Never, Ever, Ever, Ever Sell the Rights
December 13, 2019 9:22 AM   Subscribe

 
There's a small shift in copyright legislation, particularly in civil law jurisdictions, toward making availability mandatory when someone buys or exclusively licences someone else's content. That won't protect content created on a work-for-hire type basis where the corporate owner that fails was the first owner of copyright, but it would mean that a creator who sells rights expecting to earn residuals over the long term can get them back if the buyer locks the product in a vault or if the whole platform fails. Some older copyright acts had these sorts of protections specifically for books -- if the publisher would not do another print run after a book was no longer generally available, they had to return the rights to the author. They aren't, as far as I know, well-tested protections -- the cost of trying to recover your rights would probably be prohibitive for a lot of small media properties -- but that the are being written into in copyright laws at all is an interesting development.

Of course, as the article notes, owning the rights to something is only useful if you also own a copy of it.
posted by jacquilynne at 9:42 AM on December 13, 2019 [4 favorites]


What are ‘the rights’ for video? Copyright and...?

Odd that they call out ‘orphan’ without referring to previous legal fights over orphan works.
posted by clew at 9:51 AM on December 13, 2019


It doesn't matter to most people. They just start watching new shows.
posted by dgeiser13 at 11:38 AM on December 13, 2019


Ahhhh, this article is exceedingly interesting for reasons I contractually can't discuss. Great post.
posted by limeonaire at 2:40 PM on December 13, 2019 [2 favorites]


The author says that all but 1 of the Seeso shows have a new home, but only mentions a couple of them -- what about the UCB Sketch show? WHAT ABOUT HARMONQUEST?!
posted by Saxon Kane at 7:09 PM on December 13, 2019


This is why it's essential that we support media pirates. They are the only ones doing the hard work to make sure these works are protected for future generations to enjoy.

Go out there, find a long forgotten show, game or album and torrent it now. Do your part to protect culture.
posted by dazed_one at 9:41 PM on December 13, 2019 [5 favorites]


Saxon Kane: Harmonquest is on VRV.

I have no idea about UCB Sketch Show.

I also have no idea about the tons of stand up specials Seeso had.
posted by Rev. Syung Myung Me at 2:00 PM on December 14, 2019 [1 favorite]


Reminds me of a lot of bummers unmentioned here. Machinima produced a brief Sifl & Olly revival (eponysomething) and I still kinda blame Seeso for the MBMBAM show getting iced.
posted by supercres at 8:14 PM on December 14, 2019 [1 favorite]


The UCB Sketch Show had some killer bits, my favorite being a monologue by Michael Caine about how he had become unstuck in time...
posted by Saxon Kane at 11:26 AM on December 16, 2019


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