The "Eldred Act" -- Petition

[Tom Moritz]

This is an initiative that is fundamentally consistent with
the work on the "Bodiversity Commons" that we at
AMNH Library have been involved with now for about two years.

I encourage all librarian/colleagues to consider signing...

Tom Moritz



>Date: Tue, 03 Jun 2003 13:48:16 -0400
>From: "James Boyle" <BOYLE at law.duke.edu>
>Subject: The "Eldred Act" -- Petition
>To: undisclosed-recipients: ;
>X-Spamicity: No, tests=bogofilter, spamicity=0.000000, version=0.8.0
>
>Impersonal Petition Missive Follows:
>
>Dear All,  Forgive me if you have received a similar announcement from 
>another source.
>This is an invitation to sign a petition --
><http://www.petitiononline.com/eldred/petition.html>http://www.petitiononline.com/eldred/petition.html
>If you go to this site, you can see the details and sign...  (PLEASE DON"T 
>REPLY TO ME, THE PETITION CAN ONLY BE SIGNED AT THAT SITE)  Or, you can 
>read on....
>
>A number of people, most notably Larry Lessig, have been working on a 
>legislative proposal that would undo one of the sad effects of copyright 
>term extension -- the fact that 98% of the material covered by copyright 
>is no longer being commercially exploited but remains unavailable, despite 
>the fact that the owner of the copyright may well have no interest in 
>continued copyright protection, and may indeed be untraceable.
>
>50 years after a (US) work's publication the "Eldred Act" would require 
>that an annual payment of a low -- perhaps $1 -- fee be made to maintain 
>the copyright.  If the author wishes to maintain the copyright, he or she 
>can simply pay the fee.  Non payment of the fee for three years means that 
>the work enters the public domain.  (The form for payment of the fee would 
>also list the address of a copyright agent from whom licensing permission 
>could be sought, for those works which are maintained in copyright.) 
><http://eldred.cc/ea_faq.html>http://eldred.cc/ea_faq.html has details, 
>including a mention of the complex Berne issues.
>
>A couple of things are worth noting.  This does not shorten copyright for 
>anyone who wishes to keep asserting it.  It simply lowers some of the 
>enormous transaction costs that our colossally inefficient copyright 
>system currently provides.  (That is, we lock up most of twentieth century 
>culture for more than 95 years, in order to provide actual protection and 
>financial return to less than 2 percent of those works.)  The Eldred Act 
>simply means that some of those 98% of songs, books, poems, movies, and 
>pictures will become available to the public after 50 years or so, while 
>fully maintaining the interests of anyone who wishes to keep the copyright 
>in force.  It is an extremely moderate proposal, and I hope you can find 
>it possible to support it by signing at 
><http://www.petitiononline.com/eldred/petition.html>http://www.petitiononline.com/eldred/petition.html
>
>Please pass this e-mail on to anyone who might be interested.
>
>With all best wishes,
>
>James Boyle
>(Institutional affiliation for identifying purposes only)
>
>

Tom Moritz                                              212-769-5417
Boeschenstein Director, Library Services        212-769-5009 - FAX
American Museum of Natural History              tmoritz at amnh.org
79th St. @ Central Park West                    http://library.amnh.org/
New York, New York  10024                       (Time:  GMT -5)
USA
___________________________________________________

"It is not observed... that librarians are wiser men than others..."

-- R.W. Emerson "Spiritual Laws"
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