But there is *another* policy lever American creators can and should yank on to partially resolve this: #Termination. The #1976CopyrightAct established the right for any creator to "terminate" the "transfer" of any copyrighted work after 30 years, by filing papers with the @CopyrightOffice. This process is unduly onerous, and the @AuthorsAlliance (where I'm a volunteer advisor) has created a tool to simplify it:
https://www.authorsalliance.org/resources/rights-reversion-portal/
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Termination is deliberately obscure, but it's incredibly powerful. The copyright scholar @RGibli has studied this extensively, helping to produce the most complete report on how termination has been used by creators of all types:
https://pluralistic.net/2021/10/04/avoidance-is-evasion/#reverted
Writers, musicians and other artists have used termination to unilaterally cancel the crummy deals they had crammed down their throats 30 years ago.
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Then they either re-sell their works on better terms or make them available directly to the public. Every George Clinton song, every Sweet Valley High novel, and the early works of Steven King have all be terminated and returned to their creators.
Copyright termination should and could be improved.
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