Hmmm. The Gowers Report on Intellectual Property has been published. I haven’t read it through yet (in fact have only read the Press Release). When I started on the Report proper, I was immediately distracted by the Gowers signature:

That doesn’t seem at all safe to me. I mean to say, how do we know that this is the real Andrew Gowers, rather than a cheap counterfeit copy knocked up in Bangkok?

UPDATE: Bill Thompson has been reading the report. His initial impression is one of relieved surprise. Given what could have happened to the document, it seems sensible. And it’s delicious to think that ‘Sir’ Cliff Richard’s er, descendants, will not be able to wax fatly on his royalties after all. Gowers thinks that 50 years is quite enough, thank you very much. Actually, of course, it’s far too much, but we will leave that pass. I’m still trying to work out when Windows 95 comes out of copyright, for example.