A Mass of Copyrighted Works Will Soon Enter the Public Domain
This seems like a good place to throw this out there and get some feedback.  My proposal on how to fix copyright:<p>1. Everyone must register their copyright in a searchable database.  Registration is free and good for 10 years.<p>2. At the end of 10 years, you must renew your copyright.  If you have transferred ownership, you must submit the chain of custody.<p>Edit:  New option 3a.<p>3. The cost of renewal will be 10% of the estimated value of the copyright to the rights holder for the next ten years.<p>3a. The cost of renewal will be 10% of what you made off of it in the last 10 years.  If you made nothing you pay nothing.  You can renew two times and pay nothing.  After that you either have to commercialize or release the copyright.  This fee will be on top of income taxes, but be enforced the same way, through audits similar to the IRS.  This would obviate the need for 4a&#x2F;b.<p>4a. To keep the rights holder honest, after they submit their estimated value, any other person may buy the copyright from them for 110% of the estimated value within 90 days.<p>4b. Another way to keep them honest instead is to make the rights holder submit tax forms to prove their estimate was valid, and pay a penalty if they were too far off.<p>5. If it&#x27;s not in the database or the fee isn&#x27;t paid, it&#x27;s public domain.<p>6. Initial registrations for existing copyrights will be done on a rolling basis on the closest decennial anniversary of the initial copyright.  The person registering must show proof that they currently own the copyright by demonstrating that they were the creator or they purchased the or inherited the rights from the creator.<p>7. You may extend your copyright for as long as you want, as long as you pay the fee.<p>I <i>think</i> this addresses most everyone&#x27;s concerns.<p>- Disney gets to keep Mickey Mouse forever, as long as they keep making money from it.<p>- The public no longer has to wonder if a particular work is copyrighted or not, because if it&#x27;s not in the database then it isn&#x27;t copyrighted.<p>- Creators are still incentivized to create because they can hold a monopoly as long as it&#x27;s valuable to them.<p>- If you go with option 4a, then it might actually make for even greater works.  For example, Fox owns the rights to Star Wars Episode 4.  But that alone is not nearly as valuable to them as it is to Disney, who could put it in box sets.  So Fox is now incentivized to sell their copyright since it Disney could come in and buy it for 110% of what they claim it is worth to them.<p>This is a work in progress, and I&#x27;d love to know where I missed things.