The explicit, stated purpose of copyright was to encourage sharing of ideas. When it lasted originally 14 years, it worked. Before that, you might have had a great idea and kept it to yourself because why take years of your life researching a subject and writing a book when a publisher’s going to immediately copy it and pay you nothing? 14 years is plenty of time to get a return on your investment and most importantly, after that, it didn’t belong to you anymore. It belonged to everyone.
For example, that would mean District 9 and Hunger Games would be in the public domain right now.
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Yeah nothing says “write a book” like all revenue going to whichever corporation bootlegs it on the fanciest paper.
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Gosh wow if only people like me had a solution for that.
The explicit, stated purpose of copyright was to encourage sharing of ideas. When it lasted originally 14 years, it worked. Before that, you might have had a great idea and kept it to yourself because why take years of your life researching a subject and writing a book when a publisher’s going to immediately copy it and pay you nothing? 14 years is plenty of time to get a return on your investment and most importantly, after that, it didn’t belong to you anymore. It belonged to everyone.
For example, that would mean District 9 and Hunger Games would be in the public domain right now.