Re: Some Thoughts on Copyright Term

On 10/11/98, Madeleine Fix <fix.3[_at_]osu.edu> wrote:
>
> Jeremy -- what do you mean exactly by placing copyright in the realm of
> political economy only? It is also a protective right that preserves a
> sense of uniqueness

Artificial scarcity is the self-serving invention of a consumerist system, engineered to produce and enhance demand--and to promote socioeconomic stratification. I can't see why free access to and re-use of knowledge and ideas should be sacrificed for "a sense of uniqueness".

> it ensures some sense of boundary between one 'thing' and another
> 'thing'.

We face far too many boundaries already, IMHO. Me, I'm for the big ol' Melting Pot, almost as a general principle.

> Do you advocate a world where all intellectual property is a free for
> all, free, that is, from conceptions of the artist, of the maker, of the
> producer; of the name; and therefore is a collective [un]consciousness?

Quite.

> Further, do you really think the Internet is free from power?

Fundamentally.

> [Do] you think that the Internet is going to destroy copyright when
> corporations, business interests, and the monied parts of technologized
> society are 'buying it up' and beginning to regulate it; are advertising
> on it, and using it as a marketing tool?

Yep; and them too, eventually.

> Copyright is definitely the wrong thing to pick on here, in my opinion.
> It may be just the thing that saves Mr. Underdog from The Man.

Well, that's what they'd like you to believe. :)

CYa,
JEREMY Jeremy G. Byrne
<jeremy[_at_]iz.org> Received on Sun Nov 15 1998 - 09:34:18 GMT