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Comment by Caligatio | Hacker News Reader

This intrigues me as I had no idea, at one time, that the US didn't have the most restrictive copyright laws in the world. It looks like the US had to restore/extend copyrights to foreign works as part of the agreement that established the WTO?

That being said, copyright is a product of laws and laws can always change. Your comment made me believe that the copyright owner somehow extended their rights; not a literal act of Congress.

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Initially (19th century) the US did not recognise copyright of foreign works.

This is all about interests: when you are a net importer you want to make it easy and cheap to reproduce and use works. Buy once you start being an exporter you want your works protected, and that's a quid pro quo.

> It looks like the US had to restore/extend copyrights to foreign works as part of the agreement that established the WTO?

What happens is that lobbyists for the same (copyright) interest groups instructs their governments that extended copyright is in their interest, and that whoever have the longest should “win” and become the norm.

WTOs are basically big business “negotiating” with itself through nation states.

The copyright owners persuaded other countries to make copyright very long, then persuaded the USA to fall in line with other countries.

Read up on the history of Hollywood! It's deeply intertwined with the history of copyright.

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