|
As for the last point, I was contrasting "a painting might have been created 20 years ago but never made public until later in their life" and "from the date something was made available to the public" - i.e. does copyright start when something was first created or when it was first made publicly available? In that case, whilst it might be a derivative work, the original would be unavailable to be copied so it would effectively reset the copyright clock. This is effectively a parallel to the case in UK copyright law where an unreleased recording is covered by copyright for 50 years, and if released at any point in those 50 years gets covered for 70 years from the date of release. > Copyright should last ten years, at the very maximum 15 years, after publication. This is an entirely solved problem. It is the complete opposite to an entirely solved problem, because not everybody agrees how long copyright should last, or even if it should exist at all. You might think your solution would make it a solved problem, many others would disagree. Governments similarly believe that the copyright term lengths they have enacted into law are correct, and that the lengths enacted by other countries are wrong, and maybe people (including yourself) disagree with them. As a consumer, I'd prefer copyright terms to be shorter in general, but as someone who's spent around half their career working in games development, and on the kind of games that need a team of 100+ and so need heavy investment and protection in order to recoup that investment, I also support the idea of copyright in general. While my specific area probably doesn't need copyright terms longer than a decade, I can also see that in other areas these lengths are justified - I still listen to older bands, and see it as entirely fair that e.g. Pink Floyd should still receive money if I want to buy an album they made 60 years ago. Similarly, if I want to watch Wizard of Oz, it's absolutely fair that MGM should still get a chunk of royalties from a streaming platform. That money is going to fund the films of the future. |