Submitted by “John Perry Barlow – EFF co-founder, Grateful Dead lyricist, and, improbably, now a rancher – arrived in Paris and began tweeting up a storm from the e-G8 summit gathered there this week to discuss the future of the Internet.” Incredible what Sarkozy is planning – how about he focus on the many problems in France the people there are actually suffering from?
“I may be one of very few people in this room who actually makes his living personally by creating what these gentlemen are pleased to call “intellectual property.” I don’t regard my expression as a form of property. Property is something that can be taken from me. If I don’t have it, somebody else does.
Expression is not like that. The notion that expression is like that is entirely a consequence of taking a system of expression and transporting it around, which was necessary before there was the Internet, which has the capacity to do this infinitely at almost no cost.”
It is a pity that wise words are but gibberish to the ears of fools, and coldly ignored by those with power who wish to keep it.
The scary thing is – these people *do* believe they can take the expression away from the creators…
Nah, the most scary thing is that they actually do take it away, they’re not just thinking about it.
Yeah but unfortunately it’s not true:
“property
The right to the possession, use, or disposal of something; ownership
– rights of property”
Why is it that so many arguments against stringent copyright rules are pathetic attempts to redefine words (e.g. “I’m not technically ‘stealing’ so it’s ok.”).
We can bestow property-ness upon ideas using laws if we want to. Give an actual argument why is it bad to do that – don’t just say “idea’s aren’t property, so you can’t own them”.
Keywords: we, want.
“We” do not “want” such laws. At least, not in their current form. We live in (what are claimed to be) democracies, and that means that laws exist to serve US, and not the other way around. As a result, if “we” collectively decide we do not longer “want” a law (as has clearly happened with the case of copyright), then such laws become meaningless. Laws are only legitimate because we collectively decide to follow them, because we see merit in them – and NOT because some guy in a suit tells us to.
That’s why common knee-jerk responses like “So if I want to kill someone I should just be able to disregard the law?” are missing the point completely – you’ll be hard-pressed to find many people who believe we should not follow laws against murder in the same way we do not follow copyright law.
The people are usually quicker to adapt to changing morals than than lawmakers do. Big content will try to pour more and more money to buy laws, but in the end, it’s futile – you can buy lawmakers, but you can’t buy the people.
Edited 2011-05-26 13:07 UTC
Because ideas are ruled by quantic rules: when one observe an idea, 1) it duplicates instantly in his mind and 2) both original and clone ideas starts to change on their own.
You can only *own* an idea if you keep it away from any observation *forever*. As soon as you start to show it, whatever under which condition, it duplicates.
That’s the point. You can’t ask people mind to *not* store new knowledge.
“The right to the possession, use, or disposal of something; ownership
– rights of property”
You can’t lost the right to possess an idea until you lost your mind ability to keep it there.
You can’t lost the right to use an idea until your lost your mind ability to use it.
You can’t lost the right to dispose an idea until you lost your mind ability to forget about it.
It’s not an issue of idea being a property or not.
It’s an issue of idea being an *exclusive* property or not.
To which I’ve already replied, above.
Edited 2011-05-26 14:14 UTC
…Grateful Dead lyricist, and, improbably, now a rancher…
Actually there is nothing improbable at all about moving from jam-band singer to EFF founder and rancher. Farming is one of the most necessary, satisfactory, and undervalued professions in the world.
Whether or not you are aware of it, Thom, you are propagating a stereotype about farming being a “hick” profession that is somehow irrational for intelligent people to pursue.
That depends.
Using personal experience (sample size: one), I’d probably conclude it’s improbable simply because I’m a very cerebral person and, at the same time, I’m very lucky to have a good diet and good genes because physical activity bores me to tears and I’d be a mass of fat otherwise.
Did you read the original article? It is, as can be deducted from the quotes used, an exact quote from there. Don’t blame the messenger, please.
And in what kind of region do you think I live?
I’m happy we have internet in my hick hometown. I *am* a hick.
Farming in itself yes, but note that as soon as you talk about selling farm products, there is a big issue:
many ‘occidental’ farmers are competitive with ‘third world’ farmers only because of trade barriers..
“how about he focus on the many problems in France the people there are actually suffering from?”
That’s a very good question. But considering that he worsened some of them in a totally voluntary fashion, in order to please the biggest pockets, I think he doesn’t exactly care that much about what you and me call “the people”.
In France, people who have the most problems don’t vote. And, to make matter worses, Sarkozy also had no serious competition at election time…
Maybe the upcoming ones will be better. The sudden rise of the green party in the last few years might lead to interesting results, though they won’t win alone. Or maybe a weird twist of fate will make Marine score the most as the biggest parties tear apart…
Edited 2011-05-26 07:27 UTC
If I were french I’d hang him by his feet with an ethernet cable on top of Eiffel tower. Theoretically speaking, ofc.
I usually don’t agree with him, but in this case, can you explain what’s wrong about these sentences ?
First of, what is reasonable to me may be totally unbearable to lots of people so, how it is possible to him to ask everyone to be reasonable?
As so, nothing is neutral about laws and rules on ours societies. What he is arguing is to take a biased system and try to apply it globally.
This is disgusting, he is trying to hang on our sympathy to artists and their creations to hand over even more power to politicians and big corporations.
I agree with the original post, metaphorically, so to speech.