"Information Age":
For Whom?

Now is The Time!

1.  The Public Domain is an "inalienable right". . .meaning that I could NOT get rid of my rights to Public Domain information in any manner, either giving them away, or selling them, etc., etc.

2.  If _I_ cannot get rid of those rights, then no one else must be allowed to do that for me.

3.  The copyright law was created to ENHANCE public information, at least in the United States.  Copyright has a somewhat spotted history outside the United States, having often been used for an extra methodology of censorship. . .when copyright was invented, only 12 legal printing presses were allowed [with two exceptions for Oxford and Cambridge scholars]. This was also a monopoly on publishing new materials for the Stationers' Guild. [Not a major comment, but the copyright referred to earlier, was 28 years. . .rather than 26]

The original copyright was for 14 years, even in light of all of the censorship and monopoly issues. . .and could NOT be renewed, except by the author. . .which required that the author still be alive!!!

Please take note that all copyright creation and extensions have been ONLY to repress increases in the public's ability to copy--no such interest was taken when it was only the RICH who copied; and RICH is an honorable man.

The First Information Age was created by the Gutenberg Press and was brought to a screeching halt by the first copyright laws. The Second Information Age was created by the steam and electric presses of the turn of the last century, and was brought to that same kind of screeching halt by the Copyright Act of 1909, which doubled all copyright terms, retrospectively: as long as it was not an already expired copyright.

The Third Information Age was created by the xerox machine, such a short time ago that many of you still remember it, and, it was brought to a screeching halt by yet another copyright extension; not by better enforcement of the current copyright laws.

Each one of these three "Information Ages" brought millions, and millions, and millions, of copies of books to the masses, and it was probably true that most of them were legitimate copies.  Yet the reply was a "Search and Destroy" mission to eliminate both a concept of a large Public Domain, and also the content of Public
Domain.  Each time a million books that would have gone into the Public Domain were kept under copyright.

The copyright laws, in the United States at least, were designed to provide more information to the masses, not less, and we paid for them with our taxes.

These copyright laws are TWO-SIDED COINS. . .when something gets a copyright it generates TWO-SIDED RIGHTS. . .for a LIMITED TIME those rights go to the copyright holder. . .and after that LIMIT the rights go into the Public Domain.

The public has granted these copyright holders their years of an outright monopoly, and the public has a right to the expirations of those copyrights ON TIME. . . .

The proposed laws would violate those "inalienable rights" to do nearly nothing for the profits of the copyright holders. . .less than 1% of 1% of 1% of works will gain ANY more profit under the proposed extensions. This is a law that makes no pretense of an effort to gain anything for any but "the riches of the richest." Only the best of the best of the best sellers could even expect, or even hope, to have profitable sales 95 years from now, but it
would eliminate 99.98% of what would enter the Public Domain for that period of history, which would become an intellectual "Dark Ages" in terms of comparing "Information Access" a class we have
come to call the "Information Rich," and a class we have come to call the "Information Poor."

This, the Fourth "Information Age" is being treated the same way as were the other three.  THEY are only interested in copyrights as a way to keep US from copying, from being educated.  It NEVER crosses their minds to create or extend copyrights unless and/or until the MASSES get too much information.  For millennium after millennium no one cared about copying, because only the rich had the means to copy anything and why should THEY pay for anything?

Here is an example:

At the beginning of this century most copyrights expired without being renewed, since most copyrighted materials had already gone out of print well before the first 14 years of copyright.  It is likely that probably 7 out of 8 books that were even selected to be in libraries were out of print at the end of those 14 years-- probably a much greater proportion of other materials.  It would probably be a great shock to many of you to find out how many of
the books printed are out of print in only 6 weeks.  The minimal effort required to renew the copyright, still created the larger Public Domain, by far, than that that would have been created by not requiring ANY effort for renewal.

After the second major copyright law all copyright periods would be doubled. . .28 years. . .plus a possible 28 year extension to total 56 years.

After the third major copyright law, all copyrights would be for 75 years, whether any extension was applied for or not.

If this fourth major copyright law is passed, all copyrights for the next period will be for 95 years, no extension required.

So. . .after over centuries of copyrights of 14 years, plus a 14 POSSIBLE extension. . .in this single century we will have moved from a copyright law which probably averaged around 15 years for the average item, to a copyright regime which will generate a 95 year copyright.

To put that in perspective:  when copyrights were averaging time periods of just over 14 years, and information was doubling at a rate of every 14 years, you could be sure that at least HALF the information in the world was in the Public Domain.

Now that information is doubling perhaps every 2 years, it is an easy math problem to realize that VIRTUALLY ALL INFORMATION WILL BE UNDER COPYRIGHT. . .and for a longer period than our children can be expected to live.

THAT. . .is TOO much.

No one, not even the greatest aristocracies of history, has ever dreamt of having such a great portion of anything, be it land or sea, be it real or imaginary.

Michael S. Hart
Project Gutenberg Executive Director

Michael S. Hart, Professor of Electronic Text
Benedictine University [Illinois Benedictine]
Executive Director of Project Gutenberg Etext
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