Subj : Re: GNU Public Licences Revisited (again) To : comp.programming From : Chris Sonnack Date : Tue Sep 20 2005 10:52 pm Antoon Pardon writes: >>> How does that differ from me, just brewing my own? >> >> I think the key factor here is the recipe - assume that Chris has >> a particularly good recipe for beer and is making a living brewing >> beer to that recipe. > > I could have a good recipe too, just as others. Maybe Chris got his > his idea for a recipe from a public source. And then spent years and funds developing my own "touch". If you steal the fruits of that effort, you are stealing from me. >> If you are copying - ie. brewing to the same recipe then you are >> depriving Chris of exclusivity. If you are brewing your own beer >> to a different recipe then that is fine. > > But depriving someone of exclusivity, is not the same as stealing. Correct. This isn't about exclusivity. It's about protecting the author of a work from theft of that work. IF--AND ONLY IF--you can derive a **similar** work by following much the same process I followed, then it is YOUR work that is protected. It has nothing to do with how useful the work is. It has nothing to do with how easy it is to copy the work. It has everything to do with respecting the author's work. > If I am the owner of something, in general it is pretty clear I am > the only person with rights concerning the property. Indeed. And if I spent years coming up with the perfect beer recipe, do I not own the results of that effort? > However if I know something, it is not at all that clear that I > should be the only one with rigths concerning this knowledge. So > arguments that try to treat knowledge as a form of property are > IMO bound to fail. Well, now, you went from "not at all clear" to "bound to fail", so you seem to be pre-supposing the answer here. But I ask you, on what moral grounds do you claim that knowledge is freely shared? If I have a staff of research encyclopediaists doing an online encyclopedia, do you say I must make that knowledge freely available? How do I pay my researchers? The milk of human kindness has less than the adult recommended daily vitamins. -- |_ CJSonnack _____________| How's my programming? | |_ http://www.Sonnack.com/ ___________________| Call: 1-800-DEV-NULL | |_____________________________________________|_______________________| .