Copyright protection should be limited to the creator and bound by a length restriction.
We have two cases to make here, one regards ownership, and the other regards duration of protection. Wikipedia points out that in some cases the employer of the author may be the owner otherwise the owner is the creator, there are provisions as well for joint authorship. Duration of ownership for an individual is lifetime plus seventy years. “Work for hire” copyright extends 120 years after creation or 95 years after publication.
In 1998 the Copyright Term Extension Act increased the duration of copyright. Opponents, of the act, called it the Mickey Mouse Protection Act and asserted that Disney and others were benefiting from a kind of corporate welfare. A quick and dirty review of changes to copyright law does seem to show corporations and professional organizations as the driving forces behind the legislation, rather than individual content creators.
The industrytap.com offers the claim that knowledge is doubling every 12 months, soon to be every 12 hours. I think this claim is a little deceptive since they are counting data as knowledge, copyright protects the form of expression, so my crafty and compelling interpretation of the data. Even with that clarification is seems absurd to protect my interpretation for the next 100 years (assuming I live another 30 years). I say absurd because at hour 13 my interpretation is increasingly irrelevant. If my copyright extends for 3 hours, and then my interpretation becomes public domain, which leaves 9 hours for subsequent interpreters to use my knowledge to in turn innovate and create additional and still relevant knowledge.
Few books published through traditional publishing houses sell enough to break even. Likewise, few books published through e-books do either. (I have selected “books” just for a point of reference.) Few books stay in print after their initial run. So, again it seems copyright is more about protecting lucrative properties owned by corporations, Mickey Mouse for one example. LULU.com offers us some data on the lifespan of a bestseller. Currently, two weeks at the top of the bestseller list is an excellent run. In the 1960’s 22 weeks was the average time at the top of the chart. The book itself will continue to make money, but the interesting point mirrors the lifespan of knowledge described above. Accordingly, I am susceptible to the assertion that copyright duration should be shortened significantly perhaps, 5-years, with a single 5-year renewal. I like very much the modifications that Creative Commons licenses offer both in clarifying use, and privileges. So perhaps legislation could be crafted that gives some legal teeth to Creative Commons.
I am less susceptible to the assertion that copyright is limited to the creator. However, I think employment law and hiring paperwork should make this transfer of rights very visible to all parties. Certainly, many of the policy and procedure manuals and training resources I have written over the years are gray and useless outside of the context of a particular work place. That employer is welcome to that copyright. However, if I was making something creative and potentially profitable then yes I want clear understanding and terms of ownership. If I draw the next “Deadpool” yet "work for hire" then perhaps I need to be compensated in some way that mirrors the exponential profits of that success – even if that does not include copyright ownership. In truth, I suspect that this is some of the argument that Carolyn Stice is trying to make in her post, IP, Friend or Foe. Taking artists/creators for granted is unacceptable.