Mirabelle Feng

Although America’s copyright laws are necessary, they go beyond the point of simply protecting intellectual property and actively work to limit creative expression by making it prohibitively difficult for creators to reimagine or take inspiration from past works.

2072. That’s when the first Star Wars movie, “A New Hope,” will enter the public domain, allowing Americans to finally create their own projects with the original iterations of legendary characters like Luke Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi.

They won’t be able to publish a new lightsaber duel between Jango Fett and R2-D2, for example, until 70 years after George Lucas passes away — Jango Fett was created in 2002, and works created after 1978 are protected for “a term lasting for the author’s life plus an additional 70 years.”

Although America’s copyright laws are necessary, they go beyond the point of simply protecting intellectual property and actively work to limit creative expression by making it prohibitively difficult for creators to reimagine or take inspiration from past works.

With the exception of files shared under open licenses like Creative Commons, most people looking to distribute work based on copyrighted media have to either obtain permission from the copyright holder, justify their usage of copyrighted material under the fair use doctrine or wait for the copyrighted work to enter the public domain.

Fair use can be used as an affirmative defense to a copyright infringement lawsuit, meaning that people accused of illegally using someone else’s content can argue that they are using it in a manner that falls under the legal standards. Fair use law generally protects reuse of copyrighted material if the new content is transformative, doesn’t take too much from the original and doesn’t harm the market for the original. Additionally, reuse of factual content is preferred over reuse of fictional content.

These four factors all intuitively make sense, and the interpretation of fair use should be expanded to combat growing copyright protections that stifle creativity. Fair use laws encourage people to create content that is genuinely original and explores new perspectives, and the whole goal of the copyright system is to support creativity.

Copyright laws were initially developed to support inventors and artists looking to monetize their work. Without them, it would be much more difficult for scientists, developers and other creators to profit off of their ideas. Companies with only profits in mind could simply copy successful products and pass them off as their own, reaping the rewards of others’ work.

Consequently, totally eliminating copyright laws is illogical, as that would significantly disincentivize innovation. Shortening the duration of copyright protection and making fair use protections more robust would instead be a better way to protect creative works while still allowing people to reinvent what others have made.