Susan Cheever: Just Google 'thou shalt not steal'

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

Begin forwarded message:

From: Dewayne Hendricks <dewayne () warpspeed com>
Date: December 18, 2005 2:14:53 AM EST
To: Dewayne-Net Technology List <dewayne-net () warpspeed com>
Subject: [Dewayne-Net] Susan Cheever: Just Google 'thou shalt not steal'
Reply-To: dewayne () warpspeed com

[Note:  This item comes from friend John McMullen.  DLH]

> From: "John F. McMullen" <observer () westnet com>
> Date: December 17, 2005 11:03:11 PM PST
> To: "johnmac's living room" <johnmacsgroup () yahoogroups com>
> Cc: Dewayne Hendricks <dewayne () warpspeed com>, Dave Farber  
> <farber () cis upenn edu>
> Subject: Susan Cheever: Just Google 'thou shalt not steal'
>
> From Newsday -- <http://www.newsday.com/news/columnists/ny- 
> etcolumn4549299dec12,0,7399981.column?coll=ny-news-columnists>
>
> Just Google 'thou shalt not steal'
> by Susan Cheever
>
> It's late at night, and you are in the bedroom cruising auction  
> sites for furniture on the Internet. You should go to sleep, but  
> you don't. Then you see them, the pair of chairs from your own  
> living room. They are for sale by someone in New Jersey, but they  
> are your chairs. You can even see the stains on the blue one where  
> your son spilled some orange juice and the stitching on the  
> slipcover you repaired. What are they doing out there in cyberspace?
>
> You go into the living room and, sure enough, they are gone,  
> leaving gaping spaces on the floor where they once stood. A table  
> is gone, too, the one your father built for you when you got your  
> own place. The bowl you had as a centerpiece is shattered on the  
> floor.
>
> It's a strange experience to see your own property in someone  
> else's possession when they haven't asked your permission for it or  
> paid for it. It's disorienting and infuriating. You've been robbed.  
> That's how it feels when something of yours suddenly appears in  
> cyberspace, whether it's a chair or a book excerpt, a table or a  
> newspaper column.
>
> Words are property. This principle has been upheld by the law since  
> 1710, when the first copyright law was passed. According to the  
> most recent Federal Copyright Statute, passed in 1977, writers own  
> their words - not their ideas, just their writing. Copyright  
> protects writers and enables them to make money by selling their  
> work. Copyright makes it possible for me to get paid for writing  
> this column. When other newspapers reprint a column of mine, they  
> have to pay for it. The payments are small, usually about $60, but  
> the principle is beyond price.
>
> Most writers don't leave much money when they die, but many of them  
> leave copyrights. My father was a writer, and his estate primarily  
> consists of copyrights that yield enough income to support my 87- 
> year-old mother.
>
> Copyright is generally limited to the life of the writer plus 70  
> years. After that, the work goes into the public domain and is  
> available to everyone. The Copyright Statute also includes a "fair  
> use" clause, so that a few lines or phrases of a writer's work can  
> be used as illustration by someone else. The amount of words that  
> constitute fair use varies according to court case. At present, it  
> is 400 words.
>
> Enter Google, the hip, incredibly profitable corporation whose  
> motto is "Do No Evil." Google doesn't like the copyright laws as  
> they have existed for centuries. Google wants the rights to store  
> all the books in the world in its Google Library program, and the  
> company doesn't want to pay for that right.
>
> [snip]

Weblog at: <http://weblog.warpspeed.com>



-------------------------------------
You are subscribed as lists-ip () insecure org
To manage your subscription, go to
 http://v2.listbox.com/member/?listname=ip

Archives at: http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/