🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <6780@agate.BERKELEY.EDU> mwm@eris.UUCP (Mike (My watch has windows) Meyer) writes:
>In article <160@octopus.UUCP> pete@octopus.UUCP (Pete Holzmann)
>demonstrates the common fallacy of thinking that anything you can do
>can be turned into a right:

A 'right' is only a 'right' if a society deems it to be so. It is TRUE!
*Anything* you can do can be turned into a right, if society decides that it
should be a right. This doesn't require a law necessarily, it simply requires
society's approval.

Whether we like it or not, we live in a capitalistic society. Now I'm not an
Econ major, nor Poli Sci, so I can't debate the niceities of capitalism... but
at the very least, it is my understanding that in our society, people are
supposed to be given the right to fair wages for their work. In our society,
that is not a 'priviledge' (something only granted to a certain subset of
the population, and taken away if you don't toe the line). It is a 'right'
(something any law-abiding citizen can expect, and will hopefully be upheld
in a reasonable court of law).

><	- The owner's right to control the distribution and use of X

>The first of these isn't a right, but it is legally granted privilege.
>I happen to think the laws in this case are wrong.

See above. In the USA, these *are* 'rights'. If you don't agree with
capitalism, I don't mind. You've got your work cut out for you if you want
to change us into a communal society though!

><	- The owner's right to make a living from the distribution and use of X

>The second isn't a right, or anything else. The law grants you the
>right to _try_ to make a living distributing X. It doesn't say whether
>you'll succeed.

A nit, in this discussion. You are right, but it makes no difference to my
argument. I have the right to try to make a living selling my X creation. You
do NOT have the right to damage the value of X by endless duplication! You
do NOT have the right to damage the value of X by making untrue disparaging
remarks about it either! (c.f. various lawsuits with Consumer Reports, etc)
[This second being added in to further the point that I (the owner) am given
control over sales of X. If you buy a copy of X from me, you own a copy, not
the complete distribution rights!]

><	- The owner of X has the moral right to say 'you may not have X if you
><		will not pay for it, because sales of X are my livelihood'.
>
>Of course the owner has the right to say that. But that doesn't mean
>he has the right to actually prevent you from obtaining a copy from
>another source. Currently, he can *legally* prevent you from doing so.
>That doesn't mean he's behaving morally in doing so.

But if you can't have a copy of X without paying for it, and I retain exclusive
distribution rights to X, where can you get a copy? Anyone who gives you a copy
is destroying my livelihood by taking away my society-given right to earn a
living by distributing X! 

><There are many positions that can be held wherein such property rights are
><given over to some other party (the State, the People). But in all cases, the
><original creator must be *paid* in some way for the transfer of these rights.

>Oh, yeah, like RMS got paid for GNU emacs, right?

You sure are good at introducing extraneous arguments! I can forego any 'right'
I have, any time I want! If *I* want to give something away, of course I'm
allowed to! This is silly. [And please don't take things even further afield
by arguing (the obviously true exception) that for a few things, society 
doesn't give me the right to give up my rights].


><If this is not done, society is left without all forms of professional
><intellectual creation vocation. This would be rather serious!

>	- artists, including songwriters, authers (fiction), and others

>Many of these people don't expect to make a living on the artwork they
>do. How many artists do you know of whose works are now selling for
>fortunes scraped by for most of their life, and died penniless?

You are arguing that I only have the right to 'try' to make a living by
creating. I agree! Teachers only have the right to 'try' to make a living by
teaching. In both cases, they are usually underpaid, and may decide that they
have to take a second job in order to earn enough. Just because an artist
isn't earning enough from their art doesn't mean you have the right to
make it *worse*!

>	- toolsmiths: programmers, architects, research firms & product testing
>
>...They [often] make money by contracting out to right the
>original product, and then just hand the report (and copyrights) over
>to whoever paid them to produce it. Many programmers work on the same
	    ^^^^^^^^^
>scheme.

So they got paid, and paid well. A fair and square deal. Then whoever paid
them to produce X now owns X in all of its glory, and owns the distribution
rights to X.

>	- Howto book (cookbooks, etc), and similar mass market people.

>These people will have more problems. But currently, the cost of
>copying a book is more than the cost of the paperback. People trying
>to sell overpriced hard & tradebacks would probably loose sales. But
>that doesn't kill the works of the authers, only restricts the format
>they can publish in slightly. And there'll still be a market for
>hardbacks & tradebacks in the presence of paperbacks & slightly more
>expensive copying. After all, there is now.

Ahhh- but suppose I take the book you wrote, scan it into my computer here,
make a nice laserprinted copy, and send it out to be published? Then I
keep careful track of your marketing efforts, and undersell your publisher's
price in all major markets, until your publisher gets tired and quits. Now
I have the market and can set my own prices. In our society, my actions are
not tolerated, because I don't own the distribution rights to your book!!!

>	- money market watchers

>These people tend to sell to a small, select audience by subscription
>(overpriced, at that). Adding a license agreement to the affet that
>you recieve the newsletter under the condition that you not give it to
>anyone else is a minor matter.

You may GIVE *it* (your copy) to somebody. *Copy*right law is in place already
to control giving a *copy* to somebody.

>Basically, the only thing lack of a copyright law kills is things
>produced explicitly in hopes of making money by selling lots of copies
>of something. My reasons for claiming why a minority of software
>written fills that bill have already been posted. I believe the same
>about everything else, with the possible exception of mass-market
>books. And loss of coypright laws won't hurt mass-market paperbacks
>worth noticing.

Oh really? Lack of copyright law kills anything for which I want to make $$$
by selling a COPY without selling the RIGHT TO COPY (i.e. distribution rights).
This covers everything I listed above, and a lot more. You seem to believe
that if you purchase a COPY of something, you (should) also have the RIGHT TO
COPY it. You should be allowed to start your own business selling it! (There
is little difference in the affect on me whether you give copies of X away or
sell copies of X: in either case, people who might buy a copy from me will get
it from you instead!)

>On the other hand, copyright laws tend to restrict the free flow of
>information. This causes duplicated work, lost work, and numerous
>other things generally considered bad for society.

No, it isn't copyright law that causes all these bad things. It is the
unwillingness of people to (1) see if X has been done already, and (2) pay
for somebody else's hard work. Just a f'rinstance: it is worth my while to
buy a book on X if I need to know about X for my job. If I'm not going to
make money on it, then yes, I might go out and figure out how to write an X
program, even though it has been done already. *Sure* I'd rather just have
X for free. But it would be *SELFISH* and *GREEDY* of me to EXPECT the original
creator of X to always give away her creations! (Just as society is frequently
selfish and greedy to expect great teachers to work for a pittance. People's
pay is already far out of proportion to the value of their work. Let's not
make it worse!)

>	<mike

Pete

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  OOO   __| ___      Peter Holzmann, Octopus Enterprises
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