Copyright term, film labeling, and film preservation legislation : hearings before the Subcommittee on Courts and Intellectual Property of the Committee on the Judiciary, House of Representatives, One Hundred Fourth Congress, first session, on H.R. 989, H.R. 1248, and H.R. 1734 ... June 1 and July 13, 1995 (1996)

52 Why? The theater ticket price remains the same, no matter what picture is showing. I do not know of any home video store that gives you a discount nor do I know of any television station that lowers its advertising rates because it happened to buy a program more cheaply than did its competitors. That is a fact of life. The academics also assert that when copyrighted works lose their protection, they become more widely available to the public. Again, what the academics do not know are the marketplace realisms which exist. Whatever work is not protected is a work that nobody preserves. The quality of the print is soon degraded. And there is no one around who is going to invest the money for enhancement. Why? Because there is no longer a financial incentive to rehabilitate and preserve because it belongs to everybody and therefore it belongs to nobody. A public domain work is an orphan. No question about that. No one is responsible for its future life. But everyone exploits its use until that time certain when it becomes soiled and haggard and barren of all of its former virtues. Who then — who then will invest the funds required to renovate it and to nourish its future when nobody owns it? How does the consumer benefit from that scenario? The answer is the consumer has no benefit. What the academics offer in numbing detail are the arcane drudgeries of graphs and charts and arithmetical lines that cross a page. But the fact is that all of these scholarly works are separated from the real world in which realism exists. And that brings me now to the fourth reason why it is necessary to extend copyright terms. That Congress can, without reaching into the pockets of any consumer, magnify the revenue curve of copyright owners, which can be delivered back to this country and thereby help, maybe modestly, but nonetheless help in the reduction of our trade deficit, as well as encouraging the preservation and nourishment of what I think is one of America's great, glittering trade prizes, the American movie. In the global intellectual property world of tomorrow, I think competition is going to reach a ferocity unimagined today. And you have to understand what intellectual property means to this country. The core copyright industries represent intellectual property, movies, home video, books, musical recordings and computer software. Together they comprise about 4 percent of our gross domestic product. About $240 billion. They collect some $45 billion in revenues abroad. Their employment rate is growing four times faster than the national economy. If ever there was a prize that ought to be protected by the Congress of the United States and by this administration, it is this wonderful world of intellectual property in which we are superior and dominant throughout the world. So I say the Congress ought to equip us with the kind of intellectual property protection we need by extending this copyright term. Otherwise, competition in Europe particularly is going to get skewed against us. Which brings me now to the singular premise on which this, I hope, passionate plea is based and that is what we are asking you