<div>While the points raised by RMS may be interesting enough, I don't really think his concerns are as pressing as they are made out to be. His post seems to assume the immediate application of PP's proposals to todays systems and business models, while the way works are sold/distributed remains at a status quo.<br>
</div><div><br></div><div>Anyone who things a reduction in copyright duration would happen overnight is kidding themselves. The FSF has been working for a little over 20 years now, a relatively short time, and the change in the software marketplace has been truly astounding. There was no point where a switch was flicked and everyone who is today involved in some way with free software changed their respective outlooks and/or business models.</div>
<div><br></div><div>Let's not forget the actual motivation behind reducing copyright duration - to think that radical change in how indivuals/organisations that currently hold copyrights do business and distribute their content will not occur as a gradual result of any inroads we make is short sighted, and yet the arguments made by RMS are not being applied to a hypothetical future way of doing things, but to todays way, as if it will remain static.</div>
<div><br></div><div>Edison Carter makes the most valid points in this thread sofar, in the very first reply. RMS claims that a shorter copyright term will result in less editable content being distributed, but in all likelihood those choosing to reduce the distribution of such editable content will see their ability to compete similarly reduced.</div>
<br><div class="gmail_quote">On Mon, Dec 7, 2009 at 9:53 AM, Sven Clement <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:sven.clement@gmail.com">sven.clement@gmail.com</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex;">
<div class="im">On Mon, Dec 7, 2009 at 2:11 AM, Edison Carter <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:the.real.edison.carter@gmail.com" target="_blank">the.real.edison.carter@gmail.com</a>></span> wrote:<br></div><div class="gmail_quote">
<div class="im"><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">
<div class="gmail_quote"><div><br>Varable length copyright is not something I will ever agree with. I do not care if it's based on media type, the nature of the content or it's perceived usefulness, copyright held by a person vs. copyright held by a corporation, or the licence used. I very strongly believe that all copyright should expire a uniform number of years after the creation of a work. This would make it so much easier to be sure that a work is no longer in copyright before being able to make use of it in a commercial way. Otherwise we have the problem of works still being locked away long beyond their copyright because even though the copyright has expired, nobody can be sure of it.<br>
</div></div></blockquote><div><br></div></div><div>Thinking about this topic for quite a while, I realized that no solution will be 100% perfect, I do see the problem that if software is licensed as open source and the copyright expires that then someone could use the software under a closed source license for the next X years. But still the software would be available in the version that was available before the copyright expired. </div>
<div><br></div><div>Thus I came to the conclusion, that an uniform expiration date for all works should be introduced, the length should be subject to further discussions with experts in the industry to guarantee, that a creator would not loose more than 20% in average. </div>
<div><br></div><div>To illustrate:</div><div>We know that most books are sold in the 2 years after the publication, so if we would limit the copyright to 5 years a book author would not loose much money.</div><div>Software is normally considered old after 5 yrs so that there would be no problem neither, movies and music idem, so we should first and foremost try to find a consensus, if we want variable or fixed length copyright and after that we should discuss the exact terms with experts knowing how the industries work.</div>
<div><br></div><font color="#888888"><div>Sven</div></font></div>
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