Lessig - Public Domain Dead in 35 Years 469
tcd004 writes "Lawrence Lessig, in an article on the Foreign Policy site, predicts that the public domain will die a slow death at the hands of anti-piracy efforts. From the article: 'The danger remains invisible to most, hidden by the zeal of a war on piracy. And that is how the public domain may die a quiet death, extinguished by self-righteous extremism, long before many even recognize it is gone.'"
Going to die? (Score:5, Insightful)
It's dead Jim.
Re:Going to die? (Score:4, Interesting)
I think Dr. Lessig overlooked copylefts as a viable alternative to public domain.
Re:Going to die? (Score:5, Insightful)
An author can easily purposely put something in the public domain, or use a copyleft that is almost as good. That doesn't solve the original problem.
Re:Going to die? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Going to die? (Score:3, Funny)
The FSF agrees with you, you know. In the GPL FAQ, it's written that if your code is shorter than the GPL, it's probably not worth it to put it under the GPL.
Re:Going to die? (Score:3, Insightful)
Or at least that's what was originally planned. Now it's been corrupted all to hell.
The PD preserves itself, even if it doesn't grow. (Score:3, Informative)
Your post would have been more productive had you avoided calling the GNU General Public License "viral". What you think of the GPL is not on topic here, as this discussion primarily concerns how the public domain works, not your views on how distributed GPL derivatives are licensed. Similarly, a previous poster used the word "fell" to describe entry into the public domain. I'd argue that the popularity of the term in this context is irrelevant and that we are better served by examining the connotation t
Re:Going to die? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Going to die? (Score:3, Insightful)
I think he's just going through a bitter mid life crisis.
Re:Going to die? (Score:2)
Yeah, especially when he helped create the CC:SA license. :P
Actually, this was a very short and broadly termed article that I think was hardly newsworthy. You can generally learn more just reading his blog entries.
Re:Going to die? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Going to die? (Score:4, Interesting)
The first, of course, is to make work available to the public.
The second is to protect the author from others using thier work against them (ie share and share alike).
But even with copyrights, if a work is not published, but is something internal (say, the code to Google servers), then 50, 75, 100 years can pass, and even though it may (may!) end up technically in the public domain, it's still a trade secret, and if it never gets published externally, it's not public domain.
Copyleft and CC address this issue by getting more works out, but Copyleft and CC only cover works that are specifically placed under those licenses, which are not the majority of works. Both are essentially workarounds for a system that is fundamentally broken and has lost its balance of profit vs public good.
So every single thought should be public domain? (Score:3, Interesting)
Yes, this is a serious problem. To avoid it, all human beings should be forcibly compelled to document every thought they ever have, and to publish them through a centralised public database that
Re:So every single thought should be public domain (Score:5, Funny)
5/17 5:11pm "My cat rolled over on it's back again today"
5/17 5:15pm "I feed my cat and he liked it"
5/17 5:23pm "That voice in my head telling me to kill my cat and eat it is getting harder to resist"
Re:Going to die? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Going to die? (Score:3, Insightful)
Of course. Copyleft means that the author still retains some power to specify how it's used (although they have to declare such intentions upfront, typically that they don't want it incorporated into non-free projects)
Declaring something public-domain makes it "more free" than declaring it copyleft.
However, the big point of the public domain is that it applies to everything (after a certain grace period) even if the author or his publisher is a parani
Re:Going to die? (Score:3, Insightful)
Lawrence Lessig overlooked copylefts?? Lawrence Lessig, the founder of Creative Commons, author of Free Culture [wikisource.org], and director on the FSF board??
I rather doubt it.
The issue is that a large part of our culture is copyrighted and owned by people who are going to milk this copyright for all it's worth, as long as they can. Creative Commons/GPL/GFDL are only useful if you already own the copyright, and it's not practical to repl
Re:Going to die? (Score:5, Insightful)
There is however a huge, and admittedly 99% crap, amount of work that is released with creative commons style licenses, or released into the public domain immediately.
I hope that over the years -- as popular culture becomes more and more formula driven -- that a new and burgeoning culture arises that sees the various sharing licenses as well as public domain as the best option. Where anyone can release their creative works into the world, and their merits, not their marketing budget, determines whether it is successful or not.
Re:Going to die? (Score:2)
Look at the requirement that everything on the next gen players be DRM'ed and licensed. There's no "Region 0"
Re:Going to die? (Score:2)
I do like to buy DVD's of movies that I enjoy, and the industry's insistence that they don't release movies in certain regions just gives me one less reason to give them my money.
Of course, I'm sure most future players will be hackable/flashable.
Re:Going to die? (Score:5, Insightful)
There's three reasons I can think for this.
The first reason is simply that while digital content may cost a lot to produce originally, making copies is basically free. This means that every sale is profitable, no matter how low the cost. This, in turn, means that there is no market where selling the product wouldn't be profitable, no matter how low a price you must set in order to sell it. So, you sell the same product for a high price in rich western countries, and for a low price in poorer countries, maximizing the profits in each particular area. However, this model breaks down if someone buys the product in areas of low price and sells it in areas of high price.
In other words, companies want the benefits of globalization for themselves but not for their customers.
The second reason is that companies like to sell the same product several times. First you buy a ticket to see a movie in a theater, then you buy it in a DVD. If theater and DVD versions were available at the same time, they would compete with each other - you might decide to simply rent the DVD and skip the theater completely. Because of this, the DVD version only appears after the movie has disappeared from the theater.
Now, movies are shown at different times at different countries. This means that a movie that debuted in the US is already released as a DVD there when it is shown in theaters here in Europe. Againt, the companies don't want their customers to get the benefits of globalization, but want them reserved for themselves.
The third reason is the simple fact that company executives are human beings (as hard as that might be to believe sometimes), and human beings like power; telling others what they can and cannot do gives them kicks, so why not do so ?
Isn't circumventing access control a crime nowadays in the US ?
market segmentation (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm not saying that companies shouldn't be allowed to set different prices in different places - but that other people should not be prohibited from buying in the cheaper market, shipping to a more expensive market, and selling the product at an intermediate price. For example, why shouldn't Americans be allowed to buy cheaper drugs in Canada? The drug companies may profit less; they would have to raise Canadian prices and lower American prices. But, why should the law be set up to benefit the pharmaceutical company at the expense of the consumer, any more than it should benefit the consumer at the expense of the company? Efficient markets generally require a level playing field.
Re:Going to die? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Going to die? (Score:3, Informative)
No. The companies who produce DVDs are free to sell it at whatever price they like, and I am free to choose whether or not I am willing to pay that price. However, if they are selling
Re:Going to die? (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Going to die? (Score:3, Insightful)
...and now let's go back to reality. Marketing budgets cut through the babel of thousands--millions !--of other products competing for attention in the marketplace. The only "merit" that ensures survival in the marketplace is marketability.
That's a hard truth, but it's what it is. Great work is seldom popular work.
Re:Going to die? (Score:5, Insightful)
Nothing has fallen into the public domain for almost a half century before I was born.
That is amazing isn't it? Back in the days when it took years to publish and distribute a work artists were given fourteen years of protection. Today, despite near instantaneous communication, they are protected for a hundred years or better. It's no wonder that so many people don't give a damn about sharing copyrighted works.
Re:Going to die? (Score:5, Insightful)
*cough*
You mistake the freeloader attitude for an understanding and rejection of the issue.
Most people don't give a damn cause they get it for free, not because of some political opinion.
Re:Going to die? (Score:4, Insightful)
You're mostly right, but the mess that is copyright law today certainly contributes to people's attitudes about violating those copyrights. People don't feel bad about downloading songs without paying for them because they don't see it having a meaningful effect upon the artists. If, however, musicians were actually paid the money for those songs a lot of people might feel guilty about "ripping off" their favorite bands. As it is now most musicians survive on touring and merchandising.
Re:Going to die? (Score:3, Insightful)
As it is now most musicians survive on a day job.
Re:Going to die? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Going to die? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Going to die? (Score:4, Insightful)
In other words, the choice is between limited copyright and no protection at all, not limited copyright and eternal entitlement.
By the way, the 14 year term did refer to copyright -- a hundred years ago. Now, mostly because of Disney's lobbying (we couldn't have Mickey Mouse becoming public domain, now could we?), copyright is life of author + 70 years, or 100 years in the case of works created by a corporation. It cannot be passed down to your executors.
Also, copyright lasts that long whether you assert it or not. You're thinking of trademarks -- they're the things that last indefinitely, but only while you're asserting them.
Re:Going to die? (Score:5, Interesting)
Um, what about patents? (Score:5, Interesting)
Patents may have their problems, but at least the length of time and the requirement of maintenence fees to keep them in force are appropriate.
As an intellectual property owner, I worry when Congress goes overboard in an attempt to "protect intellectual property holders' rights". Yes, I like that what I create can benefit me. However, when other people use IP as a cudgel to abuse people, it makes me worry about the stability of the whole system. If you were an aristocrat in France in 1780, wouldn't you be a little concerned about the other aristocrats who beat and starve the peasants? They might just have a revolution.
Re:Going to die? (Score:2)
Re:Going to die? (Score:2, Insightful)
If you're implying that works without a copyright symbol attached are in the public domain, you are mistaken. Copyrights in the U.S. are opt-out, not opt-in.
Re:Going to die? (Score:3, Interesting)
For something to enter the public domain today, it must've been created around the early part of last century.
Not true. Consider this [wikinews.org], or this [infoanarchy.org], or this [voanews.com].
If you're implying that works without a copyright symbol attached are in the public domain, you are mistaken.
No, I'm implying that works that are explictly placed into the public domain or are produced by an employee in the US government as part of her duties is in the public domain.
Re:Going to die? (Score:3, Interesting)
Not true. Almost everything published between 1922 and 1964 is now public domain, because of the requirement for renewal. For example, a book published in 1960 had to have its copyright renewed 28 years later, in 1988, or else it fell into the public domain. The vast majority of published work did not have its copyright renewed. What got renewed was typically the relatively small fraction of publ
Re:Going to die? (Score:3, Insightful)
Actually, I have, and do.
First off, I hate Britney Spears, and I hate when she is used as the icon of modern copyrighted material, for some reason. Let's instead talk about what might be a better example: The Beatles. You may love them, you may hate them. But you have to admit they are better than Britney. And if copyri
Lessig? (Score:5, Insightful)
In any event, people simply don't care. As long as they have a cool ringtone, that is.
Re:Lessig? (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm not sure I fully understand this comment. Are you referencing Ray Bradbury's remarks about how Michael Moore "stole" the title for Fahrenheit 911?
"He stole my title and changed the numbers without ever asking me for permission."
Seriously (Score:2)
Re:Seriously (Score:4, Insightful)
"That can be arranged."
- RIAA
"*shrug*, *BLAM*"
- Your government
People forget (Score:4, Insightful)
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
I foresee a crisis at Disney (Score:5, Funny)
Re:I foresee a crisis at Disney (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:I foresee a crisis at Disney (Score:5, Insightful)
I'll be terrified to see the day that the USPTO actually starts selling the rights to public domain works of unknown origin.
I can honestly see it happening.
Re:I foresee a crisis at Disney (Score:3, Insightful)
Like when the govt. allowed two sisters to copywrite "Happy Birthday"?
Re:I foresee a crisis at Disney (Score:3, Interesting)
No, they wrote: "Good Morning to All" which has the same notes as Happy Birthday. Nobody know who wrote the words to "Happy Birthday". The sisters were given the rights to "Happy Birthday" 10 years after if first appeared because it was musically the same as "Good Morning to All".
Re:I foresee a crisis at Disney (Score:5, Insightful)
You see, that's exactly the problem. They have you using words like "ripping off" to describe what they do with thos public domain stories. As long as the public feels like this then congress can do whatever it wants (translation:whatever is suggested to it by the media giants) with copyright law.
I realize you were just pointing out hipochricy. But the terms you used to do it, so pervasive in our society, are the exact terms and feelings Disney counts on so the public never questions their "right" to keep their works locked away forever.
TW
Re:I foresee a crisis at Disney (Score:4, Insightful)
Which also implies that draconian copyright law will make great art one day no longer possible.
35 years? (Score:2)
Fight back! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Fight back! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Fight back! (Score:3, Interesting)
Please-kindly-note that while YOU may release anything you write on Wikipedia into the public domain, Wikipedia itself IS NOT PUBLIC DOMAIN
Wikinews is, but some people are trying to change that. If you want to see Wikinews stay in the public domain, create an account and vote here [wikimedia.org].
Re:Fight back! (Score:3, Interesting)
Will it be dead? (Score:4, Insightful)
As long as people are out there sharing ideas freely, it'll survive. It may not get as much attention as it does right now (i.e. all the attention open source gets right now), but as a concept, it cannot die.
There, I had a thought and shared it. PD was just reborn
Re:Will it be dead? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Will it be dead? (Score:4, Informative)
I disagree (Score:5, Insightful)
Although, things aren't so great right now, and will probably get worse before they get better.
Re:I disagree (Score:5, Insightful)
That's exactly the problem (Score:3, Insightful)
I much more feel that society and culture are the root of the problem. Let me explain.
One problem is the political system. Winner-take-all is a way of counting votes that basically admits only 2 parties (a 3rd party will take away votes from the party closest to it, increasing the likelihood that the less-favored party wins).
Because there are only 2 parties, and it's hard to start up a 3rd party with a fighting chance, it's har
Re:I disagree (Score:2)
No such thing. This planet has never seen one, and never will.
There will come a point when things get so bad that people will just stop caring
Agreed, and I think we've already gotten right to the threshold of that in the US. Personally, I try to do the "right" thing, but could care less about what "the law" says I should do (largely because I've learned that "law" and "right" only rarely overlap, and then only for purely accidental reasons).
And looking at the next generation -
Anti-piracy? (Score:5, Insightful)
Public Domain's Not Dead, Just On Hold (Score:5, Insightful)
Congress wouldn't extend copyright again, would they?
Of course, new stuff locked down by DRM won't know when it's supposed to expire, so 90+ years when it's supposed to expire, no one will know what to do with the scrambled bits.
Double edged sword of copyright? (Score:4, Interesting)
I think the only way to save the public domain is for serious reform - be it soapbox, ballot box, or revolution - to take place sooner rather than later.
I predict exactly the opposite... (Score:2)
When I first read the article title, I thought this was going to be a story about how everything would be public domain in 35 years. You'd think a guy like Lessig would be more optimistic about things.
Anyway, I predict that in 35 years the pendulum will have swung. The zeal of the war on piracy will have gone too far for too long, and people will fight back. Sure, the fight will start with copyleft, as it already has begun to do so, but once copyleft has won the establishment will be forced to move in t
Refreshing (Score:3, Insightful)
I agree. It's not in fashion here on Slashdot to actually be optimistic about the mechanisms of change in a representative government
Re:Refreshing (Score:3, Insightful)
Imagine that the country wakes up and eventually stops voting for the current crop of dung beetles, how do you take back property rights that have already been granted. Even if you believe that representative governments reflect the desire of the population and that the population is smart enough to vote in their own interest, how do we take back property rights granted world wide
But where will it go? (Score:2)
Culture of Greed (Score:5, Insightful)
What is the incentive for people to give away things when the trend is to become wealthy as quickly as possible?
People who already are wealthy are the ones with the greatest means and free time to create more wealth...it is a mindset.
Re:Culture of Greed (Score:3, Interesting)
Authors have control (Score:4, Insightful)
That said, PHBs and paternalist OSes from Redmond may decide the implement restrictive DRM settings for their own idiotic reasons. I noticed more than one company annual report that uses a password protected PDF to prevent copy-past operations for who knows what reason. Yet the first time a small content creator's use of DRM causes problems for their big client, the small company will "turn off" DRM.
As long as there are people that want to be heard as far and wide as possible, there will be a public domain.
Another Prohibition (Score:5, Insightful)
Only about one in twenty or one in a hundred will go to the effort of buying the illegally chipped merchandise that will become available in flea markets, on the Internet, and via other black-market channels. This gear will be sold like the pressed-grape-concentrate bricks of the Prohibition era, which came with detailed instructions explaining that it was totally illegal to use them to make wine and giving careful step-by-step directions on what you must not do to stay legal.
It will create more social unrest, injustice, and disrespect for the law. As with prohibition, and with current marijuana laws, a huge fraction of the population will be felons according to the law. Enforcement will be inconsistent and selective. Most people breaking the law will not be deterred because they will feel that getting caught is unlikely and totally a matter of bad luck.
My analog cassette player died last year. My old CD player is starting to become unreliable. I'm not sure what the useful life of a solid-state laser is, but I'm beginning to suspect it's less than ten years. The next one I buy will probably have DRM.
Prohibition eventually ended, the "war on drugs" will eventually end, and the war on the public domain will eventually end. Probably not in my lifetime, though, and not until a lot of damage and misery has occurred.
Such a short article but so wrong (Score:2, Insightful)
While I see the guys point he probably couldn't be more wrong if he tried. I never used to release anything I wrote or developed into the public domain. As restrictions increase though I am more and more inclined to release my material, in part, as a protest. Most of it is not really worth anything to anyone but me but there are a few gems in amongst it that potentially have value.
While I don't imagine everyone will follow my course I imagine that there are suficient like minded people that will do the sa
Misleading Catch Phrase (Score:5, Insightful)
But plenty of people love to share their work and ideas. Some of these people are going to be putting stuff in the public domain. Also, with copyleft and similar policies, a lot of copyrighted material is going to provide similar benefits to public material (reusability).
All is not lost, and all won't be lost as long as enough people behave socially rather than trying to grab as much money and power as they can.
35 years (Score:5, Informative)
Not dead. Just comatose. (Score:2, Insightful)
Do NOT obey the laws. (Score:2, Troll)
Shit like this happens based on pure greed, and they expect us to sit there and blindly follow the law? Hah.
Even people on slashdot that are always siding with the RIAA on those piracy stories.. how can you justify this?
The law is only good for so much, people. You CAN ignore it without consequence, you know..
A2K (Score:3, Interesting)
There is the A2k treaty project, we will get a development agenda for WIPo soon. Is Lessig accredited to WIPO? No, sure he isn't. You can make a dent there. Lawrence Lessig does not expect it to last 35 years...
Public domain -- it might be an US-only problem. Of course the works of Kafka and others are public domain in my legal system.
In 35 years... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:In 35 years... (Score:3, Insightful)
There are two reasons to expect these protectionist IP trends to continue, even if the Western world loses its position in the front seat of global policy.
For one, countries will tend to use loose intellectual property standards to get the leg up on other countries if they feel they are "behind." The United States stole a good amount of British IP after divorcing themselves from the crown, but afte
I see an 'instant' death (Score:3, Informative)
Sure, you can still run your C64 at home, but dont expect to get online. And if you try, expect to be visited by the bit police.
No recordings go into public domain until 2067! (Score:5, Informative)
I quote:
Records, cassettes, CD's, and other music recordings come under a general category called Sound Recordings or Phonorecords. Before 1972, sound recordings were not protected by copyright law, but by a hodge-podge tangle of state laws. This problem was fixed with the 1972 copyright act and extended by the 1998 twenty year copyright extension. Different copyright experts have offered very different complicated explanations, but all agree that all sound recordings essentially are under copyright protection until the year 2067. So here is the one sentence you need to remember:
Sound Recording Rule of Thumb:
There are NO sound recordings in the Public Domain.
There are, of course, exceptions to everything, and there really are some PD sound recordings. However, the federal and state laws are so tangled and complicated, it is extremely difficult to do confident sound recording PD research. There are several U.S. web sites claiming that sound recordings made in the United States prior to February 15, 1972, are in the public domain, and there are links to U.S. Copyright Office publications stating: "Sound recordings fixed before February 15, 1972, are not eligible for Federal copyright protection." We have had this reviewed independently by several attorneys across the U.S. Each has confidently and independently told us that between federal and state copyright protection, virtually all sound recordings are protected until the year 2067.
Re:No recordings go into public domain until 2067! (Score:3, Interesting)
See also:
http://www22.brinkster.com/paradio/pages/pre1972.h tm [brinkster.com]
http://www.legallanguage.com/lawarticles/Clarida00 7.html [legallanguage.com]
It seems there are three points here:
1)before 1972, copyright laws were governed by state regulations, not
national regulations.
2)Merely because they are not covered by federal copyright laws
doesn't imply that they are still owned by someone. The owners may be
dead, or the original master unavailable. I
Re:Say what?? (Score:2, Informative)
No, public domain means not covered by copyright. If there's "a small EULA" which depends on copyright for its force, then it's not public domain. You're thinking of "freeware".
Re:Say what?? (Score:3, Informative)
If you were to release an application in to the public domain and offer it as a free download from your web site, you could not stop me from simply changing the strings so that it looks like my work and then reselling it as a commercial application.
Re:Say what?? (Score:3, Insightful)
Open Source is not helping this situation either, there seems to be confusion between the 2 in many peoples minds.
Re:Spell check please (Score:3, Funny)
No. It's spelled correctly. The /. editors forgot to add the sinister gregorian monk music and demon guide dogs and crows.
Re:Spell check please (Score:2)
Re:Spell check please (Score:2)
Re:Public Domain in the balance (Score:3, Informative)
Not much in the way of content, you are right. As for 35 years, it's because it was part of a larger "Here Today, Gone Tommorow" piece that is talking about what institutions that we take for granted might not be here in...you guessed it...35 years.
Re:Public Domain in the balance (Score:2)
Re:I don't think so. (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Communism must die. (Score:5, Informative)
Marx original comunism idea specifically called for industry workers that overthrow their governing regime on their own, not purely agricutural societies forced to change by some so-called intellectuals. Real communism never called for a one-party system, nor a quasi-dictatoric board of directors in it. Instead it relies solely on self-organizational principles and true equality (In the libertarian + social security sense, everyone paid according to his needs).
Every "communist" system so far has utterly failed to even attempt employing these principles, which lead to oppression (via the "we know better" and "not with us is against us" approaches) and inequality ("Some are more equal than others", because they bear the burden of ruling...). Followed directly by restrictions, that were only necessary, because people didn't decide to become communist in the first place and didn't want to stay communist, because their infrastructure wasn't up to it (the reason Marx wanted industry workers under all circumstances!)
In short: Communism has not failed, because it has never been tried. Systems hiding under that name have failed though. Wrong names for systems is pretty common though, consider democracy, which means "ruling by the people". Nowhere does this call for parliaments!
Re:Communism must die. (Score:3, Insightful)
Well, it actually has been tried a lot. However, the results of the attempts never were what Marx and Engels hoped for. All the evidence is against communism. Principles, which dozens of countries have tried with usually disastrous consequences, are very likely to be flawed.
When it comes to Public Domain in the internet world, we won't know for another couple of dozen years how it will work out, but we can of course theorize (that means
Re:What are you on? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Copyright irrelevant in 35 years (Score:3, Funny)
Read too much Marx recently?