jeffmeh;195680 Wrote: > Well, there is certainly a fundamental difference in that copying > intellectual property does not deprive the owner of the intellectual > property, while taking an apple deprives the owner of that apple. On > the other hand, if we stipulate that the IP owner has rights associated > with the IP, then copying the IP deprives the owner of those rights, > just as taking an apple deprives the owner of the right to do what he > pleases with the apple. >
I just don't think this is a good way to think about things - it's forcing a square peg into a round hole. Look at the language you used - you said "taking an apple deprives the owner of the right to do what he pleases with the apple", when you could have simply said "taking the apple deprives the owner of the apple". Wouldn't that be much clearer and less convoluted? But in order to make the concept of ownership fit abstractions like music we are forced into these kind of rhetorical knots. I think it's even a bit dangerous - if you can own an abstraction like a song, then it's a short step to owning an idea, and I don't really want to live in a world where one can own ideas. Instead, can't we just admit that copyright is not ownership? Music or the text of a book simply isn't property, it's something new and different. The question we should ask ourselves is whether it's a good idea to allow creators to have control over copying their creations, or not, and that's NOT the same question as whether people should be allowed to own apples or houses. I think it should be a question of optimizing the law to maximally encourage creativity, art, and the spread of ideas in our society. If we decide a 20 year term of copyright is best, fine - no big deal. If you want to see how different that is from real ownership, imagine if all physical property became public domain 20 years after its creation :-). -- opaqueice ------------------------------------------------------------------------ opaqueice's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=4234 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=34366 _______________________________________________ discuss mailing list [email protected] http://lists.slimdevices.com/lists/listinfo/discuss
