Fashion Designers Realizing New Fashion Copyright Would Cause Serious Harm To Business

from the waking-up dept

For many, many years, we've pointed out how the fashion industry is an example of a highly creative industry that has thrived without the use of copyright. The industry itself is massively successful, incredibly innovative, and involves plenty of competition. This should be seen as a good thing. Yet, some big name designers, who were annoyed that they had to keep competing by releasing new designs all the time have been lobbying Congress to pass a new law that would institute a special copyright for fashion design. This makes little sense. The entire purpose of copyright is to encourage innovation. Yet, if the industry is thriving, competitive and innovative, why would you ever want to introduce new copyright?

Yet, as expected, there has been a big push to get the law passed this year. People have been submitting stories on a near weekly basis about how one or another celebrity designer trekked up to Capitol Hill to push starstruck Congress Critters to support the bill.

It's reached the point that many expect the bill to finally pass this year, but suddenly many in the industry are realizing what a disaster this would be. Boing Boing points us to a plea from industry insiders who are realizing how such a law would destroy the industry and force many small businesses and designers to shut down. Yet, when they talked to their Congressional reps, they were told that Congress hadn't heard anyone complain about this yet, so now they're trying to get out the word.

It might help them to present some of the economic research on this, including the studies that have shown how much the lack of copyright has helped the industry to thrive, and how much harm the addition of copyright would do to the overall industry. This research has been out there for years, but apparently the folks writing the laws would rather hang out with celebrities like Tim Gunn than actually do some research around what such a law would really mean for the industry.

Filed Under: copyright, fashion, fashion designers, protectionism