Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!apple!oliveb!amdahl!pacbell!sorinc!magik From: magik@sorinc.PacBell.COM (Darrin A. Hyrup) Newsgroups: news.misc Subject: Re: The Rape of Usenet Summary: Long but informative. Sorry about that. Can we stop now? Keywords: The wholesale capturing of Usenet by GEnie Message-ID: <8912220034.AA09899@sorinc.PacBell.COM> Date: 22 Dec 89 01:34:27 GMT References: <946@crash.cts.com> <1989Dec21.000041.6034@ns.network.com> <1989Dec21.020140.24067@athena.mit.edu> Reply-To: magik@sorinc.PacBell.COM (Darrin A. Hyrup) Followup-To: news.misc Organization: Yes, I'd like that. Lines: 219 Flames-To: /dev/null In article <1989Dec21.020140.24067@athena.mit.edu> jik@athena.mit.edu (Jonathan I. Kamens) writes: >[...] > You're missing a few things. I think you are as well, as I will point out below. > First of all, although there may not be any reason why GEnie cannot >legally put news on their system, that is not the objection; the >objection is that they are selling something that someone else put >work into creating, without giving anything in return. I think it is >quite justifiable to be "morally outraged" by that. What does Usenet give you for your postings? What do folks who have to pay UUNET or pay a local news site get for posting to the net? This is a "global network" in that anyone anywhere can join in and carry on intelligent discussions relating to various topics, irregardless of where they live, or work, or what they do. Much like GEnie. Of course GEnie doesn't currently have a real feed to Usenet, if they were to get one, the fact that GEnie charges $5 or $6 per hour for a person to access the network and engage in this exchange (yes *exchange* it does go both ways) of information is of no consequence. There are thousands of Usenet sites out there, and of those who do allow public access (most are private), many charge for access to the same information that GEnie would be offering for a fee as well. The person using the network either from a pay-to-use system, a pay-to-use BBS with a gateway to usenet, or a commercial service with usenet access doesn't get any more or any less information, nor do they get any less in return for their money in any of those cases. If you have free access to a Usenet site, then fine, but there are many, many people out there who do not. Unless you are willing to offer a 1-800 number access for worldwide, free, and unlimited access to usenet, then there is no reason to be morally outraged by any of this. There is no real reason why a site should not collect a little money from people who are getting a service from them. There is a great deal of outlay on equipment, as well as bills and upkeep costs. If the site chooses to foot the whole bill, then that is fine, but there are those who feel that they are offering a service to a community that has a demand, and if keeping up the system and the making it available was free, then free access would be much better justified. Alas, nothing in this world is free so do not condemn those who at least offer the availability of the service rather than keep it private (as most do). Say you were to write a "Letter to the Editor" for your local newspaper, and it was published, would you feel morally outraged at it? The newspaper has no intention of paying you for that submission, and it does plan to make a profit on the sales of that issue of the newspaper, and they must also think that their subscribers would pay to read your article. They are doing exactly the same thing as you condemn in your statements above, yet are they so evil? > Second, all it takes to make it impossible for GEnie legally to post >one of your articles on their system is to put something to the effect >of, "This article is copyright 1989 by . You may >redistribute this article only if you do not charge a fee from the >people to whom you redistribute it." If you don't want public-access >Unix sites to have to filter your articles, and GEnie reserves >redistribution rights on everything posted to it, then you can change >the second sentence to "You may redistribute this article only if the >people tho whom you redistribute it may do likewise." That would exclude 90% (or more) of the usenet community from ever seeing your messages. For example, if you are a student at a University that has a usenet feed, that University would be in violation of your statement by giving you access to the message. The University charges you a fee by your tuition which is a clear violation. In addition, look at the big backbone sites like UUNET. They charge those who subscribe to their system for news and mail feeds. There are plenty of the pay-for-feeds type of groups out there like UUNET which would also be clear violations as well. Of course, there are also "public-access" (which is a fairly misleading term) sites out there which charge their users for access to their system, and its information, which usually means usenet and mail. That doesn't include the various fido and BBS sites out there with usenet gateways, and such. Do you wish to exclude all these groups and various members of the usenet community from access to the net? > The point is that we DO have the legal ability to stop GEnie from >gatewaying our posts, if they are selling them, and if we find that >offensive. Several people on the net that I have seen already use >copyright notices of this sort on their messages, although I don't do >it myself. Technically no. The copyright laws clearly state that if you release your copyrighted material into the public domain, it is no longer copyrighted and can be transferred in any way the recievers see fit. Btw, under the Berne Convention (of which the USA is now a member), you do not have to put a "Copyright (c) 1989", in your original works to have a copyright, but you give up any such rights by putting your works into the public domain. Since the very nature of Usenet dictates that any works that are entered into the net are in the public domain, you would have a hell of a time trying to prove misuse of your information in any court if you tried to sue for violation of your copyright. In any case, if you didn't attempt to sue all infractors, you could loose any chances of winning any settlement, and that would be a very costly endeavor! (Especially against something with the raw legal power of General Electric behind it!) >>All I see is that a few more people get to read your gems of wisdom. Since >>there is no moral requirement for anyone else on usenet to "post" some >>minimal amount of information, your demand for "two way" transfer is >>patently arbitrary. > > No, it is not. The demand is for something in return for what GEnie >is getting for nothing. I see nothing arbitrary about that. That statement doesn't hold up under fire. GEnie does indeed pay for what it offers to its users. That aside, what if GEnie were to get a feed from UUNET? Then it would be paying specifically for its usenet information, in addition to paying for hardware costs, media costs, communications and network costs, phone costs, ad nauseum. Would that make you happy? As I mentioned before, many sites out there charge users for information that they recieve for free. Look at the pay-to-play BBS's out there, as well as the public-access UNIX sites I mentioned above that charge for access. That doesn't even touch on the Universities. The subject is not quite so cut and dried as you seem to think. > Let's assume that the Atari ST newsgroup is filled with posts from >various Atari ST experts (I say "assume" not because I don't think >it's true, but because I don't read the newsgroup and therefore don't >know whether or not it's true.). In that case, those experts are >voluntarily contributing information to the net, and GEnie is taking >that information and selling it. I have a real problem with that, as >do other people on the net. They do the same thing right now. What about the experts that may be on GEnie but have no access to usenet? Do you feel that you have the power to deprive people in the usenet community from information that the "expert" may have to offer them? The axe cuts both ways! There is no way to justify your statements on the "selling" of information. I know I don't need to mention again how many of the people out there DO indeed pay to use the net. >>I suspect your outrage is merely symbolic. After all, the telephone line >>companies, modem companies, computer manufacturers and software firms all >>make money AT THE COST OF USENET SITES!!! Yet I seriously doubt whether >>you would find it in your moral code of ethics to condem them. If so, then >>your condemnation of ANYONE (even beyond the GEnie case) is contradictory >>and arbitrary on its face. > > This analogy is about a tenth of a gilly, I'd say; in other words, >it's pretty bogus. I agree, thats not what you were talking about and it was a poor stand against your argument, but of course, you cannot condemn any site (say GEnie, if it was to be one), for offering usenet on a charge basis without condemning all the sites, and excluding the majority of the usenet community! > I think it would seem obvious to anyone with half a brain that >Usenet sites which use the phone lines, or which purchase modems, or >which purchase computers, or which purchase computer software, all GET >SOMETHING IN RETURN for their purchases. I agree here. But this is a moot point, this tangent gives very little actual substance to the arguments at hand. > However, GEnie's gatewaying of news postings is NOT voluntarily on >the part of Usenet posters, and they have NOT received anything in >return. The ONLY people profiting from the exchange are the GEnie >people reading the postings and the GEnie adminstrators raking in the >cash from the time they spend reading the postings. Again, GEnie would not be alone in this regard. >>In contrast to the lack of harm to you or anyone caused by GEnie access, >>your suggestion to prohibit GEnie access DOES cause harm to potential >>GEnie usenet readers. You, as we say, are the aggressor in this case! > > This is ridiculous. It is not "aggresive" to not want other people >to make money off of work you have done without giving you anything in >return. That's just common sense, and a sense of justice. You are off base on this one. Unless you choose to believe that GEnie is the only company in the world that makes money off people accessing the net; which is completely out of the question, as I have proven above. I can't see how you can stand by that argument. > Oh, and I hope you don't tell me, "Well, if you don't want GEnie to >make money off of your postings, then don't post!" because that ruins >the whole purpose of the Unsenet. It could be stated, "Well, if you don't want [insert favorite university, corporation, public access (pay) unix site, or pay bbs site, etc] to make money off of your postings, then don't post!" That seems to be what you are looking for. Your argument shares the misapplication of the original (and I hope current) purpose of usenet. This is a public network. It should be available to anyone, or any organization. There never was any requirement that a usenet site not charge or make a profit off of the people it allows to access the net, or that any site must be responsible to make payments to authors who post to the net if they are a pay service! If that were the case, usenet never would have come into being, nor would it have the huge base of "subscribers" it now commands. It sounds to me that your own personal opinion of what usenet is all about, and your own view of morality are the basis of your argument, and they are not in line with the real guidelines of this net. >Jonathan Kamens USnail: Again, the comments in this article are my personal opinion, and I certainly don't expect to get flamed on (all flames will of course be sent to /dev/null), nor do I expect to be paid for posting this, and that shouldn't need to be said. My stand of this would be the same no matter if the subject was CIS, Plink, Prodigy, GEnie, or any of the other user networks, private and public organizations, or Universities that [would/do] sponsor usenet access. There is no reason to point fingers and there is nothing that says that all sites must be free. I've been participating in this forum off and on for many years now, and I always thought this information was common knowledge. I certainly hope this helps to clear up some of the misconceptions Jonathan and anyone else has about this network. (At least as far as I was made to believe in the time I have been participating here). Darrin Hyrup, SysAdmin sorinc.PacBell.COM -- Darrin A. Hyrup // AMIGA Enthusiast rencon!esfenn!dah magik@sorinc.PacBell.COM \X/ & Software Developer pacbell!sorinc!magik ========================================================================== "Speak little and well, if you wish to be considered as possessing merit."