I think I tried Fiesty. It's been a few months. However, as I understand it, the Ubuntu folks have decided to not provide releases for PPC Macs. This is a particular problem for people with late-model PPC iMacs, because their thermal control code (the fans) differs from earlier models. The result: the fans run at full speed, all the time.
My guess is that it won't run on my Mac. I've used, and appreciated, Ubuntu. I'm using a late-model PPC iMac, which I bought thinking that I'd use it to run Linux when Apple moved on. Now, it looks like that's not going to happen, as some developers can't be bothered to figure out how to control the fans.
I''ve said copyright does not give anyone rights. Therefore, people must have fair use rights. The specific definition, the metrics, of fair use is a legal issue.
>>"In the absence of copyright law, yes, with copyright law, no. Is it that tough for you to get this?"
Yes, because you seem to be saying people acquire rights via copyright law, which I reject.
>>"Would the creator of a dance step, who records the new dance byway of diagrams in a book and a video showing the dance, get rights to stop others from dancing that dance?"
I'd say yes, but I don't know what copyright law says. Regardless, either they have that right or they don't, and nothing in copyright law can change that.
>>"What about patents. Inventions. Do people have the same rights in these as in works that fall under copyright. "
Different discussion that I don't want since this one is very tiresome.
>>"But, again, talking about copyright law is only a diversion from my point."
But you seem to keep answering in that context. Why?"
Because you keep raising edge cases using the word "copyright" and asking me about them. It's hard not to talk about copyright if you keep bringing it up. All I've ever said about copyright is that the law doesn't create rights and has no bearing on my argument. How many times can I say that? Stop asking me silly questions aboout dancers and model airplanes. Look at what I've already repeatedly said for my answer and figure it out yourself.
I will ignore any further response. You've not answered my challenges to your argument and I'm bored with this.
>>"No, once again, we are discussing things in the absence of copyright law. Please, give your position relative to this state of affairs unless I specifically ask for how it works with copyright law."
I've repeatedly said copyright law has no bearing on my side of the discussion. It does not have anything at all to do with creating rights. So, any questons along the lines of "Do people have the right to do X without copyright...?" are just beside the point. They have the same rights with or without copyright. So, my answer to all your questions about copyright is this: It doesn't matter.
And, you do not get to determine what I can discuss and when
>>"you maintain that he has rights to the combination of words absent as physical entity..."
I have not claimed that. I've claimed he has the right to determine who can make copies of his work, or portions of it, or otherwise manipulate it. Reciting a work does not involve manipulating or copying the object that is a work. So, if you want to split hairs, reciting a work from memory is one thing, copying a work from memory is another. Copyright law allows a musician, poet, playright, etc., to require receipt of prior permission before a work is performed. Peronally, I've no problem with that, but it isn't part of my argument.
>>" please give your metrics as to where the line is crossed.
How can I not put on a play, but I can tell jokes??
Whatever copyright law says is fair use.
>>"I am talking strictly claiming it is his code and copying it while giving him the credit. If that is not totally clear by now, I doubt I will ever be able to make it clear."
No. You've said that the act of publication means the general public has full rights to do with it as they please.
>>"Oh, just as a guess... Because of copyright law..."
Copyright law gives Stallman the protection of his rights that he needs to even dream of making the GPL enforceable. Absent copyright law, his license would have no meaning or standing. Stallman uses copyright and his license to protect his rights against people who argue, as you do, that all rights tranfer to the public upon publication. After all, Stallman's license is essentially the same as a publishing contract. In it, Stallman transfers limited rights to others and retains all the rest.
>>"I argue that they would have those rights in the absence of COPYRIGHT LAW."
And I thinks that's wrong. Copyright neither creates or destroy rights.
>>"...since you saythat it takes the rights an author has in his works and places them into the public domain after a time."
That's actually a validation of copyright. If I wanted to invalidate cppyright, I'd argue against the entry of works into the public domain. Remember, I've said copyright protects everyone's rights, authors and the public. The public has a right to expect works to pass into the public domain after a certain period of time. That, and all the other copyright protections of the public's interest, is not relevant to the issue of where those rights originate.
But, again, talking about copyright law is only a diversion from my point.
>>" If I claimed to have written MacBeth, what is that called.."
Whatever it is, it isn't plagiarism until you produce a work with chunks of MacBeth in it, and claim it as your own.
>>" it is entirely possible to copy without plagiarism and yet you constantly put the plagiarism aspect into you examples when I have said over and repeatedly that I do not claim anyone has the right to plagiarise, only to copy. Why are you doing this?"
Because you keep asking questions about plagiarism. As I've said, it's peripheral.
>>". What right would you have to try and stop me if I were making copies of "A Midsummer Night's Dream" I wonder?"
None. I didn't write it.
>>"...you have previously said that it is within my rights to recite / quote a work, that the problem would arise if I tried to make copies."
Your right to quote a work is protected by that previous legal arrangement known as copyright law. The right to quote a specific work, obviously, does not exist until that work exists. Hence, all rights to a work originate with its author. It's not possible for them to have any other origin.
>>"I am trying to get you to clarify..."
I think I've been very clear. I've stated my postion over and over and over. You keep bringing up peripheral issues -- words, Shakespeare, plagiarism -- that are not relevant.
To continue with the example of a book: A book is a physical object. At some point in time it does not exist. At another point of time it does. The person who creates that unique entity -- that particular combination of language and medium -- owns it and has all rights in it. The only way for anyone else to legitimately possess that copy of that book is with the author's permission. The only way for anyone else to have any rights to do anything with that book is with the author's permission, i.e., a transfer of rights from the author.
I'm from the U.S., and see my views as being firmly aligned with the views of the Founders. But, that's really irrlevant. I wouldn't change my opinion if the case was otherwise.
A joke is not an object. A book of jokes is. You can tell every joke in that book. You can't start printing your own copies of it.
If an author publishes his own work, he still transfers to the public only those rights he chooses to transfer. The bit about publishing seems to me to be a red herring. Contracting with a publisher is nothing more than transferring the limited rights the author chooses to transfer.
I don't get the point about lieing about a work. Claiming authorship of something you didn't write is more than a simple lie, it's fraud. Plagiarizing is simply a form of copying. Can you legitmately make use of fair use and still plagiarize? Of course. Is it plagiarism if you copy an entire work and claim it as your own? Of course.
I know all about the GPL. Claiming Stallman's code as your own would violate the GPL, and my argument, as well. I think Stallman's position is rooted in beliefs much like mine. If not, why would he need to craft a license to specifically transfer to people rights that would otherwise not be theirs? You are arguing that they acquired those rights as soon as he released the code.
Your argument does invalidate copyright law, because you say all rights to a work belong to the general public upon publication.
And, yes, as I have repeatedly said, copyright law protects our rights. It's just fine with me.
>>"...you would be fine making copies of a book on your shelf and selling them. As many as you wanted to try and sell."
Obviously, I think that would be wrong, and I would do everything to stop you. Copyright law came into being to protect the rights you would be violating, not to create them. (Unless you want to argue that laws actually create and destroy rights, which is a very slippery slope.)
>>"...would be wrong for a repertory company to put on someone else's plays without permission or compensation?"
Yes.
My position is simple: The source of all rights to such a work is the work's creator, even those rights of the public that are protected by copyright law. I contend that there can be no other origin for those rights.
Don't waste time think of "Gotcha" examples. It won't change my position.
I suppose you'll go through the text of the law and nitpick out-of-context zingers. Remember that copyright law could disappear and my argument would stay the same.
By the way, you've never explained the source of the rights you say we all get when someone publishes a book. Where do they come from? Do people who buy the book get more rights than people who don't even know the book exists? What about people who borrow it from a library?
Why doesn't a prospective publisher acquire these rights when he first reads a copy of the manuscript made by the author? If he doesn't, why does the rest of the world acquire these rights as soon as the publisher starts making copies? It's the same thing. Or, is there something special about copying with a printing press? If the publisher does gain these rights upon reading the manuscript, why do publishers bother to sign contracts and pay royalties? Why would an auther ever show a manuscript to a publisher or anyone else, if that mean losing rights to it?
That's not a strawman. You argue that rights transfer upon publication. Publication enables people to see copies of a work. So does submitting a manuscript to a publisher.
Stallman wrote emacs. He published the code. Does that give people who've never heard of emacs the same rights as you seem to argue that everyone acquires when a book is published? Why shouldn't I slap my name on emacs, repackage it, and start selling it? I'd respond to the inevitable lawsuit by making your argument, which invalidates both copyright law and Stallman's license. After all, you are claiming that rights pass from a work's creator to the public at the moment of publication.
>>"Why did you not bother to adress your mixing up plagerism and copying?"
Huh? Plagiarism is copying. Someone copies someone else's work and claims it as their own.
Re: copyright -- You try to counter my statements by reference to copyright law. I only state that my argument has no dependencies on that law. From my point of view, copyright law is peripheral to all this.
>>"if there was no copyright law of any kind, you maintain that it would still be illegal to make those copies?"
I haven't been discussing legalities. But, wrong? Yes. A violation of another's rights? Yes. If the law says it is illegal, then it is. If not, the law is wrong.
>>"...it must have been illegal to make such copies before there was any copyright law. Can you point to any successful cases on this issue before the first copyright law?"
I don't understand that. If you mean a legal case, then obviously that would have been impossible in the absence of any relevant law. But, the existence or nonexistence of a law has no bearing on whether or not behavior is right or wrong, or deprives others of their rights.
By the way, my position isn't radical. It's the commonly accepted position. An opinion that rights to a work pass to everyone else upon publication is certainly the radical stance.
>>"f someone has never seen your object and you don't own the words themselves,...."
I own the object that is the combination of the medium and the words, and all rights to it. That includes the right to allow or prevent others from copying my words onto another medium.
>>"...no, not at the moment they see the author's work. At the moment the author publishes his work. If he does not publish it but keep it private, someone seeing it would not have those rights."
It seems you are still using the act of seeing somethng as the act that gives you all rights in it.
>>"Because it is an unpublished manuscript?"
No. Because they sign a contract to buy some of the author's rights.
In any case, the world is full of published manuscripts. You are arguing that I am fully within my rights to pull a book off my shelves, make 10,000 copies listing me as the author, and put them up for sale. After all, it was already published, which you say is "the moment" at which we all acquire rights to that book.
Well, as I said, the homesteading thing doesn't seem to me to be especially relevant to the issue at hand. I wasn't trying to refute your point, just pointing out some questions that came quickly to mind.
As I read your other definitions, they support my argument, which, to restate, isn't about copyright law.
I'm not sure why this is apparently so difficult to convey, but:
1. You can't own an object until it exists. You can't have rights in an object until it exists. (Yes, there is the presence of previous legal arrangment. That's what I see copyright law as -- recognition and protection of existing rights, not their source -- and we have no choice but to accept those arrangments by virtue of our presence in the state.)
2. The person who creates an object takes sole possession of the object when it is created, as well as all rights inherent in its use, manupulation, duplication, alteration, etc., including tranferring any symbols,etc., fixed in or on the object to other objects.
3. Barring theft, others can own the object, or acquire rights to it, only by transfer from the object's creator. There is, quiete literally, no other source of those rights.
4. The encoding of words, music, code, etc., on a medium creates an object. Hence, the statements listed above apply. Specifically, those who acquire copies of a duplicate object that is produced, in effect, under license by the object's creator (as happens under a publishing contract) acquire only those rights specifcally transferred to them by the original object's creator, via the publishing mechansim. (And, as stipulated by the previous legal arrangment of copyright law.)
Beats me. One point of contention would be proving someone was the first occupant. How long do you need to stay in one place to be an "occupant"? Is all land owned by the first people to ever spend the night on it? What's the extent of the "land" in question? If a neolithic family built a hut in the middle of Manhattan, do their ancestors now have a claim?
Interesting, but I don't see the relevance.
>>"I don't think we're speaking the same language here."
I see an idea as forever trapped inside one person's brain. Their existence does not depend on words or language. (An infant certainly has ideas, but has no language skills, so he cries or smiles or giggles.) Because it is impossible to transfer ideas directly from one brain to another, we depend on words and language to communicate, even with ourselves. (When people say they think in words or pictures, they are describing how they use language and art to comprehend their own ideas.) Language and communication, art, etc., -- all use of symbols -- are our way of getting around the fact that each individual's ideas are ultimately non-portable. We hope our language can generate in others the same ideas and emotions that prompted us in the first place. (I think it is likely that a universally telepathic species would not develop spoken language, at least as we know it. They'd certainly have much less incentive.)
Homesteading is historic reality, but I don't necessarily agree that the first person to settle on a piece of land becomes its owner.
I don't agree that ideas are "Representations of abstract concepts (potentially) encoded in the form of a physical object". A representation of a thought is just that, a representation, not a thought. An object underlying an encoded form of that representation is just that, not an idea. It's very akin to someone being angry, and writing a note that says "I'm angry." The note is not the emotion, or the idea, of that person's anger.
I never said anything about owning words. I've said you own the object that is created when you write the words on it, and that you -- and no one else -- have all rights to the object. That includes the right to copy ir or otherwise manipulate it.
Obviously, if someone steals the thing on which they write, then they write on a stolen object.
Consider: If I own a blank stack of paper, why would I not continue to own it just because I write somethng on it? Why would I own the blank paper but not the new combination of the paper and the words?
If somone recites words from the work, that is not copying it. No object has been created. If someone memorizes the work and then transcribes it from memory onto another object, that is copying.
You, and many others, seem to be arguing that others acquire rights in an author's work at the moment they see the author's work. I don't see how that is possible. All rights originally belong to the author. How can the mere act of allowing other people to see the work, or a copy of it, transfer rights to them against the will of the author? That sounds like magic to me, if not wishful thinking.
If that's true, why don't publishers gain all those rights when they first read an author's manuscript? Why do they bother signing contracts and paying royalties? How are publishers different from everyone else? It isn't that copyright law restrains them, because copyright law applies to everyone, not just publishers. If your argument holds, why aren't publishers suing to invalidate copyright law?
The concept of the transfer of limited rights in an object from one person to other people is common. I know of no other instance in which rights are transferred at the moment other people see the object.
The difference between ideas and words has always seemed self-evidently clear to me. Ideas cannot be shared because no way exists for thoughts in my head to get into your head. As I've said, I can use symbols in an attempt to cause you to form similar thoughts, but that's not the transfer of thoughts. It's the creation in one place of thoughts that originated in another. We never know how close those thoughts are to ou'rs. That's all communication, literature, art, and all the rest really do.
>>"You do believe that you own the words and symbols that you put out in public or write down. "
If I use some sort of medium to preserve or convey my words. The "owning" part is less important than my rights to the language in that object. If I publish a book, for instance, anyone who buys it obviously owns that copy, but I retain all rights to the language contained in it that I haven't transferred to them.
Like I said, I'm done. It's tiresome just going back and forth over nitpicks without addressing the fundamental issue: If "society's" members have rights to the work of an author, how do they get it and what's the source of those rights?
>>"...is it your contention that copyright laws remove rights from authors that they would otherwose have in the absence of copyright laws?"
In a manner of speaking, in return for protection of more, and more valuable, rights. Copyright law is a "previous legal arrangement" that all authors must accept by virture of living in the country with the law.
>>"If so, why is it that authors are not calling for copyright law to be done away with? "
It's obvious. Copyright protects and enforces the ability of authors to control and profit by their work. In the years before copyright law became common, theft of authors' work, forgeries and the publication of bogus work credited to known authors was common, by publishers and others.
That's it. I'm done. This exchange has become an eighth-grade debating class. No one has explain where all those other people get their rights in my book.
As I've said repeatedly, I'm talking about symbols (language, etc.) affixed to or encoded in some sort of medium. It can be gibberish for all I care. The combination of symbols and medium is property.
Thag owns the border with the words. He also has exclusive rights in that rock. Other people acquire rights in that rock only be transfer from Thag, who is their sole original source. Whether the marks Thag put on the rock constitute a story, represent ideas, or are just idle doodling is immaterial.
As I've also said repeatedly, to argue that other people acquire rights in Thag's rock apart from a transfer from him requires the identification of another source of those rights and a transfer mechanism. I've never seen anyone convincingly demonstrate such things exist, apart from arguing that "society" has these kind of rights as if by magic.
If Thag uses one of Grod's boulders without Grod's permission, then he's stolen Grod's rock. Whatever Thag does to the rock, Grod still owns it. (If I shoplift a writing pad and write in it, do I now have rights to the pad?)
Whatever I decide. I hae the exclusive right to decide what anyone can do with that manuscript or with any copies that I may authorize. If you buy my book, you have only those rights I say you do, plus those outlined in copyright law. E.g., unless I say you have the right to make multiple copies, or republish the book with your name as author, you don't.
>>"The right to merely observe the manuscript is implicit in both publication and purchase, and sufficient to create unlimited duplicates..."
Absolutely not. That's is merely one way to copy something, among many. Memorizing a book and then printing 5000 copies from memory is equivalent to printing 5000 copies on an offset press.
>>"The answer should be obvious: the legal system known as copyright..."
Copyright law does not create rights, it only recognizes and protects rights, of everyone involved.
Until someone can demonstrate that people other than a book's author have a claim -- of any kind -- on that book absent acquiring rights from the book's author, and identify the source of thos rights, I'll accept my argument as reflecting reality. Lots of people assert that the mere act of making the book visible via publishing conveys fulls rights to everyone to do with the book as they please, but that's only an unsubstantiated assertion.
>>"...physical property usually isn't created by encoding (representations of) ideas into it. All the physical ingredient involved in creating the final product are typically already owned. So who owned the physical property before it was encoded with a representation of these ideas? (Hint: Probably not the author/artist..."
If I create a manuscript on a stack of paper that I own, then I own the manuscript and exclusively possess all rights to that manuscript. Unless you propose that other individuals have an a priori right to that manuscript, that is.
When I decide to publish that manuscript, I transfer certain limited rights to the publishers, who in turn transfers certain limited rights to the purchaser. If, for example, I do no stipulate that retail buyers will have the right to make and distribute multiple copies of the book they buy, they do not have that right. To argue that they do is to propose that rights in the book come from some source other than the book's auther, which I categorically reject. (And, I don't think you can demonstrate otherwise, unless you make that a priori claim.)
Re: Publishers -- You are very wrong about publishing. If you want to argue that publishers "have the same rights as anyone else" to any published work other than those for which they've contracted (as you've argued) why, then, aren't publishers copying their competitor's bestsellers and undercutting them on price?
I think any publishers would be surprised to know that they have not bought limited rights in a book. That's what the contract spells out: What the publishers has the right to do and what rights have been retained by the author. For example, an author might grant a publisher distribution rights in the U.S., but retain distribution rights elsewhere. You seem to be arguing a position that would nullify the publisher's legal obligation to distribute the book only in the U.S. as soon as the first retail copy rolls off the press.
Symbols on a page, bits in a file, etc., are not ideas. Neither is the page or the file.
You cannot "write an idea down". The only thing you can write are words and numbers. Those are not ideas.
You cannot own an idea. Nor can you share an idea. Ideas are thoughts in our heads. We can use language and other symbols in an attempt to cause other people to have similar thoughts, but no ideas pass from one person to the next (unless you believe in telepathy.)
Structuring an argument around notions of copying, sharing, or owning ideas is simply constructing an elaborate metaphor.
Slashdot Mirror
I think I tried Fiesty. It's been a few months. However, as I understand it, the Ubuntu folks have decided to not provide releases for PPC Macs. This is a particular problem for people with late-model PPC iMacs, because their thermal control code (the fans) differs from earlier models. The result: the fans run at full speed, all the time.
My guess is that it won't run on my Mac. I've used, and appreciated, Ubuntu. I'm using a late-model PPC iMac, which I bought thinking that I'd use it to run Linux when Apple moved on. Now, it looks like that's not going to happen, as some developers can't be bothered to figure out how to control the fans.
I''ve said copyright does not give anyone rights. Therefore, people must have fair use rights. The specific definition, the metrics, of fair use is a legal issue.
>>"In the absence of copyright law, yes, with copyright law, no. Is it that tough for you to get this?"
Yes, because you seem to be saying people acquire rights via copyright law, which I reject.
>>"Would the creator of a dance step, who records the new dance byway of diagrams in a book and a video showing the dance, get rights to stop others from dancing that dance?"
I'd say yes, but I don't know what copyright law says. Regardless, either they have that right or they don't, and nothing in copyright law can change that.
>>"What about patents. Inventions. Do people have the same rights in these as in works that fall under copyright.
"
Different discussion that I don't want since this one is very tiresome.
>>"But, again, talking about copyright law is only a diversion from my point."
But you seem to keep answering in that context. Why?"
Because you keep raising edge cases using the word "copyright" and asking me about them. It's hard not to talk about copyright if you keep bringing it up. All I've ever said about copyright is that the law doesn't create rights and has no bearing on my argument. How many times can I say that? Stop asking me silly questions aboout dancers and model airplanes. Look at what I've already repeatedly said for my answer and figure it out yourself.
I will ignore any further response. You've not answered my challenges to your argument and I'm bored with this.
>>"No, once again, we are discussing things in the absence of copyright law. Please, give your position relative to this state of affairs unless I specifically ask for how it works with copyright law."
I've repeatedly said copyright law has no bearing on my side of the discussion. It does not have anything at all to do with creating rights. So, any questons along the lines of "Do people have the right to do X without copyright...?" are just beside the point. They have the same rights with or without copyright. So, my answer to all your questions about copyright is this: It doesn't matter.
And, you do not get to determine what I can discuss and when
>>"you maintain that he has rights to the combination of words absent as physical entity..."
I have not claimed that. I've claimed he has the right to determine who can make copies of his work, or portions of it, or otherwise manipulate it. Reciting a work does not involve manipulating or copying the object that is a work. So, if you want to split hairs, reciting a work from memory is one thing, copying a work from memory is another. Copyright law allows a musician, poet, playright, etc., to require receipt of prior permission before a work is performed. Peronally, I've no problem with that, but it isn't part of my argument.
>>" please give your metrics as to where the line is crossed.
How can I not put on a play, but I can tell jokes??
Whatever copyright law says is fair use.
>>"I am talking strictly claiming it is his code and copying it while giving him the credit. If that is not totally clear by now, I doubt I will ever be able to make it clear."
No. You've said that the act of publication means the general public has full rights to do with it as they please.
>>"Oh, just as a guess... Because of copyright law..."
Copyright law gives Stallman the protection of his rights that he needs to even dream of making the GPL enforceable. Absent copyright law, his license would have no meaning or standing. Stallman uses copyright and his license to protect his rights against people who argue, as you do, that all rights tranfer to the public upon publication. After all, Stallman's license is essentially the same as a publishing contract. In it, Stallman transfers limited rights to others and retains all the rest.
>>"I argue that they would have those rights in the absence of COPYRIGHT LAW."
And I thinks that's wrong. Copyright neither creates or destroy rights.
>>"...since you saythat it takes the rights an author has in his works and places them into the public domain after a time."
That's actually a validation of copyright. If I wanted to invalidate cppyright, I'd argue against the entry of works into the public domain. Remember, I've said copyright protects everyone's rights, authors and the public. The public has a right to expect works to pass into the public domain after a certain period of time. That, and all the other copyright protections of the public's interest, is not relevant to the issue of where those rights originate.
But, again, talking about copyright law is only a diversion from my point.
>>" If I claimed to have written MacBeth, what is that called .."
Whatever it is, it isn't plagiarism until you produce a work with chunks of MacBeth in it, and claim it as your own.
>>" it is entirely possible to copy without plagiarism and yet you constantly put the plagiarism aspect into you examples when I have said over and repeatedly that I do not claim anyone has the right to plagiarise, only to copy. Why are you doing this?"
Because you keep asking questions about plagiarism. As I've said, it's peripheral.
>>". What right would you have to try and stop me if I were making copies of "A Midsummer Night's Dream" I wonder?"
None. I didn't write it.
>>"...you have previously said that it is within my rights to recite / quote a work, that the problem would arise if I tried to make copies."
Your right to quote a work is protected by that previous legal arrangement known as copyright law. The right to quote a specific work, obviously, does not exist until that work exists. Hence, all rights to a work originate with its author. It's not possible for them to have any other origin.
>>"I am trying to get you to clarify..."
I think I've been very clear. I've stated my postion over and over and over. You keep bringing up peripheral issues -- words, Shakespeare, plagiarism -- that are not relevant.
To continue with the example of a book: A book is a physical object. At some point in time it does not exist. At another point of time it does. The person who creates that unique entity -- that particular combination of language and medium -- owns it and has all rights in it. The only way for anyone else to legitimately possess that copy of that book is with the author's permission. The only way for anyone else to have any rights to do anything with that book is with the author's permission, i.e., a transfer of rights from the author.
What's not clear about that?
I'm from the U.S., and see my views as being firmly aligned with the views of the Founders. But, that's really irrlevant. I wouldn't change my opinion if the case was otherwise.
A joke is not an object. A book of jokes is. You can tell every joke in that book. You can't start printing your own copies of it.
If an author publishes his own work, he still transfers to the public only those rights he chooses to transfer. The bit about publishing seems to me to be a red herring. Contracting with a publisher is nothing more than transferring the limited rights the author chooses to transfer.
I don't get the point about lieing about a work. Claiming authorship of something you didn't write is more than a simple lie, it's fraud. Plagiarizing is simply a form of copying. Can you legitmately make use of fair use and still plagiarize? Of course. Is it plagiarism if you copy an entire work and claim it as your own? Of course.
I know all about the GPL. Claiming Stallman's code as your own would violate the GPL, and my argument, as well. I think Stallman's position is rooted in beliefs much like mine. If not, why would he need to craft a license to specifically transfer to people rights that would otherwise not be theirs? You are arguing that they acquired those rights as soon as he released the code.
Your argument does invalidate copyright law, because you say all rights to a work belong to the general public upon publication.
And, yes, as I have repeatedly said, copyright law protects our rights. It's just fine with me.
Plagiarism: You can't plagiarize unless you copy.
>>"...you would be fine making copies of a book on your shelf and selling them. As many as you wanted to try and sell."
Obviously, I think that would be wrong, and I would do everything to stop you. Copyright law came into being to protect the rights you would be violating, not to create them. (Unless you want to argue that laws actually create and destroy rights, which is a very slippery slope.)
>>"...would be wrong for a repertory company to put on someone else's plays without permission or compensation?"
Yes.
My position is simple: The source of all rights to such a work is the work's creator, even those rights of the public that are protected by copyright law. I contend that there can be no other origin for those rights.
Don't waste time think of "Gotcha" examples. It won't change my position.
http://www.copyright.gov/title17/
I suppose you'll go through the text of the law and nitpick out-of-context zingers. Remember that copyright law could disappear and my argument would stay the same.
By the way, you've never explained the source of the rights you say we all get when someone publishes a book. Where do they come from? Do people who buy the book get more rights than people who don't even know the book exists? What about people who borrow it from a library?
Why doesn't a prospective publisher acquire these rights when he first reads a copy of the manuscript made by the author? If he doesn't, why does the rest of the world acquire these rights as soon as the publisher starts making copies? It's the same thing. Or, is there something special about copying with a printing press? If the publisher does gain these rights upon reading the manuscript, why do publishers bother to sign contracts and pay royalties? Why would an auther ever show a manuscript to a publisher or anyone else, if that mean losing rights to it?
That's not a strawman. You argue that rights transfer upon publication. Publication enables people to see copies of a work. So does submitting a manuscript to a publisher.
Stallman wrote emacs. He published the code. Does that give people who've never heard of emacs the same rights as you seem to argue that everyone acquires when a book is published? Why shouldn't I slap my name on emacs, repackage it, and start selling it? I'd respond to the inevitable lawsuit by making your argument, which invalidates both copyright law and Stallman's license. After all, you are claiming that rights pass from a work's creator to the public at the moment of publication.
>>"Why did you not bother to adress your mixing up plagerism and copying?"
Huh? Plagiarism is copying. Someone copies someone else's work and claims it as their own.
Re: copyright -- You try to counter my statements by reference to copyright law. I only state that my argument has no dependencies on that law. From my point of view, copyright law is peripheral to all this.
>>"if there was no copyright law of any kind, you maintain that it would still be illegal to make those copies?"
I haven't been discussing legalities. But, wrong? Yes. A violation of another's rights? Yes. If the law says it is illegal, then it is. If not, the law is wrong.
>>"...it must have been illegal to make such copies before there was any copyright law. Can you point to any successful cases on this issue before the first copyright law?"
I don't understand that. If you mean a legal case, then obviously that would have been impossible in the absence of any relevant law. But, the existence or nonexistence of a law has no bearing on whether or not behavior is right or wrong, or deprives others of their rights.
I'd point to any copyright law. They recognize and enforce the rights I've been explaining.
>>"ard is it for you to remember that I am making these statements supposing that there were no copyright laws."
Because you haven't been qualifying your assertions in that manner.
In any case, my argument has no dependencies on copyright. With or without copyright law, my position would be the same.
By the way, my position isn't radical. It's the commonly accepted position. An opinion that rights to a work pass to everyone else upon publication is certainly the radical stance.
>>"f someone has never seen your object and you don't own the words themselves, ...."
I own the object that is the combination of the medium and the words, and all rights to it. That includes the right to allow or prevent others from copying my words onto another medium.
>>"...no, not at the moment they see the author's work. At the moment the author publishes his work. If he does not publish it but keep it private, someone seeing it would not have those rights."
It seems you are still using the act of seeing somethng as the act that gives you all rights in it.
>>"Because it is an unpublished manuscript?"
No. Because they sign a contract to buy some of the author's rights.
In any case, the world is full of published manuscripts. You are arguing that I am fully within my rights to pull a book off my shelves, make 10,000 copies listing me as the author, and put them up for sale. After all, it was already published, which you say is "the moment" at which we all acquire rights to that book.
Well, as I said, the homesteading thing doesn't seem to me to be especially relevant to the issue at hand. I wasn't trying to refute your point, just pointing out some questions that came quickly to mind.
As I read your other definitions, they support my argument, which, to restate, isn't about copyright law.
I'm not sure why this is apparently so difficult to convey, but:
1. You can't own an object until it exists. You can't have rights in an object until it exists. (Yes, there is the presence of previous legal arrangment. That's what I see copyright law as -- recognition and protection of existing rights, not their source -- and we have no choice but to accept those arrangments by virtue of our presence in the state.)
2. The person who creates an object takes sole possession of the object when it is created, as well as all rights inherent in its use, manupulation, duplication, alteration, etc., including tranferring any symbols,etc., fixed in or on the object to other objects.
3. Barring theft, others can own the object, or acquire rights to it, only by transfer from the object's creator. There is, quiete literally, no other source of those rights.
4. The encoding of words, music, code, etc., on a medium creates an object. Hence, the statements listed above apply. Specifically, those who acquire copies of a duplicate object that is produced, in effect, under license by the object's creator (as happens under a publishing contract) acquire only those rights specifcally transferred to them by the original object's creator, via the publishing mechansim. (And, as stipulated by the previous legal arrangment of copyright law.)
>>"How else would you assign first ownership? "
Beats me. One point of contention would be proving someone was the first occupant. How long do you need to stay in one place to be an "occupant"? Is all land owned by the first people to ever spend the night on it? What's the extent of the "land" in question? If a neolithic family built a hut in the middle of Manhattan, do their ancestors now have a claim?
Interesting, but I don't see the relevance.
>>"I don't think we're speaking the same language here."
I see an idea as forever trapped inside one person's brain. Their existence does not depend on words or language. (An infant certainly has ideas, but has no language skills, so he cries or smiles or giggles.) Because it is impossible to transfer ideas directly from one brain to another, we depend on words and language to communicate, even with ourselves. (When people say they think in words or pictures, they are describing how they use language and art to comprehend their own ideas.) Language and communication, art, etc., -- all use of symbols -- are our way of getting around the fact that each individual's ideas are ultimately non-portable. We hope our language can generate in others the same ideas and emotions that prompted us in the first place. (I think it is likely that a universally telepathic species would not develop spoken language, at least as we know it. They'd certainly have much less incentive.)
Homesteading is historic reality, but I don't necessarily agree that the first person to settle on a piece of land becomes its owner.
I don't agree that ideas are "Representations of abstract concepts (potentially) encoded in the form of a physical object". A representation of a thought is just that, a representation, not a thought. An object underlying an encoded form of that representation is just that, not an idea. It's very akin to someone being angry, and writing a note that says "I'm angry." The note is not the emotion, or the idea, of that person's anger.
I never said anything about owning words. I've said you own the object that is created when you write the words on it, and that you -- and no one else -- have all rights to the object. That includes the right to copy ir or otherwise manipulate it.
Obviously, if someone steals the thing on which they write, then they write on a stolen object.
Consider: If I own a blank stack of paper, why would I not continue to own it just because I write somethng on it? Why would I own the blank paper but not the new combination of the paper and the words?
If somone recites words from the work, that is not copying it. No object has been created. If someone memorizes the work and then transcribes it from memory onto another object, that is copying.
You, and many others, seem to be arguing that others acquire rights in an author's work at the moment they see the author's work. I don't see how that is possible. All rights originally belong to the author. How can the mere act of allowing other people to see the work, or a copy of it, transfer rights to them against the will of the author? That sounds like magic to me, if not wishful thinking.
If that's true, why don't publishers gain all those rights when they first read an author's manuscript? Why do they bother signing contracts and paying royalties? How are publishers different from everyone else? It isn't that copyright law restrains them, because copyright law applies to everyone, not just publishers. If your argument holds, why aren't publishers suing to invalidate copyright law?
The concept of the transfer of limited rights in an object from one person to other people is common. I know of no other instance in which rights are transferred at the moment other people see the object.
The difference between ideas and words has always seemed self-evidently clear to me. Ideas cannot be shared because no way exists for thoughts in my head to get into your head. As I've said, I can use symbols in an attempt to cause you to form similar thoughts, but that's not the transfer of thoughts. It's the creation in one place of thoughts that originated in another. We never know how close those thoughts are to ou'rs. That's all communication, literature, art, and all the rest really do.
>>"You do believe that you own the words and symbols that you put out in public or write down. "
If I use some sort of medium to preserve or convey my words. The "owning" part is less important than my rights to the language in that object. If I publish a book, for instance, anyone who buys it obviously owns that copy, but I retain all rights to the language contained in it that I haven't transferred to them.
Like I said, I'm done. It's tiresome just going back and forth over nitpicks without addressing the fundamental issue: If "society's" members have rights to the work of an author, how do they get it and what's the source of those rights?
>>"...is it your contention that copyright laws remove rights from authors that they would otherwose have in the absence of copyright laws?"
In a manner of speaking, in return for protection of more, and more valuable, rights. Copyright law is a "previous legal arrangement" that all authors must accept by virture of living in the country with the law.
>>"If so, why is it that authors are not calling for copyright law to be done away with? "
It's obvious. Copyright protects and enforces the ability of authors to control and profit by their work. In the years before copyright law became common, theft of authors' work, forgeries and the publication of bogus work credited to known authors was common, by publishers and others.
That's it. I'm done. This exchange has become an eighth-grade debating class. No one has explain where all those other people get their rights in my book.
This is getting tiresome.
As I've said repeatedly, I'm talking about symbols (language, etc.) affixed to or encoded in some sort of medium. It can be gibberish for all I care. The combination of symbols and medium is property.
Thag owns the border with the words. He also has exclusive rights in that rock. Other people acquire rights in that rock only be transfer from Thag, who is their sole original source. Whether the marks Thag put on the rock constitute a story, represent ideas, or are just idle doodling is immaterial.
As I've also said repeatedly, to argue that other people acquire rights in Thag's rock apart from a transfer from him requires the identification of another source of those rights and a transfer mechanism. I've never seen anyone convincingly demonstrate such things exist, apart from arguing that "society" has these kind of rights as if by magic.
If Thag uses one of Grod's boulders without Grod's permission, then he's stolen Grod's rock. Whatever Thag does to the rock, Grod still owns it. (If I shoplift a writing pad and write in it, do I now have rights to the pad?)
>>"What are you transferring rights in? "
Whatever I decide. I hae the exclusive right to decide what anyone can do with that manuscript or with any copies that I may authorize. If you buy my book, you have only those rights I say you do, plus those outlined in copyright law. E.g., unless I say you have the right to make multiple copies, or republish the book with your name as author, you don't.
>>"The right to merely observe the manuscript is implicit in both publication and purchase, and sufficient to create unlimited duplicates..."
Absolutely not. That's is merely one way to copy something, among many. Memorizing a book and then printing 5000 copies from memory is equivalent to printing 5000 copies on an offset press.
>>"The answer should be obvious: the legal system known as copyright..."
Copyright law does not create rights, it only recognizes and protects rights, of everyone involved.
Until someone can demonstrate that people other than a book's author have a claim -- of any kind -- on that book absent acquiring rights from the book's author, and identify the source of thos rights, I'll accept my argument as reflecting reality. Lots of people assert that the mere act of making the book visible via publishing conveys fulls rights to everyone to do with the book as they please, but that's only an unsubstantiated assertion.
>>"...physical property usually isn't created by encoding (representations of) ideas into it. All the physical ingredient involved in creating the final product are typically already owned. So who owned the physical property before it was encoded with a representation of these ideas? (Hint: Probably not the author/artist..."
If I create a manuscript on a stack of paper that I own, then I own the manuscript and exclusively possess all rights to that manuscript. Unless you propose that other individuals have an a priori right to that manuscript, that is.
When I decide to publish that manuscript, I transfer certain limited rights to the publishers, who in turn transfers certain limited rights to the purchaser. If, for example, I do no stipulate that retail buyers will have the right to make and distribute multiple copies of the book they buy, they do not have that right. To argue that they do is to propose that rights in the book come from some source other than the book's auther, which I categorically reject. (And, I don't think you can demonstrate otherwise, unless you make that a priori claim.)
Re: Publishers -- You are very wrong about publishing. If you want to argue that publishers "have the same rights as anyone else" to any published work other than those for which they've contracted (as you've argued) why, then, aren't publishers copying their competitor's bestsellers and undercutting them on price?
I think any publishers would be surprised to know that they have not bought limited rights in a book. That's what the contract spells out: What the publishers has the right to do and what rights have been retained by the author. For example, an author might grant a publisher distribution rights in the U.S., but retain distribution rights elsewhere. You seem to be arguing a position that would nullify the publisher's legal obligation to distribute the book only in the U.S. as soon as the first retail copy rolls off the press.
Symbols on a page, bits in a file, etc., are not ideas. Neither is the page or the file.
You cannot "write an idea down". The only thing you can write are words and numbers. Those are not ideas.
You cannot own an idea. Nor can you share an idea. Ideas are thoughts in our heads. We can use language and other symbols in an attempt to cause other people to have similar thoughts, but no ideas pass from one person to the next (unless you believe in telepathy.)
Structuring an argument around notions of copying, sharing, or owning ideas is simply constructing an elaborate metaphor.
>>"Then we have an astoundingly different idea of right and wrong regarding ideas made public."
No, we don't. I'm not talking about ideas.