From: Charlie Stross (charlie@antipope.org)
Date: Wed Sep 23 1998 - 03:32:16 MDT
On Mon, Sep 21, 1998 at 07:15:43PM +0200, den Otter wrote:
> > From: Doug Bailey <Doug.Bailey@ey.com>
>
> > http://www.abcnews.com/sections/tech/DailyNews/websuit980921.html
>
> Frankly, I think (online) copyright should be abolished, at least
> in the case of non-commercial use; it only serves overpaid lawyers
> anyway.
No, it needs to be _replaced_.
For non-commercial use, the Open Content license is a fairly good option.
But.
Any resolution of the essential problems of copyright needs to bear in
mind several points.
1) How to make arrangements for the recognition and remuneration of
developers of new intellectual goods, while handling the essential
problem of copyright, which is that the cost of replicating information
tends towards zero but the value of the information (and effort
required to produce it) does not.
2) With respect to (1), how to authenticate the origin of a piece of
information. (Libraries of record to accept email submissions?)
3) How to prevent violations of any provisions of (1), without tending to
damage the free flow of information within society, which is essential
to our continuing development. (Consider the WIPO treaty as an example
of throwing out the baby with the bathwater.)
4) How to deal with the transition to the new system, assuming there is
one. (For example, recent copyright treaty changes raised the length
of copyright from "life plus fifty" to "life plus seventy"; a considerable
amount of out-of-copyright work went back into copyright control, and I
know at least one publisher who was seriosly inconvenienced by this.)
If I had an answer to question (1), which is the big chestnut in this
fire, I'd be crowing it from the rooftops. Unfortunately I don't, this
side of a nanotechnology revolution (which puts the _whole_ economy in
the same basket as intellectual property, thus completely changing the
ball game we're playing).
Any suggestions?
-- Charlie
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