This is my first diary and I need your help DKos.
You see, I'm freelance illustrator. I make my living by making art and a lot other people do the same. Right now there's a new bill making it's way to Congress. It's called the Orphan Works bill and it will dramatically change copyright laws in this country.
As current copyright laws stand, whenever I create new a property (a work of art, a design, a photograph) I own the copyright. In order make a living, I sell my services to second parties who intend to use that property. Those second parties purchase the rights to use that image for an agreed amount and period of time.
The bill being proposed would essentially require me to "register" my work with a private registry corporation in order to sell it. If I did not, the work would automatically be considered an orphan work. As an orphan work, the second party could use that image in anyway they see fit, without paying me or entering into any kind agreement with me. They would essentially own the copyright themselves. What this means is, is that I would have to pay some company for the right to sell my own creation.
This doesn't just apply to illustrators, though. The bill being proposed effects all works of art, all creative properties. All photographs, designs, logos, paintings, poems, and any and all photographs or videos that you post online. If it's not first registered, a second party can claim that image theirs and use any way they see fit. This applies to current works and any and all works I've ever made. Artists would have to register every single work of art they've ever made, in order to keep it safe, in order to be able to claim as their own, and in order to sell it.
This bill also damages the industry, though. There's little incentive for that second party to hire an artist for work, when all they'd have to do is take an orphan-work found online. Sure, some of the bigger corporations would still hire out artists, but what's to keep the smaller ones from doing so too.
There's a myth in this country about artists. That we're all starving, or we spend out times in coffee shops looking for inspiration. That we have fun making art, and so in some way, perhaps we shouldn't be paid for what we do. That's not the case though. We are just as hard working as everyone else, in some cases, maybe perhaps more. We work day and night just to pay the bills just like everyone else. And if you look around you now, everything you see, every single "thing" was at some point, imagined and then created by an artist of some kind.
This bill essentially let's corporations get around the pesky issue of having to pay for those creations. It's not right.
For more information please visit:
http://www.illustratorspartnership.o...
If you'd like to write to your representative, they have a neat auto-letter writing form. It take 2 min.
http://capwiz.com/...
Help us out Dkos. Please spread the word.
I just wrote to John Kerry (whom I've seen on this site a few times) and my other reps. I only discovered this site a short time ago (after getting inspired by Obama) and I've seen the good that this site can do.
Thanks
jason