From: fernwithy@aol.com (FernWithy) Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: Re: OT: copyright (was Re: electronic text opinions?) Lines: 38 NNTP-Posting-Host: ladder07.news.aol.com X-Admin: news@aol.com Date: 06 Sep 1999 23:06:43 GMT References: <7r1ddv$a6u$1@nnrp1.deja.com> Organization: AOL http://www.aol.com Message-ID: <19990906190643.19370.00002472@ng-fa1.aol.com> Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news1.sunrise.ch!news.imp.ch!nntp-out.monmouth.com!newspeer.monmouth.com!netnews.com!feed1.news.rcn.net!rcn!newsfeed.cwix.com!portc03.blue.aol.com!audrey01.news.aol.com!not-for-mail As to travel, isn't it a bit easier to throw a paperback in your briefcase than it is to drag a computer and modem along? It's certainly lighter. ;) I agree that an electronic concordance to look up texts is a good idea -- LotR on a CD. Really a good thought -- and possibly one that's in the works, or under consideration. The Tolkien estate holds the copyright to the work that would then be distributed in that manner. So, yes, having e-texts of LotR floating around is stealing property from its rightful owners, who might put it to work for them. Now, an argument can and has been made that fanfic and fan art and so on can be subsumed under the "fair use" law -- to use reductio ad absurdum (? -- not so good with Latin), is the Tolkien Estate going to sue for infringement of performance rights if a couple of kids play Orc in their front yards? I happen to agree with this, as I think it addresses the only really pernicious effect of copyright law: the false walls built around an intellectual property that short-circuit the traditional life of a story. (Eg, imagine Greek life if Homer had been copyrighted!) A law student wrote a good essay on this subject at cyber.harvard.edu -- I'll get the right URL, if anyone wants to look at it. It's very interesting (imho), and I think she hits on the right solution. She says it's not an infringement, as long as no money is involved, but neither is it copyrightable in itself. That way, if the legal owner wants it, it belongs to him, and he needn't worry about accidentally coming across a fan writer's plot and finding himself in court for using that fan's storyline. Therefore, he stands no chance of losing any potential profit, and the fan's right to, well, goof around and play, is protected from litigation as well. But I digress. But copyright law came into being for a reason -- authors were getting screwed over. They needed to have their work protected from being distributed without compensation to them. That I believe it went a little overboard in stifling the growth of stories does not negate the fact that the basic laws are fair and just. --- FernWithy "If [moral] behavior is to be, it cannot be as a result of an intellectual moral stance; it is because there is such a thing as love, merely a practical fact, a practical force in human affairs." -- Stephen King (Danse Macabre) ###### From: Max Moroz Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: Re: OT: copyright (was Re: electronic text opinions?) Date: Tue, 07 Sep 1999 07:08:47 GMT Organization: Deja.com - Share what you know. Learn what you don't. Lines: 48 Message-ID: <7r2dlq$vm3$1@nnrp1.deja.com> References: <7r1ddv$a6u$1@nnrp1.deja.com> <19990906190643.19370.00002472@ng-fa1.aol.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: 38.185.42.14 X-Article-Creation-Date: Tue Sep 07 07:08:47 1999 GMT X-Http-User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 5.0; Windows 98; DigExt) X-Http-Proxy: 1.1 x41.deja.com:80 (Squid/1.1.22) for client 38.185.42.14 X-MyDeja-Info: XMYDJUIDmmoroz Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!newsfeed-zh.ip-plus.net!news.ip-plus.net!News.Amsterdam.UnisourceCS!skynet.be!newsfeed.direct.ca!newspeer.monmouth.com!nntp2.deja.com!nnrp1.deja.com!not-for-mail > As to travel, isn't it a bit easier to throw a paperback in your > briefcase than it is to drag a computer and modem along? It's > certainly lighter. ;) What about if you are at work, and have to look something up urgently? ;) Plus, all books together is quite a weight! > I agree that an electronic concordance to look up texts is a good > idea -- LotR on a CD. Really a good thought -- and possibly one > that's in the works, or under consideration. Unfortunately, as I said, I doubt it. They'd be too concerned that people would make illegal copies. Plus, it's unlikely to bring enough revenue to make it worth the trouble of organizing, etc. > The Tolkien estate holds the copyright to the work that would then > be distributed in that manner. So, yes, having e-texts of LotR > floating around is stealing property from its rightful owners, > who might put it to work for them. My opinion is that they won't. Still it means stealing from them, since presumably some people will avoid buying a book if they can just print all the text out on from the e-text. So it's a tradeoff between making life of Tolkien fans better, and keeping the net worth of the "rightful owners" higher. > she hits on the right solution. She says it's not an infringement, > as long as no money is involved, but neither is > it copyrightable in itself. That way, if the legal owner wants it, > it belongs to him, and he needn't worry about accidentally coming > across a fan writer's plot and finding himself in court for using > that fan's storyline. Therefore, he stands no chance of losing any > potential profit, and the fan's right to, well, goof around and play, > is protected from litigation as well. Unfortunately, this scheme won't work here. Tolkien estate concern would not be that it cannot use the e-text itself (if it is published on the web for free even for an hour, they will never be able to make money from it). Their concern would rather be the reduced sales of printed copies, I'm afraid. I'd love that problem solved, but I don't see how. Max Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/ Share what you know. Learn what you don't. ###### Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!usenet From: Neil Franklin Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: Re: OT: copyright (was Re: electronic text opinions?) Date: 07 Sep 1999 16:46:44 +0200 Organization: My own Private Self Lines: 159 Sender: neil@chonsp.franklin.ch Message-ID: <6uyaei4w4r.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch> References: <7r1ddv$a6u$1@nnrp1.deja.com> <19990906190643.19370.00002472@ng-fa1.aol.com> X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.3/Emacs 19.34 fernwithy@aol.com (FernWithy) writes: > > As to travel, isn't it a bit easier to throw a paperback in your > briefcase than > it is to drag a computer and modem along? It's certainly lighter. ;) Hmmmm. Hobbit (1), LOTR (3), Silm+UT (2), HoME (12), Letters ... That is going to be a large briefcase! And I am already am carrying my notebook (because of all the other things it has in it). If you just want one book with you, it is nice that you can get away so compact with paper. But for those of us who carry computers anyway, they are best, when used as much as possible. > So, yes, having e-texts of LotR > floating around is stealing Nope. As much as the pro-copyright propagandists like to repeat that line, as if it were an mantra, copying is not stealing. Stealing is _taking_away_ an object from an other person (its owner), so depriving them of its use, for which they outlayed/invested the cost (in time or money) of making/buying the object. Copying is _duplicating_ an text/book/music/film/video/program, which does not deprive the owner of the original being duplicated. It does not either deprive the owner of the first copy of still having/using his copy either. This difference is the direct physical consequence of objects being made of _atoms_ (which must be collected and assembled by specialised workers for each _exemplar_, so costing time/money) and of texts/musics/... being made of information/bits (which can be automatically copied onto an second _carrier_ without involving worktime of specialised workers, so costing no time/money other than the copymakers own). It is only this difference that makes copying a problem for publishers (professional copiers of the paper carrier age) in the first place. Try copying an piece of food, or an car or an house. The day that become possible (see Sci-Fi for "replicators"), industrialism will start dying. BTW: An old sig block of mine said: 20th century record companies fit the 21st century data highways as good as 19th century stagecoaches fit the 20th century freeways Replace "record companies" with "book publishers" and it stays valid. > property from its rightful owners, who might put it > to work for them. Right-/lawfull yes, but justified? Law ist often injust, and in such cases creates the dilemma of chosing betweel right and just. To take an known (but af course more grave) case: freeing an slave was (when slavery was legal 200 years ago) depriving an right/legal owner of his property. Freeing slaves was though definitely just from an humanitarian perspective. Of course this lead over time to the injust law being dropped, but only after many centuries of fighting it. Should decent people in the meantime have been "good" citisens and left slaves to their lot? I (like many others) think copyright will be dead in less than 100 years, so should an decent citisen keep on respecting it? > I agree that an electronic concordance to look up texts is a good > idea -- LotR > on a CD. Really a good thought And all the other works, and all other authors ... I want my entire Library (7 * 32cm + 9 * 68cm shelves) with me - on line, searchable. > Now, an argument can and has been made that fanfic and fan art and > so on can be > subsumed under the "fair use" law The problem is IMHO not fanfic, but the portable reference library: Search "balrog & wing" Tolkien/*, or something like it :-). > short-circuit the traditional life of a story. (Eg, imagine Greek life if > Homer had been copyrighted!) Imagine the Renaissance (or rather non-Renaissance) if only a few Homer originals (all now lost) had existed. We only even know of him because so many people copied his works. The same for nearly all classic authors such as Plato, Aristoteles, ... Nearly all the originals were deliberately destroyed around A.D.600 because of being "pagan". A lot of greek stuff only survived because the oriental folk discovered it aroung 300-400 and copied it for own use, we recieved again copies when the crusaders were in the Orient in 1100-1400. > A law student wrote a good essay on this subject > at cyber.harvard.edu -- I'll get the right URL, if anyone wants to > look at it. > She > says it's not an infringement, as long as no money is involved, That may be a good compromise, restrict it to the prohibiting same-madium copies. I will have remember that one. Can we have the URL? As you read webpages discussing copyright issues, you may like this one (from the law dept of Columbia): http://old.law.columbia.edu/my_pubs/anarchism.html Anarchism Triumphant: Free Software and the Death of Copyright (Eben Moglen) > But copyright law came into being for a reason -- authors were > getting screwed over. Screwed by publishers - who were not paying, because supporting authors would have made their copies more expensive than non-supporting copies by other publishers of the same work. So copyright was introduced to "help the arts" (according to the US constitution) by giving the artist more support-bringing publishers, by reducing the danger of them being outpublished by annother publisher. But it does not work! Authors still get too little out of publishing to even cover writing costs, see: http://photo.net/wtr/dead-trees/story.html The book behind the book behind the book (Philip Greenspun) So the intent of increasing author willingness to create art does not take place. OTOH it does stops people form doing sensible things, such as say project Gutenberg making an electronic Tolkien edition. > That I believe it went a little overboard in stifling > the growth of stories does not negate the fact that the basic laws > are fair and just. Unfortunately they did not just "go overboard". They invented a system that does not work (as in doing what it was intended to do) but does harm society badly. If a cure is worse than the malady it should be got rid of. Ask any doctor. That is the case with copyright. May it die - soon. -- Neil Franklin, Nerd, Geek, Unix Wizzard and Guru, Hacker, Mystic neil@franklin.ch.remove http://neil.franklin.ch/ Computer: toy that speeds work, so you have more time to play with it ###### From: softrat Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: Re: OT: copyright (was Re: electronic text opinions?) Date: Tue, 07 Sep 1999 14:46:30 -0700 Organization: Posted via Supernews, http://www.supernews.com Message-ID: X-Complaints-To: newsabuse@supernews.com X-Newsreader: Forte Agent 1.6/32.525 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Lines: 28 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news1.sunrise.ch!news.imp.ch!netnews.globalip.ch!news-raspail.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!grolier!dispose.news.demon.net!demon!newsfeed.icl.net!newsfeed.icl.net!newsfeed.nacamar.de!newscore.gigabell.net!newscore.ipf.de!nntp-relay.ihug.net!ihug.co.nz!remarQ60!rQdQ!supernews.com!remarQ.com!news.supernews.com!not-for-mail On 07 Sep 1999 16:46:44 +0200, in rec.arts.books.tolkien Neil Franklin wrote: >Nope. As much as the pro-copyright propagandists like to repeat that >line, as if it were an mantra, copying is not stealing. Yes, it may be, as defined in law. > >Stealing is _taking_away_ an object from an other person (its owner), >so depriving them of its use, for which they outlayed/invested the >cost (in time or money) of making/buying the object. Your definition of 'stealing' is defective. It assumes only physical entities. It is also possible to steal intangible entities for which a person outlayed/invested the cost (in time or money) of making/buying the object. My whole 32 year career was selling the intellectual contents of my brain, that is, intangible entities. I was a software engineer. I was NOT creating or selling hardware. Patents and copyrights inhibit people from stealing the intellectual contents of brains. I rather favor that. the softrat -------- I despise in a nominal adult the two-year-old's ethics of 'I-want-that-therefore-I-should-be-allowed-to-have-that. ###### From: "Tim Crews" Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien References: <7r1ddv$a6u$1@nnrp1.deja.com><19990906190643.19370.00002472@ng-fa1.aol.com> <6uyaei4w4r.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch> Subject: Re: OT: copyright (was Re: electronic text opinions?) Lines: 92 X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.00.2615.200 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2615.200 Message-ID: Date: Tue, 07 Sep 1999 16:40:02 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 24.1.216.12 X-Complaints-To: abuse@home.net X-Trace: news.rdc1.az.home.com 936722402 24.1.216.12 (Tue, 07 Sep 1999 09:40:02 PDT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Tue, 07 Sep 1999 09:40:02 PDT Organization: @Home Network Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!newsfeed-zh.ip-plus.net!news.ip-plus.net!News.Amsterdam.UnisourceCS!skynet.be!hermes.visi.com!news-out.visi.com!nntp.abs.net!newshub2.home.com!newshub1.home.com!news.home.com!news.rdc1.az.home.com.POSTED!not-for-mail Hi Neil: I see you believe strongly in your position, and have taken time to think it through, but I really can't say I understand it or agree with it. (Below this message I have excerpted the passages that trouble me.) To me, the direct implication of your distinction between stealing and copying is that creators of copyrightable material should not be compensated for their work. If making a copy of a created object (however easy this may be) is not stealing from the creator of that object, then this ultimately means that the object itself has no value to its creator. Is this your intention? If you believe that people who create material that is currently copyrightable should be compensated (even 100 years from now when copyright might be dead), what is your model for _how_ they should be compensated, if no restrictions are placed on the duplication of that material? When you provide your definition of stealing, you acknowledge that the "owner" of an object invested time and/or money to make/buy the object. But when you provide your definition of copying, you do not acknowledge the time that the object's creator spent making the object. Making a copy of an object, without giving its creator some money, _does_ deprive the creator of the object -- he is effectively deprived of the (often considerable) time he spent creating it. The current copyright laws are _certainly_ not harming society badly. The availability of inexpensive copies of all sorts of creative output in today's society is unparalleled by any previous civilization. How Homer would have loved to log on to amazon.com or walk into a bookstore and spend the equivalent of a few hours' wages on some book that interested him, from a selection of hundreds of thousands of books! I have spent my entire life buying books from bookstores, borrowing them from libraries, and reading them, to my immense profit, without any significant financial burden on myself or on my family. I have read enough science fiction to have been exposed to models of future societies in which information is copied at will -- however, in _all_ of these books, the information itself served the role of currency. In these future information-based cultures, information has _value_ to its creator, and can only be exchanged for other information of similar value. I would be glad to live in a civilization in which I could have instant electronically searchable access to any literature I want in any format that I want it, but only if I can be assured that the creators of that literature are compensated for it. Tim Neil Franklin wrote in message news:6uyaei4w4r.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch... > > Nope. As much as the pro-copyright propagandists like to repeat that > line, as if it were an mantra, copying is not stealing. > > Stealing is _taking_away_ an object from an other person (its owner), > so depriving them of its use, for which they outlayed/invested the > cost (in time or money) of making/buying the object. > > Copying is _duplicating_ an text/book/music/film/video/program, which > does not deprive the owner of the original being duplicated. It does > not either deprive the owner of the first copy of still having/using > his copy either. > I (like many others) think copyright will be dead in less than 100 > years, so should an decent citisen keep on respecting it? > > > So the intent of increasing author willingness to create art does not > take place. OTOH it does stops people form doing sensible things, such > as say project Gutenberg making an electronic Tolkien edition. > Unfortunately they did not just "go overboard". They invented a system > that does not work (as in doing what it was intended to do) but does > harm society badly. > > If a cure is worse than the malady it should be got rid of. Ask any > doctor. That is the case with copyright. May it die - soon. > ###### From: "Tim Crews" Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien References: <7r1ddv$a6u$1@nnrp1.deja.com><19990906190643.19370.00002472@ng-fa1.aol.com> <6uyaei4w4r.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch> Subject: Re: OT: copyright (was Re: electronic text opinions?) Lines: 92 X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.00.2615.200 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2615.200 Message-ID: Date: Tue, 07 Sep 1999 16:40:02 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 24.1.216.12 X-Complaints-To: abuse@home.net X-Trace: news.rdc1.az.home.com 936722402 24.1.216.12 (Tue, 07 Sep 1999 09:40:02 PDT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Tue, 07 Sep 1999 09:40:02 PDT Organization: @Home Network Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!newsfeed-zh.ip-plus.net!news.ip-plus.net!News.Amsterdam.UnisourceCS!skynet.be!hermes.visi.com!news-out.visi.com!nntp.abs.net!newshub2.home.com!newshub1.home.com!news.home.com!news.rdc1.az.home.com.POSTED!not-for-mail Hi Neil: I see you believe strongly in your position, and have taken time to think it through, but I really can't say I understand it or agree with it. (Below this message I have excerpted the passages that trouble me.) To me, the direct implication of your distinction between stealing and copying is that creators of copyrightable material should not be compensated for their work. If making a copy of a created object (however easy this may be) is not stealing from the creator of that object, then this ultimately means that the object itself has no value to its creator. Is this your intention? If you believe that people who create material that is currently copyrightable should be compensated (even 100 years from now when copyright might be dead), what is your model for _how_ they should be compensated, if no restrictions are placed on the duplication of that material? When you provide your definition of stealing, you acknowledge that the "owner" of an object invested time and/or money to make/buy the object. But when you provide your definition of copying, you do not acknowledge the time that the object's creator spent making the object. Making a copy of an object, without giving its creator some money, _does_ deprive the creator of the object -- he is effectively deprived of the (often considerable) time he spent creating it. The current copyright laws are _certainly_ not harming society badly. The availability of inexpensive copies of all sorts of creative output in today's society is unparalleled by any previous civilization. How Homer would have loved to log on to amazon.com or walk into a bookstore and spend the equivalent of a few hours' wages on some book that interested him, from a selection of hundreds of thousands of books! I have spent my entire life buying books from bookstores, borrowing them from libraries, and reading them, to my immense profit, without any significant financial burden on myself or on my family. I have read enough science fiction to have been exposed to models of future societies in which information is copied at will -- however, in _all_ of these books, the information itself served the role of currency. In these future information-based cultures, information has _value_ to its creator, and can only be exchanged for other information of similar value. I would be glad to live in a civilization in which I could have instant electronically searchable access to any literature I want in any format that I want it, but only if I can be assured that the creators of that literature are compensated for it. Tim Neil Franklin wrote in message news:6uyaei4w4r.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch... > > Nope. As much as the pro-copyright propagandists like to repeat that > line, as if it were an mantra, copying is not stealing. > > Stealing is _taking_away_ an object from an other person (its owner), > so depriving them of its use, for which they outlayed/invested the > cost (in time or money) of making/buying the object. > > Copying is _duplicating_ an text/book/music/film/video/program, which > does not deprive the owner of the original being duplicated. It does > not either deprive the owner of the first copy of still having/using > his copy either. > I (like many others) think copyright will be dead in less than 100 > years, so should an decent citisen keep on respecting it? > > > So the intent of increasing author willingness to create art does not > take place. OTOH it does stops people form doing sensible things, such > as say project Gutenberg making an electronic Tolkien edition. > Unfortunately they did not just "go overboard". They invented a system > that does not work (as in doing what it was intended to do) but does > harm society badly. > > If a cure is worse than the malady it should be got rid of. Ask any > doctor. That is the case with copyright. May it die - soon. > ###### From: "Conrad Dunkerson" Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: Re: OT: copyright (was Re: electronic text opinions?) Date: Tue, 7 Sep 1999 18:53:59 -0400 Organization: AT&T WorldNet Services Lines: 25 Message-ID: <7r45ht$d8f$1@bgtnsc03.worldnet.att.net> References: <7r1ddv$a6u$1@nnrp1.deja.com> <19990906190643.19370.00002472@ng-fa1.aol.com> <7r2dlq$vm3$1@nnrp1.deja.com> Reply-To: "Conrad Dunkerson" NNTP-Posting-Host: 12.79.24.14 X-Trace: bgtnsc03.worldnet.att.net 936745341 13583 12.79.24.14 (7 Sep 1999 23:02:21 GMT) X-Complaints-To: abuse@worldnet.att.net NNTP-Posting-Date: 7 Sep 1999 23:02:21 GMT X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.00.2314.1300 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2314.1300 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news1.sunrise.ch!news.imp.ch!nntp-out.monmouth.com!newspeer.monmouth.com!hermes.visi.com!news-out.visi.com!newspump.sol.net!news.execpc.com!newspeer.sol.net!wn3feed!worldnet.att.net!wnmaster2!not-for-mail Max Moroz wrote in message news:7r2dlq$vm3$1@nnrp1.deja.com... > Tolkien estate concern would not be that it cannot use > the e-text itself (if it is published on the web for free > even for an hour, they will never be able to make money > from it). Their concern would rather be the reduced sales > of printed copies, I'm afraid. I'd love that problem > solved, but I don't see how. Actually, I've seen e-texts of various JRRT works in non English languages (primarily Russian) on ftp sites. I'm guessing there is some weakness in international copyright law there or simply no way to enforce it. So the genie is already out of the bottle to some degree. Given the fan interest in such a thing I continue to hope that the Tolkien estate will someday release a CD or set up a web site where you can do searches and get blocks of text of some limited size with references to where they appear in the books (various printings). This could be encrypted to prevent the data from just being hacked and it would be unfeasible to search quote after quote to compile the full text. ###### From: fernwithy@aol.com (FernWithy) Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: Re: OT: copyright (was Re: electronic text opinions?) Lines: 68 NNTP-Posting-Host: ladder05.news.aol.com X-Admin: news@aol.com Date: 07 Sep 1999 20:25:14 GMT References: <6uyaei4w4r.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch> Organization: AOL http://www.aol.com Message-ID: <19990907162514.12558.00003176@ng-fp1.aol.com> Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!newsfeed.berkeley.edu!newsfeed.enteract.com!news.compuserve.com!news-master.compuserve.com!portc03.blue.aol.com!audrey01.news.aol.com!not-for-mail > >Hmmmm. Hobbit (1), LOTR (3), Silm+UT (2), HoME (12), Letters ... > > YOu need all that to travel with? >Stealing is _taking_away_ an object from an other person (its owner), >so depriving them of its use, for which they outlayed/invested the >cost (in time or money) of making/buying the object. Yes. And a person (whose heirs now own this) has put time and effort into producing a product (a manuscript) which is used to create income. E-texts are a type of property. Yes, I agree wholeheartedly that in many matters, copyright has gone way over the line. The idea of prosecuting fanfic is as ridiculous as suing an artist because he had an idea similar to one you once mentioned publically. It's ridiculous to try and keep ideas locked up. But the actual text? That's property, and as long as Fair Use is kept in mind -- quotes are fair game and interpretations (and Frodo-rescuing, of course ;) ) -- then it is only right and fair. Now, the question comes up, of course, of software piracy. Is it to be considered theft if an owner installs software on several sites, and encourages employees to copy it to their own home computers? Does the owner own it, or does the creator own it? Is it a product or a contract? Does this intersect with our discussion of books? I think it does. Programmers tend to work for companies, which make sales and then pay salaries (not always, but frequently enough to call it a general rule). On the whole, the large sales to the firms are high income, and they can afford to keep their programmers in Jolt Cola for awhile. They anticipate this kind of non-kosher distribution, and price accordingly, which suggests to me that even they know we're not really talking about the same thing. Authors, on the other hand, are dependent on what they write, and the income it generates. Whether it is the author himself or his designated heirs isn't relevant. There's nothing built into the system to see to it that they get paid -- that's why copyright was created in the first place, and for all its (admitted) problems, it's obviously still needed. I understand your point, but I cannot agree with it. To say that intellectual property does not exist at all (as opposed to saying that its boundaries may need some reshaping) is tantamount to saying that anyone who creates in the non-physical realm hasn't actually done any work for which he or she ought to be compensated. Copyright does not apply to ideas, but to their expression. Technically, if I wanted to write a story about little short guys with hairy feet who lug a magic ring around, I could, provided I don't call them hobbits and make enough changes in detail to make it my own. Of course, I'd get laughed out of fandom, but that's that. There are moves to make such an obvious knock-off illegal (and some court precedent for it), but I believe that to be a rather serious misinterpretation. It's only when you are dealing with the actual artifact -- the text itself, created painstakingly by Professor Tolkien -- that I would blow a whistle and yell "Stop Thief!" That is fair, and does no harm to society. --- FernWithy "If [moral] behavior is to be, it cannot be as a result of an intellectual moral stance; it is because there is such a thing as love, merely a practical fact, a practical force in human affairs." -- Stephen King (Danse Macabre) ###### Message-ID: <37D5BCA3.82A9A8A7@wizard.net> From: "James Kuyper Jr." Organization: Not Enough X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.61 [en] (WinNT; I) X-Accept-Language: en,de,es,ru MIME-Version: 1.0 Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: Re: OT: copyright (was Re: electronic text opinions?) References: <7r1ddv$a6u$1@nnrp1.deja.com> <19990906190643.19370.00002472@ng-fa1.aol.com> <6uyaei4w4r.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Lines: 15 NNTP-Posting-Host: 209.8.153.39 X-Trace: typ12.nn.bcandid.com 936753904 209.8.153.39 (Tue, 07 Sep 1999 21:25:04 EDT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Tue, 07 Sep 1999 21:25:04 EDT Date: Tue, 07 Sep 1999 21:32:19 -0400 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!newsfeed-zh.ip-plus.net!news.ip-plus.net!News.Amsterdam.UnisourceCS!newshunter!cosy.sbg.ac.at!logbridge.uoregon.edu!newsfeed.direct.ca!gw12.nn.bcandid.com!gate.bCandid.com!typ12.nn.bcandid.com.POSTED!not-for-mail Neil Franklin wrote: ... > Imagine the Renaissance (or rather non-Renaissance) if only a few > Homer originals (all now lost) had existed. We only even know of him > because so many people copied his works. The same for nearly all > classic authors such as Plato, Aristoteles, ... > > Nearly all the originals were deliberately destroyed around A.D.600 > because of being "pagan". A lot of greek stuff only survived because > the oriental folk discovered it aroung 300-400 and copied it for own > use, we recieved again copies when the crusaders were in the Orient in > 1100-1400. That was moslems, not orientals; the Orient starts a few thousand miles farther east. ###### From: fernwithy@aol.com (FernWithy) Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: Re: OT: copyright (was Re: electronic text opinions?) Lines: 36 NNTP-Posting-Host: ladder05.news.aol.com X-Admin: news@aol.com Date: 07 Sep 1999 22:21:14 GMT References: <19990907162514.12558.00003176@ng-fp1.aol.com> Organization: AOL http://www.aol.com Message-ID: <19990907182114.27477.00005848@ng-bh1.aol.com> Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!isdnet!oleane!portc04.blue.aol.com!audrey01.news.aol.com!not-for-mail >Now, the question comes up, of course, of software piracy. Is it to be >considered theft if an owner installs software on several sites, and >encourages >employees to copy it to their own home computers? Does the owner own it, or >does the creator own it? Is it a product or a contract? Does this intersect >with our discussion of books? > >I think it does. Programmers tend to work for companies, which make sales >and >then pay salaries (not always, but frequently enough to call it a general >rule). On the whole, the large sales to the firms are high income, and they >can afford to keep their programmers in Jolt Cola for awhile. They >anticipate >this kind of non-kosher distribution, and price accordingly, which suggests >to >me that even they know we're not really talking about the same thing. Actually, I take this back. Some of the big programs, like WordPerfect or whatnot, are clearly distributed with the assumption that they will be spread around, and are priced with according obscenity. If people weren't doing that, the price would probably come down. And the things that really are priced for individual ownership, like games and accessories, shouldn't be copied. Of course, there is a much more fair question -- if someone sells his computer and all the files on it, is it really infringement if he doesn't copy his old files onto the new computer? He's not specifically selling those features (usually, we're talking about a sale within the family or among friends), just the hardware, with which those files are legitimately associated. Well, I'm rambling. But thinking about it, I did want to take back what sounded an awful lot like permission for software theft. --- FernWithy "If [moral] behavior is to be, it cannot be as a result of an intellectual moral stance; it is because there is such a thing as love, merely a practical fact, a practical force in human affairs." -- Stephen King (Danse Macabre) ###### From: fernwithy@aol.com (FernWithy) Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: Re: OT: copyright (was Re: electronic text opinions?) Lines: 23 NNTP-Posting-Host: ladder07.news.aol.com X-Admin: news@aol.com Date: 07 Sep 1999 23:44:54 GMT References: <7r45ht$d8f$1@bgtnsc03.worldnet.att.net> Organization: AOL http://www.aol.com Message-ID: <19990907194454.25382.00006065@ng-fz1.aol.com> Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news1.sunrise.ch!news.imp.ch!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!howland.erols.net!portc02.blue.aol.com!audrey01.news.aol.com!not-for-mail > I'm >guessing there is some weakness in international copyright >law there or simply no way to enforce it. There are serious problems in international copyright law, and they are largely in the enforcement area, but, yes, many countries don't abide by the various agreements. >Given the fan >interest in such a thing I continue to hope that the >Tolkien estate will someday release a CD or set up a web >site ... What say we all write and ask for such a thing? The publisher might be the best bet. Is it still Unwin? Which house holds LotR? (In the U.S., it's Houghton Mifflin -- I'm local to them and can call...) --- FernWithy "If [moral] behavior is to be, it cannot be as a result of an intellectual moral stance; it is because there is such a thing as love, merely a practical fact, a practical force in human affairs." -- Stephen King (Danse Macabre) ###### Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!usenet From: Neil Franklin Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: Re: OT: copyright (was Re: electronic text opinions?) Date: 08 Sep 1999 16:47:13 +0200 Organization: My own Private Self Lines: 101 Sender: neil@chonsp.franklin.ch Message-ID: <6ulnahe9zi.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch> References: X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.3/Emacs 19.34 softrat writes: > > On 07 Sep 1999 16:46:44 +0200, in rec.arts.books.tolkien Neil Franklin > wrote: > >Nope. As much as the pro-copyright propagandists like to repeat that > >line, as if it were an mantra, copying is not stealing. > > Yes, it may be, as defined in law. Could you point out where that is supposed to be? Copyright is an separate law to property rights. Breaking this law is legally "breaching copyright", not stealing. All of this AFAIK, IANAL. It only becomes stealing in the IP supporters propaganda efforts. > >Stealing is _taking_away_ an object from an other person (its owner), > >so depriving them of its use, for which they outlayed/invested the > >cost (in time or money) of making/buying the object. > > Your definition of 'stealing' is defective. Not according to the concise OED (which I checked up on before posting): steal v. (stole; sto'len; pr. sto-) & n. 1. v.t. take away (thing, or abs) esp secretly for one's own use without right or leave... [rest abbridged:] 2 obtain surreptitiously 3 win, get possession of 4 move secretly or silently 5 Hence ~er 6 stealing easy task or good bargain Note the _away_ bit in "1". That is not the case with copying. And none of the others add your claim. > It assumes only physical > entities. So does the OED, with IMHO is the definition of the english language. > It is also possible to steal intangible entities for which a > person outlayed/invested the cost (in time or money) of making/buying > the object. Just that that is not stealing according to either the OED, nor the common understanding (outside of IP circles!) of the word. If you don't believe this, take an man-off-the-streat, from the times before todays anti-piracy discussions (and the propaganda spewed in them) becoming public knowledge, and ask him. IP (intellectual property) people (such as authors, lawers) are using an word completely out of its original meaning (which is defined in the world of physical objects). That is most likely intellectually less costly than introducing an new word, but also less honnest, but what else to expect from lawyers? Twisting language is their job since millennia. Aside: if they did need to reuse an existing word, then cheating (as in cheating on an bus/train fare) would have been far more fitting. At least the "part of the development cost" aspect would fit. > My whole 32 year career was selling the intellectual contents of my > brain, that is, intangible entities. I was a software engineer. I was > NOT creating or selling hardware. Snap. I was an pro programmer for 5.5 years. Before I changed job, because I liked sysadmin work better. So I am aware of the programmers viewpoint (see my answer to Tim Crews for elaboration). > Patents and copyrights inhibit people Or rather not, as rampant "pirating" shows. > rom stealing the intellectual > contents of brains. I rather favor that. AFAIK slave holders also favoured what they got from the slavery laws. But whether a law is good depends on the sum of all good and all bad it does to all people, not on if some minority (here authors) likes it. > I despise in a nominal adult the two-year-old's ethics of > 'I-want-that-therefore-I-should-be-allowed-to-have-that. I dispise this in the world of atoms/objects. But it is IMHO the natural state for the world of bits/information. Different world, diffferent physics, different economics, different behaviour. -- Neil Franklin, Nerd, Geek, Unix Wizzard and Guru, Hacker, Mystic neil@franklin.ch.remove http://neil.franklin.ch/ Computer: toy that speeds work, so you have more time to play with it ###### Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!usenet From: Neil Franklin Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: Re: OT: copyright (was Re: electronic text opinions?) Date: 08 Sep 1999 18:39:15 +0200 Organization: My own Private Self Lines: 240 Sender: neil@chonsp.franklin.ch Message-ID: <6uk8q1e4ss.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch> References: <7r1ddv$a6u$1@nnrp1.deja.com><19990906190643.19370.00002472@ng-fa1.aol.com> <6uyaei4w4r.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch> X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.3/Emacs 19.34 "Tim Crews" writes: > > To me, the direct implication of your distinction between > stealing and copying is that creators of copyrightable > material should not be compensated for their work. At least not directly for each copy, but see below for how they can get income (and actually lots of them already do today!). > If making a copy of a created object (however easy this > may be) is not stealing from the creator of that object, > then this ultimately means that the object itself has no > value to its creator. Actually it still does have usage value, it only loses its sale value (which I agree, is what most commercially motivated authors produce their works for). > might be dead), what is your model for _how_ they should > be compensated, if no restrictions are placed on the > duplication of that material? There actually have been quite a few models suggested. For each project an fitting one would have to be selected. 1. based on the usage value Switch to an distributed authorship model, where each author ads an small bit to the entire works, and so only shoulders an small bit of the development cost. This can be taken out of normal usage costs (if I use an resource for 1h daily average for an profit making job, then occasionally working a few hours to improve the tools goes under overhead costs, like renting an office). So long enough people do this adding it works. The entire free software movement (such as Linux) uses this model. I am writing this on an 100% free software computer. But also the entire Internet standards were made like this. And of course the entire human languages were developed this way. And incidently also the entire canon of law. And all pre-20th century folk music. And Homer, the Bible, the Volsung saga, Mabiognion (sp?), ... 2. regard the authoring as an "loss leader" That term comes from salesmans jargon, it means that one accepts an inherently loss making action for its positive side benefits. The gain usually is in being an advert for ones ability to do payed work. Technical book writers do this, the gain is in them being recognized as an publicly proven competent consultant. Such books are known as OpenText. I met the "Jargon Fle" online, later I actually got its corresponding book (The New Hackers Dictionary). But also musicians use this, the gain is in more concert ticket (larger concerts because wider known, more fans) and in selling more fan articles (merchandising). The Gratefull Dead are the most known band of this type, bootlegging their concerts is explicitely legal. But modern musicians have also put songs free on the Internet, Billy Idol, Prince, ... For book authors (we are on rec.art.BOOKS.tolkien this would make public readings and fan articles (I have been to an Douglas Adams reading, inkl buying the entry ticket). If Tolkien were alive and reading nearby I would definitely go. BTW: most musicians get about $0.1-0.2 per CD, they get over $10 per T-shirt or concert ticket. So if you want to support your favourite band, go to the concert and/or get the T-shirt, not the collected works CDs! Historical note: up to 200 years ago artists lived entirely from life performance or from benefactors. Recording does not really change that, as it is mainly the publishers/labels that make the money. I assume that we will simply return to the old state, today being an abberation. 3. Rely on non-commercial authors. As surprising as this one is, most authors actually fall into this category! Most never make up their writing costs with the royalties. And those that do write for financial gain are usually make the shoddiest works (compare Windows with Linux). Actually more on topic: did Tolkien set out writing LoTR with the intention of making an financial gain (you must insert all his ME-inventing time into the calculation)? I doubt it. IMHO, like most good authors, he wrote from the human desire to create (and possibly to make an mark on history). He actually lived off his professorship job. Actually he had difficulty to get LoTR published, the publishers doubted to even make up their own costs. One of the nice effects of the Internet is to make self publishing so easy (upload once, the readers do self service). The result is an large amount of previously unavailable creative talent (look at all them home pages). Of course much of it is crap, but the good finds its way to becoming known. P.S: how much do you write on Usenet (that makes you an author), without recieving any pay for it? Do you have an home page? Paid? As result of this, professional authoring ceases to be an neccessity, and are now only an luxury addition. So the question becomes: is the damage copyright restrictions do justifiable with the small gain that a few only-for-direct-pay professional authors can still deliver to society? I don't think so. Of course people wanting to be pro authors will not like this change of things. But so did the makers of horse carriages not like the changes cars brought. It did not stop cars. It will not stop the Internet. Or free information. > When you provide your definition of stealing, you acknowledge > that the "owner" of an object invested time and/or money to > make/buy the object. Yes. Collecting/shaping atoms (or having someone/many others do it). > But when you provide your definition > of copying, you do not acknowledge the time that the object's > creator spent making the object. This I actually do acknowledge (allthough left out of the previous post for brevity, unlike this post). But making the one initial "copy" is an one-time creation cost, not an every-copy-repeated cost (as in farming/manufacturing/service) work. This changes the whole situation and so the rules. This is why coping becomes possible. And it is also why saddling the world with "bit/information copies only via payed professionals that guarantee a few percent of autor support payment" becomes an menace. The outcome is that we end up under-utilising the technical possibilities more and more. And that has failled historically in every case done long enough, and is failling on the Internet right before our eyes. Trying to sue copyright violaters (an expensive process for the author and often failling) is, given the cost of violating copyright for those doing it, essentially impossible. Too many enemies. So it will fail, with authors spending more than they are gaining. > Making a copy of an object, > without giving its creator some money, _does_ deprive the > creator of the object -- he is effectively deprived of the > (often considerable) time he spent creating it. Author support has got to be divorced from the distribution process. As an author myself (I am writing a large technical text since about 6 years) I am definitely not going to rely on getting rich by the old system. Of course the new ones are nowhere near developed, but they have more future potential. P.S: despite the text being only an 1MByte ASCII draft, I have thousands of downloads per month (about 1/4 full downloads), and have recieved emails from readers, including 2 publishers (who both wanted me to write commissioned works to related themes, on the base of the work seen there, I declined both). Will an future Tolkien-quality author also prefer the Web over paper publishers? I think the percent of future authors who will not web is smaller than the authors who today will not consider the cost and mess of getting publishers to carry them. > The current copyright laws are _certainly_ not harming society > badly. The availability of inexpensive copies of all sorts of > buying books from bookstores, borrowing them from libraries, > and reading them, to my immense profit, without any significant > financial burden on myself or on my family. The problem is not distribution/license cost. The problem is time to delivery, usage flexibility (computer searchable) and so the loss of potential utilisation gain for readers. I am waiting now 5 weeks for my ordered copies of HoME, on the Web that would have been downloaded long ago. 2 of these weeks were lost because the ISBN I got from the Web lead to an "not licensed for sale outside the US" edition. Great, copywronged once again, I hate that! Then there is that great Sci-Fi book I have had recommended by 5 people, but I can not get it because it is out of print. Not enough profit for the publiser to reprint it. So it is now unaccessable for everyone for most likely the rest of my lifetime. Shit! Why should my (and many others) desire for the ultimate library-in-the-pocket (a possible and usefull thing) be dependant on whether an author can figure out an (for him) profitable arangment (including preventing loss of paper book sales)? Copy-prevention systems anyone? If you have ever been copybroke (denied using something you have paid for, because the licence enforcement system ailled) you know how I dislike that proposal. > I would > be glad to live in a civilization in which I could have instant > electronically searchable access to any literature I want in any > format that I want it, but only if I can be assured that the creators > of that literature are compensated for it. I also want that society. And, given the enormous volume of Internet-enabled publishing, I am prepared to sacrifce the output of those few percent of only-for-pay authors for it. This trade off is simply the lesser evil for me. And it think that society as an whole (which cares hardly at all for producers, so long it gets what it wants) will also take this place once it becomes common knowledge (in a few years). Then copyright will die an merciless death. Some minorities (authors, publishers, IP lawyers) will dislike this, but I doubt they have any more chances than the horse and coaches people had against the spreading of cars (they delayed it for a short time, about 10 years). As I said: 20th century record companies fit the 21st century data highways as good as 19th century stagecoaches fit the 20th century freeways That also covers book publishers. May they go soon, I will not cry for them. -- Neil Franklin, Nerd, Geek, Unix Wizzard and Guru, Hacker, Mystic neil@franklin.ch.remove http://neil.franklin.ch/ Computer: toy that speeds work, so you have more time to play with it ###### Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!usenet From: Neil Franklin Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: Re: OT: copyright (was Re: electronic text opinions?) Date: 08 Sep 1999 19:14:11 +0200 Organization: My own Private Self Lines: 111 Sender: neil@chonsp.franklin.ch Message-ID: <6uiu5le36k.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch> References: <6uyaei4w4r.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch> <19990907162514.12558.00003176@ng-fp1.aol.com> X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.3/Emacs 19.34 fernwithy@aol.com (FernWithy) writes: > > > >Hmmmm. Hobbit (1), LOTR (3), Silm+UT (2), HoME (12), Letters ... > > YOu need all that to travel with? Need not, but would like. My reading style (after an initial linear read) is largly jumping around following references. I usually have about 3-5 book open or at least with an bookmark. > >Stealing is _taking_away_ an object from an other person (its owner), > >so depriving them of its use, for which they outlayed/invested the > >cost (in time or money) of making/buying the object. > > Yes. And a person (whose heirs now own this) has put time and effort into > producing a product (a manuscript) which is used to create income. Used because it is possible. But would the book not exist if it were not possible? As in my reply to Tom, I doubt Tolkien had financial gain in mind when writing LoTR. Of course he certainly enjoyed getting some. > E-texts are > a type of property. Property according to present law. But not neccessarily justly so, that is what is causing all the copyright/IP discussions (not just here on r.a.b.t, the net is full of them). > Yes, I agree wholeheartedly that in many matters, copyright has gone way over > the line. The idea of prosecuting fanfic is as ridiculous as suing an artist > because he had an idea similar to one you once mentioned publically. It's > ridiculous to try and keep ideas locked up. Give an person (or his lawyer) an law and they will use it for what they can (at least some people and some lawyres will). > Does this intersect > with our discussion of books? > > I think it does. Books, music, programs are all about authoring/developing in an no-cost-for-copy-making world, so yet it intersects. > Programmers tend to work for companies, which make sales and > then pay salaries (not always, but frequently enough to call it a general > Authors, on the other hand, are dependent on what they write, and the income it > generates. Autch! AFAIK companies also depent on what they produce, and the programmers on the company. Either it is copyright for all (individuals or companies) or no one. Else you get the nightmare of defining (and getting through law) of an restricted copyright-zone. > Whether it is the author himself or his designated heirs isn't > relevant. Not for the copyright discussion. That would be the inheritance discussion, an entire different can of worms, which I am not going to enter. > I understand your point, but I cannot agree with it. To say that intellectual > property does not exist at all (as opposed to saying that its boundaries may > need some reshaping) Wherether amy property (intellectual or physical) exists is defined by law. Presently law defines both to exist. The question is whether intellectual property is declared existant justly or not. There is no doubt that it definitely has been declared (in copyright law, by the US congress, and internationally in the agreement of Berne). > is tantamount to saying that anyone who creates in the > non-physical realm hasn't actually done any work for which he or she ought to > be compensated. Or at least should not be compensated on an per-copy base (with the restrictions that brings). See the previous reply to Tom. > There are moves to make such an obvious knock-off illegal > (and some court precedent for it), but I believe that to be a rather serious > misinterpretation. Which we can trust the courts (and nifty lawyers) to uphold. > It's only when you are dealing with the actual artifact -- the text itself, > created painstakingly by Professor Tolkien -- that I would blow a whistle and > yell "Stop Thief!" That is fair, and does no harm to society. Fair is up to discussion. As for harm, I think my reply to Tom shows some of the harmfull effects. -- Neil Franklin, Nerd, Geek, Unix Wizzard and Guru, Hacker, Mystic neil@franklin.ch.remove http://neil.franklin.ch/ Computer: toy that speeds work, so you have more time to play with it ###### From: Douglas Henderson Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: Re: OT: copyright (was Re: electronic text opinions?) Date: Wed, 08 Sep 1999 15:32:14 -0400 Organization: DarkGrey Consulting Lines: 13 Message-ID: <37D6B9BE.F8949C02@mindspring.com> References: <6uk8q1e4ss.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch> <19990908142823.12561.00003285@ng-fp1.aol.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: a5.f7.10.a5 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Server-Date: 8 Sep 1999 19:18:13 GMT X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.06 [en] (Win95; I) Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news1.sunrise.ch!news.imp.ch!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!nntp.abs.net!remarQ-easT!supernews.com!remarQ.com!news.mindspring.net!firehose.mindspring.com!not-for-mail FernWithy wrote: SNIP I've had friends who are artists, writers, etc. ask me to make copies of my software. They say that nobody gets hurt, the companies are so big, what's the big deal. When I suggest that I should copy their works of art or writings and not pay them a penny they get upset and claim that the two issues are ENTIRELY seperate, THEY have a right to the proceeds from their work. Go figger. -- Douglas Henderson ###### From: fernwithy@aol.com (FernWithy) Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: Re: OT: copyright (was Re: electronic text opinions?) Lines: 66 NNTP-Posting-Host: ladder05.news.aol.com X-Admin: news@aol.com Date: 08 Sep 1999 18:28:23 GMT References: <6uk8q1e4ss.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch> Organization: AOL http://www.aol.com Message-ID: <19990908142823.12561.00003285@ng-fp1.aol.com> Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news1.sunrise.ch!news.imp.ch!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!howland.erols.net!portc02.blue.aol.com!audrey01.news.aol.com!not-for-mail > If Tolkien were alive and >reading nearby I would definitely go. Why? Authors are not necessarily terribly good performers, or performers at all. Actors are paid to perform. Writers are paid for their creations. >Historical note: up to 200 years ago artists lived entirely from >life performance or from benefactors. Recording does not really change >that, as it is mainly the publishers/labels that make the money. I >assume that we will simply return to the old state, today being an >abberation. If we had a guarantee of a return to a decent patronage system, I might agree with you, but I doubt that will happen, and at any rate, it is morally preferable to make a living based on the number of people who you can communicate with than it is to pander to a single person whose approval you absolutely need. > >Actually more on topic: did Tolkien set out writing LoTR with the >intention of making an financial gain (you must insert all his >ME-inventing time into the calculation)? I doubt it. IMHO, like most >good authors, he wrote from the human desire to create (and possibly >to make an mark on history). He actually lived off his professorship >job. Actually he had difficulty to get LoTR published, the publishers >doubted to even make up their own costs. That something is not written with the express intent of making money doesn't mean it shouldn't be compensated. I write a lot for free, G-d knows. That's just goof-around silliness. But I have yet to turn down a check I've earned, just because I had fun doing the writing. Hobbyists will always be around in every field (heck, my grandfather tracked hurricanes as a hobby -- does that mean that meteorologists shouldn't be paid?), but that doesn't mean professionals shouldn't be compensated. That doesn't logically follow. >As result of this, professional authoring ceases to be an neccessity, >and are now only an luxury addition. Sure. So are movies as opposed to television, and theaters as opposed to movies. THat there is a new place around without any kind of review process prior to publishing doesn't mean that real publication is going anywhere. I've written media tie-ins in fan internet sites, and I've written one that was actually published -- wanna make a guess as to which is read more? It's because people will always want real books. They're easier to carry, and besides that, they smell nice and feel good on the fingers. There will always be a hierarchy -- internet publishing is amateur. It could be amateur the way the Olympics are amateur, but it's more likely to be amateur the way a school play or a local Rotary Show is. In no case does it replace actual professional products. >Of course people wanting to be pro authors will not like this change >of things. But so did the makers of horse carriages not like the >changes cars brought. It did not stop cars. It will not stop the >Internet. Or free information. No one is trying to stop the internet, or the flow of information (well, not no one, but no one here). We're just trying to make sure that the proper and just owner of a piece of intellectual property recieves compensation from its distribution. You can argue until the cows come home that there's no such thing as intellectual property. You'll still be wrong. --- FernWithy "If [moral] behavior is to be, it cannot be as a result of an intellectual moral stance; it is because there is such a thing as love, merely a practical fact, a practical force in human affairs." -- Stephen King (Danse Macabre) ###### From: "Tim Crews" Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien References: <7r1ddv$a6u$1@nnrp1.deja.com><19990906190643.19370.00002472@ng-fa1.aol.com><6uyaei4w4r.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch> <6uk8q1e4ss.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch> Subject: Re: OT: copyright (was Re: electronic text opinions?) Lines: 96 X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.00.2615.200 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2615.200 Message-ID: Date: Wed, 08 Sep 1999 20:50:48 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 24.1.216.12 X-Complaints-To: abuse@home.net X-Trace: news.rdc1.az.home.com 936823848 24.1.216.12 (Wed, 08 Sep 1999 13:50:48 PDT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 08 Sep 1999 13:50:48 PDT Organization: @Home Network Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news1.sunrise.ch!news.imp.ch!nntp-out.monmouth.com!newspeer.monmouth.com!nntp.abs.net!newshub2.home.com!news.home.com!news.rdc1.az.home.com.POSTED!not-for-mail Neil and I were discussing possible models in which creative individuals were compensated for their creative output, while still allowing free copies to be made of that creative output. Here's a very snipped version: Neil Franklin wrote in message news:6uk8q1e4ss.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch... > "Tim Crews" writes: > > > > To me, the direct implication of your distinction between > > stealing and copying is that creators of copyrightable > > material should not be compensated for their work. > > At least not directly for each copy, but see below for how they can > get income (and actually lots of them already do today!). > > There actually have been quite a few models suggested. For each project > an fitting one would have to be selected. > > 1. based on the usage value > 2. regard the authoring as an "loss leader" > 3. Rely on non-commercial authors. In my opinion, none of these three alternatives is adequate. All three of them are strategies for dealing with the loss that results from not being paid for copies. None of them provide any form of direct compensation for those copies. Option 1, as I interpret it, is "have lots of people work on the product, so that the loss is negligible for each person", which is clearly a ludicrous proposition for literature such as the Lord of the Rings, which was certainly the work of a single literary genius. Option 2 assumes that the creative individual has some day job or other source of income that benefits from the existence of the creative output which is being freely copied. I agree that this works in the realm of technical literature, and maybe even for music, but I sure don't see how folks like Tolkien or most other mainstream fiction authors really could derive an adequate income in this way. Neil, do you really consider this a serious option in the specific case we started off discussing, i.e. LOTR, even if Tolkien were still alive? Option 3 says that authors should not be paid for their output. I believe this is a very short-sighted opinion. As our culture becomes more and more information-based, information will become currency. Even in today's culture, there is plenty of room for people whose only job is to create literature or other forms of information. This tendency will only increase as the years go by. These people have to be paid, somehow, in a way that reflects the value of the information they produce. Going back to the patronage system of several hundred years ago is just not the answer. Now here is my main point: Creative output has _value_, and its value is determined, among other things, by the _demand_ for that output. (In the case of fiction literature, that's about the only objective measure of value that I can think of right now.) I firmly believe that the compensation that creative individuals receive should be based on the value of their creation. This is a basic principle of the free enterprise system. It encourages the production of literature that people want. It discourages the production of mediocre literature. It encourages and rewards people for being _excellent_ at what they do. Tolkien deserved such rewards, in abundance. What else, other than the number of copies sold, is an adequate measure of the demand for literature? I can't think of anything. That's the main reason why I will never give up on the concept of _selling_ copies of creative literature. I don't care what the mechanism is. For example, see www.fatbrain.com for an Internet-based publishing model. I'm not hung up on publishers, middlemen, and paper-only copies. But I _am_ hung up on every copy, in any form, of creative output, resulting in compensation to the original creator of that output. The very technology that makes these free copies possible is easily able to handle the problem of tracking these copies and exacting payment for them. What is your objection to such a system? In general, it appears that the source of our disagreement is on the value of the creative output itself. Tim Crews ###### Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!usenet From: Neil Franklin Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: Re: OT: copyright (was Re: electronic text opinions?) Date: 09 Sep 1999 23:51:03 +0200 Organization: My own Private Self Lines: 133 Sender: neil@chonsp.franklin.ch Message-ID: <6uhfl3bvp4.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch> References: <6uk8q1e4ss.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch> <19990908142823.12561.00003285@ng-fp1.aol.com> X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.3/Emacs 19.34 fernwithy@aol.com (FernWithy) writes: > > > If Tolkien were alive and > >reading nearby I would definitely go. > > Why? Authors are not necessarily terribly good performers, or performers at > all. Actors are paid to perform. Writers are paid for their creations. Any data on how good Tolkien would have been at this? (No I don't have any) But that actually misses the point. When questioning if society would be better or worse off under an proposed different system, one has to compare the amount of authors who would make it, not judge if todays exact set would (some definitely won't). No doubt the suggested system would kill some of todays, the question is: will the new ones appearing be more or less than the vanishing ones. Once the amount is there, normal gaussian variation will ensure that some of them are good ones, including Tolkienesque quality. > >Historical note: up to 200 years ago artists lived entirely from > >life performance or from benefactors. Recording does not really change > > If we had a guarantee of a return to a decent patronage system, I might agree We could introduce an system that does guarantee this. There have been suggestions (no doubt none of them final), mainly aimed at music (which since the MP3 stuff is the present hotbed of such discussions). Unfortunately it is already 23:30 and I have no time to detail today (nor tomorrow, as I am out until 24:00). > preferable to make a living based on the number of people who you can > communicate with than it is to pander to a single person whose approval you > absolutely need. Who says an future system needs to be single-decider based? What about everyone voting an point for their favourite band/writer/etc? Then distribute some sum (say from taxes) proportional to points. Not elegant, but surely possible. And better can surely be devised (we are after all at the beginning of looking for replacements). > >Actually more on topic: did Tolkien set out writing LoTR with the > >intention of making an financial gain (you must insert all his > >ME-inventing time into the calculation)? I doubt it. IMHO, like most > > That something is not written with the express intent of making money doesn't > mean it shouldn't be compensated. I write a lot for free, G-d knows. That's > just goof-around silliness. But I have yet to turn down a check I've earned, Neither would I turn one down. But when designing laws (which all restrict some possible activity, to anable an other) one has to compare whether the gain is more than the cost. With copyright this is nowhere near sure, and giving the technological changes (more desire for flexibility, less dependancy on pro authors) the bargain is getting worse daily. When will it become negative? What then? > just because I had fun doing the writing. Hobbyists will always be around in > every field (heck, my grandfather tracked hurricanes as a hobby -- does that > mean that meteorologists shouldn't be paid?), but that doesn't mean > professionals shouldn't be compensated. That doesn't logically follow. The question is: do we (society as an whole) need professionals to the extent that we are going to put up with the limits that ensuring their income under the present system bring. I have an strong an growing feeling that society is soon going to turn into saying no to this. > actually published -- wanna make a guess as to which is read more? Most likely the more available, so the more spread one. Most likely in present technology the book. In 20 years? > It's > because people will always want real books. They're easier to carry, and > besides that, they smell nice and feel good on the fingers. What about Book on Demand? The technology already exists to go into an BoD shop (a bit like an copy shop) plonk down an URL and say: I wan 5 books of that text (say electronic LoTR), in 2 in 3 volumes, rest in 1, with the Lee Covers (as opposed to Howe). You can have it in book format. Technically we can do this now, the devices do not (yet) exist due to lacking market (using them would be illegal). Only Law stops this. > be a hierarchy -- internet publishing is amateur. It could be amateur the way > play or a local Rotary Show is. In no case does it replace actual professional > products. There are people who are beginning to doubt this. In the world of physics there actually exists an Web server (xxx.lanl.gov, IIRC) which is displacing professional reviewed magazines as choice medium of exchange, even among the actual researchers. Other similar sites are appearing for specialised news. Wait 5-10 years for this revolution to start. What about in 20? > >Of course people wanting to be pro authors will not like this change > >of things. But so did the makers of horse carriages not like the > >changes cars brought. It did not stop cars. It will not stop the > >Internet. Or free information. > > No one is trying to stop the internet, or the flow of information (well, not no > one, but no one here). No one is intentionally trying to stop it. But the actions of some are having this as an side effect. Result will be an head on collision of copiers vs copypreventers. Who has got the steamroler? Who in 20 years? > distribution. You can argue until the cows come home that there's no such > thing as intellectual property. You'll still be wrong. IP is (like all property) an social convention. Like any convention it appeared at some time and can disappear at any time. The question is whether it will. I presently think so, you do not. Like any new idea this will seem strange to you today. But in 5 years? 10? 20? -- Neil Franklin, Nerd, Geek, Unix Wizzard and Guru, Hacker, Mystic neil@franklin.ch.remove http://neil.franklin.ch/ Computer: toy that speeds work, so you have more time to play with it ###### Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!usenet From: Neil Franklin Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: Re: OT: copyright (was Re: electronic text opinions?) Date: 10 Sep 1999 00:28:54 +0200 Organization: My own Private Self Lines: 190 Sender: neil@chonsp.franklin.ch Message-ID: <6ug10nbty1.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch> References: <7r1ddv$a6u$1@nnrp1.deja.com><19990906190643.19370.00002472@ng-fa1.aol.com><6uyaei4w4r.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch> <6uk8q1e4ss.fsf@chonsp.franklin.ch> X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.3/Emacs 19.34 "Tim Crews" writes: > > > There actually have been quite a few models suggested. For each project > > an fitting one would have to be selected. > > > > 1. based on the usage value > > > 2. regard the authoring as an "loss leader" > > > 3. Rely on non-commercial authors. > > In my opinion, none of these three alternatives is adequate. These are the 3 that just came to my mind, there are about 10 known presently. But I presently lack the time look them all up. > All three of > them are strategies for dealing with the loss that results from not being > paid for copies. Which is the logical consequence of giving up copyright. > None of them provide any form of direct compensation > for those copies. I may not have made it clear: direct compensation will disappear under without copyright. Definitely. > that the loss is negligible for each person", which is clearly a ludicrous > proposition for literature such as the Lord of the Rings, which was > certainly the work of a single literary genius. This one is definitely better suited for systems like software. But I doubt it to be totally impossible to also develop literature over an large dispersed team. RPG are slowly going into this direction of multi-authoring (presently 1 author per main figure). This has not been tried in grand scale, but it may turn out to be passable. Before Linux no one had developed an entire OS with 1000s of programmers who have never meat. It worked, against all conventional wisdom (too larger team, no directed control, ...). Now we know it works. > source of income that benefits from the existence of the creative output > which is being freely copied. I agree that this works in the realm of > technical literature, This one is definitely strong in this sector. > adequate income in this way. Neil, do you really consider this a serious > option in the specific case we started off discussing, i.e. LOTR, even if > Tolkien were still alive? As I wrote above: "There actually have been quite a few models suggested. For each project an fitting one would have to be selected". This one is most like not fitting for literature, so not for Tolkien. I was refering to replacing copyright in general, not just for literature. > Option 3 says that authors should not be paid for their output. I believe > this is a very short-sighted opinion. That is exactly the $64k question: is it? > As our culture becomes more and > more information-based, information will become currency. While I an not sure of this one, this actually produces an interesting thought: currencies are known to collapse to next-to no value (known as hyper-inflation) it too much of them becomes available (they lose scarcity). What will the effect of unlimited copyability be on the value of an information currency? Zero value? Hmmmm. BTW: Actually professional news agencies ar estarting to reliese their entire output to the web for free, simply time-delayed, on the base that any value in it "goes off", like in non-fresh fruit. > today's culture, there is plenty of room for people whose only job is > to create literature or other forms of information. This tendency will only > increase as the years go by. There once were many people whose only job was to provide horses, coaches and all needed for running them (stables, food). Their numbers increased while the 19th century (expanding transport needs). Where are they today? An new technology (cars) sacked their jobs. I doubt hat todays information workers are any more immune to technology taking their place. How often did you use professional library search services before the Web, how often do use today use search engines? It starts here, where in 10 years? 20? > These people have to be paid, somehow, Only so long society needs them. One the need for their jobs is gone any system to pay them is dead wood. > Now here is my main point: Creative output has _value_, and its value > is determined, among other things, by the _demand_ for that output. Actually value in determined by what good it does the user, price is determined by supply and demand. > (In the case of fiction literature, that's about the only objective measure > of value that I can think of right now.) And even that would only give how many people estimate its value above its price, not the actual value for them. > I firmly believe that the > compensation that creative individuals receive should be based on the > value of their creation. Well actually that does not even hold true for physical products. Price is often diverging from value, particularly in markets with overproduction. PCs cost half of before 3-4 years, did their value half? Most likely not, just over-supply and reduced fabrication work allowed price to drop. > This is a basic principle of the free enterprise system. Theoretically yes, in practice not. > It encourages the production of literature that people want. > It discourages the production of mediocre literature. It encourages > and rewards people for being _excellent_ at what they do. Actually it encourages production of what sells best, that is what fits the majority taste. That tends to be fairly mediocre. Examples such as prime time TV, electro-pop music, cheap romance novels, ... > Tolkien deserved such rewards, in abundance. Well as he is dead, I doubt he will be recieving it :-). The only thing that (may) reach him is spiritual, such as thankfullness. OK, that would not apply to an present author. ;-) > I'm not hung up on publishers, middlemen, and paper-only copies. But I _am_ > hung up on every copy, in any form, of creative output, resulting in > compensation And what when the cost of ensureing this (mainly in lost opportunities) outways the gain? Somewhere in the future? 10? 20? 30? > The very technology that makes these free copies possible is > easily able to handle the problem of tracking these copies and exacting > payment for them. What is your objection to such a system? Have you ever had such an enforcement system fail on you? If you have not, you may have difficulty understanding my feelings towards this. > In general, it appears that the source of our disagreement is on the > value of the creative output itself. Not on the value. Rather on what is the better deal for society: Ensure payment at cost of restrictions, or do without payment but gain freedom. I believe that the second is rising in attractivity, you (still?) believe in the first. Presently these ideas are new, so they are foreign, not tried and trusted. Cars were once also new and unreliable. They won over horses. Time will tell in this case (as it did in the other). -- Neil Franklin, Nerd, Geek, Unix Wizzard and Guru, Hacker, Mystic neil@franklin.ch.remove http://neil.franklin.ch/ Computer: toy that speeds work, so you have more time to play with it ###### From: jsavard@tenMAPSONeerf.edmonton.ab.ca (John Savard) Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: Re: OT: copyright (was Re: electronic text opinions?) Date: Fri, 10 Sep 1999 16:27:56 GMT Organization: PowerSurfr - High Speed Internet Lines: 39 Message-ID: <37d92f6f.77061144@news.prosurfr.com> References: NNTP-Posting-Host: c9169-003.v-wave.com X-Trace: dagger.videotron.ab.ca 936980796 29320 24.108.21.103 (10 Sep 1999 16:26:36 GMT) X-Complaints-To: abuse@powersurfr.com NNTP-Posting-Date: 10 Sep 1999 16:26:36 GMT X-Newsreader: Forte Free Agent 1.11/32.235 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news1.sunrise.ch!news.imp.ch!nntp-out.monmouth.com!newspeer.monmouth.com!ameritech.net!newsfeed.telusplanet.net!news.tac.net!news.videotron.ab.ca!not-for-mail softrat wrote, in part: >On 07 Sep 1999 16:46:44 +0200, in rec.arts.books.tolkien Neil Franklin > wrote: >>Nope. As much as the pro-copyright propagandists like to repeat that >>line, as if it were an mantra, copying is not stealing. >Yes, it may be, as defined in law. Just because something isn't stealing doesn't mean it isn't wrong. Copyright and patent laws encourage people to write and invent, on the basis of a promise that they will be rewarded with a monopoly of what they have produced. If someone brews liquor without paying taxes, they're not stealing anything from anyone, but they have failed to make a social contribution the law demands of them. Copyright infringement is like this: nothing is directly _taken_ from someone who is _deprived of what is taken_, but instead someone merely has done something without paying the required levy on it. Unfortunately, since few people feel themselves to be direct victims of tax evasion, nonpayment of import duties, and the like, those seeking to promote observance of copyright law have tended to refer to violations as "stealing" because that is more emotionally appealing. That may seem useful, but it is also counterproductive, because people can see that someone taping a friend's CD isn't grabbing something out of anyone else's hands that was previously already there. The reason why it _is_ wrong is less obvious, but it is there: our society has promised artists a reward for their work, and this is failing to live up to an obligation as a citizen. But arguments on that level aren't persuasive to many people who see their society as having failed them because they can't find a job that pays well enough and so on. But everybody knows stealing is wrong... John Savard ( teneerf<- ) http://www.ecn.ab.ca/~jsavard/crypto.htm ###### From: darat9999@my-deja.com Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: Re: OT: copyright (was Re: electronic text opinions?) Date: Fri, 10 Sep 1999 18:59:17 GMT Organization: Deja.com - Share what you know. Learn what you don't. Lines: 16 Message-ID: <7rbkdu$pc6$1@nnrp1.deja.com> References: <37d92f6f.77061144@news.prosurfr.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: 162.114.124.191 X-Article-Creation-Date: Fri Sep 10 18:59:17 1999 GMT X-Http-User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 4.0; Windows NT) X-Http-Proxy: 1.1 x28.deja.com:80 (Squid/1.1.22) for client 162.114.124.191 X-MyDeja-Info: XMYDJUIDdarat9999 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news1.sunrise.ch!news.imp.ch!nntp-out.monmouth.com!newspeer.monmouth.com!nntp2.deja.com!nnrp1.deja.com!not-for-mail IMO, copyright theft is as much stealing as swiping a car from someone. You (the copyright stealer, that is) are getting profit from something you did not create and that profit would have gone to the rightful creator if they hadn't brought your ripped-off version first. As far as people not understanding it as theft, I think any adult with a halfway decent brain understands it is theft. Those who do it and get caught might come up with that line as an excuse for what they did, but they are just being self-serving in their denials. Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/ Share what you know. Learn what you don't. ###### From: Robert Brady Subject: Re: OT: copyright (was Re: electronic text opinions?) Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien References: <37d92f6f.77061144@news.prosurfr.com> <7rbkdu$pc6$1@nnrp1.deja.com> Reply-To: rwb197@ecs.soton.ac.uk X-URL: http://www.aber.mud.org/ X-Conspiracy: There is no conspiracy User-Agent: tin/pre-1.4-19990805 ("Preacher Man") (UNIX) (Linux/2.0.34 (i686)) NNTP-Posting-Host: soolin.ecs.soton.ac.uk Message-ID: <37dc0fa1@news.ecs.soton.ac.uk> Date: 12 Sep 1999 21:40:01 GMT X-Trace: 12 Sep 1999 21:40:01 GMT, soolin.ecs.soton.ac.uk Lines: 26 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!colt.net!baron.netcom.net.uk!netcom.net.uk!server3.netnews.ja.net!spruce.sucs.soton.ac.uk!news-spool.soton.ac.uk!news.ecs.soton.ac.uk!not-for-mail darat9999@my-deja.com wrote: > IMO, copyright theft is as much stealing as swiping a car from >someone. You (the copyright stealer, that is) are getting profit from >something you did not create and that profit would have gone to the >rightful creator if they hadn't brought your ripped-off version first. ITYM "record company", or "publisher", rather than creator. The vast majority of copyright violations (NOT theft), would not have resulted in legitimate sales if averted. This is true. Deal with it. And, to be honest, the publishing industry seems to be doing quite well, for itself. >As far as people not understanding it as theft, I think any adult with >a halfway decent brain understands it is theft. Those who do it and >get caught might come up with that line as an excuse for what they did, >but they are just being self-serving in their denials. That's an impressive line of argument, just calling everyone who disagrees with you 'not having a halfway decent brain'. I see there is no point arguing further with you. -- Robert ###### From: darat9999@my-deja.com Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: Re: OT: copyright (was Re: electronic text opinions?) Date: Wed, 15 Sep 1999 17:15:05 GMT Organization: Deja.com - Share what you know. Learn what you don't. Lines: 10 Message-ID: <7rok6d$naa$1@nnrp1.deja.com> References: <37d92f6f.77061144@news.prosurfr.com> <7rbkdu$pc6$1@nnrp1.deja.com> <37dc0fa1@news.ecs.soton.ac.uk> NNTP-Posting-Host: 162.114.124.191 X-Article-Creation-Date: Wed Sep 15 17:15:05 1999 GMT X-Http-User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 4.0; Windows NT) X-Http-Proxy: 1.1 x28.deja.com:80 (Squid/1.1.22) for client 162.114.124.191 X-MyDeja-Info: XMYDJUIDdarat9999 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news1.sunrise.ch!news.imp.ch!netnews.globalip.ch!news-raspail.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!news.belnet.be!newspump.monmouth.com!newspeer.monmouth.com!nntp2.deja.com!nnrp1.deja.com!not-for-mail Mr. Brady quote: "I see there is no point arguing further with you." Dear Mr. Brady, I was responding to a post by Mr. Savard. I was not 'arguing' with you. This was a 'IMO' post. Deal with it. Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/ Share what you know. Learn what you don't. ###### From: Robert Brady Subject: Re: OT: copyright (was Re: electronic text opinions?) Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien References: <37d92f6f.77061144@news.prosurfr.com> <7rbkdu$pc6$1@nnrp1.deja.com> <37dc0fa1@news.ecs.soton.ac.uk> <7rok6d$naa$1@nnrp1.deja.com> Reply-To: rwb197@ecs.soton.ac.uk X-URL: http://www.aber.mud.org/ X-Conspiracy: There is no conspiracy User-Agent: tin/pre-1.4-19990805 ("Preacher Man") (UNIX) (Linux/2.0.34 (i686)) NNTP-Posting-Host: soolin.ecs.soton.ac.uk Message-ID: <37e54f76@news.ecs.soton.ac.uk> Date: 19 Sep 1999 22:02:46 GMT X-Trace: 19 Sep 1999 22:02:46 GMT, soolin.ecs.soton.ac.uk Lines: 16 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news1.sunrise.ch!news.imp.ch!join.news.pipex.net!pipex!eyre.news.uk.uu.net!tank.news.pipex.net!pipex!server1.netnews.ja.net!server2.netnews.ja.net!news-spool.soton.ac.uk!news.ecs.soton.ac.uk!not-for-mail darat9999@my-deja.com wrote: > Mr. Brady quote: "I see there is no point arguing further with you." > Dear Mr. Brady, > I was responding to a post by Mr. Savard. I was not 'arguing' with >you. This was a 'IMO' post. Deal with it. You only qualified the first paragraph with at "IMO". In the second paragraph, you personally insulted a set of people that includes me. -- Robert The ASCII Consortium : dragging character encoding kicking and screaming into the 20th century! ###### From: darat9999@my-deja.com Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: Re: OT: copyright (was Re: electronic text opinions?) Date: Tue, 21 Sep 1999 18:02:54 GMT Organization: Deja.com - Share what you know. Learn what you don't. Lines: 21 Message-ID: <7s8h84$n55$1@nnrp1.deja.com> References: <37d92f6f.77061144@news.prosurfr.com> <7rbkdu$pc6$1@nnrp1.deja.com> <37dc0fa1@news.ecs.soton.ac.uk> <7rok6d$naa$1@nnrp1.deja.com> <37e54f76@news.ecs.soton.ac.uk> NNTP-Posting-Host: 162.114.124.191 X-Article-Creation-Date: Tue Sep 21 18:02:54 1999 GMT X-Http-User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 4.0; Windows NT) X-Http-Proxy: 1.1 x36.deja.com:80 (Squid/1.1.22) for client 162.114.124.191 X-MyDeja-Info: XMYDJUIDdarat9999 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!newsfeed-zh.ip-plus.net!news.ip-plus.net!News.Amsterdam.UnisourceCS!uunet!ams.uu.net!newsfeed2.news.nl.uu.net!sun4nl!news.csl-gmbh.net!blackbush.xlink.net!howland.erols.net!newsfeed.cwix.com!news.maxwell.syr.edu!nntp2.deja.com!nnrp1.deja.com!not-for-mail Dear Mr. Brady, I guess I should have thrown a few more 'IMO's around. In my mind I meant the IMO to apply to the whole post. Sorry you were offended, although since you seem like a person who has enough sense to operate a keyboard, I find it troubling that you place yourself in the 'doesn't think copyright swiping is stealing' block that I referred to in the 2nd paragraph. I bet if you thought up a unique way of producing something and someone who had never thought of that themselves, but was smart enough to see a moneymaking idea, and managed to get your unique idea to the market before you knew what hit you, I would think that maybe then you would see what I was commenting upon. Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/ Share what you know. Learn what you don't.