Path: utzoo!utgpu!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!unmvax!ncar!ames!elroy!orion.cf.uci.edu!balboa.eng.uci.edu!dlawyer
From: dlawyer@balboa.eng.uci.edu (David Lawyer)
Newsgroups: comp.misc
Subject: Re: New Communicational Morality
Keywords: software, copyright, society
Message-ID: <1672@orion.cf.uci.edu>
Date: 6 Apr 89 00:16:04 GMT
References: <754@infovax.lan.informatik.tu-muenchen.dbp.de> <3687@ficc.uu.net>
Sender: news@orion.cf.uci.edu
Reply-To: dlawyer@balboa.eng.uci.edu.UUCP (David Lawyer)
Organization: University of California at Irvine.  Electrical Engineering
Lines: 61

In article <3687@ficc.uu.net> jeffd@ficc.uu.net (jeff daiell) writes:
>Fourth - uh, is Datafuhrer Frank trying to tell us that material
>communism has worked well enough to be a role model that
>the information sciences should adopt?  If so, what planet
>is he living on?  Material communism has meant poverty,
>oligarchy, mass murder, brutal repression -- the list goes
>on.  Is *that* what he wants the software field to emulate?
>
>Jeff Daiell

By "material communism" it is not clear what you talking about.  The
Soviet Union does not have a communist economy and never did (except
possibly during "War-Communism" during the Civil War.  It claims to
have a socialist economy but even that is debatable.  Communism is
supposed to mean (according to Karl Marx) "from each according to his
ability and to each according to his needs".  The USSR has not
followed such a policy and vehemently denies that it follows such a
communist policy.  The U.S. with it's welfare system etc. to provide for
peoples "needs" is perhaps closer to a Marx's definition of Communism
than is the USSR which has no welfare benefits (but today has many
people unemployed as a result of perestroika).

True Communism seems to exist mainly in religious communes where it has
not usually meant poverty, mass murder (exception: the one in Central
America) etc.  They have, however, been guilty of oligarchy as you
state.  So has the USSR, but in terms of poverty, the USSR has make more
progress since say 1920 than has the US.  I think that the jury is
still out regarding the comparative advantages of socialism, communism,
and capitalism.

Now back to software copyright.  I think the philosophy expressed by a
Soviet writer some years ago in explaining the copyright laws of the 
Soviet Republics is a good one.  (Each of the 15 "Repulbics" has its
own laws).  The purpose should be (he claims and I agree) to balance
the right of the author of a program to reasonable compensation for his
efforts with the "right" of the public to use the software.  I think
that the recognition of the public's right to use the software is
important (but this does not necessarily mean the right to use it at no
cost at all).

Software has all the attributes of a free good since the marginal cost
of making another copy is next to nothing.  However, to qualify for a
free good it should also be of general usefulness.  Thus I would
propose that the United Nations (or another international organization)
pay for the development of general purpose free software (editors,
compilers, spread sheets etc.).  Taxes could be levied on computer
equipment to help pay for this (but the UN has no such authority at
present).  They could also evaluate the existing free software and plan
improvements to it.  To save development costs, they could get students
to work on it as class projects as well as recruit other volunteers.

The copyright laws on software need to be changed.  First, a copyright
holder should have the duty to make source code (adequately commented)
available to all who request it.  Large economies will accrue if others
can reuse some of this code, but not for producing a similar piece of
software.  You may claim that if I write a program and others use it
freely in other applications, then I am being hurt.  But I am being
greatly benefited by having the right to put into my programs any of
the huge pool of source code which would be available.

				David S. Lawyer