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It seems there is a new Orphan Works legislation that is before Congress in the States that will remove the ‘automatic copyright’ an artist has to his/her own works.
"Currently, you don’t have to register your artwork to own the copyright. You own a copyright as soon as you create something. International law also supports this. Right now, registration allows you to sue for damages, in addition to fair value…..
….The only people who benefit from (the orphaned works act) are those who want to make use of our creative works without paying for them and large companies who will run the new private copyright registries.
These registries are companies that you would be forced to pay in order to register every single image, photo, sketch or creative work
If the Orphan Works legislation passes, you and I and all creatives will lose virtually all the rights to not only our future work but to everything we’ve created over the past 34 years, unless we register it with the new, untested and privately run (by the friends and cronies of the U.S. government) registries. Even then, there is no guarantee that someone wishing to steal your personal creations won’t successfully call your work an orphan work, and then legally use it for free."
So what its the States, right? It seems Europe has a similar bill on the table. Says acclaimed artist Roger Dean (He did a lot of promo art for Shadow of the Beast in the Amiga days, not to mention a host of acclaimed fantasy art album covers)
"This will devastate the livelihood of artists, photographers and designers in a number of ways. That at the behest of a few hugely rich corporations who got rich by selling art that they played no part in the making of, the U.S. and U.K. governments are changing the copyright laws to protect the infringer instead of the creator. This is unjust, culturally destructive and commercial lunacy. This will not just hurt millions of artists around the world."
Read the implications here:
http://mag.awn.com/index.php?ltype=pageone&article_no=3605 -
That’s very very worrying. I can’t see how passing a bill like that would be legal though, considering under current legislation you own works you create, undoing that for the past 34 years is theft surely?
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I cant believe it. The reasonable person in me is screaming that this will never pass, but looking at the way things have been going recently who the hell knows.
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Wow.
I wonder is this in response to the "Creative Commons" movement…
This seems to be gathering momentum and have seen its logos on several sites over the past few months.
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