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back to article Gowers considered cutting music copyright to less than 50 years

Andrew Gowers considered shortening the copyright term for music to less than 50 years in his Treasury-commissioned review of intellectual property, but pulled back from the plan because it was "politically prudent" to do so. Gowers was speaking exclusively to weekly technology law podcast OUT-LAW Radio on World Intellectual …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    20 years is more than enough

    If a company can't make a decent profit from a recording in its first 20 years, it means one of two things -- either the recording is worthless (in which case it isn't going to make much in the next 30 years anyway) or it spent too much money making the recording.

    These days, you can make decent recordings without needing lots of equipment, so there's no justification for having big record companies and therefore no need for the present excessively long copyright protection.

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  2. Aubry Thonon

    25 years max

    One generation. If they haven't made a profit by then, it simply shows they're lousy at their job. And we shouldn't be burdening the next generation with the mistake(s) of the previous one.

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  3. Bren Flibig

    They make their own bed, let them lie in it.

    The companies ALREADY make this decision - they should just be legally held to it.

    When they let the material go out of print, the copyright should expire. This is the point at which the company's analysts have already determined the product is no longer profitable.

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