Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!rwwetmore
From: rwwetmore@watmath.waterloo.edu (Ross Wetmore)
Newsgroups: comp.misc
Subject: Re: lotus chairman makes 26 million
Keywords: copy protection piracy
Message-ID: <18963@watmath.waterloo.edu>
Date: 18 May 88 15:26:13 GMT
References: <9160@cisunx.UUCP> <1801@uhccux.UUCP> <807@netxcom.UUCP> <2767@tekig5.TEK.COM> <5371@ihlpg.ATT.COM>
Reply-To: rwwetmore@watmath.waterloo.edu (Ross Wetmore)
Organization: U. of Waterloo, Ontario
Lines: 63

In article <5371@ihlpg.ATT.COM> timim@ihlpg.ATT.COM (Tim Lorello) writes:
>In article <2767@tekig5.TEK.COM>, wayneck@tekig5.TEK.COM (Wayne Knapp) writes:
>> The real PROFITEER is
>> the priate who copies my code.  He gets 4 years worth of work for nothing!  
>>                                       Wayne Knapp  
>
>This is right on the money. 
  It is one aspect of the problem. No one except a 110% socialist really
believes that those creative enough to come up with original ideas should
not be compensated accordingly. Most people don't understand the role of
the chairman of the board, seven levels of middle-men and the government
who get most of this compensation though and this confuses them into
thinking they can do the same.

>All questions of capitalism aside; 
  Then you are a socialist, and we already discussed what those fundamental
hypotheses imply.

>when you pirate someone's software, you take something that is not yours. 
  Oops, property is a capitalist concept.
  Careful, what you take is ideas structured in a particular form.

>You did not design it.  You did not provide input to its
>assimilation.  What gives you the right to take it or copy it?
  Ideas cannot be owned by anyone (yet, and I hope never). Back off and 
take a serious look at the implications of this one before rushing off to
legislate. If someone stands on his soapbox and spouts, those ideas do not 
remain his/her property (besides they probably weren't his/hers anyway).
To be more explicit, copyrighting certain negative ideas would be a great
way to control dissent.

>Our legal system has already stated that software is "copywrightable." 
  It is not clear what the Apple lawsuit will mean, but until now I believe
it has been perfectly legal to take the description of the idea and create
ones own particular form of its implementation.
  That is, it is the form of expression or implementation of the idea that 
the creative person can currently lay claim to.

>Our morality says that taking something from someone, INCLUDING IDEAS, 
>is a form of theft unless compensation is provided.  
  Morality == religion -> breeds all kinds of myopic fanatics. Moral
justification is only applicable to those who belong to your particular
sect, and should be confined to discussions between its members.
  Besides this statement is obviously wrong :-)

>		Tim Lorello
>		AT&T Bell Laboratories

  We are in the information age, and one of its problems is defining
workable property rights for information. This is not a good-guy/bad-guy
emotional exercise but a serious issue. Those that wish to blindly apply
material property rights to everything are ignoring some fundamental
differences between the material and the non-material. Those who make
no obeisance to property rights are ignoring millenia of history and
experience at their peril.
  It would be nice to see some rational discussion of these fundamental
differences, the implications of choosing one particular course of
action over another, and less outright religion.

Ross W. Wetmore                 | rwwetmore@water.NetNorth
University of Waterloo          | rwwetmore@math.Uwaterloo.ca
Waterloo, Ontario N2L 3G1       | {clyde, ihnp4, ubc-vision, utcsri}
(519) 885-1211 ext 3491         |   !watmath!rwwetmore