[cc-community] Critique a short essay on Free music?
Terry Hancock
hancock at anansispaceworks.com
Wed Nov 7 20:24:16 EST 2007
drew Roberts wrote:
> How many copyleft supporters would prefer no copyright laws to the current
> state of affairs - especially in the absence of copyleft licensing?
Not many when it comes to software, I would think.
The source code provision requirement in the GPL relies on copyleft,
which in turn relies on copyright to work. Without any copyright,
software authors would routinely withhold source code as a
"technological protection measure" to effectively subvert the freedom of
information supposed in a no-copyright regime.
Creative Commons licenses would similarly lose their ability to forbid
TPM distribution, which condition exists for the same purpose -- to
ensure that end users have full use and modification freedoms and
abilities in the work.
So, not only does the GPL subvert copyright-based sequestering of
knowledge, it uses copyright to subvert the sequestering of knowledge
that would occur in a copyright-free society.
Free licenses keep work freer than it would be without copyright.
Those of us who like this kind of freedom should therefore be thankful
that there is some kind of copyright, though it is entirely consistent
to wish for a more limited copyright law (in both extent and duration)
which would cause the public domain to be richer (which of course, is
supposed to be the whole point of copyright -- in the USA at least).
Cheers,
Terry
--
Terry Hancock (hancock at AnansiSpaceworks.com)
Anansi Spaceworks http://www.AnansiSpaceworks.com
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