Melancholy Spider
January 28th, 2003
Spider Robinson, who once wrote a short story called Melancholy Elephants about the need to limit copyright terms, has decided to slag off Lawrence Lessig:
[...] I suspect what really got on Prof. Lessig's wick was that a major lobbying force behind the Sono Buoni Act . . . I mean the Sonny Corleone Act . . . I'll have it under control in a minute . . . that one of the biggest supporters of the Sonny Bono Act was none other than Mordor itself: the evil empire men call Disney.I've never understood exactly what's so vile about Disney. Every time I've ever given them a dollar, I got back a buck and a half of value. If the Sonny Boy Williamson . . . I say, if the Sonny Bono Act hadn't passed, Steamboat Willie (the Mouse himself!) would have slipped into the public domain.
Naturally, the Disney corporation pressured Congress. If it hadn't, today we'd probably be paying half a buck for cut-rate Mickey Mouse gear that isn't worth a dime, and wondering why nothing good ever seems to last.
Granted: As far as I know, precious few of those who are currently major players at Disney are relatives, loved ones, friends, or even associates of Walt himself any more. I wonder how many people getting rich on his genius today ever met the man. And I'll bet they all wear better clothes, drive better cars, and have more aerobic sex than the average Stanford law professor. I'm not disputing that they're scum.
As far as I can tell, Robinson is worried that if he drops dead today his daughter Terri, who is now 28 years old, might find herself in dire financial straits when she's all of 98 years old. This isn't a terribly strong practical argument for what amounts to perpetual copyright. If Spider is anything like the average writer, the trickle of royalties from her father's books is going to be too meagre to live on. Realistically, it's going to be a nice little supplement to whatever income his daughter earns from her own work. If Spider's work is "rediscovered" somewhere down the line and suddenly in great demand Teri will get lots of cash for the publishing rights and be able to invest or spend that cash as she wishes.
Spider closes with a plea that "We creative types are content for our information to be reasonably inexpensive. Whether we ourselves happen to be breathing or not, don't begrudge us that pittance, as long as someone we loved is alive." Presumably one day if Spider's daughter has a kid Spider will love his grandchild too. Should copyright be extended to cover that generation too?
[Via MemeMachineGo!]
January 28th, 2003 at 23:18
The copywrite thing is really messed up. If micky mouse was in the public domain you could buy official disney stuff or unofficial stuff. You wouldn't only get rubbish
January 29th, 2003 at 19:07
Even if every piece of Disney merchandise, from DVDs to stuffed toys, was utterly top-notch, quality produce that wouldn't justify extending copyright indefinitely. The problem isn't that if the copyright on Steamboat Willy expires it'll suddenly become impossible to find nice merchandise, it's that companies which have effectively perpetual copyright can't be forced to keep their property in circulation, and it's often very difficult to figure out who exactly owns the copyright. Ending copyright protection after a reasonable period ensures that work remains in circulation.And that's before you consider the hypocrisy of Disney, which has adapted countless folk tales from the public domain as animated epic, wanting to make sure that nobody ever does the same to their characters.