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> > > I don't see any point in copyright after someone is dead, except on a > > financial, "support his dependants" sort of a thing. I agree with you > > that it isn't fair to not be able to use something just because you > > can't ask, and if the author is dead, then you REALLY can't ask. > > A lot of stuff these days is sold as work for hire, and if copyright > expired after the original author's death, then people would pay > less to older or sicker authors. I find the concept of "work for hire" very scary, to be frank. I don't like the thought that someone else might own my creations *in entire* rather than just the specific excerpts I sold to them. If you write a novel and sell it, you still have legal control of your characters and world. If you write a novel for hire, the people hiring you have legal control of your characters and world. Yuck! I suppose that reaction would be different for people who habitually use other people's characters and worlds anyhow, but I plan to NOT work for hire if I can at all avoid it. You are right though, voiding all copyrights at the owners death does really complicated things to "company owned" copyrights. Another thing to think about... group copyrights. > > If I built a chair, I would have "natural" rights over who got to use > > that chair. > > Until/unless you sold it. And of course if you made the chair out of > stolen materials, it gets more complicated. Well, yes, but given that I had rights to the materials, I would have the right to sell/transfer ownership, I would have the right to priority of use, I would have the right to forbid the use of, and so forth. If those are natural rights, then intellectual property rights could just as easily be "natural." If I made an intellectual property out of stolen material, things would get complicated. :) > > By the time I have polished a lyric, contructed a tune, and made a > > musical arrangement for a tune, I have probably spent a similar amount > > of time to the amount of time it takes to make a chair. (And I could > > make an 11 piece dining set in the time it takes me to write a novel.) > > Yes, I think I deserve some rights over who gets to use the tune. > > My better songs get written FASTER than my average songs. I object > to counting time made in creating something as a factor in how much > I own it or what rights I have to it. No, not time. But something to do with effort and skill and so forth. Quality of workmanship? Perhaps the author should be able to decide. But that would require that there be some sort of obligation on the part of the author to be fufilled (making themselves available for reprint requests, perhaps?) or they would probably automatically request the longest possible time? > > In a society where there is no copyright the only way I would have to > > maintain that control was to never let my song be heard. But then, the > > only way I could maintain my right to the chair in a society with no > > personal property laws, would be to hold on to that chair for the rest > > of my life. > > In a society without copyright, you might not want to control who > used stuff you created. Yeah, "natural" rights have this uncany way of seeming more natural after the fact. :) > In spite of all the above, I do agree that some sort of copyright > is a Good Thing for commercial publication, and that even non- > commercial publication should carefully note who originated > something and whether it's still the same as the original > version and if not, who made the changes. At the very least we'll agree on a creator's right to acknowlegement, and the right to "if anyone makes money off of my effort it should be me"? <grin> I think that the reason intellectual rights are less natural than property rights are that they are darn hard to qualify, rate and administer. I bet in small close-knit societies the two rights work just about the same. "May I copy your picture?" is just as natural as "May I borrow your chair?" In a world with matter replication, I bet property rights become as confusing as intellectual rights. :) Michelle Bottorff Lady Lavender -- Family webpage: http://home.sprintmail.com/~mbottorff/index.html Lady Lavender's Filksongs: http://www.freemars.org/lavender/index.html 25r:2a:1p