Re: Abandoning property (Was: Copyright Extension Bill Passes Congress)

From: Lance Purple <lpurple[_at_]netcom.com>
Date: Thu, 12 Nov 1998 13:07:50 -0800 (PST)

Moritz Roettinger <moritz.roettinger[_at_]dg23.cec.be> wrote:
>
> Lance Purple <lpurple[_at_]netcom.com> wrote:
> >
> > How do you propose for scholars or researchers (or just the interested
> > members of the public) to acquire a copy of a program which is still
> > copyrighted, but hasn't been sold for 50 years? Or do you think that
> > history older than that should be erased forever, in order to protect
> > the publisher's monopoly on works they aren't even willing to publish?!
>
> I'm not quite sure whether I got your point. If a reseracher wants to
> acquire a 50 year old computer program he may do so. He just has to pay
> for it.

How can they pay for it if the product is no longer being sold? You said yourself that most 20-year old software is "worthless", meaning that there is no incentive for the publisher to sell it anymore.

If you demand that, nevertheless, nobody else should be allowed to make any more copies until 90 years has elapsed, then these works will almost certainly be lost for all eternity, through the decay of the magnetic media they are stored upon.

> Your second question is quite polemic. Anyway, it is not always
> the publisher who has the copyright, very often it's the author.

I am sorry you find it "polemic" to point out the inevitable bad results of granting hundred-year monopolies without compelling some minimum level of service in return. I ask you to consider a hypothetical question:

    Would you be pleased if the local electrical utility had an     exclusive 99-year right to sell power to your city, but it     chose not to do so, and forbid you even to set up your own     generator in the basement? They argue that they can make     more profit by selling the electricity elsewhere, and that     it would hurt their bargaining position if you were free     to generate your own power. Moreover, you can still use     candles and batteries as alternatives.

If the answer is "no", why do you not feel the same way about previously-published but long-out-of-print materials? This is not meant as an ad-hominem attack, but an honest question of your world-view.

Lance Purple
<lpurple[_at_]netcom.com>

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Received on Thu Nov 12 1998 - 21:10:30 GMT