Invent a sane copyright law

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combatentropy

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A story over in another thread makes me mad. Someone found a videotape of a children's television show that piloted 24 years ago. The pilot was never picked up, it's the only episode. Only 200 copies on VHS were made. Since the tape is out of print and hard to find, he put it on Youtube for the benefit of a fan club.

The people who made the show no longer have the rights. The son of one of its creators says that the copyright was swindled from them. That current holder of the copyright found out that the show was on Youtube and threatened lawsuit. The uploader removed the video. The copyright holder continued to threaten lawsuit, citing "sales lost."

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A wedding videographer gets sued for $14,000 for putting a pop song in a wedding video.

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I write the copyright holder of a song for a quote to use in a wedding video. No reply.

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A firemen's benefit wants to show a memories video with some classical music underneath. They seek a quote from the copyright holder: $64,000.
 
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If you were king, invent a sane copyright law, one that covers all uses of all copyrighted works: a pop song in a home video, a pop song in a Hollywood blockbuster, a remix of a several 80s cartoons into a video on the Internet, a 30-second clip of one movie in another movie. You don't have to cover every situation, but lay out a general outline and rate card so that one might extrapolate anything.

Put yourself first in the shoes of the maker of the work and then in the shoes of all of the users of the work. Come up with a plan that both sides would consider a fair compromise, that you think would be a sane handling of the work.

I'm in my 30s and have been accused of being creative all my life. I started out drawing, wrote poems and songs, and got into moviemaking when I was 13. Friends, families, festival audience members, clients, and employers have said that I have a gift. Yet I agree fully with Kerby Ferguson that everything is a remix and that copyright law is not some huge, absolute law. It was invented, by governments, to be given for a limited period of time, and to a limited degree (for example, "fair use" is legal copying), and only for the benefit of the general public: "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts" (U. S. Constitution, Article I, Section 8, Clause 8).
 
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i don't know enough to rewrite laws, but i wish there was a site with standard fees based upon the size of the project .

for example, a song used in a wedding would cost $100, a song used for a low budget film under 100k would cost $500, a local tv commercial would cost $1000, a national tv commercial would cost $25,000, etc.

the website could get 5 percent of the sales and the recording company and artist could split the remaining 95 percent.

these figures i just made up as an example, but that is sort of how the framework would work.
 
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