2008/9/8 <WJhonson(a)aol.com>om>:
I take the opposite tack. Until we find some case law
that "exercises" the
statute law, we really have no clear way to interpret what that statute law
really means. We can make interpretations of it, but we cannot rule out other
interpretations that could be gleaned from it as well. And we all know how
widely disparate various interpretations of the same law can be.
The problem is that that creates a complete mess with things like
Freedom of panorama and invalidates all but two free licenses neither
of which we use to any great extent. It is likely that it also creates
issues with the PD-US gov stuff and things like crown copyright
expired.
Most life+whatever laws have not technically been tested so rejecting
statute law until we have some case law isn't practical.
--
geni