[Mandrakeot] ESR gives up on Fedora

[Avi Kivity]

Simo Sorce wrote:
> No, what I mean is that "Intellectual Property" is not natural law,
> children do not understand ownership of a song, they just sing it if
> they like. Children do understand perfectly ownership of an apple, just
> because only one can hold the same apple, and it can be eaten only once.
>
>   

It's just a matter of age.  Very young children do not understand 
ownership at all.  Older children understand physical ownership, but 
things like information are too abstract for them.

Nor do we want to base our society on how children behave.

> "Intellectual Property" it is an artificial construct made up by
> societies to achieve some goal in the belief that these rules are an
> overall benefit to the society as a whole. For the American society the
> goal should be to "promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts"(from
> the constitution), the mean is Copyright/Patents.
>
> You cannot physically posses a piece of code, you can physically own the
> specific instance of the code you have saved on your disk. But the code
> by itself is abstract, if I copy it from you, you still have your copy
> and it is intact. So "taking" your code didn't leave you without it.
>
> Property make sense only when taking something from someone leaves him
> without it.
>   

If you borrow my bicycle while I'm asleep, I'm still have it when I wake 
up, but you've undermined by bicycle-rental business.  Think of 
licensing intellectual property as renting a bicycle.  Copying my code 
(or book, or movie) doesn't leave me without it, but it takes away my 
freedom to do what I want with it, including witholding it from others, 
or charging them for it.




> Copyright can be seen as a form of property, as if I have the copyright
> on something, you don't. But you have to realize that this works at a
> different level. You own the "right to copy" the code, an artifact made
> by law, you do not technically own the code itself.
>
>   

Ok.  I have a bicycle, I own the right to decide how it's used.  Even if 
you promise to return it later, I can still choose not to let you ride it.

>> Because that also means that I control what is done with my code.
>> You  
>> make it sound like all ideas should be in the public domain.
>>     
>
> Ideas are technically and by law in the "public domain", as they are
> abstract and you can't copyright nor patent an ideas.
> Code is a different thing, see above.
>
> Finally, can we close this thread on a devel list?
> I am happy to debate around law philosophy elsewhere if you like.
>   

Ok.

-- 
Do not meddle in the internals of kernels, for they are subtle and quick to
panic.

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