Rage Callao <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > Patents and copyrights are essentially the same in that they allow > someone who created something a right to profit from it before anyone > else does. The only difference between the two lies in what is being > patented or copyrighted. An artistic work (by this I mean literary or > musical) that is published or recorded using some means is copyrighted. > Inventive work on the other hand is patented when specific techniques > borne out of a concept is applied to the creation of some product or > process. Thus, although both are creative works, it is the subject > matter being protected that determines whether a copyright or patent > should apply.
Patents apply to the abstract notion of concepts; copyrights, however, apply to the mechanism that makes use of these concepts. Consider the `Happy Birthday' song: how convenient today's `Game K N B' TV show can relate to this, since they reveal that Time Warner obtained the copyright to this ubiquitous song a long time ago in 1988.[1] If I follow your exposition, then the Warner folks had done it all wrogn: they ought to patent it, since it was an artistic work. If that happened, then even the mere humming of the song's tones (whether in public or private) would be enough to warrant arrest, wouldn't it? But of course we don't live in an impossible world. It's okay to sing `Happy Birthday' in private gatherings as copyright allows this, protecting our right to use it. But it also protects the copyright holder since it can *possibly* restrict the *public display* and/or *performance* of the song, particularly when it is sung so it can be reproduced and sold as a product. It it were patented, then you probably can't sing it either anytime you want it, private or not. > In the case of software, the technique (which is represented by the > source code) used to compress an image, for example, would be patented. > If the code were published, that published work would fall under a > copyright. In both cases, it is the specific application of an idea into > something tangible that is patented or copyrighted, not the idea or > concept. Again, the concept + application thing. Nice tool to illustrate the relationship of copyrights and patents, given we live in an ideal, no-flux world. But the argument fails quite easily: If software patents were to be allowed to make a foothold, no sooner would artistic, cultural and psychological patents come out too: I can imagine some Cubist painter patenting Picasso's technique someday, given this were to happen... > Software patents, I believe, are necessary. Whether or not it will > stifle any progress in the industry will always be subject to > debate. In any case, software is created work. It did not just > miraculously appear out of thin air. A person creating something has > the right of an owner and is therefore entitled to the same kind of > protection a state gives to all persons who own property. It is really > up to them to decide whether or not the rest of us benefit from their > work by either keeping it to themselves or by letting the whole world > know about it. That is of course based on the concept that `we own property'. However, looking at the history of the world shows us that `property owns us' is more the norm than not, and countless conficts arose as a side effect. I do agree that persons still have the final choice of whether to share or not; to follow the Golden Rule, or not to. Let's just try to nudge those that don't into sharing it. [1] http://www.unhappybirthday.com/ -- ZAK B. ELEP <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> -- <http://zakame.spunge.org> 1024D/FA53851D 1486 7957 454D E529 E4F1 F75E 5787 B1FD FA53 851D -- Running Debian GNU+Linux testing/unstable. GnuPG signed mail preferred.
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