<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN">
<html>
<head>
<meta content="text/html;charset=ISO-8859-1" http-equiv="Content-Type">
</head>
<body bgcolor="#ffffff" text="#000000">
Glenn Kerbein wrote:
<blockquote cite="mid:49946943.2010605@pirate-party.us" type="cite">
<pre wrap="">Andrew Norton wrote:
</pre>
<blockquote type="cite">
<pre wrap="">copyright term extension of performances from 50 to 95 years got a step closer today
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/expert/infopress_page/058-48812-040-02-07-909-20090209IPR48791-09-02-2009-2009-false/default_en.htm">http://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/expert/infopress_page/058-48812-040-02-07-909-20090209IPR48791-09-02-2009-2009-false/default_en.htm</a>
I would suggest working on something, but since any sort of cooperation seems low on people's minds, i don't know why I bothered suggesting it</pre>
</blockquote>
<pre wrap="">A joint release from any of the EU parties would be best. It doesn't have to be all of them, just some of them.</pre>
</blockquote>
Here is a press release draft that I've sent to some Spanish parties
& civic groups. Just in case any pirate party is interested in
becoming involved in the drafting process.<br>
<br>
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------<br>
<br>
Legal Affairs Committee <a
href="http://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/expert/infopress_page/058-48812-040-02-07-909-20090209IPR48791-09-02-2009-2009-false/default_en.htm">passed
last thursday</a> the extension of the commercial author's rights term
to 95 years, and now only lasts the decision of the Europarliament
Plenary, <a
href="http://www.europarl.europa.eu/oeil/FindByProcnum.do?lang=en&procnum=COD/2008/0157">expected
for the 23rd of march</a>.<br>
<br>
If passed, non commercial culture sharing of currently in public domain
works like <i><a
href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Love_Me_Tender_%28song%29">Love Me
Tender</a></i> (1956), <a
href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Pretender"><i>The Great
Pretender</i></a> (1955)<i> </i>o<i>r <a
href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concierto_de_Aranjuez">Concierto de
Aranjuez</a></i> (1940)
would become an author's rights infringement in most EU Member States.
Plenty of works affected by this change, which would go back to works
published since 1914, are not available in stores and are hard to be
found; also, the European Parliament wants to include in January 2010
audiovisual works within this extension, which would affect works like <a
href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0034167/"><i>Sergeant York</i></a>
(1941), <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0038650/"><i>It's a
Wonderful Life</i></a> (1946) or <i><a
href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0023037/">Las Hurdes</a></i> (1933).
An artificial scarcity scenario is thus created, what difficults a
human rights like <a href="http://www.un.org/Overview/rights.html#a27">enjoying
the arts</a>.<br>
<br>
We, the signatories of the present paper, reject the arguments brought
by the term extension supporters, because:<br>
<br>
<span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: sans-serif; color: black;">-
<big>though United Nations <a
href="http://www.unhchr.ch/tbs/doc.nsf/898586b1dc7b4043c1256a450044f331/03902145edbbe797c125711500584ea8/$FILE/G0640060.pdf"
target="_blank">stated in 2005</a> that the objective of commercial
author's rights is to "<em>enable those authors to enjoy an adequate
standard of living</em>“<font color="#000000"><font size="2"><font
face="sans-serif">, <big>c</big></font></font></font></big></span><big><font
color="#000000"><font face="sans-serif"><font size="2"><big>onsidering
the long career and high income of the forementioned artists, what does
</big></font></font></font><font color="#000000"><font face="sans-serif"><font
size="2"><big><i>an adequate standard of living</i></big></font></font></font></big><font
color="#000000"><font face="sans-serif"><font size="2"><big> mean? It
is
pointless to talk about minimum wages in their cases, as their albums
have brought them hundreds of thousand, even millions -more than what <a
href="http://www.20minutos.es/noticia/288314/0/demasiados/mileuristas/espanoles/"
target="_blank">more than half of working Spaniards</a></big></font></font></font><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: sans-serif; color: black;"><big>
(counting with inflation) will ever earn during all their career-, nor
is EC's proposal aiming to secure x times the minimun wage for each
work to each artist;</big></span><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: sans-serif; color: black;"><big><br>
- the new terms proposed by European Commission (70 or 95 years) are
purely arbitrary, even considering the EC arguments -which we reject;
and seem to just be aimed to achieve that the citizens finally accept
an extension lower than to 95 years, yet higher than current 50<br>
- European Commission lies when pretends to be caring for authors, as <a
href="http://www.copia-privada-si.com/que-es-la-copia-privada/la-compensacion-por-copia-privada-una-cuestion-de-justicia-para-autores-y-editores-un-beneficio-para-la-sociedad">labels,
at least in Spain, also have a share from levies</a>;
also, as EC bids this way for more money to be managed by a few in a
opaque manner, what, knowing <a
href="http://www.partidopirata.es/blog/comunicado-de-la-junta-directiva-nacional-de-solidaridad-con-ana-maria-mendez-y-con-el-resto-de-damnificados-por-sentencias-similares-y-de-denuncia-contra-la-impunidad-de-sgae/">how
rights management organizations like SGAE work</a>, wouldl mean that
such new levies wouldn't improve the standard of living of all authors,
but that of <a href="http://es.youtube.com/watch?v=711s0YrIIAA"><i>very
selected ones</i></a></big></span><big><big><big><span
style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: sans-serif; color: black;"><big>
and of big labels-</big>.</span></big></big></big><br>
<span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: sans-serif; color: black;"><big><br>
Because of these reasons, we encourage the internet community, if
sharing this rejection to the 95 years extension, to write e-mails to
the MEPs -Spanish MEPs' address can be found <a
href="http://www.informaticaverde.org/blog/?p=54">here</a>, and the
rest in <a
href="http://www.europarl.europa.eu/members/expert.do?language=ES">the
European Parliament web site</a>- to make them perceive such rejection;
if that rejection becomes massive, they'll know which will be on stake
regarding internet users' vote in the European Election.</big></span><br>
</body>
</html>