It seems to me intellectual property rights ought to remain in effect indefinitely and be transferrable from one generation to the next. Why should someone who creates a valuable entity lose rights and control over it just because time passes?
You’ve accepted the dubious notion that a government granted monopoly is “property”. Just because rent-seekers call it “intellectual property” and try to confuse us by conflating the reuse of previously developed technology, the quoting of melodic lines, the black-market in digital good of “piracy” and the theft of credit and honor which is what is actually stolen in plagiarism in the phrase “theft of intellectual property” does not make it so.
I suppose you think the world would be a better place if Ralph Vaughn Williams had either never composed Fantasia on the Theme of Thomas Tallis because he couldn’t secure permission to use the theme from whatever corporation held the perpetual rights, or had to pay royalties on the melodic line (ditto for Rachmaninoff’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini). Maybe we mathematicians should let our discipline grind to a halt by insisting on royalties for use of our theorems, and just to make sure, give that right to our heirs in perpetuity.
And even if you don’t care about music or mathematics (or literature, no Stoppard “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead” — the Shakespeare estate wouldn’t release the rights to the characters), have you considered what a dead-weight on the economy all the monopoly rents being paid to the estates or corporations holding rights to old inventions would create, not just in terms of the monies paid, but the cost of maintaining the rights-holding infrastructure in perpetuity? How much should we all be paying the estate of Nikolaus Otto for our car’s engine?
Copyright and patents d*mned well better not really be property, and exercisable in perpetuity because if they are, the world economy (to say nothing of culture) will grind to a halt, and we all descend into a sort of feudalism with copyright and patent lawyers as our overlords.
So, anyone who wants to put on a play by Shakespere should go and hunt down any and all decendents so they can be paid for their "property"?
You've actually got the entire concept completely wrong and backwards, which isn't entirely surprising concidering the massive propaganda on the part of media companies to convince of exactly that. The natural state of all "works" of this nature is the public domain. We, as a society see a benefit for us to encourage people to produce such works, so we have agreed to grant them a limited time where they will have exclusive control of a work, after which, it is supposed to revert to the public domain.
As others have mentioned on this thread, major companies like Disney have twisted and perverted this agreement to a point far beyond it's intended purpose. The modern american copyright harms the public greatly, especially since there is no clear way to deterimine who actually owns copyright to a specific work. Used to be, that the owner had to register said ownership with the government, which would then grant the creator exclusive rights to the work for 14 years, after which, the creator would have the option to extend it once for another 14 years, to bring the total to 28 years worth of government granted monopoly of a work. If the author did not renew, the work would enter the public domain after 14 years.
Today, with the horrid state of affairs regarding copyright, you can have a 50 year old book, written by someone dead for a decade or more (if that person can even be located), that is completely out of print and unavailable, yet noone can do anything with this work for another 50 years (or more if Disney buys off more congresscritters in a few years to extend it again).
The copyright laws of Canada are slightly better. They specify life of the author +50 years I believe. This is why the Narnia tales are now available for free download on the Project Gutenberg Canada website. Unfortunately, USFedGov is putting a lot of pressure on countries like Austrailia and Canada to change their laws to match our own insane versions.
I do occasional proofreading for the main Project Gutenberg site so I actually follow this stuff a bit. I can understand how a corporation, which is essentially an artificial immortal governmental construct might want to see copyright extend into perpetuity, but for us mere mortals, it's a bad deal all around.
The very minimum change that should be made to copyright law, even beyond reduction of the length, is that we should go back to a system where copyright for a work is registered for 14 year segments. If a work is not worth enough of someone's time to keep track of and to renew the registration of the copyright, it shold enter the public domain.
LOL but great idea. Isn’t the temporary nature of ownership in the Constitution, though? Had something to do with sharing scientific knowledge for the benefit of the people?