Something to keep your eyes on.
http://www.awn.com/articles/mindbiz/min ... ur-own-art
You will lose all the rights to your own art
Moderators: Víctor Paredes, Belgarath, slowtiger
You will lose all the rights to your own art
"and then Man created god!"
That article is from 2008. Apparently the legislation died that year and was never enacted:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orphan_wor ... introduced
Cheers,
Muffy.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orphan_wor ... introduced
Cheers,
Muffy.
The United States Constitution says the following "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries".
There was a lot of discussion on just what to include but the phrase "for a limited time" was never in question.
The principle espoused by Jefferson and later by Madison was that people don't own the products of their minds but that to encourage creativity it was a good idea to give them a head start.
Congress over the centuries, heavily lobbied by copyright holders, has gradually come to act and legislate as though people do own ideas. I think this is a bad thing for our culture although it is great for lawyers.
A head start is a very good idea and it should be well protected by law.
After that there shouldn't be any protection because the way a culture advances and a society grows is by building on the ideas of others. It's as bad to get in the way of that as it is to not give that head start; maybe worse.
Our present copyright system is vastly overblown. It is our system and we should support it till we have a better one but it's become a bad system and something like an orphaned works law will be a small step in improving it.
Barry
There was a lot of discussion on just what to include but the phrase "for a limited time" was never in question.
The principle espoused by Jefferson and later by Madison was that people don't own the products of their minds but that to encourage creativity it was a good idea to give them a head start.
Congress over the centuries, heavily lobbied by copyright holders, has gradually come to act and legislate as though people do own ideas. I think this is a bad thing for our culture although it is great for lawyers.
A head start is a very good idea and it should be well protected by law.
After that there shouldn't be any protection because the way a culture advances and a society grows is by building on the ideas of others. It's as bad to get in the way of that as it is to not give that head start; maybe worse.
Our present copyright system is vastly overblown. It is our system and we should support it till we have a better one but it's become a bad system and something like an orphaned works law will be a small step in improving it.
Barry