Most people support copyright because they think content creators should be rewarded for their work. Unfortunately, the copyright laws that we have do much more than that, and that's a problem.
I support minimalist copyright laws, where for a set period of time (shorter than current copyright) an author/creator is the only person who can profit from work. For instance, an author publishes a book, and for 10 years is the only person able to sell copies, sell the manuscript to a publisher, etc.
But after 10 years, that book is essentially public knowledge. It's been out there, maybe some people have memorised portions of it, it's been read in a library far more times than it's been purchased, etc. At that point, I see no societal benefit to maintaining copyright. My own moral framework does not require an author to be rewarded indefinitely for their creative work (imagine if a builder and their estate received royalties every time somebody entered a building they constructed for 70 years? Absurd.)
I also have a huge problem with creative "rights". Take Harry Potter as an example. Everybody knows about Harry Potter, anybody could tell you the story, some people could probably reproduce a very rough abridged version from memory. It is part of our culture, cannon, consciousness, whatever. It's popular.
Now, if I want to make a Harry Potter game, or write a play, or do a live dramatisation, etc, I owe JK royalties. That to me is not fair. She has been rewarded for her work many times over. The ideas and the characters are now in everybody's minds. We know them. If I want to adapt them or discuss them through a creative work, I should be free to do so.
I often use the example of Ancient Greece to explain this. Almost all the written stories and poems we have from that time are simply written versions of stories told aurally. The Illyiyd as we have it is just one version that somebody wrote down of possibly hundreds of spoken versions that existed at the time. The Greek plays were part of their culture and were freely shared. Anybody could build on them, change them, and referencing them in new works was an honor to the original creator (if they were even known). It is very sad that the West has now favored infinite profit (I.E. copyright that lasts a lifetime) over the spreading of ideas and the sharing of common cultural references freely.
I support minimalist copyright laws, where for a set period of time (shorter than current copyright) an author/creator is the only person who can profit from work. For instance, an author publishes a book, and for 10 years is the only person able to sell copies, sell the manuscript to a publisher, etc.
But after 10 years, that book is essentially public knowledge. It's been out there, maybe some people have memorised portions of it, it's been read in a library far more times than it's been purchased, etc. At that point, I see no societal benefit to maintaining copyright. My own moral framework does not require an author to be rewarded indefinitely for their creative work (imagine if a builder and their estate received royalties every time somebody entered a building they constructed for 70 years? Absurd.)
I also have a huge problem with creative "rights". Take Harry Potter as an example. Everybody knows about Harry Potter, anybody could tell you the story, some people could probably reproduce a very rough abridged version from memory. It is part of our culture, cannon, consciousness, whatever. It's popular.
Now, if I want to make a Harry Potter game, or write a play, or do a live dramatisation, etc, I owe JK royalties. That to me is not fair. She has been rewarded for her work many times over. The ideas and the characters are now in everybody's minds. We know them. If I want to adapt them or discuss them through a creative work, I should be free to do so.
I often use the example of Ancient Greece to explain this. Almost all the written stories and poems we have from that time are simply written versions of stories told aurally. The Illyiyd as we have it is just one version that somebody wrote down of possibly hundreds of spoken versions that existed at the time. The Greek plays were part of their culture and were freely shared. Anybody could build on them, change them, and referencing them in new works was an honor to the original creator (if they were even known). It is very sad that the West has now favored infinite profit (I.E. copyright that lasts a lifetime) over the spreading of ideas and the sharing of common cultural references freely.