Slashdot Mirror
The Guardian On Intellectual Property
mykdavies writes "The Guardian has an excellent article giving lay readers an overview of some of the problems being caused by the concept of 'intellectual property', including references to stories familiar to Slashdot readers, such as DVD Jon, the Sony rootkit, Amazon and Google business patents." From the article: "Even facts about the world can, in some cases, become the property of commercial companies. It was the promise of gaining patents on the human genome that lured investors into the private consortium that attempted to sequence it in competition with the public effort. Laboratory animals have already been patented, starting with the OncoMouse, an animal whose genome has been manipulated to ensure that it develops cancer."
It's a troll, always posts this crap.
"Did You Say "Intellectual Property"? It's a Seductive Mirage "
Please help publicise swpat.org - the software patents wiki
The purpose of copyrights and patents is to promote the progress of science and useful arts USC Article I, Section 8, Clause 8. It's purpose is not to make inventors rich.
When you look at the great inventions, people mostly didn't do it for the money. I talking not about things like the light bulb but the fundamental research that went into most of the break through discoveries in science. Take just about anything, the vacuum tube, the transistor, integrated ciruit, the Internet, etc. and you'll find the incentive came, not from being able to get rich from it, but by the desire to create and discover. That people can make a living from their discoveries and inventions is great but it's not essential for progress.
Just wondering... isn't that covered under fair use (and perfectly legal as a result)? Can someone clarify this for me?
Thanks.
.-.
I saw the same thing, and they are wrong. it is legal to copy to your own IPod. Granted, Sony and others are trying to fix that, but in the US, you still have a right to archive any digital media you want, even if you archive the original and listen to the copy.
He is simply wrong on that point.
Tequila: It's not just for breakfast anymore!
Two years, and you still don't have anything new to say?
ABSURDITY, n.: A statement or belief manifestly inconsistent with one's own opinion.
Sony Corp. of America v. Universal City Studios, Inc., 464 U.S. 417 (1984)
:)
(aka "the Betamax case")
Essentially, the court found that home time-shifting is a fair use, which is not exactly the same as making "backups", it is extremely similar.
More on point might be American Geophysical Union v. Texaco, Inc., 60 F.3d 913 (2d Cir. 1994). In that case, the court found that making unauthorized copies of journal articles was copyright infringement. The copying there was much more similar to P2P, where there was a library with a single (or a few) copies of the journals, and researchers from texaco were making hundreds of copies so that they could each have their own at their work areas. But the court did state that if the purpose of the copying had primarily been so that a researcher could take the photocopy into the lab and not accidentally damage the original, it probably would have been fair use.
Section 107 of the Copyright Act outlines some specific instances of fair use (criticism, comment, news reporting, etc.), but does not limit fair use to only those purposes, instead codifying the judicial doctrine of fair use (the 4-part test somebody noted above).
Usual disclaimer applies: IANAL, just a well-meaning law student studying hard for his Copyright final.
fuck you.
Or rather "space shifting". The case is Recording Indus. Ass'n of Am. v. Diamond Multimedia Sys., Inc., 180 F.3d 1072 (9th Cir. 1999). That was the Rio MP3 player case.
...Such copying is paradigmatic noncommercial personal use entirely consistent with the purposes of the Act.
The Rio merely makes copies in order to render portable, or "space-shift," those files that already reside on a user's hard drive.
It relies heavily on the time-shifting analysis of Sony. I shoulda included it in my reply below...
fuck you.
It is completely irrelevant that those scientists are working for big companies, patents are not supposed to serve those companies, rather they are supposed to be an incentive to invent new things. Since they actually hinder inventions in this case, they should not be possible.
Yeah, It would be covered under fair use. If, however, there is any DRM on that CD, it is illegal to circumvent it to make copies, even if it would be covered under fair use.
"how can they call it a MINE if everything here is THEIRS?!?!" -Straight Jacket
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
Just wondering... isn't that covered under fair use (and perfectly legal as a result)? Can someone clarify this for me?
Yes, as long as it doesn't require you to circumvent an effective copy protection. Remember, fair use is only a defense against copyright violation, not circumvention.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Relax? Being able to patent any living thing (or the process in which a living this is modified) is a huge deal. And a scary one. You should really see the documentary 'the corporation' if you haven't already. One section of it deals with genetically modified foods/animals.
i neering.html
Just googling a little I found a bit from that's covered in the docu:
This monopolisation extends to effect the lives of us all, especially peasant farmers in the developing world. Monsanto planned to introduce its genetically modified seeds accompanied by its patented "technology protection system" which makes the seeds from this year's crop sterile. Critics call Monsanto's seed sterilising technology "terminator" and "suicide seeds". Wherever suicide seed technology is adopted, farmers will have to go back to Monsanto year after year too buy new ration of genetically modified seeds.
"By peddling suicide seeds, the biotechnology multinationals will lock the world's poorest farmers into a new form of genetic serfdom", says Emma Must of the World Development Movement. "Currently 80 per cent of crops in developing countries are grown using farm-saved seed. Being unable to save seeds from sterile crops could mean the difference between surviving and going under", she says. "More precisely", says Canadian journalist Gwynne Dyer, "it would speed the consolidation of small farms into the hands of those with the money to engage in industrialised agribusiness - which generally means higher profits but less employment and lower yields.
http://www.marxist.com/scienceandtech/genetic_eng
Also these 'terminator seeds' have been found in other crops by plants naturally crossbreeding and they've wanted to sue these farmers when the last thing they ever wanted were these terminator seeds.
There have indeed been cases of farmers being sued by Monsanto because their crops were contaminated bij pollen from nearby Monsanto crops. The most famous case is Monsanto vs Schmeiser.