Book People Archive

Re: Redeeming copyright (Was Re: Eldred v. Ashcroft)


On Tue, 20 Feb 2001, Eric Eldred wrote:
> I don't have a ready answer to your point that a conservancy
> might encourage the noxious idea of copyright as some sort
> of personal property, instead of directly encouraging a free
> public domain on the utilitarian principles of the U.S.
> Constitution.
>
> When I first presented the idea to Richard M. Stallman, he
> quickly pointed out that the ethics of the conservancy would
> be similar to redeeming slaves from slavery.  He asked
> whether we really wanted to drive up the price of slaves in
> such a process, and make slavery more attractive financially
> to the slaveholders.  On the other hand, redeeming slaves
> has been an important moral obligation for people of many
> religions for thousands of years.  Slavery still exists in
> some parts of the world (including the United States).
> Groups that raise money to buy slaves' freedom in Africa
> face the same criticism from honest people who do not
> approve of slavery in any form.  Many who belonged to the
> Society of Friends did not approve of the 1861 war against
> southern slave states, because they did not believe in
> killing people--yet they had for many years raised money to
> buy freedom for the slaves instead.  I haven't examined any
> studies that purport to show the effect on slavery of any
> of these responses.
>
> [snip]
>
> This issue is not as simple as it sounds.  We need input
> from everybody concerned here.  Thanks for raising this
> issue.  We will expand on the general concept as we meet
> this spring and decide on a charter for the corporation and
> will be back in touch.  In the meantime, we welcome more
> discussion here.

Thanks for explaining more about the intellectual property
conservancy.  The analogy of buying slaves does help me
understand the concept and intention of conservancy.  But,
forgive me for being a doubting Thomas.  I don't think that
this is a good idea.  I am afraid that it is sending a
wrong message to the authors, heirs and copyright owners,
and eventually lawmakers and judges.  On a personal level,
I try to reduce my monetary support for the copyrighted
materials by not spending too much money on the copyrighted
materials.  This is not easy to do because of Hobson's
choice but it is doable.  The money that I save will be
spent on the public domain materials.  Because I am just one
person, I won't make any much difference.  But, if more and
more people reduce monetary support for the copyrighted
materials, the message will be stronger, I think.

Even though we have very different opinions and perspectives
(what I do on a personal level is really the opposite of
what the conservancy does), keep all of us posted on the
progress of your group.

Regards,

Joseph Pietro Riolo
<riolo@[redacted]>