Well, good news after a fashion.
Quite frankly, all works should be public domain after 14 years, or 28 if the artist or author — not the publisher, not an artistic estate, the artist or author — requests an extension.
The last good copyright law was the Law of Queen Anne. The last good patent law was the Statute on Monopolies of 1624.
You have spoken as someone who has no idea what you are talking about.
I just put up a song on iTunes and Amazon mp3 I wrote in 1992.
I recently re-recorded the song and paid for the entire master recording, including hiring some great Nashville musicians and singers.
This song has never before been for sale to the public.
It is NOT uncommon for good songs to never be recorded for sale to the public for YEARS after they are written.
The writing of a song is the creation of the work "in tangible form" and thus begins the copyright
I am sure the same could be said for poems, books, screenplays and a host of other creative works.
For works created after 1978, the term of copyright is the lifetime of the author plus 70 years.
What is really good about the termination of assignment of copyrights, as discussed in this article, is the reversion of the copyrights to their original creator(s) or heirs.
Many copyrighted songs were assigned under horrible terms, unconscionably disfavoring the original creator(s) who were often young, inexperienced composers and artists when such assignments were executed.
It has been a sad history of exploitation that young hopeful creative people have often been royally screwed by moguls and corporations knowing such young hopefuls are so desperate for a "break," they would sign anything placed before them.
This termination of assignments brings some fairness back to the creator(s) or their heirs.
The problem with current copyright law is that much content is lost when it goes out of print. Movies, music, and books that do not justify continual re-publishing will have their media long be lost by the time they come into public domain, whereas public-domain content will always find SOMEBODY that likes it well enough to give it disk space on the internet.
As the spouse of a composer, I disagree strongly. Copyright should be for the entire life of the composer, the lives of his children and grandchildren, just as a house and land are passed down from parent to child.