EU commissioner McGreevy proposes to extend the copyright lifetime for performers from 50 years to 95 years. Interestingly copyright lifetime for composers is of 70 years after his/her death. In most of the world, the default length of copyright is the life of the author plus either 50 or 70 years.
The current limit of 50 years means that many songs from still alive performers will soon enter in public domain. According to some estimations, this extension represents a gain of 3 to 10% for the European phonographic industry. Electronic Free Foundation (EFF) has launched an online petition against this initiative.

Copyright lifetime expiration is an interesting problem for DRM. What happens for a protected song when it enters the public domain? Normally, they should be no more protected. Extension of 45 years may delay this technical issue for several years?  :Wink: