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The shameless attack on the public domain by Publishers is the worst, most irrational news in a while.

While Europe will continue to have more and more books reach public domain status over the next 10 years, the US gets nothing.

Yes – No books at all.

The Center for the Study of the Public Domain at Duke covers this (thanks to Nate the Great for finding this).

What public domain books are we missing out on?

ElfWreck (same link as Nate the Great) and the Duke article have a partial list of books that would have entered the public domain today (and didn’t) -

1. Fahrenheit 451. 
2. The Silver Chair.  
3. Casino Royale.
4. Second Foundation.
5. Starman Jones.
6. Go Tell It on the Mountain.

There’s a complete list at the Public Domain Works site.

We’re missing out on all these books because Publishers value the medium to low profits from these over what’s best for reading and readers.

It gets worse – copyright extension has been made automatic

The Public Domain website points out that copyright was changed from opt-in to opt-out, which has a huge impact -

Congress eliminated the benign practice of the renewal requirement (which had guaranteed that 85% of works and 93% of books entered the public domain after 28 years because the authors and publishers simply didn’t want or need a second copyright term.

That basically means that 85% of works from 1981 would enter the public domain this year. Now, they won’t, unless the author specifically opts-out of copyright protection.

What are current book copyright laws?

Here’s what the copyright situation is -

1. Books don’t enter the public domain until 70 years after the death of the author.
2. Corporate Books don’t enter the public domain until 95 years after the death of the author.
3. Copyright automatically applies to works i.e. you have to opt-out of copyright if you don’t want it. The default is that books aren’t freely sharable.

70 years after the author’s death means Publishers will be profiting off of a book for 70 whole years after the author is dead. It certainly isn’t being done for the benefit of the author.

It’s especially painful when you consider that copyright started off as a 14 year term that could be extended another 14 years if the author was still alive (1790). As recently as 1978 it was 28+28 years.

We’re on the verge of a system break-down

Publishers’ greed is expanding while technology is removing all their defences.

At a time when Publishers should be adding value to readers and giving them more freedom and flexibility they are trying to restrict readers. Consider how strange this is -

1. Books can easily be scanned and shared. 
2. DRM can easily be broken. 
3. Concepts of free and openness are spreading.  
4. Costs are going down.

YET

1. Publishers are expanding copyright terms.
2. Publishers are raising prices.
3. Publishers are behaving as if they have a defensible position.

There’s simply no excuse for pushing a law that dries up the stream of public domain content.

Publishers are trying to squeeze every single drop out of books – at the cost of harming reading itself.

Bonus Example of Dissociation from Reality – ACTA

The Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement is an even bigger example of trying to create stricter copyright laws at a time when its easier than ever to break laws.

1. ISPs will be forced to provide information on anyone doing any piracy. Download a single mp3 illegally and your entire browsing history is opened up to copyright enforcers.
2. Officials at Airports and Borders would be able to search laptops and phones and mp3 players for illegal downloads. Yes of course - it’s not like they should be looking for other things like bombs.
3. You also have related ridiculous proposals like cutting people off the Internet if they pirate things.
4. Everything is being done in secret. There is a 7th round of negotiations in January 2010 and preliminary talks have been going on since 2006.

If all of this seems ridiculous and unrealistic – that’s because it is.

At a time when converting books (and other content) into bits and distributing those bits freely is becoming easier and easier it makes zero sense to do a land grab on rights and try to impose arcane restrictions like airport hard disk checks.

Are Publishers and Copyright Owners choosing the worst possible path? 

There’s little doubt they’re making bone-headed moves. It seems that they might be making the worst possible series of bone-headed moves -

1. They’re not embracing technology.
2. They are letting other companies do the technology parts for them, thereby weakening their own position. 
3. They are assuming people are thieves. 
4. They are assuming they can evolve policing and restrictions as fast as technology progresses.
5. They are assuming people are unaware of their rights or willing to give them up.

For all practical purposes Publishers have combined the initiatives least likely to work with the initiatives most likely to upset customers. That deserves respect – An exceptionally bad strategy is just as hard to conceive as an exceptionally good one.

Filed under: books Tagged: | copyright, ebook rights, kindle public domain