by crouchet (guest, #1084) [Link]

> The point of copyright is not exclusively to protect commercial
> use of a work of art, but to let the owner decide what becomes
> of the work.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but the purpose of copyright and patent
was to create an incentive (financial) for inventors and authors to invent
and write works and release them for public use (note that I did NOT say
FREE public use). This was accomplished by giving them a limited monopoly
on profits from that work.

The goal was not control; it was incentive in the form of profit. Consider
than when a copyrighted or patented work is introduced, the public
immediately gains full use of it for personal use. You can sing any song
you like in your shower; you can build your own car using any patented
technology from GM or Ford; you can perform any play you like in the
privacy of your home provided you do not charge admission. You can show a
letter from your girlfriend to all your friends if you want to. The fair
use doctrine extends this further. The holder of the copyright or patent
has no control whatsoever over this use of their work. Moreover, the
copyright or patent was only intended to exist long enough to give the
author/inventor incentive to create it. After that time (originally 14
years, I think) it was to pass into the public domain, thus encouraging
authors and inventors to write/invent NEW works. Obviously that only works
if the term is shorter than the author/inventor's lifespan.

That is why the current spate of copyright extending laws are so
problematic; they DO seem be aimed at establishing *control* and making
that control permanent.

My biggest problem with the proposed legislation is that it is open ended.
I would also quibble that 50 years if far too long for the default,
especially under a renewable system. However, I do see how those
provisions might give someone like Disney incentive to support this act
since they could then establish a perpetual lock on their creations. Never
mind that the people who actually created much of Disney's "intellectual
property" are long since dead and buried.

Perpetual servitude is wrong; free the mouse!

JC

The Eldred Act - toward a restoration of the public domain

Posted Jun 10, 2003 21:27 UTC (Tue) by Felix.Braun (subscriber, #3032) [Link]

Actually this is a centrepoint of disagreement between the anglo-american and the continental european vision of copyright.

The version JC describes is how the utilitarian view of copyright: the creator of a work is granted a (originally limited, but less and less so) monopoly on its commercial exploitation before the work is released as a common good. This legislation is supposed to create an incentive for creators and thus stimulate development.

The continental european understanding (presented by iabervon) sees copyright as derivative of the protection of the creator's personality. Creators are supposed to control how their work is displayed publicly because such a display is always also a display of a part of them. Therefore, an author is allowed to suppress love letters that he may be ashamed of later.

One consequence of this latter concept is that the creator is not able to fully assign the copyright for his works to anybody else. He may grant somebody the right to commercial exploitation, but a remainder of control always rests with the author. By extension is it not possible in most continental european legal systems to waive your copyright and place your creation into the public domain. All you can do is to promise that you won't enforce your copyright.

The protection of the creator's personality is also the reason why the expiry of copyright is currently based on the date of the creator's death. After a certain period, the need to protect his personality is superseded by the wish of the public to base further development on past creations.

Of course, in practice these two aproaches usually lead to the same results, which is why the whole world was able to agree on a protection of author's works.