At 5:43 PM +0100 7/30/07, Stut wrote:
Copyright exists to prevent unauthorised *usage* of material. It
does not exist to prevent the unauthorised taking of instances of
that material - that's what the laws regarding theft are for.
Well, when I *use* my neighbor's car without his authorization it's
called "stealing"
This is the fundamental difference between copyright infringement
and theft. Usage is not ownership, and you cannot steal usage.
Usage is ALL you can steal regardless of what it is you're stealing.
Ownership is only a concept that is provided, or prohibited, by
society. You cannot steal ownership of anything. You can deny the
lawful owner the use of the item stolen, OR diminish it's use, OR do
something that devalues the object, but you cannot steal ownership of
the object. The object, unless returned to the owner, will always be
stolen and the act of stealing it makes you a thief.
According to Thames Valley Police here in the UK... "The basic legal
definition of theft is 'the dishonest appropriation of property
belonging to another with the intention of permanently depriving
that person of it'."[1] How can that possibly apply to copyrighted
material? By infringing copyright you are not permanently depriving
the author/publisher/anyone of it.
[1] Of course it is. The unlawful appropriation of copyrighted
material permanently denies the author payment or whatever terms the
author considers required for it's distribution. Furthermore, it
permanently degrades the marketability potential of the copyrighted
material. Both of those real and tangible damages that the author can
pursue in court -- do you deny that?
So, if you are stealing code, you are permanently depriving the
author of full use of his work product. You do not have to steal
everything to steal something.
You have a right to your belief, but that doesn't make your belief right.
This works both ways.
Oh yeah, well my dad can beat up your dad.
Your position that copyright infringement is not stealing is
fundamentally flawed.
How? Nobody is not being permanently deprived of the content you are
using in an unauthorised fashion.
Of course you're being permanently deprived -- I described "how" above.
I don't believe Larry suggested everything should be "open source
with no responsibility to the author". All he's saying, and I agree,
is that the current copyright system is not perfect and need to be
reviewed.
I will agree that the copyright system is not perfect when
considering how people can view stealing as something other than what
it is.
But it's not stealing. We talk about "stealing an idea" but in
reality that's not possible. Please tell me you can see that.
Certainly, stealing an idea is possible -- that's the reason behind
patent laws and laws protecting intellectual properties. "Ideas" are
the foundation of advancement for our society and of course they can
be stolen. It so common it's a clique.
Again, I don't understand why we have to debate the obvious?
You cannot "own" copyrighted material. You have control over it, not
ownership.
So, you are saying that an author does not own his work product?
Microsoft does not own Word? They only have control of it?
So Microsoft dumps tons of money into programmers to produce control
-- and the IRS accepts this expenditure as a deductible expense? I
don't think so, I think Microsoft is producing and selling a product
-- a product that can be (and is) stolen.
Legally speaking, and I'd love to see a legal reference that
disputes this, copyright infringement is not stealing.
I seldom look to the law to determine what's right and wrong -- the
law is certainly not my moral compass. Besides, the law has enough
problems determining what's right and wrong itself.
Instead, I look to common sense and upbringing -- from childhood I've
been taught that if I take something that's not mine, it's stealing.
A very basic childhood concept that some have apparently lost or
misplaced in the technical complexities of today.
Think about this... if I were to be accused of copyright theft,
surely I've stolen the right to control the material because it's
the control that copyright provides, not the material itself. That
simple 2-word phrase makes no sense at all. Here's hoping that made
my point of view a bit clearer.
OK, then you think about this -- you are stealing the right of
control OVER the item you took. Clearly, after you steal the item,
then you can do anything you want with it; you can give it away; use
it for your own use; publish it on a web site free for everyone to
download -- is that not true? As such, you DO have control over the
item you stole and thus have stolen control.
Control does not have to be complete, total, and absolute to
constitute stealing.
If someone steals my car and I have control over a tracking device
attached to it, does it make their act any less of a theft? Of course
not.
I don't see how much plainer I can make it.
Cheers,
tedd
--
-------
http://sperling.com http://ancientstones.com http://earthstones.com
--
PHP General Mailing List (http://www.php.net/)
To unsubscribe, visit: http://www.php.net/unsub.php
