well, this month it's getting slammed....offline at the moment.<br />
<p>...if I understand this right, is this all about people scanning and uploading copies of magazine articles? If so, what do the rights holders of the articles have to say about that (magazine publishers, authors, photographers)?</p><p>In fact, what <strong>is </strong>the copyright position on published articles? I'm sure someone out there somewhere will say that "oh, they're in the public domain aren't they, 'cos they've been published". However, given that most mainstream magazines aren't given away for free and that most authors and photographers are paid for their contributions in some way, I would suspect that scanning and uploading a magazine article without the appropriate permission will be a violation of someone's copyright somewhere.</p><p>Dumb idea all round really. </p>
Adrian
good. Death to copyright.
Lynn
<p>Oh great - the Web 2.0 "Death to Copyright" gremlins are out. Can I just point out that there are almost certainly far more abuses of patent and copyright on the side of people ripping off other people's designs and ideas than there are on the side of rights holders trying to force excessive payments out of everyone else.</p><p>Don't confuse the fact that organisations like the RIAA and MPAA (and one or two major corporations) are complete asshats with a failing of copyright as a principle.</p><p>For example, I run a small business that designs and manufactures rubber stamps. We spend time and money coming up with new designs of our own. We pay freelance designers and artists for their designs - either purchasing the copyright or licensing the design for a number of years. These copyrights that you dismiss so lightly are what help to protect not only our own living, but also that of the people we employ and the freelance designers and artists that we use.</p><p>Like I said, copyright as a principle is a different thing altogether to some of the ludicrous actions carried out in the name of copyright by organisations such as the RIAA or MPAA.</p><p>Or, if you happen to make your _entire_ living by writing music, or magazine articles, or drawing pictures or taking photographs, etc. would you be happy for me just to rip off all of _your_ work and sell it as my own? (And don't say that kind of thing doesn't happen 'cos it's happened to us a couple of times in the last year alone.)</p><p>If nothing else, at least just _think_ about all the implications of what you're saying... </p>
Adrian
<p>death to copyright. Yes. I thought it through-obviously less of an ideology and more of an operating system.</p><p>I am not a Cartesian/Dualistic/Newtonian/Materialistic mindset apologist either.</p>
Lynn
<p>I do apologize for <em>jumping ship</em> though. On my deathbed I suspect I will feel the same about copyright too. I felt that way coming into this place as well. Family like us has to learn to share....guess the 'psychopathic' model of 'propriety', coveting and wealth is less a source of inspiration too....</p><p> </p>
Lynn
<p>The RIAA/MPAA is irrelevant. They know it already. Since I have respect for A, I will say that NOBODY who truly loves music listens to the bulk of Artists that the RIAA is puking out upon society. Really. </p><p>The MPAA is another farce. Who wants to bootleg a blockbuster made to be seen on the side of a building? I contend that the mere act of going after the citizens creates the 'value' of the movie. </p><p>I think it's called the Hegelian Dialectic.</p><p>As for your business, you bought something you want to resell. Design. You make the primary case that I would: the little guy is the one that is not being protected. Again, I would suggest that this is by design. You are not a supra-governmental, international Corporation. You just want to play like them. </p><p>They are liars and fools. I can't hide my contempt for social programming.</p>
Lynn
<p>...we'll have to agree to differ (at least to some degree) on this one.</p><p>The one question that I would ask though is what workable alternative can you propose? Being pragmatic about it, we live in a world where you have to pay the bills, the mortgage, buy food to put on the table, etc. To do that, you have to have something of worth or value to sell to someone else. And, if your something is - essentially - valuable as a result of the intellectual process involved in coming up with the idea in the first place, but can then be readily copied en masse and sold by someone else (often at a lower price as they haven't had to spend days, weeks or months working on it), how do you protect that value?</p><p>I mean, in my more irate moments when dealing with some of the slimeballs who have copied our stuff (including one company a lot bigger than us), the thought of popping down to their office and explaining it all to their "product development manager" (Ha!) with a baseball bat has been very tempting. But you can't do that in a civilized society, so there has to be some legally sanctioned alternative. But what? <br /></p><p> </p>
Adrian
<p>It eventually comes down to your world view. In a community that sustains, this it not even a matter/issue. At this point we are so far out from where we truly need to be to live. The larger paradigm is a function of a world view that is divorced from the intuitive understanding that I (in my way) and you are struggling. </p><p>I would suggest that there can be no 'legal' solution and ironically, if copyright was dead, would also not be missed. Taking this down to the fabric in which we all live: Who decided this was how a family of Man should exist?</p><p>In the end, off a soapbox, I propose that we are being sold a bill of goods while the clever dynastic elite covet that which belongs to all denizens of Earth. Knowledge, wealth, science and the larger dynamics of Society at large are wholly a subset of what is truly possible.</p><p>I want to be wrong, cause information is ALWAYS additive...just like every perspective not mine. I am looking at this from this simple perspective. One day in the shockingly near future when someone asks where you are from, you will only answer EARTH. My understandings and desire for the future stem from how we all get there from here.</p><p> By the way, anyone reading my crap...build your own electric cars...make your own devices...we are out here. We are going to move forward despite these criminals.</p>
Lynn
<p>I think I see where you're coming from on this now and, as an ideal, I think I can probably agree with you. However, like most ideals, I don't think we'll ever see anything like it happening in the real world. If history and experience teach us anything it is that the human race has largely developed in a competitive environment and, for many people, climbing to the top of the heap by stomping on the hands, hearts and heads of others is a perfectly reasonable form of behaviour.</p><p>Now, I don't work that way myself - I believe it to be ethically and morally reprehensible and, if that's the only way to get to the top, I don't think the top is a place that I'd like to be. But in a society that often works in that kind of way (and which is likely to continue to do so well beyond my lifetime) I really do want to have some kind of legal system in place that I can rely upon to protect myself, my family, my friends and society at large from the worst excesses of the ethically and morally barren.</p><p>And, when it comes to intellectual property (to use the semantically loaded "P-word"), something like a copyright or patent system seems like a sensible vehicle to provide that legal protection. Of course, the trick then is to come up with such a system that works properly and fairly to provide the appropriate level of protection to the right people. When it comes to that, I don't think anyone has got it right yet, but I still wouldn't want to throw any babies out with the bathwater just yet.</p>
Adrian
<p>I don't know the answer[s], but I have questions that would give anyone indigestion.</p><p>and I don't stop asking just because it is uncomfortable! </p><p>Abduction:Human Encounters With Aliens BY Dr. John E. Mack, Phd (Harvard)</p>
Lynn