[sword-devel] conversations with Stallman

[Jerry Kreps]

On Saturday 22 December 2001 01:34, Chris wrote:
> >>Yes but things that are wrong because they are against the
> >>law, not because of some deep moral principle, can be
> >>changed through the political process. That's why it's important
> >>not to call it theft or piracy when it's not theft or piracy.
> >
> >  I don't understand, how is stealing intellectual property
>
> What intellectual property? There is no such thing. There are
> copyrights, patents and trademarks - that's all.
>
> > not theft? I
> >don't know of any time God has advocated rebelling against any
> > reasonable law. Thus, if God doesn't advocate it, isn't it a deep
> > moral priciple?
>
> I am not an American, but let's look at the US constitution. 

Oh! That's interesting!  What country do you reside in, Chris?

> The founders, somewhat reluctantly allowed for copyrights and 
patents for a reasonable time to promote innovation. That  reasonable 
time was 14 years. Now copyrights are extended to longer  than a 
person's  lifetime and retrospectively. That does not promote 
inovation, and  it is a theft from  the public domain.

I wish more people believed that.  Thomas Jefferson did.

"If nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of 
exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an 
idea, which an individual may exclusively possess as long as he keeps 
it to himself; but the moment it is divulged, it forces itself into 
the possession of everyone, and the receiver cannot dispossess 
himself of it.  Its peculiar character, too, is that no one possesses 
the less, because every other possesses the whole of it. He who 
receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without 
lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light 
without darkening me. That ideas should freely spread from one to 
another over the globe, for the moral and mutual instruction of man, 
and improvement of his condition, seems to have been peculiarly and 
benevolently designed by nature, when she made them, like fire, 
expansible over all space, without lessening their density at any 
point, and like the air in which we breathe, move, and have our 
physical being, incapable of confinement or exclusive appropriation. 
Inventions then cannot, in nature, be a subject of property."
 - Thomas Jefferson



 Significantly, the founders did not argue for copyrights or patents 
as "property." Jefferson even explicitly dismissed a property model 
for copyright, and maintained his skepticism about the costs and 
benefits of copyright for many years. 

Fearing, justifiably, that copyright might eventually expand to 
encompass idea protection, not just expression protection, Jefferson 
wrote in 1813, "If nature has made any one thing less susceptible 
than all others of exclusive property, it is the action of the 
thinking power called an idea, which an individual may exclusively 
possess as long as he keeps it to himself; but the moment it is 
divulged, it forces itself into the possession of everyone, and the 
receiver cannot dispose himself of it." 

"Jefferson then declared the flaw in the notion of copyright as 
property. Unlike tangible property, ideas and expressions are not 
susceptible to natural scarcity. As Jefferson wrote of copyright, 
"Its peculiar character, too, is that no one possesses the less, 
because every other possesses the whole of it. He who receives an 
idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as 
he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening 
me." 

Therefore, Jefferson feared, the monopolists could use their 
state-granted power to strengthen their control over the flow of 
ideas and the use of expressions. 

Monopolies have the power to enrich themselves by evading the 
limitations of the competitive marketplace. Prices need not fall when 
demand slackens, and demand need not slacken if the monopoly makes 
itself essential to the economy (like electrical power or computer 
operating systems). "
http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a3b44a5770702.htm
JLK