From: Chad Perrin <perrin@...>
Date: 2007-03-28T07:09:43+09:00
Subject: Re: free pdf ebook

On Sat, Mar 24, 2007 at 08:17:20PM +0900, Alex Young wrote:
> 
> While I've only been peripherally following this thread, and so may have 
> missed something along the way, the main point of those saying "is it 
> theft?" has been to emphasise the practical and moral difference between 
> depriving someone of a physical item which they then no longer have 
> access to, and obtaining without consent something for free which would 
> otherwise have to be paid for, *without* denying the original owner 
> access to it.  Nobody (that I've seen, other than possibly the thread's 
> originator) is saying that either is right, or trying to rationalise 
> either.  Conflating the two (as the big media owners like to do) is 
> overly simplistic and highly emotive for those who understand the 
> difference, because they understand what can be lost when that viewpoint 
> becomes entrenched.

Speaking solely for myself here, you're on the money (so to speak).
While I have some issues with the ethicality of copyright law, I would
still love to pay for a copy of one of the excellent books from the Prag
Progs (and, in fact, have already done so in the case of three or four
books bearing that imprimatur, and will surely continue to do in the
future).  Such payment need not take the form of filthy lucre, but if
that's the preference of an author such as Dave Thomas, I'm happy to
reward his work in that manner -- the parenthetically alluded books I've
acquired have been worth a fair bit more to me than the money I've paid
for them, which makes them all an excellent deal for me.

That in no way changes how I feel about copyright law, or the simple
fact that copyright infringement is not theft, which seems to be the
point at which you were stabbing.  So yes, as I said, you're on the
money at least as far as I'm concerned.


> 
> My own personal feelings on the matter are that the situation would be 
> much simpler if copyright was not transferable, but that really *is* a 
> conversation for another day...

I agree, and I once held the opinion that this was probably the best way
to fix an increasingly broken body of copyright law in the US.  I don't
think the idea is any less an improvement over the current system, now,
than I did when it first occurred to me -- but I'm now of the opinion
that other (less popular) solutions are even better.

-- 
CCD CopyWrite Chad Perrin [ http://ccd.apotheon.org ]
Ben Franklin: "As we enjoy great Advantages from the Inventions of
others we should be glad of an Opportunity to serve others by any
Invention of ours, and this we should do freely and generously."