Tom Greene's take on it:

Post #55,497 by admin 10/8/02 1:03:17 PM Reply	Tom Greene's take on it: [link\|http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/27475.html\|At The Reg] And unless my copy of the Constitution contains a typo, it says quite clearly that, "Congress shall have the power to ... promote the progress of science and useful arts by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries." One would think that if the framers had meant to quantify 'limited times' they'd have done it. It certainly looks as if Congress gets to make the call on how long is too long. And for the life of me I can't find a single word in the Constitution extolling the obvious social benefits of swift copyright and patent expiration. An 'original intent' argument is going to have to be an absolute masterpiece to succeed under the circumstances. Regards, -scott anderson "Welcome to Rivendell, Mr. Anderson..."
Post #55,530 by drewk 10/8/02 4:52:55 PM Reply	Can't decide if he's pessimistic or just wrong One would think that if the framers had meant to quantify 'limited times' they'd have done it. Then why didn't they define "unreasonable" when used with "search and seizure", or "cruel and unusual" when used with "punishment"? It seems to me they merely underestimated just how corrupt politicians would eventually become. The point in favor of Lessig's case that I haven't seen anyone even attempt to answer is the retroactive extension of copyright on existing works. If the purpose of copyright is to assure prospective artists the chance to make back their investment, then the only benefit (to society) of copyright is its assured application to new works. In corporate terms, if we already have the deliverable, why would we want to offer any additional payments? === Microsoft offers them the one thing most business people will pay any price for - the ability to say "we had no choice - everyone's doing it that way." -- [link\|http://z.iwethey.org/forums/render/content/show?contentid=38978\|Andrew Grygus]
Post #55,546 by ben_tilly 10/8/02 6:30:12 PM Reply	I already sent him email about it He completely missed the point of the petitioner's brief. Hopefully the Supreme Court does a little better. The main thrust of the petition is that Congress does not have the right to continue extending copyrights that already exist. In particular they cannot grant Disney's desire for unlimited copyright on Mickey Mouse through repeated grants of copyright extension. This does not deny the ability of Congress to decide that limited shall mean 300 years. They just can't keep doing it every time Steamboat Willie's term comes up. (If their argument was as poor on the merits as the one that Tom Greene put forth, then they wouldn't have gotten to the Supreme Court. That said, I have no idea what their odds are of winning.) Cheers, Ben "Career politicians are inherently untrustworthy; if it spends its life buzzing around the outhouse, it\ufffds probably a fly." - [link\|http://www.nationalinterest.org/issues/58/Mead.html\|Walter Mead]

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