Reclaiming the Public Domain: a Beginning
You may have heard of the Supreme Court’s awful decision last January in Eldred v Ashcroft, upholding the consitutionality of the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act (CTEA). CTEA extended the length of copyright terms by twenty years. My friend Marvin Ammori has written an excellent analysis of Eldred issues. Economics-minded folks should make sure to check out the amicus brief by Milton Friedman, Kenneth Arrow, Ronald Coase, et al. opposing the CTEA.
There are innumerable reasons to support a reduction in the length of copyright terms. You can find a good summary at eldred.cc.
Larry Lessing and other have proposed an innovative measure for returning works to the public domain. If you support it, please take a minute to sign this petition.
