This discussion may be timely and overdue. For one, I appreciate hearing the ideas of others on this topic.
Copyright of printed material dates back to the Gutenberg, only it was not called copyright. Authors obtained license from Royalty for a number of reasons, the main one being that they did not want to go to the great expense of producing a book only to have competitors jump in, cherry pick the winners, copy and sell them. In other words, publishers wanted some assurance.

Eternal copyright? I don't know about that. There was a rumor once that Microsoft and Google had this plan that would allow them to own all intellectual property ever created. Didn't hear much more about it. Maybe they figured the big money is in Mind Control.

One point of Public Domain I have heard is that work still has rights, but those rights are owned by the public. I have a book by a well known publisher in which someone transcribed and slapped a copyright on "Amazing Grace."

Last edited by edshaw; 12/03/18 10:35 AM.
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