My assumption is not "the author should get the value of the work," as that opens up the doors to perpetual copyright, but rather something like "the author should get a sufficient opportunity to try to earn back his initial investment." In your scheme, you claim to give him the present value (at publication date), but actually give it somewhat later, but then you can't maintain you're giving him present value. In my scheme, I would try to find a term that would not distract investors from investing in the production of a work, taking into consideration a number of factors, such as return on investment within a reasonable time (no investor will invest in a project with a break-even point more than 70 years in the future -- that is if he is thinking about the money), the distribution of earnings derived from a work, influence of competition from a vibrant public domain (if it can be shown that that really inhibits the creation of new works, not just stops the creation of "More of the same"); the debt every work has from borrowings from the public domain, and even personality rights (better known under a misnomer 'moral rights'), and even then I think publication + 28 years is very much more reasonable than the life + 70 we have to struggle with today. Once the public has paid the author what was necessary to enable him to create the work, I think the public should pay no more, as that will only disencourage the author to write yet another work (Why should he work if he is still getting money for nothing?), and disable us to distribute those same resources to other authors who also want to be able to write books. I am perfectly happy to give considerable margins, so that authors can actually earn a lot if their works have a big value to the public. Jeroen Hellingman.