[Nottingham] Android Freedoms - Or lack of?

[Jason Irwin]

On 21/09/11 13:30, Martin wrote:
> All depending on whether you take a commercial view or an academic
> good-for-all-mankind view? There is an awful lot of our culture
> inaccessibly locked away by commercial greed and 'copyright'... Often
> cynically only to be released upon the death of the particular
> artist...

The problem I have with the "good-for-all-mankind" bit is that actually
it isn't, not for art and thus not for culture.  AIUI copyright only got
kicked around after the creation of the printing press; the allowing of
copying wasn't such a huge issue prior to that as the effort required to
gain enough skill to make a reasonable facsimile was enough to put all
but the most talented and determined off.

Today?  Today any muppet can duplicate digital data and make perfect
copies on a scale that would be considered "industrial" a few short
years ago.  Giving anyone the freedom to copy anything is going to put
and end to major investment.  Sure, some things (e.g. GCC) would
continue, but other things will simply stop.  Think big-budget games,
movies, music etc.

I'll agree that there needs to be limits, people should not be able to
hold society to ransom; and this is where I think RMS is simply wrong,
he seems to believe that even this is insufferable.

Science...I'd say that is different and I realise this creates edge
cases which probably indicates that I haven't though this through far
enough.  I keep coming back to one thing: without that "golden period"
to raise monies from the monopoly of creating copies, how do artists
make a living?

> EU recording copyright extension 'will cost €1bn'
> Record companies, not artists, will benefit

I'll agree totally that they are trying to create artificial legal
barriers in order to entrench a defunct business model but he fact that
the major labels are a shower of bastards does not mean that the basic
idea of copyright is invalid, just that the private interests of the
companies outweigh the public's interests.

This is true of everything, we now live in a demagogic plutarchy.

-- 
Jason Irwin