Copyright term extension: Sapping American creativity

Journal of the Copyright Society of the U.S.A.

Volumn 44, Issue 2, 1996, Pages 94-102

  Brown, Hank ^a   Miller, David ^a  

^a NONE

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EID: 0038877755     PISSN: 08863520     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: None     Document Type: Article

References (12)

1. S. 483 and H.R. 989, 10th Cong.; see also H.R. 604, 105th Cong., 1st Sess. (1997).
2. 17 U.S.C. § 302.
3. 1 Melville B. Nimmer and David Nimmer, Nimmer on Copyright 1.03[A] (1996) (quoting Fox Film Corp. v. Doyal, 286 U.S. 123, 127 (1932)).
4. Twentieth Century Music Corp. v. Aiken, 422 U.S. 151, 156 (1975).
5. The original copyright law of 1790 gave fourteen years of protection, plus a fourteen year term of renewal for a total of twenty-eight years of protection. In 1831, the copyright term was changed to twenty-eight years, plus the fourteen years renewal term, totaling forty-two years of protection. In 1908, the term was extended again to twenty-eight years plus a twenty-eight year renewal term, for a total of fifty-six years of protection. In the 1960's, when valuable works from the early part of the century were moving into the public domain, there was repeated term extensions, carrying copyrights over from year to year until a complete extension was passed in 1976. The 1976 Act (effective in 1978) extended the "old act" term (for works governed by the 1908 Act) another nineteen years to make the term seventy-five years. The 1976 Act also extended protection to new works created after 1976 for a period of life-plus-fifty years for individual authors and seventy-five years for corporate creators. Not surprisingly, that nineteen year extension was eighteen years ago. Now, we are back to add another twenty years. Congress, at the behest of copyright holders, seems willing to increase copyright terms ad infinitum.
6. It is worth mentioning in the context of extending the monopoly for copyrighted works that the scope of copyright protection is already more expansive than most Americans may think. Prior to the 1978 Act, the concept of exclusive use includes any public performance of a work, regardless of whether it is for profit. Going from a concept of for profit to one of public display or performance, and then going from fifty-six to life-plus-fifty-years to life-plus-seventy years is a startling capture of creative work in a short period of time. To illustrate, "Happy Birthday" was copyrighted in 1935 and renewed in 1963 for a monopoly grant through 2010; further, a group of waiters singing "Happy Birthday" to a restaurant patron would constitute a public performance.
7. Council Directive 7831/93 of 13 July 1993 on Harmonizing the Term of Protection of Copyright and Certain Related Rights.
8. Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Work, Paris Text of 1971, art. 5.
9. Berne Convention, art. 7.
10. U.S. Const., art. I, § 8 (emphasis added).
11. Sony Corp. v. Universal City Studios, Inc., 464 U.S. 417, 429 (1984).
12. U.S. Congress, Office of Technology Assessment, Copyright and Home Copying: Technology Challenges the Law, OTA-CIT-422 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, October 1989).