If you're excited that things are entering the #PublicDomain — which you should be! — perhaps it's worth considering reforming copyright.
In many places currently it's 70 years after the death of the author, or longer. This is insanity.
An important piece of culture made by a young author could be locked behind copyright (with rights usually held by publishers, not authors themselves anyway) for over a *century*.
That's how you get #Disney to own almost everything.
Reform #copyright!
@rysiek The thing that gets me is all the claims that we can't relax copyright, not even after the creator's death, because it 'protects' creators.
When... there are so, so, so many cases of copyright laws actively or passively screwing creators over. Even more cases of creators being bullied or tricked into signing away the rights, or never really holding them to begin with.
And in all of these fights? The courts don't give a shit about creators. The law doesn't. Public outcry rarely goes anywhere either.
I went looking for examples and honestly it's worse than I even remembered.
@dartigen
I mean, it sure isn't protecting creators if the creators are dead. The idea that copyright lasts even a second longer than the author does is kind of crazy, but I can see cases where the author functionally doesn't get paid for their work if they publish it just before they die, and they had been counting on that income to take care of their family or what have you. Like, if my employer kept 3 years of wages from me and only paid them out up until I quit or died, that would be fucked up, and my family would be screwed. But 70 years after death?
That's crazy, and it's completely detached from the reality of any *creator*.
@rysiek
@Kichae @rysiek And I can bet you'd find cases where the estate got screwed out of the rights too.
Most likely because the creator never actually owned them to begin with, that happens a lot.
EDIT: Remember how I said I bet there'd be cases?
Search for 'Jack Kirby Marvel copyright'. Or even just 'Marvel copyright estates'.
They're trying to pull the same thing that Disney is pulling on living creators, but they're going after the estates of some of the creators who basically made them, all of whom are deceased too. And I bet it's in no small part because those creators aren't able to defend themselves or provide their own information anymore.
(Jack Kirby's estate's case started around 2009-10 and took until 2014 to settle, but part of that was that the estate had to withdraw a petition for a higher court review of a 2011 ruling that agreed with Marvel. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-marvel-kirby-idUSKCN0HL2EZ20140926)
It's actually kind of fascinating, it's drawn a ton of attention because it all hinges on some details of a 1960 ruling to do with The Game of Life and a review of that ruling for clarification. Depending on what that outcome is, it could affect... well, virtually everything copyrighted before 1976 (which would be covered by an earlier version of the Copyright Act). https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/how-the-supreme-court-could-shake-up-disneys-spider-man-plans-1235065460/
But I guess everyone post-1976 is kind of screwed if they didn't go out of their way to secure the rights, since it seems like the work-for-hire test is extremely broad.
The legal war between comic book art great Jack Kirby's heirs and Marvel Entertainment over the rights to Iron Man, Captain America and other superhero icons has ended, not with a climactic final battle but with a settlement announced Friday by both sides.
Michał "rysiek" Woźniak · 🇺🇦
Mre. Dartigen [maker mode]
Christopher