US Supreme Court rules for Google over Oracle

> And if you're going to allow people to transfer the copyright temporarily in exchange for a fee, it would be strange not to let them transfer it permanently.

Licences are not "transfers" of copyright, not even temporarily: only the copyright holder has the right to licence the work.

The reason for copyright assignment is not because licences exist but that work-for-hire is the norm.

No, assigning copyright to somebody else is not necessary by any means. There are jurisdictions (Germany for instance) where that simply is not possible. I create a work, I (or the company employing me for that purpose) hold the copyright; after I die, my heirs do. End of story.

So what happens instead? I sell an exclusive and perpetual license to exercise those rights to somebody else. Same effect as a copyright transfer but an entirely different legal theory behind it, which matters a lot e.g. when the work is translated to a new medium that didn't exist when the sale took place. Lawyers tend to have a lot of fun trying to guess the intent behind those contracts.

> And I'm sure there are (historic) societies that do not have one or more of the legal concepts we now take for granted.

Time Immemorial?

Which is a real thing. The definition varies, but it is English Law that pre-dates the concept of a "Jury of one's Peers" - peers is capitalised because it means a Lord of the Realm.

So basically, "time immemorial" is stuff that predates either Magna Carta, or the accession of Henry III, whichever date you choose as they're both roughly the same.

Cheers,
Wol

I only have a very superficial understanding of law, but my understanding is that some legal concepts aren't considered to be made up, but rather a reflection of reality (e.g, natural rights IIUC).

Some people would put property in that category, though that is controversial. In any case, the fact that one concept is thousands of years old and another is a few centuries years old is IMHO relevant.

In any case, I just brought this up because conflating property with copyright is a strategy that has been used to argue for stronger copyright protections without bringing up the necessary discussion about the benefit such change should bring to society. Therefore it's important to be aware that it's an analogy with important flaws.

Classic example: enforcement of the law in regard to things we would now consider the obvious preserve of the state like murder was a family matter in ancient Rome: the state did not get involved (except in the very rare case that the Emperor himself got interested) and it seems that matters like evidence were almost always much less important than the relative standing of the victim's family and the accused's. But things like what clothes you wore, or whether you lived in excessive luxury? That was a matter of state, and a serious one. (Though even there any role for anything like evidence was... marginal.)

The way societies are constructed is a social construct, obviously enough. The law is an aspect of the way societies are constructed, so it's a social construct. It sits on biological underpinnings shared with many other animals driving emotions governing things like perceived fairness, retribution, etc, but it is still a social construct.

Sounds like the fun we had with joyriders in the UK :-)

I believe theft is defined as "permanently depriving the owner of their property". Which copying a song most definitely does not.

Amd when joyriders nicked a car over here, I believe their defence council argued "it's not theft, they got their car back". So they had to bring in a new law of "TWOCing" - Taking WithOut Consent.

Cheers,
Wol