How long should intellectual copyright last?

[Arnox]

If you could change the time corporations/individuals held an exclusive copyright until it fell into public domain, how long would you make it? Me personally, I would make it 20 years.

 

[andersonnnunes]

20 years? Seems reasonable.

Too bad people aren't reasonable and piracy is widespread. Even one year would not prevent them from breaking the law.

I am afraid of guessing a single number for all industries without knowledge of how long a return of investment happens in each one.

 

[gaijinkaiju]

I don't really follow (or care all that much tbh) about copyright law, but i'm assuming we're talking about how long till something becomes free to the public to use and distribute without approval of/ payment to, the original creator/s?
Hard to say in that case, but I do know the moment something becomes abandonware it should automatically lose copyright status. same goes for games (especially older games e.g nes, n64 etc) since they're not being sold or even supported by the original creator.

 

[Vendor-Lazarus]

7 Years.

Half of the original copyright length. Which makes sense in today's faster world with constantly shifting trends.
The idea is to incentivize creative ideas, not lock it down to be held by mega-corporations.
7 years should be more than enough to reap the majority of reasonable income.

However, all copying for private use and without profit should be permissible.

 

[Arnox]

7 Years.

Half of the original copyright length. Which makes sense in today's faster world with constantly shifting trends.
The idea is to incentivize creative ideas, not lock it down to be held by mega-corporations.
7 years should be more than enough to reap the majority of reasonable income.

However, all copying for private use and without profit should be permissible.

I don't think I'd agree with this short a term, but the last line especially sounds pretty problematic. What about artists who make their money based off of subscriptions?

I don't really follow (or care all that much tbh) about copyright law, but i'm assuming we're talking about how long till something becomes free to the public to use and distribute without approval of/ payment to, the original creator/s?
Hard to say in that case, but I do know the moment something becomes abandonware it should automatically lose copyright status. same goes for games (especially older games e.g nes, n64 etc) since they're not being sold or even supported by the original creator.

Copyright law is important because of the stranglehold movie and game corporations have over IP rights. It gets pretty creatively suffocating sometimes.

 

[Vendor-Lazarus]

7 Years.

Half of the original copyright length. Which makes sense in today's faster world with constantly shifting trends.
The idea is to incentivize creative ideas, not lock it down to be held by mega-corporations.
7 years should be more than enough to reap the majority of reasonable income.

However, all copying for private use and without profit should be permissible.

I don't think I'd agree with this short a term, but the last line especially sounds pretty problematic. What about artists who make their money based off of subscriptions?

They are still required to remain creative. If an artist hasn't made anything new in 7 years, then why should that person be able to rest on laurels? Not that they would have many subscribers remaining after such a long period.

Good artists will make good art. Scammers won't. Canon is a thing...as is memes.

 

[Signa]

Copyright is such a mess I don't even know where to start. I don't think Sony or Dreamworks for example should be allowed to make their own Mickey Mouse cartoons and profit from them, but it certainly should be in the public domain now, so legally, they should be allowed. I think we should have a guideline set up for things that expire into public domain before we start looking at how soon they should expire. Something like "Presenting Walt Disney's Mickey Mouse in [Movie title]" so that it separates the fact that they didn't create the Mouse, but they are creating an adventure for him. They also would be attributing the character to the guy that owned it rather than the rights holder.

So yeah, 15-20 years seems reasonable.

 

[Arnox]

I don't think I'd agree with this short a term, but the last line especially sounds pretty problematic. What about artists who make their money based off of subscriptions?

They are still required to remain creative. If an artist hasn't made anything new in 7 years, then why should that person be able to rest on laurels? Not that they would have many subscribers remaining after such a long period.

Good artists will make good art. Scammers won't. Canon is a thing...as is memes.

I'm still kinda confused what you mean. I mean, if all copying for private use is permissible, what is stopping piracy? Unless you're saying, you can copy it all you want but you can't actually distribute it to others. At least until copyright runs out.

 

[andersonnnunes]

Funny fact: if the number of years were too low, companies would be able to modify and distribute Linux and other "free" software and not release sources for the modification. That would bring so much pain to the "freetards" that they prefer to have copyright last longer - so they can use the government to force people to distribute sources, if they refuse.