This should complete it. If anyone wants to improve it they are welcome to, otherwise I will post this immediately as the thread on reddit opens up.
"Mr. Future President
I know you will have much to do in the oval office and far greater problems to resolve, but could you please reform our Copyright & Patent laws?
The duration of copyright makes authors works end up in the ownership of big corporations who only profit from them ("Happy Birthday to You" song lawsuit in 2013 as an example), the expiry date is ludicrous (time of author’s death + 70 years) and it was never EVER supposed to be that long.
The first Copyright Act was in 1790, it was only for a term of 14 years, with the right to renew for one additional 14 year term should the copyright holder still be alive. Ever since then big corporations did everything they could to extend the expiry date (biggest example is the CTEA or derisively the Mickey Mouse Protection Act of 1998) and now they stifle creativity in favor of profit for them as owners.
The duration of copyright is not compatible with today’s economy and the laws were not made with the Internet in mind.
As for patents, many companies claim patents for inventions they have not even made yet or never will. Because of this there are many patent troll companies that hold patents ransom, blocking attempts at making an invention and set back many other legitimate companies from technological progress just so they could earn undeserved profit.
Copyrights and patents should be under the ownership of persons, not corporations. This goes back to repealing corporate personhood (which is an absolute must), but if corporations as an entity cannot own copyright or patent, that puts (restores) FAR greater worth on individuals, who corporations would then headhunt for the right to use the patent/copyright created thereby. Persons would be of greater value to a corporation, and thus would be treated better for fear of the person leaving, taking his patent with him, and denying the corporation further (because products made during the duration of employment would be acceptable) use of the patent–maybe taking it to a competitor.
There might be many more intellectual property laws that do not function as they were originally intended, I wish you can look into these problems as right now they only serve big corporations, stagnate technological progress and stifle creativity."