Richard McGowan's Blog: Smashed-Rat-On-Press - Posts Tagged "archive"
Another Boring and Irrelevant Copyright/Trademark Rant
A recent article on copyright trolls in The Digital Reader drew my attention to the use of trademarks in addition to copyright as a means of retaining eternal control over works that have (or should have) ascended into the public domain.
One quintessential example of a long-term artsy empire is Edgar Rice Burroughs™, Inc. or "ERB" for short. Back in 1923, the author of Tarzan™ (not to mention and Jane™ which is also a trademark) unfortunately had the foresight to incorporate. The corporation is still in existence because, as we know, corporations that get large enough never die. ERB Inc still owns all of the non-public domain ERB work. And they aggressively protect it with all legal means at their disposal. Apparently, they have enough money to do that. This means they protect trademarks on just about every permutation of anything ERBistic. So, who runs this company? Presently, it's run by second and third generation family members. Effectively, ERB created what amounts to a literary landed gentry. An artistocracy that owns some valuable "intellectual property".
Let's look at some. First, there's the main ERB site, and then a host of others you can get to from there, such as John Coleman Burroughs, the son of ERB; and Danton Burroughs, the grandson of ERB... Do you see where this is going? Now, they're all likely to be perfectly nice and generous people who love their ancestors and care a lot about their family legacy. But they didn't write any of the ERB work (although JCB illustrated a load of it). They're all big boys and girls now, who could, just possibly one might think, do something of their own instead of sucking off the mummified teats of their creative, prolific ancestor, N generations back, protecting the turf from open utility into the indefinite future.[1]
You might not care very much about one such company. But it's not just one. There are also megaliths like Disney®, which has grown far beyond mere control by a few descendants. See what happened to Charles Schulz's Peanuts for example, now 80% owned by not-the-family. And Jimi Hendrix Inc., still family controlled, for now. There are shadowy parasites, like those who wanted to extort $220,000 from Nina Paley to use some long-forgotten music of Annette Hanshaw in Sita Sings the Blues .[2]
Where does it end? It doesn't. Organizations like that are gobbling up all creative work as far back as they possibly can, and when they can't go far enough, they buy off the US Supreme Court, or Congress, or what have you to extend copyright terms. And the public is left with the so-called orphan works problem.[3]
It's a good thing Homer™ didn't have tradmarks at his disposal or we would still be paying off his brood for all that Odyssey™ stuff. And even I have made use of some plot elements from Shakespeare® (a.k.a. The Bard™), so I'm certainly glad he didn't incorporate or trademark his stuff, as are hundreds upon hundreds of other individuals who have used his work as a spring-board for their creative endeavors in the last few hundred years.
Democratic society—you know, that kind where all citizens have a good chance of being somewhere in the middle of the pecking order—is kind of supposed to protect the interests of the general populace from the ravages and depredations of a self-interested aristocracy that accumulates everything unto itself. But that doesn't work for creative products in a world where copyrights and trademarks keep being extended and expanded, in which the corporations that control them also influence the legal system that's meant to keep things more or less equal-opportunified.
Welcome to a glimpse of the far future, folks: a dark, polluted world, devoid of animals but populated with umpteen billions of teeming, snarling, humanity consisting mainly of ordinary disgruntled drudges, all plugged into a non-stop entertainment juggernaut to keep them docile. Just like in that Matrix movie. Remember that one? It will inevitably be a world in which the only artistically creative work ever produced will be owned and operated by a handful of giant corporations that solely benefit a few executives and shareholders, eternally sucking at the mummified teats of Creators who died aeons ago, or using a few bright souls of their modern time as wage-slaves to keep the machine chugging along with bits of fresh artistic meat. Corporations like ERB and Disney, only bigger and hungrier. They will make the laws and extend their control to the point where nothing independently artistic can actually exist unless they allow it, and get their little cut, of course.
In a world like that, an artist has two choices: prostitution or obscurity. Now, there's absolutely nothing wrong with prostitution (even though it gets a bad rap sometimes) as long as it is fairly compensated. And obscurity has its attractions as well, to certain types of stealthy maverick. But the most likely outcome for artistic wannabes of the future is a life filled with terror in a world where independent art is stifled forcibly; under constant threat of expensive lawsuits and prison sentences for infringement... as the popular creative space is increasingly controlled by the parasitic, gluttonous corporate amoebas, ever eager to squash, absorb, or render impotent, anything they can't both control and make money from. (It's probably obvious by now that I wouldn't have survived very well in the McCarthy era, huh?)
Now, of course, there are some people who think the modern situation is perfectly fine. Shouldn't descendants be entitled to profit from the work of their parents? Or grand-parents? But... How many generations down the line? I'll bet most of the people who find this appealing wouldn't look very kindly upon living in a dictatorship of an aristocracy oblivious to their needs and freedoms in anything aside from the creative realm...[4]
---- Footnotes ----
[1] If the stuff remained legitimately all-in-the-family, I might be less annoyed about the situation just like I'm not very annoyed that Britain still has a royal family, but that's not how these things work. They creep inexorably, gobbling up everything. Eventually, ERB Inc will pass out of family control because (for example) someone decides they'd would rather sell it off for some cash, and then the ERB legacy will pass into the control of a soulless corporation that will lock down control forever to enrich its major shareholders. And if/when something like that stops making money, it will just get thrown down into the oubliette with all the other dregs of history, where nobody who might care will ever be able to enjoy it.
[2] Please do read that all Sita/Hanshaw stuff carefully for an amusing tidbit on attempts to ban the film in India, and the delicious quote from an interview with Hanshaw herself, who said in part: "I disliked all of [my records] intensely. I was most unhappy when they were released."... Oh, how amusing that whoever "owns" the recordings is still trying to cash in on them in the 21st century!)
[3] A side effect of the orphan works problem, for example, is that you probably will never be able to obtain or read a copy of Carol Deschere's book Small World: only 2,000 copies ever existed. It's still under copyright. And probably nobody could make any money at all by reprinting it. I'd guess even her children don't care if it's eternally out of print and inaccessible, even though, in the modern digital age, it would require relatively little effort to scan a copy, produce an e-book from the scans; and the result could be distributed world-wide instantly, effectively for free, forever.
[4] For further reading:
Who really benefits from long copyright? Note the story of the Kookaburra song, now owned by a publishing company that has diddly-squat to do with the heirs of the song-writer.
Evils of the TPP...
Stuff that should be in the public domain by now... I'm especially annoyed about the Gershwin legacy. And I found the position of Victor Hugo's heirs in 1997 to be interesting... What a ruckus that would have made, had Hunchback of N.D. still been under copyright when Disney butchered it. LOL.
Happy Birthday, yet again
One quintessential example of a long-term artsy empire is Edgar Rice Burroughs™, Inc. or "ERB" for short. Back in 1923, the author of Tarzan™ (not to mention and Jane™ which is also a trademark) unfortunately had the foresight to incorporate. The corporation is still in existence because, as we know, corporations that get large enough never die. ERB Inc still owns all of the non-public domain ERB work. And they aggressively protect it with all legal means at their disposal. Apparently, they have enough money to do that. This means they protect trademarks on just about every permutation of anything ERBistic. So, who runs this company? Presently, it's run by second and third generation family members. Effectively, ERB created what amounts to a literary landed gentry. An artistocracy that owns some valuable "intellectual property".
Let's look at some. First, there's the main ERB site, and then a host of others you can get to from there, such as John Coleman Burroughs, the son of ERB; and Danton Burroughs, the grandson of ERB... Do you see where this is going? Now, they're all likely to be perfectly nice and generous people who love their ancestors and care a lot about their family legacy. But they didn't write any of the ERB work (although JCB illustrated a load of it). They're all big boys and girls now, who could, just possibly one might think, do something of their own instead of sucking off the mummified teats of their creative, prolific ancestor, N generations back, protecting the turf from open utility into the indefinite future.[1]
You might not care very much about one such company. But it's not just one. There are also megaliths like Disney®, which has grown far beyond mere control by a few descendants. See what happened to Charles Schulz's Peanuts for example, now 80% owned by not-the-family. And Jimi Hendrix Inc., still family controlled, for now. There are shadowy parasites, like those who wanted to extort $220,000 from Nina Paley to use some long-forgotten music of Annette Hanshaw in Sita Sings the Blues .[2]
Where does it end? It doesn't. Organizations like that are gobbling up all creative work as far back as they possibly can, and when they can't go far enough, they buy off the US Supreme Court, or Congress, or what have you to extend copyright terms. And the public is left with the so-called orphan works problem.[3]
It's a good thing Homer™ didn't have tradmarks at his disposal or we would still be paying off his brood for all that Odyssey™ stuff. And even I have made use of some plot elements from Shakespeare® (a.k.a. The Bard™), so I'm certainly glad he didn't incorporate or trademark his stuff, as are hundreds upon hundreds of other individuals who have used his work as a spring-board for their creative endeavors in the last few hundred years.
Democratic society—you know, that kind where all citizens have a good chance of being somewhere in the middle of the pecking order—is kind of supposed to protect the interests of the general populace from the ravages and depredations of a self-interested aristocracy that accumulates everything unto itself. But that doesn't work for creative products in a world where copyrights and trademarks keep being extended and expanded, in which the corporations that control them also influence the legal system that's meant to keep things more or less equal-opportunified.
Welcome to a glimpse of the far future, folks: a dark, polluted world, devoid of animals but populated with umpteen billions of teeming, snarling, humanity consisting mainly of ordinary disgruntled drudges, all plugged into a non-stop entertainment juggernaut to keep them docile. Just like in that Matrix movie. Remember that one? It will inevitably be a world in which the only artistically creative work ever produced will be owned and operated by a handful of giant corporations that solely benefit a few executives and shareholders, eternally sucking at the mummified teats of Creators who died aeons ago, or using a few bright souls of their modern time as wage-slaves to keep the machine chugging along with bits of fresh artistic meat. Corporations like ERB and Disney, only bigger and hungrier. They will make the laws and extend their control to the point where nothing independently artistic can actually exist unless they allow it, and get their little cut, of course.
In a world like that, an artist has two choices: prostitution or obscurity. Now, there's absolutely nothing wrong with prostitution (even though it gets a bad rap sometimes) as long as it is fairly compensated. And obscurity has its attractions as well, to certain types of stealthy maverick. But the most likely outcome for artistic wannabes of the future is a life filled with terror in a world where independent art is stifled forcibly; under constant threat of expensive lawsuits and prison sentences for infringement... as the popular creative space is increasingly controlled by the parasitic, gluttonous corporate amoebas, ever eager to squash, absorb, or render impotent, anything they can't both control and make money from. (It's probably obvious by now that I wouldn't have survived very well in the McCarthy era, huh?)
Now, of course, there are some people who think the modern situation is perfectly fine. Shouldn't descendants be entitled to profit from the work of their parents? Or grand-parents? But... How many generations down the line? I'll bet most of the people who find this appealing wouldn't look very kindly upon living in a dictatorship of an aristocracy oblivious to their needs and freedoms in anything aside from the creative realm...[4]
---- Footnotes ----
[1] If the stuff remained legitimately all-in-the-family, I might be less annoyed about the situation just like I'm not very annoyed that Britain still has a royal family, but that's not how these things work. They creep inexorably, gobbling up everything. Eventually, ERB Inc will pass out of family control because (for example) someone decides they'd would rather sell it off for some cash, and then the ERB legacy will pass into the control of a soulless corporation that will lock down control forever to enrich its major shareholders. And if/when something like that stops making money, it will just get thrown down into the oubliette with all the other dregs of history, where nobody who might care will ever be able to enjoy it.
[2] Please do read that all Sita/Hanshaw stuff carefully for an amusing tidbit on attempts to ban the film in India, and the delicious quote from an interview with Hanshaw herself, who said in part: "I disliked all of [my records] intensely. I was most unhappy when they were released."... Oh, how amusing that whoever "owns" the recordings is still trying to cash in on them in the 21st century!)
[3] A side effect of the orphan works problem, for example, is that you probably will never be able to obtain or read a copy of Carol Deschere's book Small World: only 2,000 copies ever existed. It's still under copyright. And probably nobody could make any money at all by reprinting it. I'd guess even her children don't care if it's eternally out of print and inaccessible, even though, in the modern digital age, it would require relatively little effort to scan a copy, produce an e-book from the scans; and the result could be distributed world-wide instantly, effectively for free, forever.
[4] For further reading:
Who really benefits from long copyright? Note the story of the Kookaburra song, now owned by a publishing company that has diddly-squat to do with the heirs of the song-writer.
Evils of the TPP...
Stuff that should be in the public domain by now... I'm especially annoyed about the Gershwin legacy. And I found the position of Victor Hugo's heirs in 1997 to be interesting... What a ruckus that would have made, had Hunchback of N.D. still been under copyright when Disney butchered it. LOL.
Happy Birthday, yet again
Following the Daily Squee to the Vault Where Sally Lives
Today I saw an article in The Digital Reader about an article about Author Solutions which led me to a particular comment about actually crunching the numbers for AS book sales. This is all dismal stuff, but there was a brighter upturn.
In another comment, someone mentioned author Sally Watson who was born in 1924 in my old haunts (Seattle), went to Reed College, and published several YA books for girls in the 1950-1970 time-frame. I had never heard of her, but her books sound intriguing and they may have some nice cover art, too. And, do not miss her brief autobiography, or this article in the Santa Rosa paper. Golly, I'd love to meet her!
Ms Watson's books have all gone out of print, of course, in part because they were published right in the middle of the 20th century black hole of copyright hell. Fortunately it appears that at least some of her work is being republished, even in e-book form, and you can find Sally Watson on Amazon. Unfortunately her new publisher, Image Cascade Books is playing the price your books so high nobody will look twice game, even though what they're re-publishing is e-vintage fiction from the 1930s-1960s. Seriously? $7.99 for Kindle editions of books published 50+ years ago by an author who is now 92 years old? I wonder if she's actually making any sales...? Interestingly, one can also get her older books apparently as paper reprints for reasonable prices. Too bad they also seem to be widely available as used books for rock-bottom pennies per throw.
In another comment, someone mentioned author Sally Watson who was born in 1924 in my old haunts (Seattle), went to Reed College, and published several YA books for girls in the 1950-1970 time-frame. I had never heard of her, but her books sound intriguing and they may have some nice cover art, too. And, do not miss her brief autobiography, or this article in the Santa Rosa paper. Golly, I'd love to meet her!
Ms Watson's books have all gone out of print, of course, in part because they were published right in the middle of the 20th century black hole of copyright hell. Fortunately it appears that at least some of her work is being republished, even in e-book form, and you can find Sally Watson on Amazon. Unfortunately her new publisher, Image Cascade Books is playing the price your books so high nobody will look twice game, even though what they're re-publishing is e-vintage fiction from the 1930s-1960s. Seriously? $7.99 for Kindle editions of books published 50+ years ago by an author who is now 92 years old? I wonder if she's actually making any sales...? Interestingly, one can also get her older books apparently as paper reprints for reasonable prices. Too bad they also seem to be widely available as used books for rock-bottom pennies per throw.
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