Yes, the UDHR doesn't do that much for me either. Though what's interesting is that it's looking like the most popular moral right is usually that of attribution -- the right for your work to be correctly identified as yours, and for work of others not to be attributed as yours. While the rest of the moral rights aren't at all appealing to me, this one is the one that most, if not all Creative Commons licenses depend on, so I suppose I'm implicitly supporting some sliver of it.
But as Mako said, 27(2), probably goes farther than we'd ever want to in every other respect.. F On 4/9/07, Benj. Mako Hill <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
<quote who="Nelson Pavlosky" date="Mon, Apr 09, 2007 at 06:35:38PM -0700"> > What do you think of Article 27 of the Universal Declaration of Human > Rights? I've never really been a huge fan. > > (1) Everyone has the right freely to participate in the cultural life > > of the community, to enjoy the arts and to share in scientific > > advancement and its benefits. > > > > (2) Everyone has the right to the protection of the moral and material > > interests resulting from any scientific, literary or artistic > > production of which he is the author. > > (1) sounds like it's exactly what we're about, promoting cultural > participation. But (2) sounds like it could be used to justify > maximalist policies in copyright and patent law, promoting absolute > control over creative works, in such a way that it could prevent (1). In fact, 27(2) *has* been used to justify high protectionist schemes. You need to remember that the UDHR reflects a very particular historical moment. *Many* of the articles represent at political balance between the principles being argued for by the US and its allies (usually typical "liberal" views) and those being argued for by the Soviet Union and its allies (more social good oriented rights). You know, free speech versus universal employment or food type of things. The result is exactly what you see here and you can probably guess which section was being argued for by which side. The UDHR is an interesting historical document but it needs to be seen in those terms. Of course, we can argue ourselves blue about what "material interest" might or might not be. And people have: I have a WIPO publication on IP as a human right that debates this issue in exactly these terms. Historically though, it's quite clear the authors of 27(2) -- or at least those arguing for the inclusion -- meant copyright and patent and a bunch of informaiton ownership that we'd probably disagree with in degree if not in principle. We can try to spin it differently now of course, and some have, but I find it easier just not to bother. This, and the article that defines marriage as a between and a man and a woman, sort of turn me off the document as a whole. Regards, Mako -- Benjamin Mako Hill [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mako.cc/ Creativity can be a social contribution, but only in so far as society is free to use the results. --RMS _______________________________________________ Discuss mailing list [email protected] http://freeculture.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/discuss
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