Re: Asimov Site

["**** ****" <***@***.com>]

>>    Let's take a look at this a moment. Not that software is the best
>>example, but when we are talking "intellectual property", for lack of a
>>better term, we are talking about something with quite a few different
>>qualities than anything else that might be termed property.
>
>Property is property.  Whether it is tangible or intangible is
>irrelevant.


This is plain silly. If someone drives a car through the wall of my house,
the house is quite different than if a kid throws a baseball into my yard
which crumples a blade of grass, that blade of grass is also my property. If
you think this isn't a fair analogy, see other posts where vogon
sympathizers argue whether or not removing a pebble from a public park is
stealing.

>>For one, it is unique. Now, this isn't literally true, but is practically
>>true. Copyright is actually about enforcing that uniqueness, is one way of
>>looking at it.
>
>Not really.  Copyright is about controlling who can have and/or make
>copies.  A work can't really be called unique if there are a million
>copies in existence.  :-)


Unique in that if I own the copyright to a novel, I am the only one in the
world that owns a copyright to that novel. If I own a car, there are
hundreds of millions of others who own cars exactly the same. This isn't
totally accurate, I'm not well-versed in international IP law.

>Copyright can, in some circumstances, allow the copyright holder to
>stop another similar work from being distributed if it contains too
>much identical material to theirs.  This is sort of like making their
>work unique even if there are a million copies in existence.  However,
>if enough of the second work is different from the original, then the
>second work can exist as well.
>
>By the way, it is also possible for an identical work to exist if it
>can be proven that it was created without using the original work.


This isn't true to my knowledge. And even if it is technically true, it
would still go to court, and the person who happens to to be the established
"copyright holder" would succeed in banning the other from using and/or
distributing such a work.

>>For another, it is eternal, or at least more so than any physical property
>>you'll ever find.
>
>This you have backwards.  Physical property is practically eternal,
>intellectual property isn't.  My father's family have owned a piece of
>land since 1784 and they still own it.  That's 226 years and counting.
>Copyrights certainly don't last that long.


5 billion years from now, the Mona Lisa will not exist. I can say this
almost with certainty. Software though? The media will be gone, but then the
argument was never about the floppies, it's about the sequence of bits on
them. Will Appleworks be worth anything 5 billion years from now? No, but
the ideas and algorithms will probably be worth something still. Even your
family's land will be gone then (along with the crust of the planet that it
is on).

>>It is arguably more valuable than any physical property. From the
>>metaphorical poem that is priceless, to the down-to-earth software that
will
>>sell millions of dollars worth of 'licenses' for very little to even less
>>manufacturing costs...
>
>There are lots of physical things that are priceless too.  The "Mona
>Lisa" for example.  There are also lots of ideas that are worthless as
>well.  I wouldn't like to speculate about whether physical property is
>more or less valuable than intellectual property.  Besides, this is
>getting into monetary values again which doesn't apply to copyright
>except to determine what type of punishment you get for breaking the
>copyright law.


Then let's consider how long a physical property can be used, vs. how long
an IP property can be used. Thousands of years(at most) compared to
something so close to eternity there is no way to test.

>>It has the characteristic of being a "discovered" property, more so than a

>>constructed property. In essence, the person who 'writes software' is only
>>discovering something, though it may be a highly complex idea.
>
>This I disagree with wholeheartedly.  When I write a program, I'm not
>"discovering" something.  I am purposely putting together sequences of
>commands to create a specific end result.  I build a program just as
>much as I would build a house.


Ah. Trouble is, you are just fine if someone builds a house similar to your
own. I build software similar or identical to yours, and you go ape-shit and
lawyer crazy (please don't take this personally, Jeff, not talking about you
specifically). Imagine, if people weren't allowed to build houses similar to
other people, without paying exorbiant "buildcopyright fees".
Software is information, of a sort, which can be distilled into sequences of
ones and zeros. To assert that a particular sequence doesn't exist until a
specific person 'creates' it, is ludicrous. The likelyhood of someone
"discovering" it independently is small, but it's still possible. Does this
mean that the discoverer doesn't deserve something? No, and they likely
deserve alot as far as that goes. But it doesn't make them a creator.

>Discovering a program would mean having to do something like drop a
>bunch of marbles on my keyboard to find that the program that results
>actually does something interesting.  :-)


Microsoft has patented this method. I wouldn't risk a fight with their
corporate lawyers.

>However, whether the work is created or discovered, if it is
>copyrighted, it is still protected by law.


Not once have I asserted that it wasn't Jeff. Do you still need to remind
me?

>>If someone takes your car, you are 'without' your car. Also, the car thief
>>has little excuse, a car is something he has a multitude of ways to
acquire
>>legitimately. Compare this to software, where they will most likely never
>>miss the software (it's still there!), and in our case, something that is
>>almost impossible to acquire legitimately, for any price.
>
>What about someone who wants a Fiero?  They can't get that
>legitimately anymore because they are no longer in production.  Unless
>they can get the company to make them one, start producing them again
>or get someone who owns one to sell them theirs they can't get one
>without stealing one.  If they don't want to steal it, they'll just
>have to live without it.


Actually, they could get a Fiero without one, though the cost would be high.
Find a frame or build one that is similar enough, and build the body out of
fiberglass. Depending on how far they are willing to go, it could be an
exact duplicate. The funny thing here is, I don't think anyone would even
consider giving them legal trouble. They might even be able to sell such,
though they wouldn't be allowed to call them Fieros.

>The same goes for software.
>
>>    Now, let's look for a rationale for copyright protection, if not for
>>economic reasons, and the whole "if they can't get paid, why will they
>>continue to create?" BS.
>
>Being compensated for what you do isn't BS.  I've already explained
>that compensation doesn't have to be monetary.  There is also no need
>to start creating more terms like "credit-right" and so on.  If a
>person has a copyright on something then only they have the "right" to
>"copy" it or allow copies to be made.  That is what copyright is all
>about.
>
>In the case of the poem being written for one person, once you create
>it, it is copyrighted.  If you only want that one person to have a
>copy of that poem then that is the only person who can legally have a
>copy of it until you either change your mind and let more people have
>it or the copyright expires.  The law does support situations like
>that.
>
>In the case of GE changing light bulb sockets, that isn't a copyright
>issue.  It would most likely be a patent issue.  Besides, unless GE
>holds a patent on the old sockets and also patents the new design,
>they won't have the control of the market required to make them a
>monopoly.  Even if they did own both patents, someone would come up
>with a new design and let lots of companies license it and their
>design would become the new standard.  Beta versus VHS is a good
>example here.
>
>In the case of control freaks, copyright gives them the right to be
>control freaks.  If they don't want to let anyone have it, that is
>their right.  I might get just as upset as you about a situation like
>that but it still doesn't give either of us the right to ignore the
>copyright.


>You then did a paragraph speculating about why people want control.  I
>won't respond to it as some of the points were pretty muddled or hard
>to understand so I don't want to assume that you meant something and
>get it wrong.  Besides, as far as I can tell, you didn't really relate
>it to copyrights except to speculate about how the law could be
>changed.
>
>>As such, let's look at
>>the disadvantages of the "control" aspect of a copyright.
>>    It wasn't the intention when copyright law was written, and still
isn't.
>
>I have no idea what the original intent of copyright law was but I
>know the law has changed over time so I'm pretty sure it isn't the
>same now as it was then.  Today, copyright law is definitely about
>control, though.
>
>>    Loss of control in and of itself, constitutes no damage to the
copyright
>>holder, financial or otherwise.
>
>It most certainly does.  If I lose control over my property (ie my car
>or my e-mail client that I am writing) then I can no longer keep
>people from doing what they want with that property (ie taking my car
>for a joyride or distributing a modified version of my e-mail client).
>That would definitely be quite harmful.


Harmful how? Disregard the car, that I can understand. The email client?
THey distribute a cruddy version of it, it just shows people they need to
get the original. THey distribute a better version, everyone wins. Now if
they claim their cruddy version was written by you, then that is harmful,
but it's no longer a control issue. It's more akin to lying, fraud, and/or
not giving proper credit.

>>    It is a dangerous privilege, that is likely to encourage abuse more
than
>>anything else.


Who would be abusing cotrol privileges inherent in copyright law? Umm. This
one is tough. How bout DeCSS and the MPAA fiasco? (Please someone, please,
dare to claim that it encourages piracy of 10 gig videos)

>>    Loss of control is not likely to discourage people to do creative work
>>in any significant way.
>
>It most certainly would.  Taking away their control would mean that
>they would receive less compensation and I've already discussed the
>compensation issue.


Dude, we aren't talking about compensation. The whole point of your argument
was (as near as I could tell) that it wasn't about money, or lack of it. It
was that they have a right to control copyrighted works, independent of any
monetary compensation. When I say these things, I mean divorcing it from
compensation entirely. Assume that these people are already being
compensated (It is undeniable that they have a right to be comensated). Do
they have a right on top of that, to control these works?

>>    It is a childish attitude, and one that isn't wise to encourage on the
>>level of a global society.
>
>Personally, I think it is pretty childish to whine about the fact that
>you can't get something that you want or to take something that
>doesn't belong to you.


Yes, but this isn't about that particular childish attitude. In case you
haven't noticed. And if you did notice, you are just sniping at me behind
insults again. "Taking something that doesn't belong to you" only counts if
it truly belongs to you. It is my point that these things don't "belong to
you". I also take the moral high ground in not "taking what doesn't belong
to me" until such a time as decent reasonable people everywhere grow up and
stop slapping labels on things that basically say "This is Jeff's email
client, do not touch unless he lets you". You can almost imagine it being
written in crayon, eh?

>>    Honestly, I'm trying my hardest not to dismiss such an argument
>>outright, but I have trouble not doing that. Perhaps you could enlighten
me
>>as to why you feel you have supreme authority over intellectual property,
>>simply because you happened to be the first person to document that you
>>thought of it?
>
>I feel that I have supreme authority over intellectual property that I
>create because I spent the time learning how to create it and actually
>creating it.


Well, arguements of creation/discovery aside, I don't deny you authority
over such outright. I simply draw a line at supreme eternal authority. I
commend you in learning to create, and in practicing. When things are no
longer so screwed up, I'll still want to pay you for what you create, simply
because I am busy creating other things, or don't feel like creating those
things that you do. I just won't sit back and let you claim that only you
are allowed to create them, and that anyone else who does is infringing on
your property.

>In the case of the e-mail program I am currently writing.  It didn't
>simply pop into existence on my machine.  (If it had I would have
>released it by now. :)  I had to take quite some time to learn how to
>program well enough to attempt this and I've also put in quite a bit
>of time in the past two years working on that program.


>Now, why do you feel that a person who has spent no time learning how
>to program well enough to attempt writing an e-mail client or hasn't
>spent the time writing an e-mail client, should have the right to do
>what they want with my e-mail client?


Jeff, I'm sorry that you still have the impression that I'm some sort of
thief. No reasonable argument can persuade you otherwise, and I can only be
glad that you were polite about your views. There is virtue in that, at
least. Please think about this though. 300 years from now, should your
great-great-great to the Nth grandchildren
have the right to say "what makes you think you have the right to do what
you want with our email client, it's been in our family for generations" ?
Seriously, no matter how many steal your email client, in any sense of the
word 'steal', you'll still have it. If I have my way, you'd be compensated
for it, not because you've sold property, but simply because you've earned
it. How could you be any poorer if that happens?

Hell, I don't even have a practical way to set up an economy the "right
way". But when so many people are busy arguing that it's "wrong", how is
there any time left to figure out how to do it? I'm not asking you to give
your software away, I'm not asking you to go bankrupt writing it. I don't
ask you to forsake your copyrights. All I ask is that you not automatically
decide that it is the best and only way to run the world.

John