Politics of Copyright
In 2014, Joseph Goebbels’ diaries were the basis of a heated legal battle between his family and Peter Longerich, a historian who had recently published a book about Goebbels. Goebbels had been Hitler’s propaganda minister, and kept a detailed diary spanning between 1924 and 1945, key years in exploring the detailed ongoings in the rise of Hitler and his–and Goebbels’, ultimate demise (Alberge, 2015).
Goebbel’s family argued that they should be paid for the usage of their late uncle’s diaries, while Random House, the publisher of the biography, argued that copyright claims did not apply to the case on the basis of morality. The case presents an interesting look at the inner workings of copyright, especially in light of several libraries, museums, and archives protesting orphan works that are lost in copyright claims and they are unable to showcase (Berlatsky, 2014).
The purpose of copyright is the protection and legal crediting of creative works to their respective creators and authors, while promoting new ventures into creative enterprises. “Copyright…was intended to protect literary, artistic, musical, and computer-generated works for a limited period of time. This grant of a limited monopoly against republication is supposed to provide enough of a reward to encourage creativity.” (Vaidhyanathan, 2001, p.20) However, to what extent is this endeavor successful? In the case of Goebbels and his family’s copyright claims, it is important to asses not only the moral principles of the case itself, but the structure of copyright and its implications.
The Goebbels’ case is significant in the historical aspect of it in two ways; the historical background of Goebbels himself, as well as the fact that the presumably copyrighted material was published in a historical biographical publication. Contextualising the benefit of Goebbels’ diary and the paying of the estate in a case of a book that is revealing the historical background of an atrocious time directly propelled by Goebbels himself comes first in arguing against his family’s copyright claims. The author that is discussing the “bad” nature of the character is made to monetarily compensate his family, creating a paradoxical position for Longerich, and other historians of terrible people at that.
The family, on the other hand, could be completely dissociated from the character of Goebbels, they could go against his politics and support the book itself, so why should they be prevented from benefiting off of their history, terrible as it may be? But this doesn’t seem to be the case, as, first of all, the family used the son of Hitler’s minister of economics as their lawyer, hinting at the remnants of a link between Hitler’s inner circle. Secondly, when Random House’s lawyer suggested a settlement that would have the family donate their earning from the case to a Holocaust charity, the family refused (Berlatsky, 2014).
Furthermore, if the case had been related to the family shielding their name from the public eye, the case only pushed it further into public consciousness, and in the worst of ways. This possible scenario is also crumbled in face of their answer to the idea of donating the settlement money.
Copyright law, in and of itself, exists in a manner that challenges its very purpose. Rather than incentivising creative projects and the free flowing of ideas, the world ends up with several creatives facing legal problems at any infringement of a presumed copyright. The module of this system is shaped around financial motivation, rather than the promotion of creativity. Copyright thus becomes a sword that is wielded by big corporations to make money off of the “little guy”, be it a documentary maker using “Happy Birthday” before it had entered the public sphere.
Focusing on ownership of ideas and documents rather than the benefit or malevolence that they may cause society is the key problem in this case, as well as the cases of several other historical documents. Besides, the diaries hold a historical importance that is much larger than an artistic one. Longerich quoted Goebbels’ letters not in admiration of his language or to plagiarise his ideas, but instead, his goal was to showcase key historical facts that had occurred. Facts cannot be copyrighted (Libraries, University of Wisconcon).
In conclusion, while copyright and the very concept of ownership of non-tangible materials is questionable at best, it is important to evaluate the claims of infringement on a case to case basis. Copyright in a neoliberal capitalist system protects not those who create for the sake of creation from their works being appropriated by large corporations as the romaticised image of copyright is framed to be, but does the opposite. Thus, we end up with corporations and those in power preventing honest and creative projects from seeing the light of day due to their claims of one aspect of a material or other.
References
Alberge, D. (2015, July 09). Joseph Goebbels’ family win legal battle to be paid royalties for diary extracts. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jul/09/joseph-goebbels-family-royalties-diaries-nazi-propaganda-minister
Berlatsky, N. (2014, November 10). U.K. Copyright Laws Suppress WWI Soldiers’ Letters, Other Historical Documents. Retrieved from https://www.infowars.com/u-k-copyright-laws-suppress-wwi-soldiers-letters-other-historical-documents/
Libraries. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.library.wisc.edu/about/scholarly-communication/copyright/copyright-basics/what-kinds-of-things-can-be-protected-by-copyright/
Vaidhyanathan, S. (2001). Copyrights and Copywrongs : The Rise of Intellectual Property and How it Threatens Creativity, New York University Press, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/lau-ebooks/detail.action?docID=866058.
