Richard Stallman Talks On Copyright Vs. the People 329
holden writes "Richard M. Stallman recently gave a talk entitled Copyright vs Community in the Age of Computer Networks to the University of Waterloo Computer Science Club. The talk looks at the origin of copyright, and how it has evolved over time from something that originally served the benefit of the people to a tool used against them. In keeping with his wishes to use open formats, the talk and QA are available in ogg theora only."
One thing I don't get... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:oh boy (Score:1, Insightful)
Good plan!
Re:anime industry (Score:5, Insightful)
Fansubbing is illegal the way it's most often done. They pirate TV programs with added text and then give them to hundreds or thousands of people. Now the companies could start being assholes and try to shut these groups down, but instead they have a gentleman's contract. Subbers stop subbing when a series is licenced and a blind eye is turned to the subbers.
In this way companies learn what is popular and get free market research, fans get what they want when they want it and then in an ideal world the fans buy the official releases to support the original companies and the ones who licenced the anime.
So basically, it's a good way to show copyright isn't always the answer. If you allow people leeway they will repay you back at a later date by supporting you. One could argue fansubs work as the perfect advertisement for merchandise to people outside of Japan and if copyright was put down on it, it would hurt the industry more than if they ignore it.
So anime is a good example of copyright done correctly in a lot of people's opinion.
choice of license (Score:2, Insightful)
UW University students' counterpoint (Score:4, Insightful)
Not everyone who saw the lecture agreed with the contents. A counterpoint can be found here. [slashdot.org]
I didn't write that counterpoint, but there's one thing the author and I agree on: Richard Stallman is a lot more crazy in person. One guy in the audience asked how he was supposed to pay for his university education by releasing free software. Stallman didn't really give him an answer, he just told the student that he didn't have to go to school, and he had no right to release closed source software in an attempt to earn money. Stallman has compared closed source software to "a crime against humanity", yes?
I talked to Stallman after the lecture. I asked him how he paid the mortgage after leaving MIT in 1984. He said that that he's never had a mortgage and "he lives cheaply". I later heard that he basically squatted on the MIT campus.
See, here's the problem with Stallman's philosophies: they're highly incompatible with the status quo, and there's no clear path for change. If you want people to do $Y instead of $X, $Y has to be relatively pin-compatible with $X. Telling people to write free software is well and good, but your paradigm isn't going to have much success if it also requires programmers to buy a house, get married, and otherwise have a normal life.
On a related note, I also asked Stallman what he thought of the wedding photography industry. For those of you who don't know, typical wedding photographers cost over a thousand dollars, show up at your wedding to take pictures, and then make you pay through the nose for prints. They don't even give you the copyright, if you want more prints you have to go back to the photographer! One must shop around to find a photographer who'll actually give you the digital originals. Anyway, I asked Stallman if he thought this was analogous to what was happening in the software world, and he said no. He thought closed source software was a greater imposition on freedom than holding wedding memories hostage.
The man is too close to his particular pet cause.
Re:choice of license (Score:3, Insightful)
He probably don't want his detractors to have fun cutting something together from the clip that gives people the impression that he said things he didn't say. For recorded speeches, this is a very reasonable demand.
Re:I attended (Score:5, Insightful)
The argument RMS puts forward is that Copyright was a good deal for the public when the only people it affected was a small percentage of the population.. when it was seen as a restriction on trade. Now, with the PC, we all copy, all the time and Copyright is just in the way. It's no longer just a restriction on trade.. it's a restriction on private acts and requires intrusive policing to enforce.
Re:UW University students' counterpoint (Score:5, Insightful)
Sounds perfectly reasonable to me.
Do I have to make a stupid analogy or do you get why?
Re:anime industry (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:UW University students' counterpoint (Score:3, Insightful)
You've been modded as funny, but somehow I don't think you're joking.
Sadly, the only analogies I could think of involve the Catholic Church, but I'm not sure they'd support your point.So yeah, you're probably going to have to come up with an analogy.
Anyway, sure, Stallman can call whatever he wants amoral. My point is, if he wants a wide audience to actually listen to him, he needs to offer a means for a programmer to make at least a modest living while avoiding amorality. As I've said, his alternative isn't "pin compatible."
Re:I attended (Score:4, Insightful)
It's more a matter of being fair (and practical). Copyright doesn't loose value like material property. With copyright people can still make money off of work they have long since done. It's bizarre. Laws are easy to create, and the non-power brokers like me have no defacto say. Five years is plenty fair IMHO for getting paid for (in some cases a few hours worth of work), over and over again for the rest of one's life.
I'm sure, all-things-being-equal, RMS wouldn't mind having an "artificial limit" placed on the GPL, but that would be assuming a fair and equal playing field.
We appreciate what you've done (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:UW University students' counterpoint (Score:3, Insightful)
What's more important: something that matters a little to a lot of people, or matters a lot to a few people?
Your argument is flawed, and here's why: according to your logic, closed source software is more of a crime than the murder of one of your family. I mean, who's going to miss your wife or daughter? Unless she's especially notable, a couple hundred people tops. But free software can benefit all of humanity!
That's not to mention that a lot more people care about wedding photos than free software. If I had to pick one of those causes, I know which one I'd get behind.
Re:UW University students' counterpoint (Score:4, Insightful)
If you're a whaler and people tell you to stop whaling your response is most likely going to be "but how will I feed my family?" And the response will likely be "look, I know you've been a whaler all your life, and I know your whole family were whalers for generations and generations, but whales are becoming extinct and to continue whaling them into extinction is just wrong!" To which the whaler may reply "you didn't answer my question!"
It's irrelevant. It's his problem. Go become a fisherman.. or drive an oil tanker, err, cruise ship, or something.
Change the relationship (Score:5, Insightful)
Not being able to force artists into loan sharking arrangements with the labels would mean, however that all the labels as they exist now are effectively and instantly bankrupt. Yay. Without this leverage, The artist writes contracts with agents, and grants his or her managers a piece of his copyright for say, five years. So, the more tracks of mine they sell, the more they make. The more concerts I give to the bigger audiences, the more money they make. But the artist is in control. He has the copyright. I might spare them 10% of revenues, or 50% if I'm a newbie. But it will revert to me.
Because, after all, what function do the huge conglomerated labels have? They used to provide money for manufacture and distribution. They no longer have any significant burden, since once the final track is laid down, all they have to do is sell copies for more than it costs to download. And they were loan sharks. Game over. Finita la commedia.
Re:I attended (Score:3, Insightful)
Good question. I know it's not me. In the US it's members of congress who get lobbied by the copyright holders (which usually aren't even the creators of the work, but just the marketers). Yes "five years is plenty fair" is a bit flippant, but think of it more as an example of something that is MORE fair than, say, fifty or 70 years after an authors death. 10 years maybe, or even 20?
Re:anime industry (Score:2, Insightful)
There is no such gentleman's agreement. The owners of the copyrighted works despise fansubbing, and the companies that license the distribution rights overseas despise them even more. There have been enough instances where producers and artists have openly said that they don't approve of fansubbing. The only reason fansubbers haven't been sued by the japanese distributors is because they realise they would gain very little compared to the time and effort wasted.
Biggest load of bull ever. Fansubbers don't always stop, they officially stop when the company that licensed it sends them a cease and desist. That's what happened when Viz picked up Death Note. What happened after the C&D was that the people originally subbing it, changed their name and continued to sub it.
I think companies get a reasonable amount of fan research from the original market already. What's popular in Japan is bound to be popular with the non-japanese anime fans if it isn't too localized (eg. containing jokes that are very culturally dependent). Market research isn't that expensive by the way that companies would start depending on fansubbers to do it for them.
In an ideal world, yes... In our world, the words "lol 'buy'" come to mind. You could start by arguing that those people were never going to buy it in the first place, but that's beside the point really. Fansubbing is a copyright violation, and it is viewed as such, but not actively pursued because it simply wouldn't be advantageous for the original copyright owner. There is more money to be made by selling the rights to an overseas distributor and let them deal with the lawsuits, than by trying to squeeze a few cents out of a college student. Fansubbers that stop distributing once it's licensed by an american company don't get C&Ds or lawsuits because they acquired the rights after the fansubbing took place.
In short, fansubbers aren't as "tolerated" as you would argue, they just aren't worth investing time and money in yet.
Re:UW University students' counterpoint (Score:5, Insightful)
Since you didn't want to come up with an analogy in the first place, I know you wouldn't appreciate it if I picked holes in it. So I won't.
Problem #1: There are some things generally considered amoral by the population. Murder. Rape. Hunting a species to extinction" Sure, we can get behind that, throw that on the list. "Closed source software" isn't something that leaps into people's heads, and even if it did I doubt most people would put it in the top fifty. "That guy who drives past all the waiting cars and then cuts into the turning lane" would likely rank higher than "closed source software".
Richard Stallman is not the pope of PCs. His saying closed source is immoral doesn't mean anything. You may agree with him, and I agree that closed source isn't preferable. But while most people mind murder and rape and extinction of cute animals most people don't give a damn about software. For them it's a means to an end, and nothing more. Hence our current situation.
Problem #2: I'm pro free software, but think Stallman is going about promoting it in the wrong way. He's literally giving talks to the programmers of tomorrow and saying, "Don't release closed source. It's immoral." Does he offer alternatives? Somewhat - he did say that one can program for open source on commission, but can one earn a good living at it? He's hardly a proof of principle himself. I know there are examples and whole business models, but he didn't talk about them.
We're talking about two different things. You're assuming that average people, when faced with two options, will pick the difficult one with no benefit to themselves, magically listening to an inconvenient person telling them that the easy option is "amoral". I'm more concerned with how Stallman will get people to actually listen to him. At this rate, he's bound to have as much success as the anti-whalers. [newscientist.com]
Re:UW University students' counterpoint (Score:5, Insightful)
I was sat directly behind the guy who asked that question and don't remember it like that at all. To me it seemed like a case of: 'ask a stupid question, get a stupid answer.' It's stupid because he was mixing up Free (as in Freedom) with free (as in beer). It's a common misconception.
Personally when Stallman was answering I really wanted to shout out: 'I get paid for developing Free software!' Which I do, now seeing this weird post on /. makes me wish I had shouted out. Also it was a lecture about copyright in general, not Free software in particular.
So please stop spreading FUD and mis-conceptions about Free software. If that chap in the audience can't make Free software pay then why the heck are Red Hat, Sun Microsystems, IBM, Novell et al. still in business?! Just because Stallman's a dirty hippy, doesn't mean everyone in the business is. Maybe, just maybe money isn't important to him? Why are you judging him to be a failure just because he hasn't made millions from his ideas?
It was a stupid question, that's why Stallman had a problem answering it, I also don't remember him answering in the way you've described, but will check later.
Re:Change the relationship (Score:3, Insightful)
- Sue for copyright infringement, since I would have no standing. They could have designated me the right to do this on their behalf, but they didn't since the whole point of copyright assignment is to allow them to do this.
- Release the work into the public domain. I can, however, release it under a license which does not place any demands on the recipient (allows them to distribute in source of binary form, without attribution).
Even without transferring copyright in name, you can still do it in deed. There's nothing forcing artists to assign their copyrights. If they are good, then they can always take out a loan to finance themselves, or release a few tracks online for free and get their fans to invest in their future to cover their costs (would you buy a share in a band you liked? I probably would).Re:UW University students' counterpoint (Score:2, Insightful)
If your goal with life is improving society rather than achieving personal success, this works perfectly fine. It's just about the same choice that Stallman made [oreilly.com] and it's the same choice that thousands of free software programmers make when they use their spare time making software that the whole society benefits from.
Besides, Stallman has on numerous occasions mentioned ways to make a living while making free software, and many of the aforementioned free software programmers use these. Making private software (software that will never be released to the public, intended for use in only one place), doing [redhat.com] support [canonical.com], making donationware [bittorrent.com] or doing something other than programming all make you a living, whilst avoiding making proprietary software.
Re:I attended (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:UW University students' counterpoint (Score:1, Insightful)
Ah yes, the usual reply to critics of Stallman/the GPL. "You don't understand." "You are stupid." I think -that's- amoral. Know what? A black box ain't amoral. It's sold as a black box. The GPL is not about freedom, it's a arrangement to get stuff back. Freedom is what you read about on the site of Amnesty International. A redefinition of that word to serve your puny software purpose, is called "decadence". If you think otherwise, perhaps you should empathically try to imagine how true victims of a lack of freedom (see Amnesty's site) would feel about someone who redefined it for software programming and a mis-conception about black box morality, and someone who can only apply that kind of luxury live philophosy, because he was born on a very rich, capitalist country. Sir, -you- are stupid. (I don't really mean that, but hey, I'm freely copying your demeanor.)
Re:UW University students' counterpoint (Score:2, Insightful)
And that's where Stallman is wrong. There is only one question to ask here: Where is the coercion?
There is none. It's nowhere to be found. There is no coercion, and therefore no aggressor and no victim. Compiling source code and selling the binary result is clearly -- drum roll please -- an act of voluntary association. There is nothing coercive about it.
Now, when government and IP law gets involved, THEN you're talking coercion. But that's a debate that I'm not interested in right now. My point is that simply selling compiled source code cannot possibly be interpreted as an act of coercion, and therefore the act is entirely moral and just -- not because government says so, but because human nature says so.
Assumption (Score:2, Insightful)
I would suggest that 'promoting progress for the benefit of the public' being the only legitimate purpose of copyright requires justification.
Another possible purpose is to protect the right of the creator to be the sole beneficiary of his labour.
Points to consider include dependence on earlier work and novelty and the benefits of the creation vs. the costs of protection with respect to those who have to pay.
Re:UW University students' counterpoint (Score:4, Insightful)
Thing is, most people don't like thinking of themselves as being someone who ignores their beliefs and lives an immoral life. So it's easy to convince yourself that you don't really believe in any of the RMS crap anyway. Especially if there's no negative repercussions.
Hold up a second there pardner... (Score:2, Insightful)
Every /. story about the RIAA involves a conflict between principals dejure and the defacto state of affairs.
"Five years is plenty fair IMHO for getting paid for (in some cases a few hours worth of work), over and over again for the rest of one's life."
James MacNeil Whistler sued John Ruskin for libel. On the stand Whistler was asked how he could ask for two hundred pounds for two days work. He responded that he was charging for knowledge "gained in the work of a lifetime." Among musicians that don't appreciate his work, Handel will still remain immortal for writting The Messiah in a mere three weeks. IIRC, Dostoyevsky "knocked off" Notes from the Underground. When you argue that monetary compensation derived from copyright should be tied to hourly measures of time you assume equivalence in the value of work by Beethoven and one by Madonna. Hell, in this day and age, a fella can make millions by playing a game of basketball. How long does that take, an hour and a half?
Re:Instructional works should be free?!!??! (Score:3, Insightful)
I think he/she was definitely talking about future "to be created" work as opposed to existing stuff. Maybe the intent was to suggest that the set of instructional works on a particular topic would be of less quality overall. There would certainly be smaller body of material available. I'd sort of consider that "lower quality", even though the quality of an individual work might be ~ the same.
"The value of a manual (to the company making it) is not in it's royalties. It is usually given away for free, so there are no royalties."
I guess you've never purchased the service/maintenance manual for an automobile. These typically run in the $100-$200 range. There are 3rd party alternatives in similar price ranges, but I *think* they must license the specs from the manufacturer as well.
I see no reason why instructional works should get different treatment.
Re:When Openness isn't Open (Score:2, Insightful)
MP3 has a history of licencing and patenting issues, OGG Vorbis is patent free and open. Thus, of the two, the latter format is more likely to ensure continued access to the data.
Yes, the popular ( read: pre-installed with an OS ) music playing software make it difficult to play Ogg but there are plenty of players [vorbis.com] around. You call it fanaticism and say he has compromised to make a point. I (and many others I suspect) would say he is absolutely not-compromising and this decision is completely in line with Stallman's aims and philosophy and those of the FSF.
Re:choice of license (Score:4, Insightful)
In the talk, he separates works into three categories: Functional works, artistic works, and position statements (like this lecture, where he gives his personal opinion on a topic). For position statements, he thinks it's reasonable for authors to be able to restrict modification - since modifications would mostly just allow people to mis-represent the opinions of others.
Re:UW University students' counterpoint (Score:3, Insightful)
On the contrary, the GPL is what its creator says it is. Why should anyone care about your arbitrary characterization--particular without any justification whatsoever? Consider the definition of "letter" and "spirit" and note my emphasis:
The letter of the law versus the spirit of the law is an idiomatic antithesis. When one obeys the letter of the law but not the spirit, he is obeying the literal interpretation of the words (the "letter") of the law, but not the intent of those who wrote the law. Conversely, when one obeys the spirit of the law but not the letter, he is doing what the authors of the law intended, though not adhering to the literal wording.
"Law" originally referred to legislative statute, but in the idiom may refer to any kind of rule. Intentionally following the letter of the law but not the spirit may be accomplished through exploiting technicalities, loopholes, and ambiguous language. Following the letter of the law but not the spirit is also a tactic used against an oppressive government. [1]
>If you think otherwise, perhaps you should empathically try to imagine how true victims of a lack of freedom (see Amnesty's site) would feel about someone who redefined it for software programming and a mis-conception about black box morality, and someone who can only apply that kind of luxury live philophosy, because he was born on a very rich, capitalist country.
The same kind of argument is used against those who fight for democracy in China. Moreover, your claim of "redefinition" is ridiculous, as if people advocating software freedom automatically discount any other kind of freedom. You have tried to set up a false dilemma fallacy: freedom is either defined by Amnesty International or by someone else. In reality freedom will always be an incompletely specified notion, as long as changes such as technology occur in the world. Advocates for software freedom have never pretended that it encompasses all possible freedom. Please use your brain.
One of the things you failed to acknowledge is that issues of freedom around software will continue to be far, far more important simply because of the always increasing dependence of society upon software.
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Letter_of_the_law [wikipedia.org]
Re:UW University students' counterpoint (Score:3, Insightful)
OK, I stated a whole counterargument, with one piece of advice mixed in: "Please use your brain."
I am sorry if that hurts your feelings. However, my counterargument otherwise remains unchallenged by your appeal to pity, just like the other challenges you have received.