[Tfug] OT: Dumping Comcast TV. Dish or Direct?

[Bexley Hall]

Hi John,

--- On Tue, 9/29/09, John Gruenenfelder <johng at as.arizona.edu> wrote:

> -0700, Linux Media wrote:
>
> >There's a whole bunch of Shows and Movies that are supposedly "Public
> >Domain" because either the copyright has expired or occasionally
> >there's a legal glitch that was never resolved. Since I can't know
> >for sure if they are, I'll just tell you the ones I heard were and
> >you can google for them:
> 
> Unfortunately, it is highly unlikely that any of these
> shows are in the public domain.  The term of a copyright 
> has reached such absurdly long lengths that
> only the oldest of films are out from under its grasp.

I think Wonderful Life is free and clear for *other*
reasons (someone forgot to renew copyright ages ago?)

But, yes, your point is well made.  Corporations are *supposed*
to be "like people" -- except without the right to vote.
Yet, they often get laws "bent" in ways that make them unfair.

E.g., I think copyrights used to need to be "renewed" every
28 (?) years.  For living entities, this puts an upper bound 
on just how long you can realistically *hold* a copyright.
Now, I think it is more like 50 years after author's death
(for corporate holdings -- which covers much of the material
that would *want* copyright protection -- I think it is a
fixed 75 years).

Regardless, if something came into being when your kids were
born, chances are, it will never "fall into the public domain"
in *their* lifetime!  :-(

> Hooray for stupidly long intervals!
> 
> But, don't let that stop you from watching some good movies
> for free.  :)

The flip side of all this is that "copying" (even for one time
use) has become so easy that the copyright holder truly is at
a disadvantage for any works they create.  The cost of prosecuting
offenders just makes it unrealistic -- unless the offender has
a fairly elaborate *commerical* operation in effect (which can
be injucted upon).

So, when it comes to works that you consider worthy of
copyright protection, either:
- *don't* publish them (as they *will* be copied, to some extent)
or:
- copyright them with liberal licensing *expecting* others to
  copy them (the extreme case being explicitly releasing them
  to the public domain)