I've found yet another log to throw on the pyre on which I hope the Trans-Pacific Partnership soon finds itself immolated.
As I just learned in this Boing Boing article, amongst the myriad noxious and obnoxious proposals in this treaty affront to common sense and public benefit, is a provision that would actually commit the US to maintain its current system of copyright for life plus seventy years—or perhaps even expand that to a term of 100 years, to match Mexico's regressive policy.
However, even more surprising is I find myself agreeing with Derek Khanna, the conservative former Congressional staffer who got canned for coming up with a workable draft policy for copyright that not only respects the need for material to promptly enter the public domain, but it even—gasp! horror!—raises revenues for the government. (So obviously, he had to be canned for that.)
While I get why Big Media wants copyright to last as long as possible ($$$$), the truth is, most of the money you're going to make off of 99.9% of publications is going to happen in the first few years. There's simply no reason for most materials to be protected for so long. If there's something worth protecting, sure. But don't bother keeping the 99.9% of stuff that doesn't have commercial value just because you're too damn lazy to file a renewal application and pay a few bucks for the 0.1% that matters!
Ugh. But yes, this just another reason why the Trans-Pacific Partnership needs to be deep-sixed with dispatch.