"To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited
Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings
and Discoveries;"
Taken out of context it would appear to mean that. Remmeber that this is a document designed to protect the people of the United States. Of course protection must be given to science in general (for the benefit of the public), and in order to do this it grants individuals further rights.
When referring to what the "spirit" of this argument is, one must consider the ENTIRE context. The entire context makes it clear that this document's point is to secure liberaties of the individual. Perhaps a more clear way to put it would be: "Because we want to secure science and art, we grant another individual liberty."
Favoring the rights of the public over the rights of the individual sounds like communism, not something the United States has ever embraced as an idea.
Sorry about my previous comment. THis one should be formatted better.
I think you need to reconsider the original intent of the copyright clause in the Constitution.
To do this, first consider why the Constitution was created. A lot of political turmoil happened around the time of the revolution. What are now called Americans believed that their/rights/ as citizens were being violated; they were not (directly) represented in Parliament. Numerous state constitutions had developed before this time, guaranteeing individuals certain liberties.
When the United States split from England, a document was created. This document was the Constitution. The document starts off with "We the people" for an important reason: this document was created by the people to _secure the rights of the people_. The Constitution is an implementation document: it defines how individual liberties are secured by and protected from government.
That is, the U.S. Constitution is a document describing how peoples' rights should be protected.
The framers of the Constitution understood at the time that artists (I am using this word broadly to mean creators of an intellectual work, including scientists) needed to be protected, that is, they needed to be able to be compensated for their work. To do this, the Constitution has a clause granting these artists control over their work.
You argue that modern implementation of copyright law contradicts the spirit of the Constitution. What is the spirit of the Constitution? To protect the individual!
Would programmers' software be pirated more or less if every program were open source (but still sold commercially)?
MORE! The existence of warez to the level it is today would indicate to any observer that a huge number of people are willing to steal this software.
If more people are pirating the software, **how are the authors' rights being protected**?
They are NOT being protected in this situation. The spirit of the Constitution is to protect and secure the rights of individuals.
The framers do recognize that it is important for the public to be able to benefit from these works, but not at the expense of the individual!
The Constitution protects the rights of the individual first and foremost. The rights of a programmer, in the Constitution's spirit, are top of the list. His rights to make money from his software are above the rights of the public to benefit from the information available in his source.
I think you need to reconsider the original intent of the copyright clause in the Constitution.
To do this, first consider why the Constitution was created. A lot of political turmoil happened around the time of the U.S. Revolution. What are now called Americans believed that their/rights/ as citizens were being violated; they were not (directly) represented in Parliament. Numerous state constitutions had developed before this time, guaranteeing individuals certain liberties.
When the United States split from England, a document was created. This document was the Constitution. The document starts off with "We the people" for an important reason: this document was created by the people to _secure the rights of the people_. The Constitution is an implementation document: it defines how individual liberties are secured by and protected from government.
That is, the U.S. Constitution is a document describing how peoples' rights should be protected.
The framers of the Constitution understood at the time that artists (I am using this word broadly to mean creators of an intellectual work, including scientists) needed to be protected, that is, they needed to be able to be compensated for their work. To do this, the Constitution has a clause granting these artists control over their work.
You argue that modern implementation of copyright law contradicts the spirit of the Constitution. What is the spirit of the Constitution? To protect the individual!
Would programmers' software be pirated more or less if every program were open source (but still sold commercially)?
MORE! The existence of warez to the level it is today would indicate to any observer that a huge number of people are willing to steal this software. Open-sourcing everything would increase piracy.
If more people are pirating the software, **how are the authors' rights being protected**?
They are NOT being protected in this situation. The spirit of the Constitution is to protect and secure the rights of individuals.
The framers do recognize that it is important for the public to be able to benefit from these works, but not at the expense of the individual! The framers understand that art requires that artists be compensated for their work or they will (may) not produce. Hence, they protect the artists.
The Constitution protects the rights of the individual first and foremost. The rights of a programmer, in the Constitution's spirit, are top of the list. His rights to make money from his software are above the rights of the public to benefit from the information available in his source.
Your analogy of novels and source code is just that: analogy. Argument by analogy is a logical fallacy. Although they are similar situations, they are not identical. Of course it would be easier for the public to benefit from existing source code, but via warez this would be at expense of the authors.
The community at expense of the individual? One word: communism.
Note that my argument is not that copyright law as implemented today is necessarily in the spirit of the Constitution, but only that the rights of an artist are (and rightly should be) placed above those who desire to benefit from his work.
Slashdot Mirror
Unfortunately you take the quote out of context.
"To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;"
Taken out of context it would appear to mean that. Remmeber that this is a document designed to protect the people of the United States. Of course protection must be given to science in general (for the benefit of the public), and in order to do this it grants individuals further rights.
When referring to what the "spirit" of this argument is, one must consider the ENTIRE context. The entire context makes it clear that this document's point is to secure liberaties of the individual. Perhaps a more clear way to put it would be: "Because we want to secure science and art, we grant another individual liberty."
Favoring the rights of the public over the rights of the individual sounds like communism, not something the United States has ever embraced as an idea.
Sorry about my previous comment. THis one should be formatted better. I think you need to reconsider the original intent of the copyright clause in the Constitution.
/rights/ as citizens were being violated; they were not (directly) represented in Parliament. Numerous state constitutions had developed before this time, guaranteeing individuals certain liberties.
To do this, first consider why the Constitution was created. A lot of political turmoil happened around the time of the revolution. What are now called Americans believed that their
When the United States split from England, a document was created. This document was the Constitution. The document starts off with "We the people" for an important reason: this document was created by the people to _secure the rights of the people_. The Constitution is an implementation document: it defines how individual liberties are secured by and protected from government.
That is, the U.S. Constitution is a document describing how peoples' rights should be protected.
The framers of the Constitution understood at the time that artists (I am using this word broadly to mean creators of an intellectual work, including scientists) needed to be protected, that is, they needed to be able to be compensated for their work. To do this, the Constitution has a clause granting these artists control over their work.
You argue that modern implementation of copyright law contradicts the spirit of the Constitution. What is the spirit of the Constitution? To protect the individual!
Would programmers' software be pirated more or less if every program were open source (but still sold commercially)?
MORE! The existence of warez to the level it is today would indicate to any observer that a huge number of people are willing to steal this software.
If more people are pirating the software, **how are the authors' rights being protected**?
They are NOT being protected in this situation. The spirit of the Constitution is to protect and secure the rights of individuals.
The framers do recognize that it is important for the public to be able to benefit from these works, but not at the expense of the individual!
The Constitution protects the rights of the individual first and foremost. The rights of a programmer, in the Constitution's spirit, are top of the list. His rights to make money from his software are above the rights of the public to benefit from the information available in his source.
I think you need to reconsider the original intent of the copyright clause in the Constitution. To do this, first consider why the Constitution was created. A lot of political turmoil happened around the time of the U.S. Revolution. What are now called Americans believed that their /rights/ as citizens were being violated; they were not (directly) represented in Parliament. Numerous state constitutions had developed before this time, guaranteeing individuals certain liberties.
When the United States split from England, a document was created. This document was the Constitution. The document starts off with "We the people" for an important reason: this document was created by the people to _secure the rights of the people_. The Constitution is an implementation document: it defines how individual liberties are secured by and protected from government.
That is, the U.S. Constitution is a document describing how peoples' rights should be protected.
The framers of the Constitution understood at the time that artists (I am using this word broadly to mean creators of an intellectual work, including scientists) needed to be protected, that is, they needed to be able to be compensated for their work. To do this, the Constitution has a clause granting these artists control over their work.
You argue that modern implementation of copyright law contradicts the spirit of the Constitution. What is the spirit of the Constitution? To protect the individual!
Would programmers' software be pirated more or less if every program were open source (but still sold commercially)?
MORE! The existence of warez to the level it is today would indicate to any observer that a huge number of people are willing to steal this software. Open-sourcing everything would increase piracy.
If more people are pirating the software, **how are the authors' rights being protected**?
They are NOT being protected in this situation. The spirit of the Constitution is to protect and secure the rights of individuals.
The framers do recognize that it is important for the public to be able to benefit from these works, but not at the expense of the individual! The framers understand that art requires that artists be compensated for their work or they will (may) not produce. Hence, they protect the artists.
The Constitution protects the rights of the individual first and foremost. The rights of a programmer, in the Constitution's spirit, are top of the list. His rights to make money from his software are above the rights of the public to benefit from the information available in his source.
Your analogy of novels and source code is just that: analogy. Argument by analogy is a logical fallacy. Although they are similar situations, they are not identical. Of course it would be easier for the public to benefit from existing source code, but via warez this would be at expense of the authors.
The community at expense of the individual? One word: communism.
Note that my argument is not that copyright law as implemented today is necessarily in the spirit of the Constitution, but only that the rights of an artist are (and rightly should be) placed above those who desire to benefit from his work.