Le dimanche 30 Juillet 2006 16:28, Barry B. Bean a écrit :
> On Thu, 27 Jul 2006 18:35:32 +0100, Christos Stavrou wrote:
> >Even the 'right of property' that you seem to take it for granted, is
> >a social construct, a very recent one in fact. 'Owenership' was
> >constructed lately, in historical terms, as the fundamental base of
> >western societies... and certainly it does not entail anything natural
> >or moral or immoral in itself.
>
> LOL! Try to take a bone from a hungry dog and tell me that the concept of
> property isn't part of nature!
Then again, you're wrong. The concept of possession is part of nature, but
property deals more with the social protection of rightful possession than
possession itself. Anyway, it's how I understood Blackstone last time I read
it. By possessing things, you claim personal rights on them ; property is how
society acknowledge those claims upon completion of certain conditions. A dog
would protect any bone coming into its possession - wether it was stolen or
given to him by its master. Property gives a right to an owner to defend a
possession, but only works if the possession is lawful.
> >As Manuel did, I also try to stress the pecularities, the nuances and
> >delicate balances entailed in the Law, which can not be reduced in a
> >simplistic 'this is stealing' or 'this is wrong'.
>
> I disagree. Pirating Photoshop is a very clear violation of copyright law.
Of course it is. But it does not equate to stealing. Saying so is just the
sign that the political spinning was very effective on you. Equating copying
to robbery leaves no room for fair use, and reducing the gaps of the fair use
is all what this spin is about. Soon, you won't be able to skip ads on
recorded broadcasts, you recorder won't let you record some flaged programs,
etc. All this was considered "fair use", but is soon to be forbidden. Because
it will be assimilated to "stealing". Truth is, tempering with copyrighted
works really is counterfeiting.
> >Finally, one other thing you seem to underestimate in Manuel's
> >argument is the social benefits involved in relaxed conditions about
> >intellectual properties. Just to offer an example and finish here: If
> >the internet was patented by its creator, you and me and all of us we
> >were probably not going to have this inspiring discussion :)
>
> I'm not prepared to abandon capitalism because youand Manuel don't see a
> problem with software piracy.
You misunderstood me. I see some problems with piracy, and I strongly feel
that it would be better to go for free software instead of violating
copyrights. And as far as capitalism goes, it's totaly OK with me. But I have
a feeling that you're no more enlighted as to what capitalism really is as
you are in law science. To function properly, capitalism postulates a free
market, with unlimited offer and demand. When it comes to personal software,
the market has a huge demand, and very few offerers. Hence, the laws of
economics that describe true capitalism are broken, and the situation is much
more akin to a monopoly market. As far as progress is concerned, monopolies
are *always* bad. In fact, soviet russia only had monopolies, and anybody can
see where that led them. Trouble is, semi-monopolies are blossoming at the
moment, in the IP field, and the happy fews are gathering to push new laws
upon citizens of every countries, through intense lobbying. USA included.
What you didn't caught was that I was (and still am) OK with most of the
copyright laws we *used to* have until very recently, because they balanced
rights between authors / editors / public. What I dislike is the robbing of
my rights I suffered with recent changes in the law, changes dictated largely
by the industry against their consumers.
> Whether capitalism should or should not
> define cultural norms is a discussion for another time and another forum.
This was a very poor attempt to dismiss documented opinions as ... what ?
"unamerican behaviour" ? But you can't be more wrong as far as I'm concerned.
I'm certain you'll finally grab what I said here someday in the future. And
that day, you're going to say "sh...t" because that's the day you realize
you've been lied all the way, and you're doomed.
Well, now that this has been straightened, it's time to go on holidays, so I
won't read the list for a couple of weeks - if some want to keep on
discussing this, I suggest we go private, my reply-to is working.
--
Manuel Viet
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