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Abstract
The death of Melville B. Nimmer, the author of Nimmer on Copyright, did not interrupt the stream of legal scholarship that has intrigued practitioners and appellate courts. Nimmer's son, David Nimmer, has taken over the family business of editing the Nimmer standard text on US copyright law. He is counsel to Los Angeles high-tech, copyright, and entertainment law specialists Irell & Manella. Nimmer is currently arguing that the US should extend its copyright term yet again, in response to the European Union's harmonization move. He maintains that the goal of copyright is to cover 1 1/2-2 generations after an author's death and that, if life expectancy increases, copyright protection should too. Nimmer refers to the fair use doctrine as the last resort of scoundrels. He also thinks that performing rights for sound recordings would be appropriate.