Message:

<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Sallent, post: 3523003, member: 76194&quot;]Blame Disney. A long time ago copyrights expired at 25 years (with the option to renew once), or 50 years after the death of the author in the case of books. That allowed the innovator (and his estate after death) to profit from the work, while allowing material to regularly enter the public domain every generation so as to prevent stifling innovation. However, when Mickey Mouse&#039;s copyright was about to expire, Disney lobbied twice and got the laws changed. This year was the first year in over 40 years that stuff got into the public domain thanks to Disney&#039;s meddling, so stuff from 1923 just went into the public domain finally. Hopefully Disney won&#039;t interfere again soon to keep Mickey out of the public domain, or next time the law might be that it will take 150 years for something to go into the public domain. At that rate there won&#039;t be any innovation left as everyone will be terrified of doing anything because they might get sued by someone holding a copyrights for some process someone else did 125+ years before.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

Your name or email address:

Do you already have an account?

• No, create an account now.
• Yes, my password is:
• Forgot your password?

Stay logged in