Pete Townshend On Lifehouse, The Net, And Pirating 129
An anonymous reader sent an interview with Pete Townshend where he talks about Lifehouse and more. He talks about pirating, as well as how Lifehouse was attempting to address the social implications of The Internet before the world had even heard of it. (BTW, I went to the Who concert in detroit last tuesday. It was awesome. I own something like 50 odd CDs of Pete's music, but to finally see them Live was pretty damn cool. If only I had been born 30 years earlier ;)
Re:remeber a day (Score:1)
Suppose you lived in a dictatorial state, where normally you were left alone but the local authorities reserved the right to pop into your house and take anything they choose. Oh, and if you resist or complain, you'll be summarily executed.
Even if they don't *ever* USE that right, you've lost something -- control. It may be intangible, which perhaps makes it a difficult concept for some people to grasp, but it matters.
Once an author's work is out being used by others in ways beyond his consent, he's lost control. Others may choose to redistribute freely, perhaps ruining him; others may choose to make their own derivative works, confusing everybody else; others may abuse it in any way to their hearts' content. That's all possible unless intellectual property is respected.
Or, perhaps, you'd like to share your identity, including likeness and supporting documents, with the rest of Slashdot. Share your work with your competitors, providing all rights to do as they see fit. And so forth.
Re:remeber a day (Score:2)
Of course it does. Could you be a LITTLE more vague and naive about it ??
Here is another question. How many drugs that are not patent protected are being pushed by drug companies today ?? How is it that the drugs that work on AIDS all have intellectual property protection that pushes them out of the financial range of African nations who need them most ?? Who exactly is that protecting ??
Discoveries in science that have potential benefit to society are nearly always strongly protected with patents. New cures for diseases are nearly always protected. Things that cannot receive intellectual property protection - such as potential good uses of vitamins as a part of treatment regimes - have limited funding because of their lack of potential utility to a corporation.
Science - wrt generating intellectual property for society's usefulness - is not open and free.
Look at it this way. If it were not for me, the creator of this media, then whatever I created would not exist. Does that not give me some sort of special rights over it?
The creators of the US Constitution allowed congress to grant LIMITED time monopolies on copyrighted works. That concept does not exist today - as copyrights no longer expire (well, technically they do expire, but none have expired in a LONG LONG time). The true perversion is that copyright law has been co-opted by corporations like Disney seeking to protect long time copyrights (like the early Mickey Mouse cartoons) that would have expired under laws written to protect the consumer.
Benefits to society are maximal with LIMITED TIME monopolies. That concept has expired with new laws in the US.
PS. As I'm sure you know, the concept you are suggesting is commonly known as "communism", whereas I am avocating "capitolism".
Whereas that is a nice distractor away from the original arguments, the fact remains that it is in no way capitalistic to maintain absolute control over intellectual property indefinitely. Intellectual property MUST have a limited time protection. That limited time must also expire within a reasonable time frame for benefits to society to be maximized.
Re:All This Whining about Piracy! (Score:1)
But if we assume my numbers are correct for this argument, yes, autodesk didn't spend $6,000,000 to generate the $600,000 in revenues. But they were deprived of the other $5,400,000 by pirates who chose to earn their livings by using their software and not paying for it. If you figure they all would have bought it rather than using a cheaper/inferior product, then those really are just LOST sales.
Re:remeber a day (Score:1)
Who patented quantum mechanics, special and general relativity, the photoelectric effect, the structure of the DNA molecule, the proof of Fermat's Last Theorem?
There is a difference between an invention and a discovery.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Piracy and Napster (Score:1)
Re:Don't be fooled again.... (Score:1)
Re:Other old examples of net vision? (Score:1)
I won't even attempt to describe it. Just read it. It's totally visionary.
It's also the place the term 'hipcrime' came from. That fact should have a little resonance with the more attuned denizens of this august forum.
This guy is so cool! (Score:1)
Re:Piracy and Napster (Score:1)
--------------------
Smedley: dude, did you put the Quake III CD in your drive yet?
Fester: yep, it's there now. go ahead.
Smedley: okay, I'll start up the CDR drive.
--------------------
Yep. People are using CDR drives to copy CD-ROMs and Music CD's right across the internet. It happens in chatrooms all across the country. There's a new plugin for AIM specifically for that purpose.
Uh-huh.
Re:Pension Enhancement Tour. (Score:1)
Re:new poll topic: (Score:1)
Re:Who's Rights are These Anyway? (Score:1)
Funniest fsckin' thing I've read on /. for quite a while. And an excellent summary, too.
I have *never* said this before, but...
MODERATE THIS UP!
Mmm (Score:1)
Care to enlighten us on what changes are happening in society? Are you Jon Katz or something?
Hey, Watch Out... (Score:1)
Hey, hey! You can be happy, but watch your mouth, huh?
Re:Yeah... (Score:1)
That would be icing on the cake.
Re:Piracy cost us all.. nothing. Here's simple pro (Score:2)
In some cases, people try to make justifiable arguments about pirating software like "I could never afford AutoCAD, so i stole it" or "i'd never buy, so i got a copy, and got good and then i bought it". Those are one thing. Illegal copies of windows are another.
When you buy a computer with Windows on it, you SHOULD be paying for your copy of Windows. Charges of price gouging/monopoly whatevers aside, if you on't want to pay for what software you're using, you shouldn't be using it. This isn't like empty seats at the theatre. It's more like people sneaking into your movies. Obviously those people are stealing from you, because they're getting what you're selling without paying for it.
Re:remeber a day (Score:1)
But modern day copyright law is a huge beast. And if the specific copyright law (most of which is IIRC (IANAL) in 17 USC) somehow does not promote the progress of the science and useful arts; or secures for an unlimited time; or assigns to someone other than the author or inventor the rights to their respective writings and discoveries; then the copyright law is unconstitutional.
Mostly I'm concerned about the expansion of copyright circa 1976 when everything automatically became copyrightable, though your damages are limited for non-registered works. I'm also worried about the frequent lengthening of the term of copyright recently. And of course the Big Five music labels have been trying to ram through legislation that would retroactively reassign the copyrights of works created by artists to the labels, permanently. (as though they were works for hire, which they weren't) And much of the DMCA is pretty clearly unconstitutional - access restrictions for one thing.
So when I say that copyrights _now_ are likely unconstitutional, I mean that the laws regarding copyrights go farther than the Constitution allows. Copyrights which fall within the boundaries set by the Constitution are of course constitutional.
Thanks for nothing, New York Post (Score:1)
{heading a bit off topic with a rant now] It seems to me like the vast majority of newsprint journalism is really quite mediocre. These days, I have to look to non-mainstream sources to find the writers cabable of seriously good analysis to go along with the facts.
Anyway, I, like CT, wish I could have seen The Who and a few other bands in their heyday. At least I got to hear a first hand report about their Woodstock show from my Ancient History teacher :]
Re:Other old examples of net vision? (Score:1)
'least I think so.
-nme!
Re:All This Whining about Piracy! (Score:1)
In a way, they are lost sales, but that would be just like someone lamenting opportunities for a new job having come and gone, and counting lost wages as a result. The people who did not buy never would have, but the ones who did might not have but for the piracy.
Perhaps you would advocate people being forced to verify their legitemate ownership of license to software in order to use it professionally, but that would have kept those "pirates" out of a job and cost autodesk sales.
Besides, even those who are using autocad without paying are making autocad money by promoting the software. They are forcing others to buy the software in order to view and take advantage of their work. They also help autodesk win sales every time someone says "Hey that's a cool design how did you make it?" "Autocad, of course. What else is there?"
Re:All This Whining about Piracy! (Score:1)
Re:Who's Rights are These Anyway? (Score:1)
You're right... this is dumb. Why do I bother with these silly arguments?
err... your "bob" person totally missed my point, but I won't go into it.
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Excellent (Score:1)
Re:All This Whining about Piracy! (Score:1)
2 - Advertising is only of use when it returns more revenues than a given advertising campaign costs. The argument for piracy increasing sales goes away when the users of a piece of software NEED that software anyways.
Say AutoCAD sells 10,000 copies per year for $3000 each. That's $30,000,000 in revenues. Now say that each year there are 20,000 more copies pirated. And of those 20,000, 18,000 are just playing with it, eventually deleting it, or relegating it to their unused software collection. 2,000 (10%) actually use the software on a day to day basis. Of those 2,000, 10% actually pay for it when they get the money.
In the end, 18,000 of those copies were just throwaways. They stood to gain nothing from those users because they simply wouldn't have purchased the software anyways.
But with the other 2,000 users. They all use the software on a day to day basis in their lines of work. If you call that advertising, they just spent $6,000,000 ($3000 * 2000) in order to gain $600,000 in sales ($3000 * 200). That's not an effective "advertising campaign", no matter how you look at it.
For music, it's even worse, because at least when you buy software, you get things like manuals and tech support. Music doesn't require any of those. And not many people seem to be overly concerned with the quality of MP3's... Around here, at least, it seems that there's a 50-50 split on whether 128 kbps creates a discenably different sound. But most sites agree that 256 kbps definetly makes it challenging to hear the differnce.
As bandwidth increases and user's local storage increases, it won't be unforseeable to have uncompressed AIFF files traded back and forth on the net just as mp3's are today. And there's no argument about quality loss... Musicians will be forced to sit back and see which ones of their fans will actually pay them for the goods which they're taking from them.
Compare that to your work place. No matter how cool your boss seems, if they turned to you and said "Hey, times are tight. I'd really like to keep you around, but I'm not sure if you're really valuable enough to keep. Could you just put in maybe 4 weeks at no pay? If i decide to keep you, i'll pay you for that time, but i let you go, i'll owe you nothing." Are you going to stick around that there?
Re:remeber a day (Score:1)
Believe or not, the reason people create music is to make money, so they can eat. That's the point.
If you want to write code by night and give your work away, that's fine. Just don't complain while you're flipping burgers during the day.
--
About moderation (offtopic) (Score:1)
Mostly, the modaration system works. I usually read at 3 because I want to read the articles and see if the
Generally, I'd advice reading at one less than You really want, because while that way You get lots of crap (compared to the level You wanted), You catch most of the excellent articles that have been written later in the discussion (and haven't thus been seen by enough moderators to bring them up). And at the higher levels (3-5), there is crap anyway. Either trolls have gained mods, the moderators are on crack, or it just represents the average
Of course the moderation/read treshold system could be modeled anew by trying to analyze the moderation that has happened in the last half a year or so (should have enough material at least). If anything like that would ever happen, I'd mostly like to read the 10 best comments, whether that means (in levels) 2 or 5 (although I doubt the latter could really happen - by mismoderation only, I think). Or perhaps the top 10%. Or perhaps I would like to create a profile that tells what moderators I respect and whom I don't want to affect anything I read.
Moderation system is open-ended in possibilities. Profiles with intelligent treshold management and moderator matching are of course possible, might be nice even, but would require some serious analysis of the material available, knowledge about suitable methods and how to apply them, and lots of work. Something I'm probably not qualified for (and neither are most of the other
Re:remeber a day (Score:1)
"Yeah... piracy is a victimless crime. Like punching someone in the dark"
-- Nelson (the simpsons) s/piracy/shoplifting/gi;
--
A mind is a terrible thing to taste.
Pete Townshend (Score:1)
Re:remeber a day (Score:1)
"Yeah.. its the companies fault for making you want it so much"
--Kerny (The Simpsons: same episode)
--
A mind is a terrible thing to taste.
Other old examples of net vision? (Score:3)
Consider that what people in the past thought today would be like, with flying cars and stuff, rather than what we have.
Cars haven't changed substantially but a technology that is really simple in principle is steadily changing society - one that doesn't seem to have been widely predicted.
I love that damned man... (Score:1)
Re:On Behalf of Old Farts (Score:2)
At the birth of the Web, everybody talked about cyberspace & how cool it would be -- including me. Then came talk about ol' Max Headroom (& I still have a crush on Amanda Pays). Then folks saw _The_Matrix_, & almost evrybody wanted to have the login of ``Neo" (yeah, there was a few wierdos who wanted to be known as ``BOFH").
Now Ol' Bottlenose talks about his ``Lifehouse" album. Who's got *that* domain. (Hrm. Type whois, grumble. Grumble about NSI. Ah, heerweego.)
Registrant:
Christian Life Center (LIFEHOUSE3-DOM)
2020 Vista Street
Belle Fourche, SD 57717
US
Domain Name: LIFEHOUSE.COM
Administrative Contact, Billing Contact:
Manna, Mike (MM14730) mmanna@MATO.COM
Christian Life Center
2020 Vista Street
Belle Fourche,, SD 57717
605-892-4767
Technical Contact, Zone Contact:
Shafto, John (JS446) jwshafto@MATO.COM
Altaire Enterprises, Inc.
144 East Grant
Spearfish, SD 57783
(605) 642-1400
Record last updated on 18-Jun-1998.
Record expires on 18-Jun-2000.
Record created on 18-Jun-1998.
Database last updated on 2-Jul-2000 18:52:58 EDT.
Domain servers in listed order:
NS1.MATO.COM 199.240.78.3
NS2.MATO.COM 199.240.78.2
Hey, look, they forgot to send their check in! Now which 3I337 4aXoR is gonna send in their $35 & take it away from these lamer Fundies?
Ya know, when ya get old, your mind wanders? Gawd I hope sumone reads this.
Geoff
Re:Other old examples of net vision? (Score:1)
Re:Other old examples of net vision? (Score:1)
My personal (very) fave authors have to be Brunner, Ursula Leguin, Philip K. Dick, Greg Benford, Samuel R Delany (Triton rocks! Would make a great movie! Dear lord! Who would we have to get to direct THAT? Fellini is DEAD!), Frank Herbert, The Boy and His Dog guy (sorry-brain fart... OOH! Harlan Ellison!), Bradbury of course. Heinlein is overrated, but I have enjoyed his stuff
Basically people who have never, ever, ever, ever written about elves or wizards.
Ever.
(except tounge in cheek. Niven had some fun with wizards and such on occasion, and it was a riot)
You realize, don't you... (Score:1)
Re:remeber a day (Score:1)
I definitely believe there should be less control over derivative works. Unfortunately though, like you said, a well paid lawyer these days would have no trouble arguing copyright infringement over an only slightly related derivative work.
As for the employment of artists, I'm well aware that there are many who produce works for the love of it, rather than for monetary reward. However, if there were NO copyrights, then (although there still would be some) the quantity of artwork would decrease - hence less inspiration. Whether this would be a good thing or a bad thing is debatable.
Re:FAWKING OSM! (Score:1)
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Re:remeber a day (Score:1)
I know about the number of artists that wouldn't practice their art if not for the money beyond the first sale. (which has close to nothing to do with copyrights anyway) I haven't seen anything better than the overall idea of copyrights. My beef is with the system of copyrights that we've currently got. It could be better. It would be better for everyone if it were reformed. But we've got to address the problem of people who don't realize that reform is possible, and that copyrights must follow certain rules, regardless of misapplications of property law on that which is naturally unownable.
Re:remeber a day (Score:2)
I am immensely delighted that Pete Townsend is on 'our side' here. He not only has the right idea around music and creating it and listening to it, but he's also made some of the best _sounding_ albums ever- in fact I own (fetish,treasure etc) a special guitar I made myself with maple body and ceramic pickups a bit lower-impedance than Strat pickups _just_ so I could have a guitar that gets a tone like the Rickenbackers Pete has used. There's nothing quite as rowdy as a cranked-out Rick :) probably the best example of what this tone is like (from my mp3s) is the tune 'Dog' from my 'anima' album, where there's a rhythm guitar that gets a pretty Townsendesque amount of snarl- actually that tune is about the closest to a Who homage tune as anything I've done :)
For _real_ ultimate Who guitar tone: "Live At Leeds". On LP, on a monster uber-high-ender-turntable. Using one of the original British pressings with the label writing that says 'crackling noises OK, do not correct!'. It only crackles like that on bad turntables. On good turntables you are THERE.
where's pete? (Score:1)
http://www.petetownshend.co.uk/life_archive.htm
Pete rocks, and it ain't 'cause I don't listen to new music!
Re:Lifehouse and Brooks law (Score:1)
You know, You Better, You Bet is one of the best songs The Who ever did, despite having Kenny Jones on drums. The version on their live album From the Blues to the Bush is one of the best rock songs ever... not bad for a bunch of guys in their late 50s.
Re:Piracy and Napster (Score:1)
Re:Piracy cost us all.. nothing. Here's simple pro (Score:1)
No, dumbass. That's trepassing. If the kid yells "Fire" after sneaking in, then it's criminal trespass. Remind me to NEVER leave anything of value where you might consider it a loss if it were to come up missing.
Re:Lifehouse and Brooks law (Score:1)
I wish that they stuck their original idea. Its odd how peoples perceptions work though. When you're starting to get over the hill, you can say to youself that you better bow out gracefully. When you are way over the hill, you may not think of yourself that way. I bet that Pete can't imagine what was going through his head when he penned I hope I die before I get old. His ideas, perceptions, and experiences are so different, that whatever emotions brought those words up are entirely foreign by now.
But on the main point of the themes of story Lifehouse. I wish he'd stop bringing up that old dead horse. I'm not sure if Fred Brooks was familiar with Townshend's work, but it was a perfect example of what Brooks called the Second System Principle It seemed that he had a success in the Rock Opera genre with Tommy, got cocky, and thought he could do anything. When he couldn't get things together, he through it on Who's Next and went on from there. Now he tries to point to the Internet, point to his failed Lifehouse project, and declare himself a visionary. I don't think it was hard to imagine in the late '60s and early '70s that technology was advancing and allowing people more and more advanced forms of communication, yet making them feel less connnected.
Some visionary.
Re:Thanks for nothing, New York Post (Score:3)
Merchandise is available from http://www.eelpie.com [eelpie.com].
A search engine is at http://www.google.com [google.com].
Well (Score:1)
Re:Pete is a Hypocrite.. (Score:1)
I tend to believe Mr. Townshend was in the right in that instance. Bear in mind, he didn't sue Will Smith for the sample taken from the 1982 WHO release "Emminence Front" in the "Wild-Wild West" theme song (you'll notice in the middle of the song, theres a break with the line "It's a put-on").
Dr. Thacker
Re:All This Whining about Piracy! (Score:1)
Lets say I need a CAD package, I cant afford AutoCAD and I can't pirate it, therefore I will have to buy a cheaper package instead of AutoCAD. If I bought the smaller cheaper HypotheticalCAD package then HypotheticalSoft would have a better chance at funding further development so that one day they could eventually catch up to AutoCAD.
If AutoCAD had to worry about this cheaper competitor catching up to them in features, etc. then AutoCAD would have to either reduce their price or improve their own product to justify their high price.
This is a variation on the argument that Piracy doesn't hurt the dominant product ie AutoCAD, MS-Office, etc. because pirate users will learn how to use AutoCAD, then request it when they get a job using CAD software. Piracy also help the dominant package by keeping down their competitors.
Re:remeber a day (Score:4)
How? Play a piece of music to me and I remember it. I can adapt it for new uses; hum or whistle, and maybe even reproduce it faithfully. How do you propose the creator of that music (or of any other piece of information) control it?
In fact, there is no way to control how people use the information you've called up into being once it's been shown, even once, to an audience of any size. Blame God if you like, but that's how people work. Whether or not we then impose a wholly artificial notion of rights onto the subject is secondary. Even as it stands the fundemental rule of copyright law (in the US - you'll find it in Article I) is that the creators of works only have those rights as far as it's good for society, not the creators. And better yet, what's good for society is for the creators to have as few rights as possible, for as short a time as possible.
In fact, since the goal is not to help creators one whit, or restrict how anyone in the world can use information, if it were found to promote the arts and sciences more by abolishing copyrights altogether - that would be only course of action that Congress could take.
So while I greatly respect the pople that create new works, and in fact, _am_ one of those very people, I realize that works are most valuable when everyone can use them. As well as that once you get an audience (and there's very little information that's useful without an audience for it) you've lost your control. You want them to think about your work? Well, you can't take that back.
If this isn't enough, think about this: Who doesn't stand on the shoulders of giants? Where would we be if no one could create works which relied on past works. Science would be forever reinventing the wheel in a literal sense. No author could write a great novel that either opposed another writer's opus or reaffirmed it. Hell, man - we'd be restricted in the words we could use. Restrict information and it's not helpful, it's harmful. Nothing new happens, nothing is done, no progress is made. Let it flow and it's capable of doing great good and inspiring the creation of more of itself.
On copyrights now: I think that they're unconstitutional. The idea _could_ work, perhaps it has worked. But I sincerely doubt that it's working now, and it goes against the spirit of the law of the land. Reform is necessary. No good can come of expanding copyright further, or letting the status quo persist.
Re:remeber a day (Score:1)
Consider: You have a chicken. He takes the chicken. Does he owe you money? Not really. He owes you a chicken. Should he only have chicken bones, guts and feathers handy, you'll have to decide what else a chicken is worth.
Information though, isn't the same. Largely because it not only _can_ be copied so trivially, but because it _must_ be copied in order to be used. You don't read source code by having a wire go from the computer to your head do you? A copy exists on your hard disk. Another in RAM. Perhaps significant parts of a copy in the processor, and additional memories. (e.g. cache, VRAM) Finally a partial copy (unless it's of Hello World length) appears on the monitor. You look at this copy and another copy (or a few - depends on the specifics of how the brain works) end up in your mind. Already, for a simple process like reading and thinking about some source code, you've had to make a multitude of copies. Information is kind of like sound - it needs a medium. But the medium isn't the stuff carried on it.
Now - your argument is basically 'If I weren't getting paid, I wouldn't do it.' Personally, I think that's kind of unfortunate. But we'll ignore that. Are you under the impression that a system of copyrights the only method by which you would get paid? If so, you're wrong. The answer is no.
There is proof in history; until a couple of hundred years ago, the notion of copyrights didn't even exist. Yet there were still people writing, and composing, and singing, etc. And they still got paid. Not for their works as a 'product' but as their works bundled along with the more important service. You paid Michaelangelo to make a nice sculpture of yourself, and the wife and the kids and even the wife's damn dog. When it was done, any idiot could copy it. For 16th century sno-globes perhaps. Shakespeare writes a play and by the end of the week there's already a company on tour performing it without paying Will a red cent.
There are similar proposals to this today (regarding paying authors - not ressurecting Shakespeare
And I'm sure that there are other proposals out there. But don't assume that not paying for each and every copy made, or for different uses of copies by different users throughout perpetuity is the Only Possible Way. It's not. It's not even very likely the best way. Just how we do things right now. There is very likely room for improvement; the current dissatisfaction implies this quite a lot.
Re:Piracy and Napster (Score:1)
Re:Piracy and Napster (Score:1)
Now, if it is illegal to run such an operation, then perhaps Sony or Panasonic could be sued for selling SVHS decks. They facilitate the piracy of VHS tapes and laserdiscs. To be honest, any producer of a recordable medium could be held legally responsible for piracy if that were the case.
The only ones who should, by old-fashioned logic, be held responsible for piracy are the pirates themselves.
Just think if the stores that sold you your video equipment were legally responsible for what you did with it. How would you like to have to undergo a background check just so you could buy a camcorder? For the same reason this is unreasonable, it is also unreasonable to hold Napster accountable for the actions of its users.
Doing so would be analogous to holding Microsoft responsible for its IPX networking software (still the preferred method of piracy on college campuses), or the US Postal Service for contraband trafficking.
Re:On Behalf of Old Farts (Score:1)
I made and then erased a mournful comment about k5n.. I don't want my posts santizied, I read at -1. i think you completely misinterpreted my reasoning - read on...
What are you, some christian religious freak who believes that everything in life needs some praise/punishment system, as if we're some base animals?
I have no issue at all with the existence of trolls, and I'm not going to bother explaining what a troll really is and why 'feeding' a troll is the opposite of what you do with them. Go hang out on usenet for a while.
Everyone else 'got it.' Maybe you should re-read.
I'm doing this because I'm very afraid of what slashdot has become, in wake of the OSM controversy. I fear that we have made a monster by encouraging Rob to develop a system that divides slashdot into 'posters' and 'trolls.' Things have obviously gotten out of hand. He is a good person, but persecuting someone for posting parody borders on heresy.
We have to stand up for OSM's, and our, rights. If we don't the slashdot that we all know and love will come to a disgusting, corporate end.
Please take the time to email rob and tell him how you feel about this.
thanks,
--
blue, outed.
Re:remeber a day (Score:2)
We are not talking about scientific discovery here. No one "pirates" science. Science has always for the most part worked like the open source community does today. We are talking about media. Audio and video clips. And software.
Another thing. I am talking about exact copying. If someone remembers some information and reproduces something similar from their memory, I do not think that that necessarily counts as copying. Remember, we're talking about piracy. No one pirates a game by reproducing it themselves. That is actually not even illegal under copyright law. I'm talking about mechanical and/or digital copying.
Now, if you still stand by what you say, stop to think for a moment. If I spend weeks, months, or even years of my life creating some wonderful piece of information, be it software, music, movies, or art, do you think that I have no right to gain something from it? To use it as I see fit? According to you, that information which I create should no longer be mine, and I should get nothing for it. That idea is so ludicrous that I'm having trouble even describing it in a way that makes sense.
Look at it this way. If it were not for me, the creator of this media, then whatever I created would not exist. Does that not give me some sort of special rights over it?
In an ideal society, people would do what they do solely to help others. However, in real life, people are greedy. Very few people are willing to spend years working on something if they are not going to get anything in return. You can talk all you want about how copyrights are supposed to be good for the people, but they are only good for the people because they encourage the creators to creat. Without copyrights, they would not creat, and we would have nothing.
It seems to me that you are just griping because you want stuff free, and you are not getting it.
That said, I write open source software as a more-than-full-time job and I don't get paid. I do it for personal entertainment. Go to my homepage and see if you must. But, as my /. user info says...
I spend my time writing open source software, not complaining when others don't.
Put more generally:
I spend my time creating free information, not complaining when others don't.
Why? Because everyone has a right to do what they choose with anything that is their sole creation.
PS. As I'm sure you know, the concept you are suggesting is commonly known as "communism", whereas I am avocating "capitolism". You'll notice that communism, as implemented by the Soviets, failed miserably, whereas capitolism, as implemented originally by the Dutch, and brought to its peak by the United States, is and incredible success. Why? Communism tried to force people to do things in a way contrary to human nature. Capitolism, on the other hand, is set up to harness human nature. Under capitolism, people benifit society by helping themselves, and thus the human race manages to advance despite its flaws. Remember, human beings hate to be forced to do things, and any system which tries to control them or limit their rights will inevidably fail.
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Re:remeber a day (Score:1)
No, they will have YOU, and all other pirates, to blame, for forcing their prices up in the first place.
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dangerous syntax (Score:3)
This will probably not do what you expect. Try:
Slashdot >> the_bible
Please do not overwrite the bible; it is very important to many university classes, and several Sunday-morning TV shows. If you feel strongly about it, you can always moderate it down.
Re:Links and more info (Score:1)
Well actually, with netscape 4.73, shockwave flash, and realplayer, everything on that page should work fine. betetownshend.com has been really good about only use plugins that are cross-platform. Yay for them!
Re:Don't be fooled again.... (Score:1)
I never said these days are any better and I qualified my geography with the "USAian" reference. Pissing match. Pissing match.
I wonder if he's ever met Lars... (Score:3)
Re:Pete Townshend (Score:2)
Some interesting from his website (Score:2)
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So while music piracy is OK, caching is bad
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Re:Thanks for nothing, New York Post (Score:1)
I could have taken a minute to look for the site but my human nature led me to attack and complain instead.
Re: (Score:1)
Re:Other old examples of net vision? (Score:2)
Not exactly sure of the year, but in the early '70s, John Brunner wrote Shockwave Rider. The 'net in question was accessed through video terminals, both fixed and portable. Not a great representation of the net, but the protagonist's means of staying ahead of the (obiligatorily corrupt) feds was to use a 'tapeworm'--a program that would alter his identification on demand. OTOH, it required a federally controlled ID block, and some of these had effectively superuser permissions with the federal computers... Too bad Brunner's game of Fencing never got adopted. Looks like it would be fun to computerize. (Analog to Go, but with triangular areas defining the territory claimed.)
Re:Yeah... (Score:1)
That is basically why there are no flying cars. They would require a pilot's license, basically, versus the cracker jack box drivers licenses cars require. And making the licensing easier like they do with cars would be very bad, just for the reasons you mention. Those dipshits would wreck into buildings and such, and can you imagine a drunk aircar driver?
I think they should make them and let people who are very skilled have them. But things are made to work for dipshits, because they are the majority and therefore a larger market. Stuff only moderately skilled people can use would have a very small target market in today's world...
Re:remeber a day (Score:1)
- sunk costs are that, effectively lost though humans have sentimental attachment to familiar objects
- when the marginal value of anything (including software) goes to zero or even negative, then the smart thing to do is liquidate it (or equivalent software of GPL) so that hopefully value can be retained by someone else
- Personally I think the point of software is to create user base with a compound average growth rate high enough to keep the idea going and growing. A static entity helps nobody.
- academic computing is different from most in that the return is often far in the future. How can you value the worth of helping someone get out of a poverty trap by equiping them with the skills to enter a higher level profession. It is very difficult to capture this and charging people up-front tends to discourage them into cheaper vocational work rather than higher value learning.
I congratulate you on your willingness to take a risk on GPL. I sincerely hope that you can gather a group of hackers with the same passion for helping others to evolve your system and perhaps, it may one day help find and recognise the next Enstein, da Vinci or Gandhi.
Regards,
LL
Re:All This Whining about Piracy! (Score:1)
This would be wonderful if your numbers had any basis. I see your point, but even assuming every other number in your analogy is correct, autodesk spends $0, not $6,000,000. They incurred no cost in copying, as that was paid by the pirates. They did gain some sales though, which they otherwise would not have.
Re:NOW WAIT A MINUTE (Score:1)
It is extremely common and very sound legal advice that a litigant not speak about the case in public. Anything they say can be used by the other side, and if it angers the other side it generally makes it harder to reach a settlement.
It is equally common for a judge to issue a gag order to participants in a case.
IANAL but it looks like you aren't either.
If osm is faking why are his natalie stories gone from his website now?
Re:remeber a day (Score:1)
Believe it or not, some people actually enjoy creating music because they derive pleasure from it. Some people even enjoy creating music, because other people derive pleasure from their creations.
Sheesh; I'm almost happy that I heard you say that; it just made my life seem so much fuller by comparison. ;-)
2001: A Space Odyssey -- the Book Version (Score:1)
In the book version of 2001: A Space Odyssey (not the movie), in chapter 9, while en route to the moon, Dr. Heywood Floyd reads from a "Newspad", thru which he can call up news from a variety of sources, perhaps a bit like CNN.com or ZDNet:
There was plenty to occupy his time, even if he did nothing but sit and read. When he tired of official reports and memoranda and minutes, he would plug his foolscap-sized Newspad into the ship's information circuit and scan the latest reports from Earth. One by one he would conjure up the world's major electronic papers; he knew the codes of the more important ones by heart, and had no need to consult the list on the back of his pad. [...] Each had its own two-digit reference; when he punched that, the postage-stamp-sized rectangle would expand until it neatly filled the screen and he could read it with comfort. When he had finished, he would flash back to the complete page and select a new subject for detailed examination.
Floyd sometimes wondered if the Newspad, and the fantastic technology behind it, was the last word in man's quest for perfect communications. Here he was, far out in space, speeding away from Earth at thousands of miles an hour, yet in a few milliseconds he could see the headlines of any newspaper he pleased. (That very word "newspaper," of course, was an anachronistic hangover into the age of electronics.) The text was updated automatically on every hour; even if one read only the English versions, one could spend an entire lifetime doing nothing but absorbing the ever-changing flow of information from the news satellites.
It was hard to imagine how the system could be improved or made more convenient. But sooner or later, Floyd guessed, it would pass away, to be replaced by something as unimaginable as the Newspad itself would have been to Caxton or Gutenberg.
There was another thought which a scanning of those tiny electronic headlines often invoked. The more wonderful the means of communication, the more trivial, tawdry, or depressing its contents seemed to be. Accidents, crimes, natural and manmade disasters threats of conflict, gloomy editorials -- these still seemed to be the main concern of the millions of words being sprayed into the ether. Yet Floyd also wondered if this was altogether a bad thing; the newspapers of Utopia, he had long ago decided, would be terribly dull.
Re:And now it is time .. (Score:1)
A few whacks from said cluehammer for you:
www.warmann.com is osm's site for hosting archives of his stories.
Slashdot is a public forum for discussion which is specifically designed to allow everything, including trolls. You do not have to click on osm's stuff, and especially you do not have to click on read more... By doing so it wopuld seem to me you actually liked what you were reading.
Moderation and bitchslapping ensure that osm and the trolls are at -1 anyway. Browse at 0 or better and osm goes away for you. This was the way taco designed /. and it works. try it sometime.
Andover should not be encouraging everyone to post on their site, and yet turning around and suing people for doing that, or censoring anyone who says something they do not like. And as for the trolls they make Andover money [slashdot.org], so I do not see what they have to cry about.
Re:remeber a day (Score:2)
This is not a disagreement over fundamental social policies. What the above poster is saying is that ideas, software and the like have no scarcity problems like most other goods and services. That is, in order for me to get it, nobody else has to loose it.
If I want a CD, WalMart has to part with it.
But if I want a song, nobody else has to lose their song. A copy can be made for extremely low or no cost.
Now, you can argue that you have the right to attempt to make money off of your Intellectual Property. But people who don't believe this are not communists. Indeed, they are actually much closer in their beliefs to the founders of the United States of America than you are.
If there's one thing that capitalists hate to do, it is to part with their own money when they believe they shouldn't have to.Intellectual Property is an attempt to limit the rights of people in order to create profits for the Corporation^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^HArtist. Yes, the inventors/creators usually like to have some control over their invention so they can profit from it, but the copyright laws in this country are way, way out of control and not at all what was originally envisioned or intended.
Oh come on, Rob (Score:2)
Go on
Re:Other old examples of net vision? (Score:2)
To answer your question about tapeworms, in 1980 researchers at Xerox PARC dubbed the first self-replicating, self-propagating computer program a "worm", after the "tapeworms" Nickie used to erase his previous identities.
Hope this helps.
If it were this simple (Score:1)
Certain types of information that people create gets protected and others do not.
Have you ever re-told a joke that you heard without seeking the creators permission or paying a fee to do so?
If so, why? You joke pirate you!
I am trying to compile a list of Copyright Questions [cayspot.net] to illustrate this point. If you have some to contribute, please do so.
all the best,
drew
Re:remeber a day (Score:1)
... [ snip ]
On copyrights now: I think that they're unconstitutional
I'm afraid you're confusing the issue. In your post you mention the sharing of ideas and information, and how it benefits society and the go on to say that copyright is bad because it prevents this.
Copyright has nothing to do with whether you can hum or sing a tune and remember the ideas. Copyright is about the implementation - not the ideas contained. For example, if I hear a song and think to myself "hey that's a neat bass riff" and then go and use that bass riff in a composition of mine as inspiration, then that is fine. That is what enables the arts to progress and allows people to 'stand on the shoulders of others', while not at the expense of the original creator. This is perfectly legal under copyright law. Now you tell me how illegally copying a recording equates to sharing ideas and benefitting society. It doesn't. It just lets you get music for free at the expense of the original creator. That is what copyright law is concerned with - protecting artist's rights over their own recordings and implemented creations, not their ideas.
To those that say "well music is just a collection of ideas anyway, and artists can't control ideas", that is absolute rubbish. I guarantee that if you take the 'ideas' from Foxy Lady and perform it, you certainly won't sound like Hendrix. Again, THAT is what copyright law is concerned with. The tangible implementations, not the ideas.
If you truly believe that sharing ideas ais a good thing, you should be totally supportive of copyright law. Without copyrights as a way for artists to make money from their creations, there would be much less incentive (emotional and practical) for them to create new works (artists can't spend time developing their creativity if they're busy trying to put food on the table in a full-time job). Hence without copyrights, we have less implementations of music, and hence there are less ideas that people can draw on 'to stand on their shoulders'.
Although many people are confused about this, the real danger comes from patents which allow people to contain ideas by suing people if they use those ideas. That is bad, and don't confuse this with the copyrighting of actual implementations of an artist's work.
Re:Links and more info (Score:1)
Pete Townsend (Score:1)
Re:Piracy and Napster (Score:1)
- On the idea of piracy and Napster being sued, I think it is patetic.
I agree. Napster is simply a file-sharing service that is tuned to MP3 files and designed for peer-to-peer transfer rather than client-server. Peer-to-peer FTP with builtin searching capability.- If you think about it, the Napster software copies bits from one source to another. CD-recordable drives, also copy bits from one source to another. BUT, do you see people trying to sue the makers of the CD recordable drives??? NO.
That's because anytime you buy a CD-R labeled as a music CD-R, you pay the RIAA a tax (I'm not sure the amount, but I think it's about 100%) to 'offset piracy' (read: extort money from the average person who doesn't know that music CD-Rs and data CD-Rs are identical except for the label). Don't buy music CD-Rs, you're just wasting your money. Data CD-Rs are much cheaper and work just as good (I use them all the time to burn audio to disc and have yet to have a problem with them).Case in point: I went to get a pack of 10 CD-Rs about a month ago. They were selling two different 10-packs manufactured by TDK, one labeled music, the other data. The music pack was over $20, while the data pack was about $12, yet the discs are identical.
- Napster is doing the exact same thing that the CD-R industry is doing, but the only reason they are being attacked is because of its more widespread use. If everyone had a CD-R, im sure Metallica would be out whining about those companies too.
Like I said, the RIAA is already getting their 'cut' when you buy music CD-Rs._______
Scott Jones
Newscast Director / ABC19 WKPT
Commodore 64 Democoder
Yeah... (Score:3)
All This Whining about Piracy! (Score:1)
Autocad is a perfect example, the same goes for other commonly-used, but hideously expensive software packages.
Why? Autocad has been the Most Pirated Software Package (TM) bar *none* and it's the _reason_ for its popularity. There are other packages that are _better_ and _faster_ than Autocad, but they're not nearly as widely known through the Samizdat network because _nobody pirates them_. Autodesk *knows this* and its threats of making it impossible to copy are empty.
Goof software houses learned long ago that copy protection is a good way of annoying your legitimate users and killing off your free PR. Those who have forgotten (like Autodesk seems to have) are throwing out the baby with the bathwater *along with the tub*.
For example: J Random Student has all his money tied up in tuition fees to Brown EDU or Northeastern EDU. Where in bloody blazes is he going to get the multi-kilobuck license fee for Autocad? He doesn't. He gets a Gold Copy (TM) and becomes member of the Autodesk Student Borg Association. He then graduates and becomes a member of the Autodesk Professional Borg Association, through which either he (as a Professional Engineer(R)) or his Employer has the budget for a Legitimate Copy(TM) of Autocad.
J Random Listener also downloads MP3s, decides that the music is cool, but the quality of the copy is utter _crap_ and buys a legitimate copy on CD. Radio Stations, up until now, have performed the SAME SERVICE as Napster or Gnutella for *billions* of people.
Such is the way of All Piracy.
So what the hell is this about "lost revenue"?
It's not piracy, it's Advertising.
Shut The Fuck Up, RIAA, MPAA, SPA. You're giving BAD ADVICE to the producers of IP.
remeber a day (Score:2)
"Piracy" is an issue that I like to be fanatical about. I remeber when teachers taught us that sharing was nice... now they teach us sharing is illegal. I don't think "pirating" music or video hurts anyone except the big fat buisness men. It's so horribly capitalist to sue people for being kind to other people instead of the corporations
Aging rock bands and Moore's Second Law. (Score:3)
--
Wait a minute... (Score:3)
Re:Pete Townshend (Score:2)
Re:remeber a day (Score:3)
That is disgusting.
Pirating is NOT sharing. Sharing is letting other people use your stuff at your own expense. That is honorable. Pirating is letting other people use other people's stuff at other people's expense. That is NOT honorable.
If someone creates a piece of information, they have every right to control how it is used. Don't like it? Don't use their stuff. If it weren't for them, you would not have it. You think you have a right to disrespect them?
Now, there are some artists who choose to make their works freely available. I applaud their generosity. If you want free stuff, you should be supporting these people, not fighting those who choose to do other things with their creations.
Better yet, spend a few years of your life creating something, and then give it away. Until you do, you have no right to complain.
------
Links and more info (Score:4)
Eel Pie is mainly Pete Townshend's solo stuff. For classic Who stuff, you can get that pretty much anywhere.
I grabbed the Lifehouse Chronicles 6 CD box set when it came out back in February (and submitted it to Slashdot..rejected), so it's really the single CD version that's coming out now, which obviously doesn't have as much material. The box set's a little pricey (40 pounds), but they still sell it, and I don't regret for a second spending that money on it. It's great.
On Behalf of Old Farts (Score:4)
If only I had been born 30 years earlier ;)
Finally, someone on /. has recognized that we old farts really did have it better. It is high time that such a prestigious publication as slashdot recognize the truth for what it is.
And, considering that Roblimo is a year older than I am, I'm amazed this has not been addressed before. ;-)
Re:remeber a day (Score:2)
Indeed, and I've taken issue with this with my teachers. However, consider the fact that by sharing music, more people listen (the point of music), but distributing classwork creates less learning (the point of school). The consideration that must be taken is a) What is the purpose of the information, and from that, b) What is the best way to accentuate that purpose?
> Teachers also taught us to share things we owned, but certainly not to take things from other people.
I write software. You "pirate" the software. I have software. You have software. You haven't taken anything _from_ me, rather, I have given something to you, with no loss to myself. If you're implying the thing taken is money, not the information itself, that's on the periphery, and not considered in your analogy.
> And justifying "piracy" by saying it only hurts "big fat businessmen" is just salve for your guilty conscience.
No, it's probably an attempt to appeal to the anti-business, anti-commercial attitude most of Slashdot (and most of the moderators) have. But that doesn't invalidate the rest of his points.
Release Capture Squadrons One and Seven (Score:2)
Oh, wait, the pagan gods throw better parties than the "established" gods. Long live Pete Townshend!
many thanks to the WHO (Score:3)
Only on condition... (Score:2)
Getting old... (Score:3)
Re:Don't be fooled again.... (Score:2)
Heh freebase cocaine has been around for a long time...the only thing "newer" about crack is that somone realised that you can make freebase with sodium bicarbonate...which means any moron can do it and NOT blow themselves up (like say Richard Priar did back in the 80s - most people just should not be playing with ether and other volitale solvents in their kitchen)
I still maintain that there are NO bad drugs...just bad relationships with drugs. Peoples lack of self disipline and concern for themselves that is the real problem... that and the use of drugs outside of a socially acceptable context. Other cultures have integrated drugs into their culture...drugs are as much a part of our culture as they are of any other the difference is that we choose to close our eyes and wish they didn't exist... like maybe we can put the genie back in the bottle... but I digress....
> many wars no one wants
Has anyone, with the exception of people in power who have something to gain (like say land or more power), ever WANTED war?
> I don't think we're any better or worse off than
> our parents' generation.
That depends how you define "better or worst". What is the criterea for judgement? We are still human beings...no better and no worst in breed than we ever were...still fundamentally the same animal as we were say 5000 years ago.
Whats different now is that we are on the leading edge of a wave of technological advancement that is unrivaled throughout all of history. Our abilities to manipulate the world around us and pass information around have advanced more in the past 50 years then in ALL of recorded history.
I think our culture is somewhat in shock from this...as cultures always are after large changes. Just think of the internet itself...the barrier to entry is tiny compared to traditional media.
Compare to television. What do we see on TV? Is it any wonder that it is called "programming"? Its lots of shows...all paid for and written by the same group sof people. A small, rich, elite control the media. I seem to remember that if you trace the money back, 4 individuals control 90% of the traditional media in all of the US. (in other countries its probably either the same or worst...like the government itself in control).
In short...I think that our generation, and the ones to come, are in the most interesting situations of all time (well assuming our generation only includes people in the US and similarly developed countries, middle class and "up"...).
Of course...on the whole the human animal is the same creature, and the biggest unknown variable in how things will progress. It will be interesting to see what social change comes of this.
Does any of this mean we are "better off"? Thats so subjective that no answer is really possible I guess. However thats never stopped it from being argued before.
Re:this must be said (Score:2)
I know, we'll change the language. That'll fix everything.
"Holdup"
Convenience store owners often refer to this kind of prohibited payment as a "holdup". In this way, they imply that illegal payments are ethicly equivalent to preventing people from ariving at work on time by stopping all the trains and buses in the city. If you don't believe that illegal payments are just like transportation disruptions, you might prefer not to use the word "holdup" to describe it. Neutral terms such as "prohibited payment" or "unauthorized wealth transfer" are available for use instead. Some of us might even prefer to use a positive term such as "encouraging local businesses to give something back to the community".
#VRML V2.0 utf8
Re:On Behalf of Old Farts (Score:3)
come on, rob, emmet, tim, i know some of you READ this site on occasion - help us out here. can people who get meta-moderated down, give out fewer mod points, and take a more active role in the site.
or get rid of moderation. trolls do it for the attention - it's a little thrill, getting moderated down. it's gotten to the point where moderation, instead of being some sort of reward or punishment, is a great big funny joke.
Re:remeber a day (Score:3)
Scientific discoveries are typically protected by patents. And trust me, there are no small number of people out there who want to copy patented discoveries. You're dead wrong if you say that no one wants to copy science.
Anyway - you're off base on a few things. First of all, it is illegal to reproduce a work which is still protected by a valid copyright (assuming that the reproduction is, for instance, in order to sell copies - other purposes are likely quite legal) even if done so from memory.
Otherwise there would be no small number of people with good or even perfect memories employed to go into bookstores, read the latest bestseller, and run back to a publishing company to type from memory.
Now of course, I have never said that you have no right to make money from your hard work and toil. I'm all for it. I hope you do very well. But once that work has been distributed, as it somehow must be in order for you to actually make any money off of it, you've lost that right. Presently, there is a rather expansive artificial right which helps to replace it, but the justifications are all different, and I don't think that anyone knowledgeable on the subject defends it as an innate right.
Now you do have some special abilities because of your authorship; that ability is that you can create this work. How on earth do you propose that you automatically - without laws to supply this right - get everlasting powers over it? If that were so, why would we need copyright laws?
Would creators still create without those laws? I think so in a lot of cases. This has been the example for thousands and thousands of years. I will grant that they might not create as much, and that there might be fewer people creating works. But I have been trying to say that copyright law is not necessarily the best way, it's not at all natural (free speech is natural - copyrights are in direct opposition to free speech) and that it's a great mistake to assume that it is the best way, or that it is natural. I would rather see significant changes made to copyright law to make it serve the people again, than for it not to. And copyrights, as spelled out in the US Constitution, must advance the useful arts and sciences. There's no mention there of paying authors. The goal is human betterment. The *tool* employed is your vaunted greediness. But it's just a tool, and clearly not a goal in itself.
But I'm not griping because I want and am not getting anything. I'm an artist, and I routinely create works of art - generally work for hire, and also many things just for fun. So not only does copyright law have a lot to do with me, I think that it is important for me to understand copyright law, to understand the basic fundementals that copyright law is founded upon, and to take all of it with some grains of salt; humans are fallible. I don't presume to know that copyright is the best way, but I'm willing to chance it that there's something better, even if I'll never know what. I try to keep this in mind.
Your 2nd to last paragraph is kind of startling to me though. Is your code your own creation? I say it's not. I say you're full of beans. Did you wake up one morning with the knowledge of how to write code newly shining in your head? No, you learned it somewhere. You pretty certainly use other people's code (e.g. standard headers and libraries) and techniques and algorithims developed by others. The language you use, and the compilers, and the processor were all certainly developed by other people unless you're awfully prolific. If Ritchie solely created the use of
No one stands alone. We all stand on the shoulders of those who came before us. If people did somehow acquire permanent rights to their creations it would be far worse than if people had rights only until they revealed their work. If you say otherwise then it is you who is acting unreasonably. Why should the protection of your code for your benefit be any different than the protection of the letters of the alphabet for the fellow who invented them so long ago? You insist that your works be protected, but that the works of the people who you rely on constantly not be - both times for your benefit.
I'm no communist. I think that it's a nice enough idea, but I know I could never be a communist, and I can tell the difference between someone who is a communist and someone who claims to be. The Soviets had a brutal dictatorship, and don't let anyone tell you otherwise. Stalin was, in many ways, worse than Hitler, and that's not at all easy to do.
But capitalism is not perfect either. I will easily say that capitalism more closely aligns with how humans generally prefer to behave. But there are problems with it, there's no doubt. Capitalism has it's own cancer: monopolies. It frequently causes great harm to people in the sake of profits. I would much prefer that no harm, or as little harm be done, even if it should hurt your money. Money's a tool of people, just like copyrights. It's not a worthy goal in itself.
In closing, here's a great gem from your post:
So what is copyright, but a limit on my natural right, granted by God, to free speech? Clearly it is such an infringement, and I take heart in your statement that the system of copyrights will someday fail.
Re:remeber a day (Score:2)
Let us propose that Alice writes a novel. The novel isn't awfully good, but it has a number of unique and memorable characters. The storyline in Alice's novel isn't all that impressive, but it's interesting to a fair number of people.
Bob is one of these interested readers of Alice's work. He's so compelled by Alice's novel in fact, that he writes - without any authorization, completely on his own - a sequel. One that is closely tied to Alice's original piece of literature. The sequel expands on the characters and takes the storyline in a completely different direction. But Bob's story cannot stand alone. It relies completely on Alice's novel to set the stage, and is barely even comprehensible to people who haven't read Alice's book first.
Bob has created a very worthy piece of literature, we'd all agree. But it is still at it's heart a derivative work, based on Alice's lackluster (but inspirational) original. Bob's sequel depends too closely on Alice; it honestly can't be changed without losing anything that makes it worthwhile.
Under the present system of copyright law, Alice has about a 99.44% chance of winning in a court case against Bob. She's clearly protected, not because her ideas are in any way better, but because they are more original.
This is not a wholly made up example. One of my little hobbies is that I am an avid reader of fanfiction. Like anything else, Sturgeon's Law applies, but there are some truly good gems out there. But in order for people to enjoy them, they must already be familiar with the foundation laid by an actual copyright holder. While this isn't my particular area of interest, let's consider something everyone knows: Star Wars.
I don't think that anyone really loved The Phantom Menace as much as, say, A New Hope or The Empire Strikes Back. But do you have illusions that if some guy, slaving over a word processor in his basement for six months single-handedly wrote a Star Wars script that was a zillion times better, would stand a chance in hell of NOT being sued into oblivion if he released it commercially?
Trust me, Lucasfilm would shut him down in moments because he's infringing on their copyright. A creation isn't an entire story; it can be even a very small but essential kernel of a story. (Although it can be a lot more. I still maintain that the first Mission: Impossible movie would have been better if Tom Cruise really had been a traitor - a five page change to a 100+ page script)
Aside from your mistakes about artists being able to support themselves entirely from their art (boy I wish - outside of commercial/work for hire art, where the artist never has the copyright at all this is exceedingly rare) it becomes basically a matter of opinion as to the benefits of copyright.
I think, and I've said many times on
The answer probably lies somewhere inbetween, barring a revelation as to a different and better system. But given how short the human lifespan is, and that the constant loss of copyrights after a short period is also an incentive (e.g. if you don't collect royalties for more than 10 years, you'd better be prepared to write bestsellers and make money all in one go, or write prolifically like Stephen King and make it up on volume) I would lean towards copyrights of 10-20 years tops.
Patents are more expansive but don't last as long. This is not a wholly unreasonable balance. But copyrights are swiftly becoming more and more expansive as well as lasting longer and longer.
Re:Other old examples of net vision? (Score:2)
Here's a bit of prior art [plexus.org] which prefigures not just any number of our new Internet-era "innovations," among them Amazon's "one-click" patent and likewise rubbish, but indeed the entire toxic psychical atmosphere of this degraded, cramped, leashled era.
Yours WDK - WKiernan@concentric.net