Posted on 07/08/2010 12:36:49 AM PDT by nickcarraway
“hmmmm, having to pay a royalty for barrowing from a nursery rhyme. Me thinks there are more that a few Rap groups that might be worried with this ruling.”
If copyright law were rigorously enforced with regard to stuff like this, the entire genre of rap and hip-hop would cease to exist.
I know; it’s abhorrent how long copyright runs now. I always teach my law students how the founders specifically noted the rationale for intellectual property regulation in the Constitution: the rationale is for the promotion of progress. With copyright now generally running 95 years for corporate works of life of author plus 75, big entertainment has made it impossible for anyone alive at the time of the creation of a copyrighted work to create a derivative work...and thus “promote progress.”
Fifty-six years was plenty long for a copyright to run, as it did under the 1909 act. I’m glad we got rid of the renewal concept but copyright now is just ridiculously long, and it serves no one except big entertainment and heirs who should be working for a living anyway.
I should add “big entertainment has made it impossible for anyone to create a derivative work without paying big entertainment a license fee for the privilege.”
This is but one more example of how structurally untenable our economy has become with to many folks trying to live off of the production of everyone else and too few actually producing anything that folks will elect to purchase with their own money of their own free will in an free market.
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