How do you have a right for whatever twisted contract you may dream up to be negotiable on fair ground? Signing away your freedom to copy, in exchange for nothing, is a fully one sided agreement in which only the delusional would sign. on fair ground. Copyright gives intellectual property producers, such as hollywood and microsoft, unfair power over their customers.
Your words fit exactly. It is a slap in the face, nothing more.
Why am I obligated to not copy their product just because I don't respect them enough to pay for it? I am violating another persons righ to profit off hte use of hteir intellectual property? Well that is exactly my point, intellectual property is an abomination.
Yes, it takes much effort and money to make a movie. If everybody did what I did, the costs would not be reimbursed and the movie company would go out of business. Whats the problem here? thats life.
Just because you put great effort into creating a benefit does not entitle you to any reward whatsoever for those who enjoy the benefit. Any payment IS a donation, and ought to be legally viewed as such.
Your argument seems to be that if i get a benefit, the creator deserves a reward. I don't see this deservement is strong enough to warrant enforcement by force.
People like you make me vomit, then shoot liquid brown foul smelling fluids out of a nether pore.
You say we should just do without. How does this benefit anyone? How does my not seeing a movie help anyone more than if i choose to see it without paying? Whats the difference?
Industries to not have a right to exist. If they can only exist through extortion, they should not exist at all.
I think art existed before intellectual property laws.
Motivation for creating content is not as important as my freedom to use a cd burner in the privacy of my home. It is exactly the same as child sex and recreational drugs. The part about motivation and payment is completely irrelevant.
WHat legal ground is there for copyright infringement? This isn't about law, i know copyright law does indeed exist. The issue is morals. Copyright law is immoral. Nothing can take away my right to copy things freely, and nothing can force me to part with my money in exchange for a movie company to part with nothing.
Lets see, I pay 5 bucks for the right to view a movie. I lose 5 dollars. What does the movie company lose? They still have their movie. They did not work harder so I could have it. I have given them something, they have kept everything. THat is extortion. Payment of course should not be optional for all cases, such as a physical product, or a service. You are quite foolish if you think you can have a guaranteed income when you sell a product for which payment is optional, as it is with all intellectual "property".
Payment is optional because the producers don't give up anything. If you don't give me something, I shouldn't have to pay anything, even if I enjoy a benefit you created.
The right for your preferred business model to be valid is NOT a given. The right to not submit to extortion, and basic freedom within my home is most certainly a given.
It does not help your credibility that you repeatedly attempt to justify intellectual property through analogies with physical property. If I steal a car, the dealer no longer has a car. If i pirate a movie, i have created another copy, the stores all have just as many as they used to. There are valid arguments for IP, but not through analogies with physical property. So that deflates half your argument.
As far as no more movies being made... If enough people want to pay for movies, as you apparently do, then the movies will get made. How will it help anyone if I go without instead of pirating? If nobody but me can ever possibly know, how can anyone but me possibly be hurt? If we all choose to not watch movies, it has the same effect as everybody pirating them. Why should one be preferable to the producers than the other?
The only reason I can come up with is a vague notion of injustice based on the idea that it is immoral to recieve any benefit without paying the creator of the benefit. It seems that it is maybe rude to not pay, but how is this rudeness anywhere near as bad as theft?
No. Theft would be if I stole it from the movie store. I can view it without paying by going to a friends house. That is legal, is it not? Say me renting a seat in the theatre is worth 2 dollars. Then I should pay maybe 2 dollars for the ticket. If I want to donate to the producers, that is my business and my business alone.
I agree completely. What right does anybody have to expect money just because you viewed a copy of their movie/software/music? What does the fact that you look at/copy it have to do with how much effort they put into it, how much it cost to make, and how much money they ought to make? If they make a movie, spending billions of dollars, and nobody pays to see it, well then they should have thought of that before making the movie. It is just like software. If the movie producers want to get rich making their movies, they must find a way to be paid for making them, NOT for viewing them. Just like software, movies are less valuable if fewer people can see them.
You are completely justified in 'pirating' a movie rather than submitting to extortion. Think about it, how much more does it cost the movie producers when you view their movie? How much more work do they have to do when you give 1000 copies away? ZERO!! Asking to pay for copying is demanding something for nothing, which is most certainly wrong. Some people claim that viewing a movie without paying is getting something for nothing, and therefore stealing. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Viewing a movie gratis is getting nothing for nothing. You aren't getting anything, except the right to do something no one has the right to deny you.
If this causes the movie industry to crumble and die, as is happening any time now with software and music, then so be it. Musicians will still write music, they have for years before copyright. Software will still be written, it is necessary for many aspects of life and business. If movies don't get made it is because nobody wants to pay. If nobody wants to pay, then obviously no one would care if they stop being made.
The point is that child porn should not be a crime. There is nothing wrong with having brutal, violent, vulgar sex with young, underage, deliciously innocent childs. And even if there was, distributing pictures has nothing to do with the children. Maybe it should be illegal to rape the children, but certainly not to distribute pictures of it. Most americans seem to have some very twisted values. It's ok for children to be porn, but not have sex? Come on!
Umm, is freeware not a contraction of Free Software? And GPL is the license for free software, correct? So how is freeware incorrect? Sure, it would be horrific to call GPL software public domain, or shareware, or something, but whats wrong with calling it freeware? (other than it sounding lame as hell)
Wine has two sides, the set of win32 libs, "wine is not an emulator", and the win32 executable loader/executor. Wine is both not an emulator AND a WINdows Emulator. If you use wine to run solitaire, it certainly doesn't magically become a native app, but it does run.
I would very much like to continue this discussion, as you seem to be coherent, unlike most pushers of the right to write proprietary software. email me at Todd-Kosloff@utulsa.edu
you are not denying freedom by not making your last english paper freely distributable. You are not denying freedom by not giving out your root password. Likewise, you are not denying freedom by not release your source code. The denial of freedom comes in when you give/sell me software, and then tell me not to further distribute it. YOu don't have to write the software. You don't have to give me a copy. Once i have a copy, I have the freedom to do what I want with it, short of claim it as my own.
I think the murder analogy holds up very well. Of course freedom of software can't be compared to the horribleness of murder, but one freedom contradicting another is quite the same.
You writing propietary software does not hurt my freedom to write free software, but that isn't the point. Your placing software under a restrictive license takes away my freedom, my right, to use my hardware to make copies of what is on my hard drive. There isn't a privacy issue because you are perfectly willingly to give a copy to anyone with a little money. Once I hear a poem, a joke, a funny story, an interesting observation, i can retell it. You can't take away my right to do that, given the fact that I credit you properly. Would taking away this right not be a direct attack on freedom of speech? How is software any different?
The part of the GPL forcing source to be released is another matter entirely. That is far to complicated to discuss here. Perhaps in email.
If the QPL was actually superior, than it's being incompatible with the GPL might be the fault of GNU being stupid, But that is not the case. No one should be forced to distribute their work. That is a horrible violation of privacy. Once you distribute it, however, you have no right to try to control further redistribution. The patch clause doesn't really matter because CVS works that way anyway. It's fine to be more profitable, but not at the expense of freedom or privacy.
i read it before, and i just read it again the only restrictions i see is that you cannot make a derivative work, and then put it under a different license. You are free to use, distribute, and modify, so long as everybody you distribute it to has the same rights you did. Perhaps i missed something? feel free to point out whatever restrictions you are thinking of.
thats the law, and the law is bastard i don't ask others to write software for me, i ask them not to tell me what to do on my computer in the privacy of my home, regardless of whether i make use of software they wrote
I would be interested to know what you mean by 'Guess freedom has only one side'. Everyone ought to have the freedom to write, modify, distribute, and use software freely, without restriction. As long as copyright exists, only GPL or similar license can guaruntee this. What other side do you want? The freedom to use other peoples software, while also having the freedom to restrict others use of your software? sorry you can't have it both ways you can't have the freedom to live if you want the freedom to murder
they wouldn't have to release the source just for 'including' gcc. They would have to release the source if they cut and paste code from gcc into vc++, making vc++ a derivative work of gcc. As far as BeOS, porting something GPL'd to an operating system most certainly does not force that operating system to be GPL.
I will not respond to your personal attacks, but I will respond to your attacks on the GPL.
Yes the GPL is 'a frigging copyright', but the only restriction it places is that nobody is allowed to place additional restrictions on the work, it's copies, and any derivative works.
Yes, copyright is what gives GPL the legal power to restrict your propietary use of gcc. Think for half a second about what this means. It means you can't place restrictions on gcc or any modifications, that's all. If there weren't copyright laws you wouldn't be able to put restrictions on it either. What the GPL does is simulate a world without copyright. Some people claim that this is hypocritical, but those people are confused. It isn't the copyright that is wrong, it is using it to place restrictions. A restriction stating that no restrictions may be imposed, such as the GPL, is a perfectly valid weapon to combat all that is propietary. The clause about releasing the source code, however, is at least debatable. If you want to argue that being forced to release the source to derivative works is going too far, then we can argue that.
Microsoft could replace the vc++ back end with gcc today, without violating any licenses or laws. All they have to do is allow vc++ to be freely distributed, and make the source code available.
you are completely wrong. No company or person has any right whatsoever to use copyright to place restrictions on information. GPL is the only ethical license because it garuntees that the software and all derivative works will not have restrictions. Unless of course you consider the fact that the GPL doesn't let you place restrictions to be a restriction in and of itself, but that of course is simply doublethink.
Wrong wrong wrong! When you use the long distance service you are taking up resources on their physical hardware, which means at the time when you are making a call they can now handle one less call at that time. You are paying for the right to use their scarce hardware.
With software you are paying for the right to use YOUR OWN hardware with their non-scarce software. Using long distance with out paying is ripping them off because you are hogging their systems without permission. When you are using it they can't sell that service you are taking up, nor can they use it themselves. That I might call theft of service. Using software without paying, even if you think is bad, is not the same thing, and isn't even related. When you use software without paying you are enjoying the benefits of a service already performed. If I priate 1000 copies of 3dsmax, kinnetix has just as many copies as they had before. Assuming the people I gave copies to wouldn't have bought it anyway, kinnetix experiences no change in ability to use, sell, or distribute their product. You seem to believe that if something benefits you, you are obligated to pay for whoever is responsible. Why should I have to pay for the development of 3dsmax? I never asked anyone to write it. I never entered a contract under which I would pay for it to be written, nor would kinnetix be doing any additional work nor would i be typing up their hardware if I were to pirate it.
If you want to argue that information is property, go ahead and do it. That is a matter of philosophy.
But there is a fundamental difference between the 'crime' of pirating software and the crimes of stealing cars, or phreaking the phone company. Confusing those issues only makes you sound brainwashed and stupid.
1) using software is taking advantage of a service already provided. There is no additional service no matter how many people use it.
2) If many people want to enter into a contract under which they will use ms word under certain conditions, then of course that is their business. But if that were the case copyright law wouldn't be needed, ordinary contract law could take care of it. Paying for software, then having the option of either agreeing to the license and using the software under unnacceptable terms, or not accepting the license and being unable to use the software, is not acceptable. many stores will not except returns or exchanges on software. And we've seen how taking it to microsoft doesn't do any better. I would have no problem with copyright if it always took the form of a WRITTEN contract. At the time of payment, the salesperson presents you with a contract, which you must sign, NOT click. The difference is if I signed such a contract, and a thief stole my copy, and the thief distributed copies, the recipients of those copies would not be under the contract. Copyright law prevents copying without permission, whether or not you agreed not to copy in the first place.
3) I do use free software instead of pirating proprietary software. I am commenting on how the proprietary model is a flawed and evil system.
You are the one being silly. You don't pay the phone company for building the phone system, you pay them for renting a line. while you are using the phone, that is one less call they can handle at the moment. Just because it's a flat montly fee instead of minute by minute doesn't change anything. Of course service has value, but me copying software is not the software company doing me a service. The only service was me copying. If they don't want people using their software, they don't have to make and sell it in the first place. Your logic says that copying software is identicle to holding a programmer and gunpoint and forcing him to write something. But of course that isn't what happens. What happens is I spread the usefulness of the programmers service a little farther. It is absolutely wrong to take money for doing nothing! you shouldn't get paid for sitting on your ass. If you want to get paid for coding, find someone to pay you for coding! If you aren't willing to pay someone to write ms word, which will then be available to all, then as a matter of simple economics ms word can't and shouldn't be written.
Your logic would mean that if by some act of genious you were able to make it rain chocolate syrup every wednesday, then if you want to drink the syrup you should pay. Otherwise, just put out an umbrella and be very careful not to let any fall into your mouth. How can you not think that is absurd? To get paid for service arrange for payment BEFORE you do the service.
I agree with you completely. It is amazing how many people have been brainwashed to believe that programmers and artists have the 'right' to tell their customers what they can and can't do with a product they have paid for. Extracting royalties is extortion, plain and simple. currently copyright is a fashionable, legal, and sometimes very profitable way of enabling organized crime. Civil disobedience combined with Free Software is the way to reduce the impact of these unethical laws. It's amazing how this kind of debate usually goes. Supporters of intellectual property always repeatedly make the same logical mistakes. Even if you think copyright is a good idea, violating it is still something very very different from theft. Absolutely no monetary loss can be placed on such a violation because it is unknown whether the software would have been bought if it wasn't copied. Another logical mistake often made is that it has something to do with keeping your word or breaking a contract. Well I don't know about you, but I wasn't presented with any contract last time I bought a book. Nor will I accept that just because the cat jumped on the keyboard and pressed ENTER before I had a chance to read the EULA that I have sold my sole to microsoft. Copyright law says that the author controls duplication. This does not involve any contract or licensing. You don't need a license to read a book. You simply need permission to copy it. Same with software. While it is nice to get the author's permission before copying his work, If you were able to legally obtain a copy without SIGNING (not clicking) a nondisclosure agreement, it is obscene that legal action can be taken for using a copy machine or disk drive in the privacy of your own home, perhaps helping out some friends in the process.
Re:What a tangled web we weave...
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if slave owning were legal, while you may be free at the moment, that is no garuntee you not be taken as a slave at any time. If i enslave you, but then give you all your freedoms, you are in effect free. In fact you are even more free than if I did not own you, for now there is not a possibility that anyone else will enslave you under worse terms. that is how the GPL works. No one would care if you could legally own people if this ownership gives you no control over them. Say i place one restriction on my slave, he himself may not own a slave. Is this restricting his freedom? of course. does that mean he is not free? no. lack of freedom to enslave and harm others is not really a lack of freedom.
when you copyright software you enslave it. when you license it under the gpl, you give it the utmost freedom, except the freedom to have children (derivative works) who can become slaves. with a public domain license the software and its descendants can be taken slave at any time. This is not freedom. Freedom is being free and never in the future being able to lose that freedom.
What natural rights does the GPL force anyone to give up? The right to make derivative works and place them under whatever license you choose? Since when is modifying someone elses work and claiming it as your own a natural right? The right to control your own work through ordinary copyright you say? Copyright is not a right, it is an artificial government granted monopoly.
Calling GPL free sofware is exactly like calling a US citizen a free man. Neither are free to be involved with slavery, but no one in their right mind would argue that calling either 'free' is misleading.
Re:Free/Open Software & Communism - Weak
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RMS Responds
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how about if the state copied your house, and gave copies to the poor. Would this still be communism. You still have your rights to do what you want with your house. The point is other people are free to copy, use, and make derivative houses.
YOu blathiner misquoting fool
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RMS Responds
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he never said programmers shouldn't make lots of money. He said they don't HAVE to. You don't have a RIGHT to make any money at all. If people simply refused to pay programmers, that is their problem. Probably less software would be written if you could never get paid for writing software. Thats just too bad, but it isn't a right. You do NOT decide your own salary, your salary is whatever your customers/employers want to pay you. The current system redistributes money towards programmers in an unfair and destructive way, as we have seen with Bill Gates. RMS simply said that if programmers can only make as much money as clerks than thats the way it is.
I can't make money picking flies out of a dung heap. It is a very difficult and highly skilled job. I use my sensitive and highly trained nose to pick out the flies from the dung. But no one is willing to pay me for it! OH NO! people are benefiting from this! You sneak into farmers' barns and pick all the flies out the dung heap. Now there are less flies, and the farmers are helped. But still they refuse to pay you!!! How immoral! There must be laws to force your salary through the roof.
Well, you dumbass bastard, the world doesn't work like that. If you can't make money selling software, it means you shouldn't be selling software. Maybe you should be selling something that has value!! HOw about SERVICE? sell your service as a programmer. That can make money. Selling something that has no scarcity is not economically feasable. Laws making it economically feasable are completely absurd. Thats like a tax to pay for your fine flatulence you work so hard to produce.
DEciding your salary for you, bah, you can't manipulate the system to set your salary! your salary is what people will pay! if programmers don't make money, then they just don't.
People like you are causing us to head into that horrible world where every time you read a book you pay a royalty, and violating this is punishable by death.
Slashdot Mirror
But we aren't talking about theft, we are talking about duplication.
How do you have a right for whatever twisted contract you may dream up to be negotiable on fair ground? Signing away your freedom to copy, in exchange for nothing, is a fully one sided agreement in which only the delusional would sign. on fair ground. Copyright gives intellectual property producers, such as hollywood and microsoft, unfair power over their customers.
Your words fit exactly. It is a slap in the face, nothing more.
Why am I obligated to not copy their product just because I don't respect them enough to pay for it?
I am violating another persons righ to profit off hte use of hteir intellectual property? Well that is exactly my point, intellectual property is an abomination.
Yes, it takes much effort and money to make a movie. If everybody did what I did, the costs would not be reimbursed and the movie company would go out of business. Whats the problem here? thats life.
Just because you put great effort into creating a benefit does not entitle you to any reward whatsoever for those who enjoy the benefit. Any payment IS a donation, and ought to be legally viewed as such.
Your argument seems to be that if i get a benefit, the creator deserves a reward. I don't see this deservement is strong enough to warrant enforcement by force.
People like you make me vomit, then shoot liquid brown foul smelling fluids out of a nether pore.
You say we should just do without. How does this benefit anyone? How does my not seeing a movie help anyone more than if i choose to see it without paying? Whats the difference?
Industries to not have a right to exist. If they can only exist through extortion, they should not exist at all.
I think art existed before intellectual property laws.
Motivation for creating content is not as important as my freedom to use a cd burner in the privacy of my home. It is exactly the same as child sex and recreational drugs. The part about motivation and payment is completely irrelevant.
WHat legal ground is there for copyright infringement? This isn't about law, i know copyright law does indeed exist. The issue is morals. Copyright law is immoral. Nothing can take away my right to copy things freely, and nothing can force me to part with my money in exchange for a movie company to part with nothing.
Lets see, I pay 5 bucks for the right to view a movie. I lose 5 dollars. What does the movie company lose? They still have their movie. They did not work harder so I could have it. I have given them something, they have kept everything. THat is extortion. Payment of course should not be optional for all cases, such as a physical product, or a service.
You are quite foolish if you think you can have a guaranteed income when you sell a product for which payment is optional, as it is with all intellectual "property".
Payment is optional because the producers don't give up anything. If you don't give me something, I shouldn't have to pay anything, even if I enjoy a benefit you created.
The right for your preferred business model to be valid is NOT a given. The right to not submit to extortion, and basic freedom within my home is most certainly a given.
It does not help your credibility that you repeatedly attempt to justify intellectual property through analogies with physical property. If I steal a car, the dealer no longer has a car. If i pirate a movie, i have created another copy, the stores all have just as many as they used to. There are valid arguments for IP, but not through analogies with physical property. So that deflates half your argument.
As far as no more movies being made...
If enough people want to pay for movies, as you apparently do, then the movies will get made. How will it help anyone if I go without instead of pirating? If nobody but me can ever possibly know, how can anyone but me possibly be hurt? If we all choose to not watch movies, it has the same effect as everybody pirating them. Why should one be preferable to the producers than the other?
The only reason I can come up with is a vague notion of injustice based on the idea that it is immoral to recieve any benefit without paying the creator of the benefit. It seems that it is maybe rude to not pay, but how is this rudeness anywhere near as bad as theft?
No. Theft would be if I stole it from the movie store. I can view it without paying by going to a friends house. That is legal, is it not? Say me renting a seat in the theatre is worth 2 dollars. Then I should pay maybe 2 dollars for the ticket. If I want to donate to the producers, that is my business and my business alone.
I agree completely. What right does anybody have to expect money just because you viewed a copy of their movie/software/music? What does the fact that you look at/copy it have to do with how much effort they put into it, how much it cost to make, and how much money they ought to make? If they make a movie, spending billions of dollars, and nobody pays to see it, well then they should have thought of that before making the movie. It is just like software. If the movie producers want to get rich making their movies, they must find a way to be paid for making them, NOT for viewing them. Just like software, movies are less valuable if fewer people can see them.
You are completely justified in 'pirating' a movie rather than submitting to extortion. Think about it, how much more does it cost the movie producers when you view their movie? How much more work do they have to do when you give 1000 copies away? ZERO!! Asking to pay for copying is demanding something for nothing, which is most certainly wrong. Some people claim that viewing a movie without paying is getting something for nothing, and therefore stealing. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Viewing a movie gratis is getting nothing for nothing. You aren't getting anything, except the right to do something no one has the right to deny you.
If this causes the movie industry to crumble and die, as is happening any time now with software and music, then so be it. Musicians will still write music, they have for years before copyright. Software will still be written, it is necessary for many aspects of life and business. If movies don't get made it is because nobody wants to pay. If nobody wants to pay, then obviously no one would care if they stop being made.
The point is that child porn should not be a crime. There is nothing wrong with having brutal, violent, vulgar sex with young, underage, deliciously innocent childs.
And even if there was, distributing pictures has nothing to do with the children. Maybe it should be illegal to rape the children, but certainly not to distribute pictures of it. Most americans seem to have some very twisted values. It's ok for children to be porn, but not have sex? Come on!
Umm, is freeware not a contraction of Free Software? And GPL is the license for free software, correct? So how is freeware incorrect? Sure, it would be horrific to call GPL software public domain, or shareware, or something, but whats wrong with calling it freeware? (other than it sounding lame as hell)
Have you even tried wine?
Wine has two sides, the set of win32 libs,
"wine is not an emulator", and the win32 executable loader/executor. Wine is both not an emulator AND a WINdows Emulator. If you use wine to run solitaire, it certainly doesn't magically become a native app, but it does run.
I would very much like to continue this discussion, as you seem to be coherent, unlike most pushers of the right to write proprietary software. email me at Todd-Kosloff@utulsa.edu
you are not denying freedom by not making your
last english paper freely distributable.
You are not denying freedom by not giving out your root password.
Likewise, you are not denying freedom by not
release your source code.
The denial of freedom comes in when you give/sell
me software, and then tell me not to further distribute it. YOu don't have to write the software. You don't have to give me a copy. Once i have a copy, I have the freedom to do what I want with it, short of claim it as my own.
I think the murder analogy holds up very well. Of course freedom of software can't be compared to the horribleness of murder, but one freedom contradicting another is quite the same.
You writing propietary software does not hurt my freedom to write free software, but that isn't the point. Your placing software under a restrictive license takes away my freedom, my right, to use my hardware to make copies of what is on my hard drive. There isn't a privacy issue because you are perfectly willingly to give a copy to anyone with a little money.
Once I hear a poem, a joke, a funny story, an interesting observation, i can retell it. You can't take away my right to do that, given the fact that I credit you properly. Would taking away this right not be a direct attack on freedom of speech? How is software any different?
The part of the GPL forcing source to be released is another matter entirely. That is far to complicated to discuss here. Perhaps in email.
If the QPL was actually superior, than it's being incompatible with the GPL might be the fault of GNU being stupid, But that is not the case. No one should be forced to distribute their work. That is a horrible violation of privacy. Once you distribute it, however, you have no right to try to control further redistribution. The patch clause doesn't really matter because CVS works that way anyway. It's fine to be more profitable, but not at the expense of freedom or privacy.
i read it before, and i just read it again
the only restrictions i see is that you cannot make a derivative work, and then put it under a different license. You are free to use, distribute, and modify, so long as everybody you distribute it to has the same rights you did. Perhaps i missed something? feel free to point out whatever restrictions you are thinking of.
thats the law, and the law is bastard
i don't ask others to write software for me,
i ask them not to tell me what to do on my
computer in the privacy of my home, regardless
of whether i make use of software they wrote
I would be interested to know what you mean by 'Guess freedom has only one side'. Everyone ought to have the freedom to write, modify, distribute, and use software freely, without restriction. As long as copyright exists, only GPL or similar license can guaruntee this. What other side do you want? The freedom to use other peoples software, while also having the freedom to restrict others use of your software? sorry you can't have it both ways
you can't have the freedom to live if you want the freedom to murder
they wouldn't have to release the source just for 'including' gcc. They would have to release the source if they cut and paste code from gcc into vc++, making vc++ a derivative work of gcc.
As far as BeOS, porting something GPL'd to an operating system most certainly does not force that operating system to be GPL.
I will not respond to your personal attacks,
but I will respond to your attacks on the GPL.
Yes the GPL is 'a frigging copyright', but the only restriction it places is that nobody is allowed to place additional restrictions on the work, it's copies, and any derivative works.
Yes, copyright is what gives GPL the legal power to restrict your propietary use of gcc. Think for half a second about what this means. It means you can't place restrictions on gcc or any modifications, that's all. If there weren't copyright laws you wouldn't be able to put restrictions on it either. What the GPL does is simulate a world without copyright. Some people claim that this is hypocritical, but those people are confused. It isn't the copyright that is wrong, it is using it to place restrictions. A restriction stating that no restrictions may be imposed, such as the GPL, is a perfectly valid weapon to combat all that is propietary.
The clause about releasing the source code, however, is at least debatable. If you want to argue that being forced to release the source to derivative works is going too far, then we can argue that.
Microsoft could replace the vc++ back end with gcc today, without violating any licenses or laws. All they have to do is allow vc++ to be freely distributed, and make the source code available.
you are completely wrong. No company or person has any right whatsoever to use copyright to place restrictions on information. GPL is the only ethical license because it garuntees that the software and all derivative works will not have restrictions. Unless of course you consider the fact that the GPL doesn't let you place restrictions to be a restriction in and of itself, but that of course is simply doublethink.
Wrong wrong wrong!
When you use the long distance service you are taking up resources on their physical hardware, which means at the time when you are making a call they can now handle one less call at that time. You are paying for the right to use their scarce hardware.
With software you are paying for the right to use YOUR OWN hardware with their non-scarce software. Using long distance with out paying is ripping them off because you are hogging their systems without permission. When you are using it they can't sell that service you are taking up, nor can they use it themselves. That I might call theft of service. Using software without paying, even if you think is bad, is not the same thing, and isn't even related. When you use software without paying you are enjoying the benefits of a service already performed. If I priate 1000 copies of 3dsmax, kinnetix has just as many copies as they had before. Assuming the people I gave copies to wouldn't have bought it anyway, kinnetix experiences no change in ability to use, sell, or distribute their product.
You seem to believe that if something benefits you, you are obligated to pay for whoever is responsible. Why should I have to pay for the development of 3dsmax? I never asked anyone to write it. I never entered a contract under which I would pay for it to be written, nor would kinnetix be doing any additional work nor would i be typing up their hardware if I were to pirate it.
If you want to argue that information is property, go ahead and do it. That is a matter of philosophy.
But there is a fundamental difference between the 'crime' of pirating software and the crimes of stealing cars, or phreaking the phone company. Confusing those issues only makes you sound brainwashed and stupid.
1) using software is taking advantage
of a service already provided. There is no additional service no matter how many people use it.
2) If many people want to enter into a contract under which they will use ms word under certain conditions, then of course that is their business. But if that were the case copyright law wouldn't be needed, ordinary contract law could take care of it. Paying for software, then having the option of either agreeing to the license and using the software under unnacceptable terms, or not accepting the license and being unable to use the software, is not acceptable. many stores will not except returns or exchanges on software. And we've seen how taking it to microsoft doesn't do any better. I would have no problem with copyright if it always took the form of a WRITTEN contract. At the time of payment, the salesperson presents you with a contract, which you must sign, NOT click. The difference is if I signed such a contract, and a thief stole my copy, and the thief distributed copies, the recipients of those copies would not be under the contract. Copyright law prevents copying without permission, whether or not you agreed not to copy in the first place.
3) I do use free software instead of pirating proprietary software. I am commenting on how the proprietary model is a flawed and evil system.
You are the one being silly.
You don't pay the phone company for building
the phone system, you pay them for renting
a line. while you are using the phone, that is
one less call they can handle at the moment.
Just because it's a flat montly fee instead of
minute by minute doesn't change anything. Of course service has value, but me copying software is not the software company doing me a service. The only service was me copying. If they don't want people using their software, they don't have to make and sell it in the first place. Your logic says that copying software is identicle to holding a programmer and gunpoint and forcing him to write something. But of course that isn't what happens. What happens is I spread the usefulness of the programmers service a little farther. It is absolutely wrong to take money for doing nothing! you shouldn't get paid for sitting on your ass. If you want to get paid for coding, find someone to pay you for coding! If you aren't willing to pay someone to write ms word, which will then be available to all, then as a matter of simple economics ms word can't and shouldn't be written.
Your logic would mean that if by some act of genious you were able to make it rain chocolate syrup every wednesday, then if you want to drink the syrup you should pay. Otherwise, just put out an umbrella and be very careful not to let any fall into your mouth. How can you not think that is absurd? To get paid for service arrange for payment BEFORE you do the service.
I agree with you completely. It is amazing how many people have been brainwashed to believe that programmers and artists have the 'right' to tell their customers what they can and can't do with a product they have paid for. Extracting royalties is extortion, plain and simple. currently copyright is a fashionable, legal, and sometimes very profitable way of enabling organized crime. Civil disobedience combined with Free Software is the way to reduce the impact of these unethical laws. It's amazing how this kind of debate usually goes. Supporters of intellectual property always repeatedly make the same logical mistakes. Even if you think copyright is a good idea, violating it is still something very very different from theft. Absolutely no monetary loss can be placed on such a violation because it is unknown whether the software would have been bought if it wasn't copied. Another logical mistake often made is that it has something to do with keeping your word or breaking a contract. Well I don't know about you, but I wasn't presented with any contract last time I bought a book. Nor will I accept that just because the cat jumped on the keyboard and pressed ENTER before I had a chance to read the EULA that I have sold my sole to microsoft. Copyright law says that the author controls duplication. This does not involve any contract or licensing. You don't need a license to read a book. You simply need permission to copy it. Same with software. While it is nice to get the author's permission before copying his work, If you were able to legally obtain a copy without SIGNING (not clicking) a nondisclosure agreement, it is obscene that legal action can be taken for using a copy machine or disk drive in the privacy of your own home, perhaps helping out some friends in the process.
if slave owning were legal, while you may be free at the moment, that is no garuntee you not be taken as a slave at any time. If i enslave you, but then give you all your freedoms, you are in effect free. In fact you are even more free than if I did not own you, for now there is not a possibility that anyone else will enslave you under worse terms. that is how the GPL works.
No one would care if you could legally own people if this ownership gives you no control over them. Say i place one restriction on my slave, he himself may not own a slave. Is this restricting his freedom? of course. does that mean he is not free? no. lack of freedom to enslave and harm others is not really a lack of freedom.
when you copyright software you enslave it. when you license it under the gpl, you give it the utmost freedom, except the freedom to have children (derivative works) who can become slaves. with a public domain license the software and its descendants can be taken slave at any time. This is not freedom. Freedom is being free and never in the future being able to lose that freedom.
What natural rights does the GPL force anyone to give up? The right to make derivative works and place them under whatever license you choose? Since when is modifying someone elses work and claiming it as your own a natural right? The right to control your own work through ordinary copyright you say? Copyright is not a right, it is an artificial government granted monopoly.
Calling GPL free sofware is exactly like calling a US citizen a free man. Neither are free to be involved with slavery, but no one in their right mind would argue that calling either 'free' is misleading.
how about if the state copied your house, and gave copies to the poor. Would this still be communism. You still have your rights to do what you want with your house. The point is other people are free to copy, use, and make derivative houses.
he never said programmers shouldn't make lots of money. He said they don't HAVE to. You don't have a RIGHT to make any money at all. If people simply refused to pay programmers, that is their problem. Probably less software would be written if you could never get paid for writing software. Thats just too bad, but it isn't a right. You do NOT decide your own salary, your salary is whatever your customers/employers want to pay you. The current system redistributes money towards programmers in an unfair and destructive way, as we have seen with Bill Gates. RMS simply said that if programmers can only make as much money as clerks than thats the way it is.
I can't make money picking flies out of a dung heap. It is a very difficult and highly skilled job. I use my sensitive and highly trained nose to pick out the flies from the dung. But no one is willing to pay me for it! OH NO! people are benefiting from this! You sneak into farmers' barns and pick all the flies out the dung heap. Now there are less flies, and the farmers are helped. But still they refuse to pay you!!! How immoral! There must be laws to force your salary through the roof.
Well, you dumbass bastard, the world doesn't work like that. If you can't make money selling software, it means you shouldn't be selling software. Maybe you should be selling something that has value!! HOw about SERVICE? sell your service as a programmer. That can make money. Selling something that has no scarcity is not economically feasable. Laws making it economically feasable are completely absurd. Thats like a tax to pay for your fine flatulence you work so hard to produce.
DEciding your salary for you, bah, you can't manipulate the system to set your salary! your salary is what people will pay! if programmers don't make money, then they just don't.
People like you are causing us to head into that horrible world where every time you read a book you pay a royalty, and violating this is punishable by death.