U.K. Rules the World in Bad Copyright Law

Who has the worst "worst, by far" copyright laws in the world? According to a pair of consumer groups, the winner is—wait for it—the UK.

Yes, the country that brought us copyright, modern parliamentary democracy, chocolate Hobnobs, and both Shakespeare and Simon Cowell was rated the absolute worst of sixteen countries surveyed when it came to copyright. The abysmal rating came from the Open Rights Group and Consumer Focus, which dinged the UK for its lack of a broad "fair use" right and the continued existence of rules that prohibit (among other things) legally ripping a CD to one's computer or iPod.

Countries surveyed included China, Australia, Argentina, Indonesia, Pakistan, South Korea, and the US, but the UK's consumer unfriendliness (read the country-specific report) can be seen in the fact that it has no copyright exemption for parody or satire. It also assigns the copyright in most government documents to the Crown, unlike the US government, which places its material in the public domain.

Many of these items were identified as problems by the hugely important Gowers Review back in 2006, but have still not been acted upon. Andrew Gowers, a newspaper editor, recommended that the UK's "fair dealing" laws get a major upgrade and that private ripping of legally purchased CDs be made legal; neither has yet happened.

To some rightsholders, of course, the "bad news" actually looks like "good news," since it gives them even more power to control their material. Consumers widely ignore rules such as the ban on CD ripping, and people aren't prosecuted for doing so, but this sort of copyright overreach simply damages public respect for law and copyrights so long as it remains on the books.

From the consumer point of view, things may get worse, quickly. The European Parliament, pushed by record labels and rock stars like Bono and Sir Cliff Richard, is considering an extension on musical copyrights to 95 years per song.

The Gowers Review said that the current 50-year copyright was plenty of time, but the UK government is pushing for an extension to 70 years. It won't go along with the full 95-year term, however, and has been holding up the legislation in Europe on the grounds that it goes too far. The European Parliament could hold a full vote on the plan next week.