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Alex Schroeder 🐝 @kensanata

Tolkien estate apparently did not like the movies. So we must needs wait for the copyright expiration before we can expect the movie of Berenice and Lúthien, the woman who entered Sauron’s tower full of werewolves and vampires. So , what’s that, 1973+70 years? 90 years? More!? Ask yourself: do you want copyright to be extended? Fuck that shit.

@kensanata They'll just extend it again. Copyright in the US is effectively infinite.

@seanl I know and it makes me sad. And somehow the voters are unable to stop them. It’s a disgrace.

@kensanata The voters don't care AFAICT. Certainly not enough to vote out their own representative.

@seanl Same here or we wouldn’t be following the intellectual property pipers in this country. Pharma über alles. So one side fights to extend copyright, the other to strengthen patents, everybody talks about the jobs saved and nobody talks about our culture diminished.

@kensanata Copyright extension is a classic example of focused benefits always winning out over dispersed interests. And worse, Disney *knows* the cost of Mickey entering the public domain. Nobody can know the value to society of all the stuff that would have otherwise entered the public domains. Which makes projects like the one that lists all the stuff that would have entered the public domain every year under different years' copyright laws really important.

@kensanata

Tolkien estate didn't like the movies?

I mean, the hobbit trilogy was kinda meh, but the original LOTR movies were adorable...

@kensanata I'm a published author, and I think that the original copyright term of 14 years with the option to renew once for 28 years total was perfectly reasonable.

I'm borrowing from my culture to create; it's only fair that what I create should become part of the culture so that others can build upon it.

Life of the author is excessive, IMO. Life + 70-90 years is outrageous, since the monopoly on a work no longer benefits the creator, but descendants who had no hand in its creation.

@anarchosaurus @kensanata Corporations should not be permitted to hold copyrights. Work-for-hire should be abolished. Instead, copyrights and patents should belong to their creators and corporations should be required to pay royalties/residuals.

@starbreaker @kensanata Ideally I think copyright should be abolished altogether, but in the context of our current capitalism this would be a step in the right direction.
@anarchosaurus @starbreaker @kensanata why would any capitalist support a turn away from copyrights / patents for the business

how about copyright law is only valid for 10 years then it's public domain
@alfred @starbreaker @kensanata There was actually a committee of the US congress who came up with a plan like that: 10 years by default, then to renew you'd need to pay a percentage of whatever revenue you made on the work. But yeah, the ridiculous notion of "intellectual property" isn't going anywhere soon :/
@anarchosaurus @starbreaker @kensanata im a very strong advocate for public domain licensing.... it is the most libre, it accomplishes the end of getting (hopefully useful) data out in a form that anyone can use for whatever purpose, AND people are going to copy/"pirate" stuff if they want to, anyway.
@anarchosaurus @starbreaker @kensanata if someone likes a product so they thank the user -- that's great -- but they shouldn't have to do that under the threat of being sued to hell and back (GPL style)

https://resources.whitesourcesoftware.com/blog-whitesource/the-100-million-case-for-open-source-license-compliance

> $100,000,000 for disrespecting RMS's license
@alfred I'm actually a fan of the GPL as a practical tool to promote software development while giving the commons a chance to fight back against people who make use of community developments while not adhering to community standards. I definitely understand it as something to be used strategically though

@alfred @anarchosaurus @starbreaker I like the GPL and find that it’s a good tool against those who would rob us of our rights and defend their position using copyright. Fight fire with fire. But if we had to give up the GPL in order to get public domain everything else, I think I’d make that deal.

@kensanata @starbreaker @alfred same, it's a tool for our current situation rather than an ideal in and of itself. Folks with BSD licenses get on just fine too a lot of the times. It's super situational.

@kensanata @alfred @anarchosaurus @starbreaker Definitely.

But it's worth noting the GPL is not the same type of legal construct proprietary software companies use (though courts have ruled it works as such).

Proprietary software uses contract law to grant a license to use. We're more than satisfied with plain license law.

@kensanata @alfred @anarchosaurus @starbreaker That's why free software doesn't need you to click "I agree".

Also I should've said IANAL.

@alfred @anarchosaurus @kensanata Fuck the capitalists. They've gotten their own way too often for too long.

@anarchosaurus @starbreaker I’m already happy if they get it down again, like down to 14 years.

@RexfordGTugwell Please implement toot editing and improve autocorrect for me.

@kara I could spend hours looking at Jackson’s pictures. It’s a different beast, of course. But if a movie is just like the books, it wasn’t worth the effort. So I’m not opposed to different interpretations and I enjoy the variations. I played on the Elendor MUSH for a while and that was also very unlike the books. The point is not whether anybody likes it but whether we need permission in the first place. And I hate the begging and paying for permission.

@kensanata to be fair, Peter Jackson is a good argument for the abolition of cinema

@mona @kensanata I'd argue the hobbit movies are a lot bigger argument than the LOTR trilogy, in that regard. Butchered the... everything.

@nautilee @kensanata I have yet to inflict those on myself. I am hoping they are are least entertaining, as a train wreck can be.

@mona @kensanata I mean they're not unwatchable by any means but they're too busy going Hey Look We're LOTR Movies! than standing on their own... and they feel rushed.

@nautilee @kensanata heh. my point is that the _first_ three Jackson LOTR movies were too busy going Hey Look We're LOTR Movies to bother with any sort of fidelity or honor to the text, or even to ordinary workmanlike standards of film direction. they're loud, empty blockbusters

@mona @kensanata my pooint is that The Hobbit films are that but even worse... for a lot of reasons. For example: they wanted to film it at 48 FPS, which meant a lot of effects they used to decent enough effect in the first film wouldn't look right at the higher frame rate which meant more CGI... and they didn't give the CGI teams enough time to work... so there's some scenes you can just tell they didn't have the time to work on (the melting statue scene for the most glaring example). Like holy crap it's bad

@kensanata I really would like to know how a semi-competent director of cheap shockers, whose previous film was a turkey called "The Frighteners", managed to score the LOTR job. I'm guessing that Jackson was hired partly because of his weaknesses. He could be trusted to impress some personal flavor on the material, but wasn't in a strong enough position to compete for authorship of the project with the corporate interests who were the real motive force behind turning Tolkien into a shitty action trilogy.

@mona I think it’s great when people get given chances even if they didn’t work their way up the ranks. You don’t like the movies and I do, that’s fine, too. It is a bit tiresome to keep hearing other people say how shitty one’s taste is, though. Let’s wait for some other topic to talk about?

@kensanata of course. *bows* forgive me. I have strong feelings about seeing a childhood source of inspiration handled so...but it is the way of the world, and there are other stories to tell.

@kensanata i'm on your side about this, but also feel like this might be a counterproductive example inasmuch as preventing another property which risks being as egregious as the _hobbit_ trilogy seems like a benefit to civilization more than it seems like a deprivation.

@brennen Let’s keep fighting copyright extension without me having to consider how egregious my taste in movies is.