Copyright Today

 

Kenneth Follett’s newest novel, The Evening and the Morning, makes this statement in place of the usual legalese on its copyright page:

Copyright@2020 by Ken Follett. Penguin supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized version of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting authors and allowing Penguin to continue to publish books for every reader.

The founders of our republic also recognized the importance of rewarding the creation of intellectual property. On September 17, 1787, the Constitutional Convention made it a duty of Congress “to promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and discoverers the exclusive right to their inventions and discoveries.” The Copyright Act of 1790 spelled out how this would be done, and subsequent revisions of the law broadened the range of creations covered and extended the term of coverage until the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 2001 made it the length of the author’s life plus 70 years.

Unfortunately, the last two decades have seen a substantial erosion of copyright protections. New technologies such as Internet blogging and massive text scanning made it much easier to repackage and repurpose an author’s content. This made enforcement more difficult. As a result, courts began to broaden the scope of what they considered “fair use” of copyrighted material.

Which brings us back to Penguin’s new copyright notice. I hope other publishers will follow suit because it recognizes that copyright law, properly understood and implemented, serves everyone's best interests. Beyond this, how can we make the most of our intellectual property in this changing environment?

First, I believe we authors need to move more swiftly. For example, if we issue sequels of our best-selling books at too leisurely a pace, we invite competitors to rush in.

Second, we need to establish distinctive publishing brands. We reach more people if we specialize in a couple of genres, set our stories in one or two historical periods, etc. It's also easier to defend a brand than to defend our exclusive right to a particularly memorable bit of narrative. 

Third, we need to be scrupulous about obtaining permission to use other authors' copyrighted work in our own. This is easier than ever, and seldom entails a permission fee.

Finally, we need to be vigilant to identify and block pirated editions of our work. A year ago, my distributor sold a copy of my goal-setting book to a customer in China, which seemed rather odd. A few months later, Amazon began selling the book well below its wholesale price. My distributor reported that Amazon's sales of the book fell to zero, but the book’s ranking in its Amazon category rose. I sent several letters to Amazon's legal department, pointing out that they seemed to be selling a pirated edition. They responded that they were not responsible to sue book pirates; I was. So I withdrew the book from the market for three months. When I announced it was back in print, Amazon adjusted its retail price and my distributor began reporting sales through Amazon again!

Copyright law is designed to promote the creation and dissemination of innovative ideas. Let’s do our part to make sure that happens.