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Hilary Rosen from RIAA will write Iraq's Copyrights?
sould writes "The Register is reporting that Hilary Rosen is to assist in writing Iraq's Intellectual Property laws. Can't have those Iraqi's pirating Eminem now can we?"
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As if the Iraqi people were not burried in oppression, now we're going to mire them up in US patent and IP nonsense. By the time we're through, the people will never have a foothold to get any technological endeavor off the ground. They'll be forever burried by our stupid laws. Of course, bad patent & IP laws are better than being murdered by your government, it's still kind of a sinister trade. The Iraqi people have no idea what we may be getting them into -- until they try to make any significant advances in the global technology industry. Someone explain to me how this isn't colonization?
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Guess somebody has their priorities straight...
If I said I didn't have an incentive to grow oranges uness I could plant a tree in your yard, or if I said I didn't have an incentive to grow cotton unless I could own slaves on the plantation, most people would see this is these as the worthless shallow arguments that they are. But if I said I didn't have an incentive to to make beneficial or creative works without a copyright monopoly, then all of a sudden people just take it on faith, they don't even question it, they just assume that society would fall apart without them. In my humble opinion, this is intellectually dishonest, especially considering that the entire Renassance happened without copyrights.
The simple fact is, there is no equivalency relationship between copyrights and property rights - incentive does not a right make. The moral and historical foundation of property derives from the fact that property has physical limits, while the foundation of copyrights dervives from kings who granted publishers monopolies in return for not publishing bad things about the monarchy. The history of Copyrights is not one of rights, but controll of sharing and restricting the open use of knowledge.
That is why people who copy are not criminals, thiefs, or akin to pirates who board ships and murder people. No, infact they are really victims of a cruel deception. A deception that copyrights somehow financially benefit artists and creators. The simple fact is, that for every artist that makes it "big" there are litterally thousands who copyrights haven't helped a bit, even hindered, or destroyed.
However, this is not the only failure of copyrights - it is just one in many issues related to copyrighrts that are just blown off ignored, or glossed over. Like the failures of Hollywood culture, the failures of big media to provide quality material, the failures to provide reasonably priced books to college students while tabloids are dirt cheap, and massive anti-trust behavior in the software industry to name a few.
While the problems associated with copyrights might have been bearable 20 years ago when the biggist issue was Xerox machines, today we are entering into the information age where information is so easy to copy and manipulate that there can be no middle ground. Our society will either half to controll all of it or none of it. Our communications will either half to be monitored or free, our privacy to be either contunuiously probed or protected
In that sense, copyrights are like a vine that will never stop growing to choke off our freedoms until we cut it off at the root. The DMCA, infinite extensions, billion dollar lawsiuts, are all just symptoms of a poor belief system - not the cause. So the efforts to find a "middle ground" on copyrights are a failure because they do not address the core issue. That contrary to copyrights, the right to copy and distribute creative works and knowledge is a right!
Like freedom of religion, and freedom of the press, the right to copy things is a right that exists above government. It is a moral right, it is an inherent right, it defines the very nature of the human condition. It is beyond politics and the petition of leaders.
In fact, the entire foundation of politics rests on the notion that it's better to fight wars with words than wars with bloodshed. But to copy things does not require coercion or viloence at all, the rules are not the same. We will not change the copyright situation by petitioning our leaders, or voteing to change the system. No it can only be changed by defiance.
Defiance by holding the belief that people have rights, even if those rights appear contrary to the popular mob or to the system. Defiance, by shedding off the guilt and shame that those who try to impose copyrights impose on us and understanding that they are the ones who should be guilty and shamefull. Defiance by copying and sharing creative works whenever we have acess to them. Defiance by using technologies that make it harder and harder for copyrights to be imposed upon us. And defi
Or maybe we're going to write the laws, and then if their elected representative doesn't enforce them, we'll get a new representative. Or even better, we could help enforce them ourselves. Joy.
This will most certainly help the poor image of the US in the middle east. We're showing our strong corporate interests. It's such a nice, clean, humanitarian image the US partrays, isn't it?
Developers: We can use your help.
There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that this will make Iraqis hate Americans more and more. For God's sake please stay away from imposing our rules (and ways) on them. Thats probably the last thing you want to do if you want to prove that we are there for liberation and not to force ourselves on them.
Jalil Vaidya
Yes, but the point that's being overlooked here is that copyrights don't have anything to do with "what's yours". Copyrights are a grant of exclusive use, for a limited time, by the Government. It is not really a property right.
One can no more own a work protected by copyright than a rancher who is grazing BLM lands owns the land his livestock are standing on.
I do think these important distinctions are being blurred. A lot of people seem to think they own ideas and others think that private property is a grant by the state. I'm not looking forward to the day when either of these beliefs become true.
A US corporate figure is going to have a word about how future LAW will look like in Iraq ???
If there was any doubt that the USA is just acting in the interests of it's corporations, then that doubt is now dead.
echo '[q]sa[ln0=aln80~Psnlbx]16isb572CCB9AE9DB03273snlbxq' |dc
Copyrights can and do benefit artists, when applied correctly. All the problems of the present copyright system are an outgrowth of the misapplication of copyright.
Copyright is supposed to benefit the whole of society by making sure that creative people get some recompense for being creative. Furthermore, the copyright laws of the US include a provision for fair use (like burning a disc for your friend); however, we currently have a copyright system that exists soley for the profit of CEO's. Copyrights now never expire, making them couterproductive to their original purpose, and the scope of what is considered fair use is being reduced everyday.
Simply ignoring copyright is not a solution. It gives the likes of Valenti and Rosen more amunition in their crusade for DRM and will lead to laws even worse than the DMCA.
If copyright really were a temporary thing, lasting, at most, 28 years, like it is supposed to, we would be able to freely trade almost everything ever recorded by The Beatles, The Doors, Buddy Holly, Elvis, etc. A great many novels would enter the public domain. Many films would be free to distribute. There would be a plentiful, rich, and significant public domain. As it is, books written by men long dead at the beginning of last century are still under copyright, a short cartoon of a rat is still locked up, and Michael Jackson owns the rights to Jahn Lennon's music. I agree that system is bad, but I think just ignoring will make it worse. The RIAA/MPAA/etc. will have even more fuel for their fires, and will be able to get laws passed that make the situation even worse than it is already. Fight for a return of reasonable copyrights, and artists and consumers will benefit.
my pet machine
I can't believe that. I'm sure that at least one of our proud 24-hour news stations would be all over that. Someone check the No-Spin Zone!
Face it, folks: This is an administration which plays the press perfectly and gets away with an astounding amount of this bullshit. We're just lucky it's not in the US this time -- he could be appointing more Enron lackies to head the army or obviously business-biased people to set policy. And he gets away with it 'cause the 24 hour "news" channels don't have the will or the stones to make, afraid that they'll lose interviews or access or credibility among people who made the WWE and NASCAR such powerhouses.
(sigh) Sorry, I guess my cynicism got out for a run again. I'm off to watch a few more hours of Fox News and MSNBC. Maybe I can hear another eloquent defense of that poor Senator from PA who's under attack by crazy lefties just because he hates homosexuals.
Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
The Bush Administration has stated over and over, VERY clearly that the Iraqi people are now "free" to build any government they want and "free" to write laws.
However, recently the Bush Administration has stated that it is unacceptable if the Iraqi people attempt to build an Islamic government (like that in Iran). And, Rosen is "writing" Iraqi law?
Does anyone see the double-standard here?
"You're free, as long as you agree with what we think is best for you."
If they're already saying "The laws will be created by the following people", listing amongst them people who aren't even Iraqi, then why are they not being called on it? Why is no media entity asking why the US and UK governments are imposing laws on a country they claim to have liberated?
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
Back in the day, the colonists "brought a new religion and civilization to the heathens in Africa"... and exploited the natural resources.
Now The United Corporations of America goes and "liberates the Iraqi from despotism in order to instore a democracy"... and exploit the natural resources.
Nothing changed, just the name and the countries doing it.
Ahhh...the great dumpster continuum. Many a free computer will be found there. -- sowth (748135)
"To wish death upon a person simply because her viewpoints are different from yours is completely barbaric."
Republican. Barbaric. Whichever.
More seriously, WTF is up with worrying about IP laws in a country that collectively doesn't have running water? Are photocopiers and CD burners so much a problem in a nation where most "modern" technology has been embargo'd for the last 12 years?
I can see it now: "Whip the camels faster, Ali, we almost have 'Jagged Little Pill'"
OTOH, Ms. Rosen is free for the first time to establish her dream: The Elite P2P Death Squad.
-- I wanna decide who lives and who dies - Crow T. Robot, MST3K
I've heard that statement before... concerning Vietnam. I recall it also concerning Iran.
In both places, the US had their wondeful little puppets (Ngo Den Diem and Shah Resa Pahlavi respectively) ruling in a 'democratic' state that very quickly degraded into totalitarianism that only stood because they were backed by the almighty military support of the United States.
What did the public want? In Vietnam, they wanted the Vietminh. They WANTED communism. They HATED Ngo Den Diem; buddhist monks lit themselves on fire in protest.
In Iran, they wanted the Ayatollah Khomeini and his Islamic state. The Shah had serious military backing, however, from the United States (It was Rummsfeld et all who did this, btw, along with war criminal Harry Kissenger).
So what happened? Eventually 'popular opinion' won, but not until long after many abuses of human rights and freedoms by the US-supported governments. Ngo Den Diem was assassinated, and the Shah was exiled. Both countries abhor the politics of the United States to this day for a VERY GOOD reason.
Want to take a bet on whether this is EXACTLY what will happen in Iraq? The US is already abusing their rights and freedoms, and this is BEFORE they've put in the puppet government.