Re: An alternative to levies on copyright

A Seg, 2004-02-23 às 20:08, David Haworth escreveu:
>  - if the publisher is the copyright holder, any law forbidding
>    exclusive licensing would be moot; the publisher would
>    grant himself a non-exclusive license and simply omit to
>    grant licenses to anyone else.  You'd need to prevent
>    publishers from demanding that copyright be signed over lock,
>    stock & barrel, instead of merely being licensed exclusively.
> 
Doesn't make sense to me. When can a publisher be the original copyright
owner? I don't see that situation.

>  - there's also nothing to prevent the author from simply not
>    granting further licenses. Maybe under pressure from the
>    publisher (compare with Microsoft's pressure on PC makers
>    not to supply systems with alternative OSes).
> 
I know. That's why the competing publishers would have to present a very
sweat deal. The difference is not that they can also get the work, but
that they would have a shot at it.

And always remember that there will be a point on which MS won't be able
to keep the pressure just because it doesn't make business sense to the
PC makers.

> > Downside: Works whose sales depend on huge marketing won't happen (no
> > one will want to risk a huge investment if another intermediary can just
> > come and collect the profits).
> 
> You could permit a limited-time (say 5 years) exclusive deal, after
> which the contracts become open again.
> You could also insist that a work enters the public domain
> if for a period of (say) 5 years it hasn't been continually
> "in print" in some form (not difficult to do in these days of
> e-books etc.)
> 
> However, all this is simply patching and shoring up an already
> seriously broken system. What's really needed is a complete
> overhaul of copyright laws with emphasis on the public good, not
> on private gain for a few publishers. That means: shorter duration,
> fewer privileges for rightsholders, and the complete abolition of
> pseudo-copyrights. However, short of outright warfare, I don't
> see that happening any time soon. Too much money flows into
> the coffers of political parties.
> 
> Dave
> 
> BTW If anyone doubts the economic viability of the public domain:
> I bought a copy of Alice In Wonderland a couple of weeks ago. The
> bookshop I went into in Erlangen didn't have one in stock, and
> offered to order one. I lost count of how many different editions
> were available, but there were at least 10. The cheapest was around
> 3 EUR and the most expensive was around 25. I eventually settled on
> a paperback volume with Wonderland & Looking Glass for about 8 EUR.
-- 
						João Miguel Neves

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