On 2/27/07, Janet Hawtin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > On 2/28/07, Dana Powers <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > I should also point out that TOT only affects a reversion of U.S. > > rights. > Our government adopted US based copyright law as a prerequisite of > being able to trade with the USA. (US Free Trade Agreement) Most other > nations are in a similar position I am sure if the USA is promoting it > then it will be something we will face. I admit that I can find no evidence that Australia has done much more than agree to join and enforce the numerous international IP treaties which have been around for some time. Termination is not required by any of these treaties so I fail to see how that applies. This is the section of the agreement addressing intellectual property: http://www.dfat.gov.au/trade/negotiations/us_fta/final-text/chapter_17.html
I also am unconvinced that the U.S. cares much one way or the other whether other countries decide to give termination-like rights. Moreover, TOT was enacted in order to provide a benefit we thought we had lost when we moved from registration/renewal to single term. As such it seems odd that we'd feel the need to force that on other countries, none of whom share this history. > The author is not the only person who can terminate. Ah yes, if the author dies his or her heirs may be able to terminate in his place. Perhaps you are confusing termination under 304(c) or 304(d), but these cannot apply directly to CC licenses as they both are limited to grants which have been executed before 1978. But these are all technicalities. TOT is today an entitlement of the author, one which cannot be waived, sold or transferred. > As with patent law it is the chilling effect of not being able to > trust some nodes in a community of information which is the problem, > ie the idea that the commons is not durable, that investing in > relationships to innovate is a risk. Agreed, this is a systemic cost of (more) termination of transfer. But the empirical question remains - do benefits outweigh costs or vice versa? > What other ways can we support the commons and explore options for free > culture. If you are asking whether I could have better spent my time doing other projects besides TOT, well maybe. I suspect I could have done lots of things. Maybe CC would have hired someone else to do it. But they didn't have to pay me much, and I learned quite a bit. I doubt I would have done something that you would have cared much about had I not. At the very least I'm glad TOT has begun to peek ever so slowly into the thoughts of non-lawyers. Dana _______________________________________________ Discuss mailing list [email protected] http://freeculture.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/discuss
