Users to USTR: Don't Sign Away Our Ability to Fix the Orphan Works Problem

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/08/users-ustr-dont-sign-away-our-ability-fix-orphan-works-problem

by walterbell • 11 years ago

58 29 11 years ago

walterbell• 11 years ago

David Post has a legal analysis of this topic, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/201...

"The solution is pretty obvious — a true legislative no-brainer: Amend the Copyright Act to eliminate statutory damages for these orphan works. Surely even Congress can see how idiotic it is that this class of invisible rights holders can keep this treasure trove of information out of the public’s hands, and there has indeed been significant movement recently (including a Copyright Office proposal to this effect) toward just such a change.

.. A [US] court would (as I read the new statute) NOT be permitted to award punitive, or exemplary, damages in orphan works cases – but the TPP seems to require that."

mtgx• 11 years ago

I wish you had to register to obtain the copyright for you work. It shouldn't be automatic. If you intend to make money from something, surely registration + a small fee every 5 years wouldn't be a huge burden. Fail to do that, and the work becomes public domain within two years.

gabemart• 11 years ago

Under such a system, a photographer would presumably have to register each photograph before hosting the image on her website, or risk losing copyright protection.

This seems extremely onerous for a wide range of creative professions.

deciplex• 11 years ago

No, the solution to the problem is for copyright terms to be limited to something sensible like 10-20 years, and leave it at that. There is no need to burden everyone with extra paperwork just because a few assholes have bought Congress.

No one would give a shit about "orphan works" if said works were going to enter the public domain in a few years anyway.

Animats2• 11 years ago

Has the EFF ever won a copyright battle? Since they lost the big one (copyright term extension), I can't think of a big win.

dannyobrien3• 11 years ago

If you're referring to Eldred v. Ashcroft, that wasn't an EFF case.

You can see some of EFF's legal victories here: https://www.eff.org/victories , although to be honest we really need to update that list. For example, in the IP space I don't think it includes the two busted patents from earlier this year, which were being used to target podcasters and online competitions. See https://www.eff.org/press/releases/eff-busts-podcasting-pate... and https://www.eff.org/press/releases/victory-photo-hobbyist-pr...

dannyobrien3• 11 years ago

(Oh, and another one just today, from our long-running Lens v. Universal"Dancing Baby" case. The Federal Appeals court today ruled that copyright holders must consider fair use before trying to remove content from the Internet. The court also rejected the opposing claim that a victim of takedown abuse cannot vindicate her rights if she cannot show actual monetary loss. This is a pretty major step forward in restoring the balance of copyright and free speech in the environment constrained by automated or excessive DMCA takedown notices.

https://www.eff.org/press/releases/important-win-fair-use-da... )

Animats2• 11 years ago

Steve Jackson Games wasn't an EFF case, either. I was at the Steve Jackson trial as a technical expert. The EFF didn't have anybody there.

Amorymeltzer• 11 years ago

I can't call this a BIG win, but it's from today and certainly a good one: http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2015/09/eff-scores-a-win-...

Basically, copyright holders MUST consider fair use before sending a takedown notice.

cm21873• 11 years ago

What I don't understand is why copyright applies for so long (life + 70y so typically 120y+) and why intellectual property (patents) applies for such a short period (20y). Fundamentally it is the same thing. And one could argue that code could be treated either way.

_stephan3• 11 years ago

Copyright and patents are not "fundamentally the same thing". A copyright gives you the right to exclude others from copying a work. A patent gives you more than that right, it gives you a monopoly over an idea (or at least a more or less vaguely defined implementation of an idea). A patent gives you the right to exclude others from using that idea or implementation even if they discovered that idea on their own and didn't copy anything.

cm21873• 11 years ago

My understanding of copyright is that it applies to the idea too. If you change the names and wording but keep the plot of a novel, even if the text are not strictly identical, you could still be sued for breach of copyright.

anon4• 11 years ago

Because the Disney corporation doesn't want Mickey Mouse to fall in the public domain. I've said before that it may behoove us to simply amend copyright in a way that gives Disney infinite copyright, while everything else gets ten years. Call them an "irreplaceable cultural giant" or whatever else euphemism you want for "lots of money". Require a yearly tax that's just below what they pay in lobby money currently. To make it "fair", you could say "first ten years copyright is free, then it's X per year per work, then it ramps up until it reaches what Disney can pay.. I mean Z, which was determined after market analysis"

dublinben3• 11 years ago

Only the original Steamboat Willy cartoon would even rise to the public domain. The character as we know him today is thoroughly trademarked, which does not expire.

All anyone would be able to do, is distribute free or paid copies of a historical cartoon film.

joesmo• 11 years ago

No, you can't argue that code can be treated as a patent because then you could argue that poetry can be treated as a patent and you'd wind up in a nonsensical hell of never being able to write another line of code, poetry, or prose because you'd be patenting coding and writing itself, essentially. It would be illegal to write a "hello world" program, for example. Actually, that's not that far from what's currently illegal under patent law, so I should say that you can't argue that code can be treated as a patent and make a rational argument out of it (Congress can argue that, in other words).

cm21873• 11 years ago

Many audio and video encoding algorithms are patented.

Users to USTR: Don't Sign Away Our Ability to Fix the Orphan Works Problem

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