[OT] - does IP exist?

[Jesse Phillips]

On Mon, 18 Aug 2008 01:34:04 -0400, Adam D. Ruppe wrote:

> Oh dear, I'm going to regret getting involved in this thread. I should
> just have kept my focus on the compiler... oh well.
> 
> 
> On Mon, Aug 18, 2008 at 02:22:05AM +0000, Jesse Phillips wrote:
>> Can I bring up my list twist on the whole give versus take rights
>> thing? Sure you can claim I don't have a right to control distribution
>> of my work, but I can also claim you don't have the right to distribute
>> work (not just mine). This works for the right to life. I can say you
>> actually don't have a right to life, but no one has the right to take
>> it away.
> 
> Fascinating. So if we accept this, what would give you the right to
> distribute your own work? If I don't have it, why do you?
> 
>> I have made my comments here: http://www.digitalmars.com/
>> webnews/newsgroups.php?art_group=digitalmars.D&article_id=75199
> 
> It's getting late where I am, so I might have to reply to that later.
> 
>> Frankly I really don't care about the bills either. The true
>> fundamental thing that controls whether I can spend time developing
>> stuff for other people, is if I can get food on the table.
> 
> Food is something I clumped in with bills.
> 
>> You claim your goal is to have ideas flourish. Yet in this scenario you
>> can't create your ideas, you create someone else's.
> 
> This is a way for an artist to pay his bills (buy food, etc.) by doing
> art.
> 
> If he can do enough work for other people, this gives him free time to
> do his own work.
> 
> However, creating someone else's ideas is still having ideas flourish.
> 
> I'd love to create illustrated books, but I'm no good at drawing. If I
> hired an illustrator to draw the pictures for me, those ideas would
> still be out in the open. I didn't do it all myself, nor did the hired
> illustrator, but that doesn't make the ideas of any less value to the
> world.
> 
>> Once again I hope you have read my beef with ignoring rights. I just
>> don't see the end result as what justifies copyright. I'm not here to
>> make a Utopia.
> 
> Our ethical systems are incompatible. I define justification as being
> dependent on the results in all cases. Thus, the only rights are those
> that can be shown to bring good consequences. (Where, of course, good
> must be defined separately as an axiom.)
> 
>> You did so well there moving away from Utopia, but you're back. See my
>> first comment. It ain't just the bills, its the food man, the food.
>> Your ideal world just got harder to create.
> 
> I could go into detail about why this isn't a deal-breaker, but it is
> bed time so I must be brief: food is cheap. A person's food is rather
> trivially paid for; a person could eat with less than $3000 / year.
> 
> It isn't difficult to make that much money (in the US anyway), even
> without a steady job or any special qualifications at all.
> 
> Housing, on the other hand, is brutal, and still quite necessary.
> 
>> Wait, stop right there. You don't have a right to place restrictions on
>> something you created.
> 
> I could live with that, but I don't see it as ideal. Keeping names on
> something is a courtesy* to the creator's ego - it makes the creator
> happy to have done the work and might build up a good reputation,
> getting him a job at a later time. This gives him some incentive to keep
> doing his work.
> 
> * Note my specific wording in the old post: do not misrepresent the
> source. I don't propose that including the author's name be /required/,
> but I don't think anyone should lie about it if asked, and should
> volunteer the information anyway for the above reason. You can see one
> reason why I prefer the zlib like license used in Phobos to the BSD
> license used in Tango here. (Another reason there is a standard library
> exists in most every program written in the language, so a requirement
> in its license is a requirement in every license of every program
> distributed as a statically compiled executable (which I prefer for end
> user convenience, just run it and go), which I think is just simply a
> hassle.)
> 
>> Assuming the creator has kept his creation private. He is the only one
>> to know of it. The creator has the rights to this creation. He is able
>> to use it as he wishes. Would you not agree with this? I mean, no one
>> knows he has it, so they can't take rights away.
> 
> This doesn't mean he has the rights to his creation. This is saying he
> has the rights to his /self/.
> 
> I'm not saying he must give up something he creates; in fact, I
> specifically said the opposite at the top of my long post earlier today.
> A person cannot be forced to divulge something.
> 
>> So with total control of his new found creation, he creates a legal
>> document that is agreed upon by using the his creation.
> 
> Why is the creation of this document justified? We are going back to out
> incompatible ethics again: I don't care about your rights, and you don't
> care about my consequences, so we'd just be talking past each other.
> 
> I'll say it anyway though: laws are justified only because of the good
> they bring society. If it does good, ok, I'll live with it. If not,
> well, I'll live with it anyway since I don't want to get sued or go to
> jail, but I won't like it.

"Why is the creation of this document justified? We are going back to out 
incompatible ethics again: I don't care about your rights, and you don't 
care about my consequences, so we'd just be talking past each other."

Aye, see we now have reached the area where we disagree. I will quote 
myself here, so you will have no reason to read the other post.

"I should probably continue on why I feel individual rights are more
important than trying to help the world flourish with ideas and invention.
People are greedy. My goal tries to tailer to this in a way that will help
the flourishing of ideas and invention, yours just says it is a bad thing
and should be denied. I do not see it as a bad thing, just a fact and no
one should be punished for it (the free market can do that)."