Quote:
Originally Posted by SameOldStory
Yes, I can see that they want to protect all the mom & pop booksellers. BUT....
Too bad that they didn't have these laws a hundred years ago.
Just think -
If you bought a car, you would have to pay the village blacksmith for horseshoes and a buggy whip.
If you bought a computer, you would have to pay for a slide rule.
If you bought a TV, you would have to pay for lime lights and greasepaint.
Must doctors buy blood letting equipment when they set up a practice?
I see that there are Project Gutenberg French language books available. Not that that will help current French authors. |
French tradition is much, MUCH older than cars, slide rules, computers or TV.
Just look at the article about the history of the button here
http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A23623616
Quote:
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If you are in any doubt as to the importance of buttons in the 17th Century you could do worse than check out la Guerre des Boutons— not the film, but the actual war. French tailors started the war and won the first battle with the use of thread buttons. These were basically little balls of thread which worked admirably as buttons. The button-makers were furious, and in response they lobbied the government to help them. A law was passed and the war was won with the tailors being fined for the production of the thread buttons. Not satisfied with this, however, the button-makers went on to insist on the rigorous enforcement of the new law. They wanted homes and wardrobes searched and even suggested the arrest and fining of people for wearing clothing with thread buttons. It is unclear how far they got with their demands, beyond the authorities fining the tailors for their ingenuity.
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Look here
http://www.boingboing.net/2007/01/12...gy_origin.html
Cory Doctorow made reference to the above little piece of history in several of his great speeches about how you just can't stop the progress.
Also here
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20070110/004225.shtml
Just like tailors started to produce buttons from ... gasp ... cloth to avoid outrageous prices imposed by very powerful button-making guild [understand monopoly] we need people that start producing an ENHANCED version of the book in an e-book format. It ain't the same thing, is it? An enhanced version would have different foreword, can have included passages that were left out from the final edit and, perhaps an interview with the author or his dog. It would be entirely different thing, so it would have different price. You can even produce a paper version of the said enhanced work (with appropriate low price), let's say 300 copies.
Like we have seen many times, you can't stop progress with a half-baked law ;-)