Date: Mon, 12 Mar 2001 22:32:24 -0700 From: Brett Glass <brett@lariat.org> To: Mike Meyer <mwm@mired.org> Cc: Rahul Siddharthan <rsidd@physics.iisc.ernet.in>, "Victor R. Cardona" <vcardona@home.com>, freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: Stallman stalls again Message-ID: <4.3.2.7.2.20010312215702.0445f5f0@localhost> In-Reply-To: <15020.33581.202339.895997@guru.mired.org> References: <4.3.2.7.2.20010311235053.00e26140@localhost> <4.3.2.7.2.20010311230800.00e19bd0@localhost> <4.3.2.7.2.20010311193801.0441d3c0@localhost> <4.3.2.7.2.20010306122244.04477f00@localhost> <20010305200017.D80474@lpt.ens.fr> <4.3.2.7.2.20010305123951.04604b20@localhost> <20010305205030.G80474@lpt.ens.fr> <4.3.2.7.2.20010305125259.00cfdae0@localhost> <20010305142108.A17269@marx.marvic.chum> <4.3.2.7.2.20010306011342.045fb360@localhost> <20010306081025.A22143@marx.marvic.chum> <4.3.2.7.2.20010306092612.00b79f00@localhost> <20010306174618.N32515@lpt.ens.fr> <4.3.2.7.2.20010311235053.00e26140@localhost>
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At 01:05 AM 3/12/2001, Mike Meyer wrote: >My point is that the conferred rights do *not* have to be the >copyright system. The rights granted by copyright are the only ones that Congress is allowed by the Constitution to confer. >Actually, the things copyright holders have the right to demand >compensation for are listed in the US copyright code, chapter 1, >section 106. "Fair use" is a list of exceptions those rights. They >don't have the right to demand compensation for anything not listed >in that section, whether it's fair use or not. There's no such thing as a "US Copyright Code." There is, however, a section of the US Code dealing with copyright. And Congress has a great deal of leeway in defining what goes there. It also has the power, due to the even broader Commerce Clause, to regulate commerce. I think that the restrictions in the DMCA suck, but it is entirely possible that the ridiculously pro-big-business Supreme Court will use the Commerce Clause as justification for them. US citizens have been lax in demanding that the President's appointments to the Supreme Court be based on traits such as clear thinking and ethics, rather than conformance to a partisan agenda. We may pay for that, big time, when the DMCA reaches the Supremes. >> You don't have to release your work to the general public. You can >> license it privately to a small number of individuals if you'd like. > >In which case it doesn't need to have a copyright attached at all; the >license is more than sufficient. That's not how copyright works. You own a copyright on any work you create, whether or not it's published. And it's only because you have the rights conferred by copyright that you can choose to give some of them away as part of a licensing agreement! >But the point of copyright is to encourage the authors to release >their work to the general public, not to a small set of licensees. That's your interpretation. I'd beg to differ. If it advances the state of the art, or encourages a creative person to create more, that's a good thing even if the whole world does NOT initially get access to it. >For something to be copyrightable, it must be fixed (Chapter 1, >Section 102, paragraph a of the US Copyright code). A performance >isn't fixed, and hence not copyrightable. Recordings of it are fixed, >and hence copyrightable. Not so. An author and/or a performer has the right to demand that you not make recordings of a performance, and to take appropriate action to protect his or her rights if you try. This right exists BEFORE you've made any "fixation" of the work. That's why you can be searched for recording devices at the entrance to a concert. >"Impacting sales" is a *long* way from "causing a major economic >dislocation". Get back to me record companies start folding because of >it. We don't have ubiquitous broadband yet. It could well happen when we do. In the meantime, however, what will happen is that the record won't earn out its advance. The publisher will grab all the money, and the artist will be forever in debt to the publisher. Not a good thing. >> >wherease the publishers mucking >> >with fair use and related rights is threatening an entire profession. >> Which one? > >Librarians. I posted a URL to the librarians take on this already. I doubt that libraries will cease to be. I think that the worst that will happen is that they'll pay ASCAP-style royalties to copyright holders. As I mentioned in another message, I get royalties from several European countries because I write a lot of magazine articles and also some music. Those fees originate from the money deposited into copying machines (the assumption being, of course, that copies are being made of my articles). I don't get that much -- only a few hundred dollars per year. But it's enough to pay for something useful -- say, the airfare for a trip to COMDEX. Or a trip to play bass at a bluegrass festival. Which in turn will encourage me to write more articles and/or create more music. >> What would you propose? Something like ASCAP? From whom would it collect >> funds? > >I don't really have a good idea. Of course, it's clear from the state >of the world that the current system isn't a good idea, either. >Stallman proposed a tax system at one point, but it's probably not an >improvement. Stallman's proposal was a terrible idea: a tax whose proceeds would go toward the creation of GPLed software. This would be a travesty. IP created by the government, using taxpayer money, should be available to EVERYONE -- most especially businesses which can productize it. (Many of the high tech products we enjoy today are spinoffs from research done by or for NASA or DARPA.) In fact, if a work is created by government employees, the law says it can't be copyrighted at all. This is good. >There have been experiments with voluntary contributions, >but I don't think those have worked very well. Possibly the concept of >copyright can be made to work, but I suspect it will take a nearly >complete reworking. The fundamentals are already sound. Artists should have merchantable and non-merchantable rights in their work, and the government should protect those rights. Yes, there are a few logistics to be worked out. >The real goal is to fix things so that the publishers attempts to >enforce copyright technologically doesn't take away the publics fair >use rights or the rights of creators who don't happen to be major >publishers. On the other hand, there should also be some measures to prevent ubiquitous, high bandwidth data pipes from making it impossible to protect those rights. Right now, only a relatively small percentage of us have broadband access. (I'm one of those lucky few; because I host an ISP's POP and the hub of a community network on the LAN in my home office, I can pump out data over a T1 line that is connected, upstream, to three more.) But I watched the traffic statistics a few weekends ago, when it was rumored that the plug would be pulled on Napster the following Monday. The line had never been so completely saturated! --Brett To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message
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