[Wikipedia-l] Dream a little...

Tue Oct 17 08:33:59 UTC 2006

Maury Markowitz wrote:

>>I think we should also focus on works from the last 30 years and put
>>some energy behind a copyright reform effort to get even older content
>>liberated by legal means.
>>    
>>
>I'm sorry, but I believe this will have no measurable effect on the wiki.
>
>In opposition to any effort this $100 million could possibly generate, the 
>entire media industry is arrayed with a variety of well established lobby 
>groups to ensure no such change takes place. It is resonable to suspect that 
>the only changes to the law will be to increase the length of time for 
>protections, while at the same time removing existing user rights.
>
This attitude of stark defeatism is the next best thing to outright 
opposition.  Right as you may be about vested interest acting to protect 
their investments it does not justify making our copyright policies any 
more wimpish than they already are.  If we bend over to achieve absolute 
legal correctness are we so naïve as to believe that those vested 
interests will be accomodating just because we are so nice about it?  
When we are bent over they will know exactly where to shove our 
niceness.  We can never win this war without showing some aggression.  
The best that can be accomplished by a totally passive defence is stasis.

As Google digitizes large masses of material from the world's libraries 
it does not talk about the fifteen year database protection laws that 
are already a reality in the European Union.  When anything significant 
is added to that database the 15-year clock is reset at the beginning.  
The copyright status of the material in the databse does not matter for 
the purpose of this protection.  By generating its huge database of 
public domain  material it puts itself in the position of being able to 
protect that material when it believe it to be big enough.  It can 
afford to lose its fight with current publishers.  For a very long time 
until now only those who wanted enhanced copyright protection were in a 
position to oursue those rights.  Those who wanted to produce a handful 
of copies to distribute free to their friends would have no incentive to 
pursue legal avenues; the cost-effectivenes of such actions was too 
poor.  We are probably in a better position than ever to seek an 
intellectual property regime that would be more friendly to the users.

Ec