[pp.int.general] Protest certain musicians?

[Brian McNeil]

On Fri, 2009-10-30 at 14:00 +0100, Christian Hufgard wrote:
> >> Why has a GPL programmer more rights than a musician?
> >
> > I think you are completely missing the point of the GPL. It implements a
> > philosophy of sharing within the current copyright legislation
> > constraints.
> 
> And this philosphy is coverd by lawyers who accuse me, if I do not follow
> that philosphy. So if we'd lower the constraints of copyright, GPL, CC and
> all those licence would also give of their claim to be protected by law?

A great deal of effort went into drafting the GPL to do what it does
*within the current copyright framework*.

Why? Because the base law does not codify the principles that would be
preferable.

It is disingenuous to lump it in with the vast majority of licenses you
will be presented with; those have been drafted for, and by, those who
wish to maximise profit from creative work with little or no actual
creative input. These licenses are littered with clauses, vaguely
worded, and intended to allow the license holder to jump on any and new
form in which a work might can make more profit from it and prevent
anyone else doing so. Example? Ringtones for your mobile phone. Some
industry scum have even suggested you should pay a 'performance fee'
because when your phone rings you're 'performing' the work you licensed
from them. Even if you did the work yourself to take a sample from a CD
you bought and turned it into a ringtone.

You seem to be forgetting, copyright is not the same as a license.

The copyright resides with the creator, and there is a convoluted chain
of licenses between them and you. Where creation, production, and
distribution are - or were - prohibitively expensive then the creator
has little choice but to work with large commercial entities like record
labels. The creator is instantly at a disadvantage when negotiating
eventual license terms.

What I see as the goal with the Pirate Party is to renegotiate the whole
concept of copyright and *inherent licensing*. More specifically, to
codify in law that release of any work has an assumed license for
distribution on a non-commercial basis, for non-commercial use, by
anyone who can afford to set up a distribution channel.

Guess what? That's not just making a mix tape from your collection of
CDs, it includes installing BitTorrent.


-- 
Brian McNeil <brian.mcneil at wikinewsie.org>
http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Brian_McNeil
Content of this message in no way represents the opinions or official
position of the Wikimedia Foundation or any of its projects.
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