Quote:
Originally Posted by tubemonkey
Why do you see that as a problem? Authors have no moral obligation to make their works available to the public.
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Well, technically they do. The point of copyright is not that the authors have a right to their intellectual property. That's a concept that was dreamed up by a lawyer much later (look up the origin of intellectual property if you doubt me). Originally, in England, copy right was a royal grant and had nothing to do with who created the original work.
In the US, copy right was placed in the Constitution - "The Congress shall have the power...To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries;"
A work that is not available to the public can hardly be said to promote the progress of science or useful arts. Of course, many have forgotten that with the right came the responsibility, promotion of the useful arts. Instead it has been seen as a "property" like land or a house which belongs to a person and can not be taken away.
Regardless, yes I am talking mostly about works that were made available to the public at one time. For one thing, if the work was never made available, why would I even know about it much less want to read it? There are some exceptions of course, works by well known authors that were known to exists but never published, but that's only a handful.