Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cornell!uw-beaver!fluke!kurt
From: kurt@tc.fluke.COM (Kurt Guntheroth)
Newsgroups: comp.misc
Subject: Re: New Communicational Morality (piracy)
Keywords: software, copyright, society, piracy, sleeze
Message-ID: <7745@fluke.COM>
Date: 14 Apr 89 20:26:50 GMT
References: <754@infovax.lan.informatik.tu-muenchen.dbp.de> <3687@ficc.uu.net> <1672@orion.cf.uci.edu> <746@maths.tcd.ie>
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Organization: John Fluke Mfg. Co., Inc., Everett, WA
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The so called "New Communicational Morality" is nothing more than the old
C-chanty of the software pirate, transposed to a new key.  "Yo Ho, No Rights
for Writers.  Yo-Ho for the Freedom to Copy as I Choose."

Society repeatedly invents intellectual property laws.  Why?  Because they
benefit society by making more intellectual property available and lower the
average price.  Individuals repeatedly attempt to tear down intellectual
property laws.  Why?  Because it (temporarily) lowers the cost to access
existing intellectual property to zero.  Like pirates of yore, such
individuals are more interested in their short-term personal gain than
the needs of society.  The difference is that modern-day pirates fly the
false colors of benefit-to-society, and it-doesn't-take-anything-away.

I propose a test of sincerity for those who espouse the so-called "New
Communicational Morality".  Do as Stallman has done.  Devote your life to
the production of important intellectual property and give it away free.
To do otherwise would be hypocritical and now "immoral".  Don't take a wage
for writing code.  Don't hack protection schemes when you should be giving
your time to the cause of freedom by writing a public domain clone of dBase IV.
Until you have tested yourself for a time, don't say society is evil because
it expects you to pay for the fruits of another's labor.