Egpyt to copyright Pyramids

From IOL:

Cairo - In a potential blow to themed resorts from Vegas to Tokyo, Egypt is to pass a law requiring payment of royalties whenever its ancient monuments, from the pyramids to the sphinx, are reproduced.

Zahi Hawass, the charismatic and controversial head of Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities, told AFP on Tuesday that the move was necessary to pay for the upkeep of the country's thousands of pharaonic sites.

"The new law will completely prohibit the duplication of historic Egyptian monuments which the Supreme Council of Antiquities considers 100-percent copies," he said.

"If the law is passed then it will be applied in all countries of the world so that we can protect our interests," Hawass said.

<snip>

"It is Egypt's right to be the only copyright owner for these monuments in order to benefit financially so we can restore, preserve and protect Egyptian monuments."

However, the law "does not forbid local or international artists from profiting from drawings and other reproductions of pharaonic and Egyptian monuments from all eras - as long as they don't make exact copies."

I don't know where to go with this: a snide remark about how people will now turn to cheap Aztec knockoffs for their pyramid fix, or a snide remark about how the city of Pisa will now copyright cylinders to protect images of the Leaning Tower?

Let's see Egypt try to enforce this law in other countries.

S**t, now where going to have to go back to calling all pyramid schemes "multi-level marketing".:p

Noone remembers Charles Ponzi, so that avenue is closed,

glatt;419368 wrote:

Let's see Egypt try to enforce this law in other countries.

Yeah, it took the world's largest nuclear arsenal, tens of thousands of lawyers, and hordes of diplomats to force our copyright laws on the rest of the world.

Pfft, I bet I can still get bootleg pyramids from China for a buck and a half.

Does this mean we will have to pay them for each of our dollar bills?

I think we're good on the money - ours are unfinished, so only 85% copies. If the Masons get on board this copyright bandwagon, then we're pooched.

We have no such plans. We're planning on world domination instead.

Chewbaccus;419440 wrote:

I think we're good on the money - ours are unfinished, so only 85% copies. If the Masons get on board this copyright bandwagon, then we're pooched.

As a side note, in Egypt most buildings are unfinished, don't have to pay taxes on an unfinished one. Using their own logic in a sense, we shouldn't have to pay for an unfinished pirimid.

There goes the food pyramid.

And the term "Ponzi scheme" is by no means obsolete usage.

Sounds like Egypt is having an attack of "Cuban Politicians' Disease."

They can only put a copywrite on exact replicas, not a prism shape. This is simply to protect their own right to market souveniers - and that's fair enough if you ask me.

Aliantha;420576 wrote:

They can only put a copywrite on exact replicas, not a prism shape. This is simply to protect their own right to market souveniers - and that's fair enough if you ask me.

Ok, we should copyright all things Red, White, and Blue, all images of anything from America, all images of any American Icon. All images of the Bald Eagle... the list goes on. It is a stupid idea.

you can't put a copywrite on colours. You have no claim to those colours. They existed essentially well before the USA did, as did the bald eagle.

I'm sure you'd have a case for the statue of liberty though.

Aliantha;420591 wrote:

you can't put a copywrite on colours. You have no claim to those colours. They existed essentially well before the USA did, as did the bald eagle.

I'm sure you'd have a case for the statue of liberty though.

A pyramid is nothing more than a stack of rocks.

The Pyramids as we know them are a lot more than a stack of rocks. As you well know, they hold religious significance to the extent that they are burial tombs for kings who were living Gods.

I think they will win the right to this copywrite, but people will still make knock off souveniers because they wont be exact replicas and therefor not subject to copywrite law.

*wince*

It's copyright, not copywrite. As in, the right to copy.

Aliantha;420596 wrote:

The Pyramids as we know them are a lot more than a stack of rocks. As you well know, they hold religious significance to the extent that they are burial tombs for kings who were living Gods.

I think they will win the right to this copywrite, but people will still make knock off souveniers because they wont be exact replicas and therefor not subject to copywrite law.

And the Bald Eagle and our Stars and Stripes are much more than colors and a bird to millions of non-Americans.

The government of Egypt did not build or design the pyramids, the architect Imhotep did, sometime around 2630 B.C.E. Assuming anyone wants to enforce a 4600-year-old copyright, then his descendants own the rights to the pyramid unless he signed a work-for-hire contract with his employer, the Pharoah Djoser.

I'm pretty sure Djoser forgot to secure the video rights too.

richlevy;420626 wrote:

The government of Egypt did not build or design the pyramids, the architect Imhotep did, sometime around 2630 B.C.E. Assuming anyone wants to enforce a 4600-year-old copyright, then his descendants own the rights to the pyramid unless he signed a work-for-hire contract with his employer, the Pharoah Djoser.

I'm pretty sure Djoser forgot to secure the video rights too.

I was just about to say this. Under our view of copyright they have no case.

You'd think so, wouldn't you?

Or would you?

Ibram;420597 wrote:

*wince*

It's copyright, not copywrite. As in, the right to copy.

lucky no one cares if you can spell or not huh? ;)

Aliantha;420591 wrote:

you can't put a copywrite on colours.

Sure you can. See for example, Blue Monochrome copyright 1961 by Yves Klein.

Also, the color PINK is a registered trademark of Owens Corning.

Cadbury lost an argument about their purple colour over here glatt. Apparently they're appealing the decision. Time will tell I guess. Here's one article about it.
With regard to the colours red, white and blue, there are a huge number of flags that use the exact same colours. I think if it were possible to copyright those three colours, someone already would have done so.

I use artificial sweeteners. I buy generic blue packets which are Aspertame, sold as Equal(tm) in blue packets. I also sometimes find generic pink packets which are a dextrose and saccharin, the ingredients in Sweet'N Low (tm), sold in pink packets. Soon there will be a generic equivalent of the ssucralose sold as Splenda (tm) in the same yellow packet.

Everyone seems happy with this arrangement.