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askBeehaw: should copyright even exist at all? and if it should, how long should the ideal term of copyright be? (beehaw.org)

submitted 2 years ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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a perennial favorite topic of debate. sound off in the replies.

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

Yes. Software developer's perspective: Copyright is needed for open source projects to be able to protect their work. The GPL license and similar ones exist so that Microsoft or Google can't slap a few features on your project and sell it themselves without giving back to the community. If nobody can be a copyright holder for their work, big corporations would jump on the opportunity to eat up small projects for their own benefit, probably while using unpaid artists' music in the background during their sales presentations for them.