Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cornell!batcomputer!itsgw!steinmetz!uunet!snjsn1!bilbo!greg From: greg@bilbo (Greg Wageman) Newsgroups: news.admin Subject: Re: Flow of information vs. ownership of information Message-ID: <657@snjsn1.SJ.ATE.SLB.COM> Date: 9 Feb 89 20:46:19 GMT References: <2739@looking.UUCP> Sender: news@SJ.ATE.SLB.COM Reply-To: greg%sentry@spar.slb.com (Greg Wageman) Organization: Schlumberger ATE, San Jose, CA Lines: 91 In article <2739@looking.UUCP> brad@looking.UUCP (Brad Templeton) writes: >A sentiment which one sees expressed on this net from time to time >(particularly when complaining about a compilation copyright 8-) ) >is the sentiment that everything (in terms of information) should be >free and unowned, as that encourages the free flow of information. > > [...] > >This net is not a propertyless commune. People here are entitled to >control and ownership of the fruits of their own labour. In fact, >if you want a growing, thriving net, it's essential that they be so >entitled. Ownership allows incentive for individual vision, for risk >and for growth. > > [...] > >Usenet is a cooperative, and a big one. But there is no rule that >says that cooperatives are communes. Other than the rules that >govern communications links paid for by the DCA, this is a fully >commercial network, and commercial traffic flows over it constantly, >with the blessing of netters. To think otherwise is to believe in >some idealistic myth. I have to absolutely agree with Brad here. Ostensibly, Schlumberger pays for its Uunet subscription so that we can get stuff off of this net to help us turn a profit. It is not a "perk" for employees, nor a charitible contribution; it is a business expense. If it became the case that Schlumberger could not use anything from the net to make a profit (and I do not necessarily mean *resale* of USENET postings, but use of utilities, tools and information to create products), it would drop USENET like a radioactive rock. Many people here (probably not in industry) would have the net be communal property, and abolish profit. Funny, there was a similar great experiment in the Soviet Union, which now seems to be ending. Guess what? Profit won. Contrary to net.belief, "profit" is not a dirty word. OK, so you don't want somebody to come along, take that nifty polyphase recursive binary sort you submitted to the net out of the goodness of your heart, and turn it into a commercial product. Fine, put a copyright notice on it. Now you have legal recourse if they try. Don't put a copyright notice on it, and you have just published it in the public domain; your rights are considerably weakened. (If it was an oversight, you can recover your rights by taking steps to correct the omission.) Declare it "in the public domain", however, and ANYONE CAN DO WHATEVER THEY WISH WITH IT! If you don't want all these nasty for-profit corporations to get their greedy, money-grubbing hands on your software (or your jokes for that matter), DON'T PUBLISH IT ON THE USENET! Spend your own resources, not ours, to disseminate your work; but don't expect Schlumberger or any other corporation to foot the bill for USENET, unless we can expect to get a return on investment. Now, some of you academic types might be thinking "Ok, pull the plug. Who needs you, anyway?" To that I say: Where do you think the vast majority of the really useful stuff in comp.sources.unix, comp.sys.sun, etc., comes from? No one remains a student forever (as much as some may wish they could). Many of the programs which were written by students are now supported by those same people, who are now in private industry. But I think most of the non-trivial stuff was developed by people in industry, to fill their own needs, and published to be of use to everyone. It isn't "free"; the company employing the author paid for that effort, and the USENET community benefits. Because it IS a community, the benefit is reciprocal when that company doesn't have to pay to create something someone else posts. There is no way the academic community alone could maintain USENET at its present level. The money isn't there, nor is the motivation. Look how quick Stanford was to drop rec.humor.funny. Not a corporation, a University; a supposed bastion of enlightenment and truth. Let's see what happens when they discover alt.sex, talk.bizarre, etc. You see the upshot of this, don't you? Anything which was sent to Brad for publication in rec.humor.funny without a copyright notice (assuming the joke was original) is in the public domain if published. *Any* of us can do whatever we want with the material, since Brad did not include any notice of copyright. If you really think you can make a buck from rec.humor.funny, I say "Go ahead!" Signature follows. Hit 'n' now. You have been warned! Greg Wageman ARPA: uunet.uu.net!sjsca4!greg (Temporarily) Schlumberger Technologies UUCP: ...!uunet!sjsca4!greg San Jose, CA ------------------ Opinions expressed herein are solely the responsibility of the author. And the author wouldn't have it any other way.