The optimal length of copyright
Copyright was introduced to encourage the creation of new works. It was never supposed to last forever, after all if you can continue to make a profit from creative work made years go where is your incentive to create new works? This, however, all changed thanks to the enormous success of Mickey Mouse; every time Mickey Mouse is about to enter the public domain copyrights get extended.
What is never mention in copyright term discussions are the costs to society of longer copyright. Costs like the lack of new public domain works, the lack of derivative works, and the lack of incentive to create new works since artists are still able to profit from work they did years ago (I wish i could do that).
In a newly-released paper, [Cambridge University PhD candidate Rufus] Pollock pegs the “optimal level for copyright” at only 14 years.
Pollock’s work is based on the promise that the optimal level of copyright drops as the costs of producing creative work go down. As it has grown simpler to print books, record music, and edit films using new digital tools, the production and reproduction costs for creative work in have dropped substantially, but actual copyright law has only increased.
According to Pollock’s calculations (and his paper [PDF] is full of calculations), this is exactly the opposite result that one would expect from a rational copyright system. Of course, there’s no guarantee that copyright law has anything to do with rationality; as Pollock puts it, “the level of protection is not usually determined by a benevolent and rational policy-maker but rather by lobbying.” The predictable result has been a steady increase in the period of copyright protection during the twentieth century….
Neither the US nor the UK are in any danger of rethinking copyright law from scratch, but if they were looking for guidance in how to set up their systems, Pollock has it. He develops a set of equations focused specifically on the length of copyright and uses as much empirical data as possible to crunch the numbers. The result? An optimal copyright term of 14 years, which is designed to encourage the best balance of incentive to create new work and social welfare that comes from having work enter the public domain (where it often inspires new creative acts).
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