Terry Pratchett's unpublished works destroyed

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Who knows, but I don't personally think it's right to make accusations of a breach of professional ethics against someone when you haven't one shred of evidence to support such an accusation.

I had assumed the original comment about the lawyer keeping a personal copy was a joke that now seems to have spun out of control.

[j.p.s]

Originally Posted by Dylrob

Surely even UK laws aren't so insane as to prosecute someone's idle speculation on a random website...

Well Deborah Lipstadt and Simon Singh got into serious legal difficulty for making true claims backed by boatloads of hard evidence.

[vrf]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Who knows, but I don't personally think it's right to make accusations of a breach of professional ethics against someone when you haven't one shred of evidence to support such an accusation.

As someone else said, yes, my comment was kind of a joke. Flavored with a bit of cynicism. Money has a way of finding the path of least resistance, and I bet it was awfully tempting to make a copy of that drive. The cover-up down the road would be fairly simple. Just say that, yes, Terry had most of his WIPs destroyed, but that he had nearly finished a few novels and had sent them along to his agent for the world to enjoy.

Still, ethics conversations always intrigue me. By what standard is it wrong, in your eyes, to casually speculate about what lawyers and publishers might do with the manuscripts of a dead writer?

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

I had assumed the original comment about the lawyer keeping a personal copy was a joke that now seems to have spun out of control.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by vrf

Still, ethics conversations always intrigue me. By what standard is it wrong, in your eyes, to casually speculate about what lawyers and publishers might do with the manuscripts of a dead writer?

There's nothing at all wrong with abstract discussions of such issues. There's all the difference in the world, though, between an abstract discussion, and an accusation that a specific person has in fact committed such an act, when you have not a shred of evidence to support such an accusation. I'm sorry, but I think it's just plain wrong to do that.

[gmw]

Originally Posted by HarryT

There's nothing at all wrong with abstract discussions of such issues. There's all the difference in the world, though, between an abstract discussion, and an accusation that a specific person has in fact committed such an act, when you have not a shred of evidence to support such an accusation. I'm sorry, but I think it's just plain wrong to do that.

Yes, I very much agree. It's one thing to comment "I bet someone has kept a copy", it's quite another to say "that particular lawyer kept a copy". The former is a cynical comment on human nature, the latter is an accusation. Sure, the original comment was meant in jest (and probably would have been long forgotten if attention had not been drawn to it), but it is still not a good way to express general cynicism - if you mean to be general then be general.

Mind you, there are some difficulties. Computer administrators are supposed to keep backups, and good backup systems keep multiple generations of backup - and they don't generally keep individual accounts on their own media. So, when one client comes and says "delete my stuff", the difficulties involved in making sure you have erased all copies of everything you have from (just) that client can be seriously difficult.

[Philippe D.]

Originally Posted by gmw

Mind you, there are some difficulties. Computer administrators are supposed to keep backups, and good backup systems keep multiple generations of backup - and they don't generally keep individual accounts on their own media. So, when one client comes and says "delete my stuff", the difficulties involved in making sure you have erased all copies of everything you have from (just) that client can be seriously difficult.

The files could be backed up, but encrypted, and unreadable without the right password - which the person who doesn't want his works to survive would not transmit to anybody. So technically the files would still exist, but for all practical matters they would not.

[gmw]

Originally Posted by Philippe D.

The files could be backed up, but encrypted, and unreadable without the right password - which the person who doesn't want his works to survive would not transmit to anybody. So technically the files would still exist, but for all practical matters they would not.

This presupposes sufficient expertise on the part of the person supplying the files, and also several other practical factors. For the latter I'm thinking here of what Google and Facebook face when asked to remove user data - so this aspect probably probably isn't relevant to the situation with Terry Pratchett. Even so, it is easy to imagine that copies exist, even if no one yet realises it.

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by HarryT

There's all the difference in the world, though, between an abstract discussion, and an accusation that a specific person has in fact committed such an act, when you have not a shred of evidence to support such an accusation.

Originally Posted by gmw

Yes, I very much agree. It's one thing to comment "I bet someone has kept a copy", it's quite another to say "that particular lawyer kept a copy".

How on earth do you guys listen to topical comedians? I can imagine you saying "No Johnny Carson, Richard Nixon's formal portrait was not painted by a police sketch artist!"

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

How on earth do you guys listen to topical comedians? I can imagine you saying "No Johnny Carson, Richard Nixon's formal portrait was not painted by a police sketch artist!"

[gmw]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

How on earth do you guys listen to topical comedians? I can imagine you saying "No Johnny Carson, Richard Nixon's formal portrait was not painted by a police sketch artist!"

A comedian knows how to deliver their lines, context and timing is everything. They don't just say something and expected it to be funny.

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by gmw

A comedian knows how to deliver their lines, context and timing is everything. They don't just say something and expected it to be funny.

You've obviously never heard of Dane Cook...

[gmw]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

You've obviously never heard of Dane Cook...

Are you suggesting that anyone could stand up and recite his lines to get the same laughs?

[DiapDealer]

Regardless of everything else: what can be defined as libel, and what has even a remote possibility of being prosecuted as (let alone legally proclaimed) such are very, very different things.

To suggest that someone without a formal audience of some type (or at least a very large informal one) needs to worry about being smacked for off-the-cuff remarks about someone in the news is quite a stretch.

I suspect some people's respect for Sir Pratchett (and those who he entrusted to protect his legacy) has clouded their sense of anything-can-be-poked-fun-of and/or nothing-is-truly-sacred.

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by gmw

Are you suggesting that anyone could stand up and recite his lines to get the same laughs?

In a way, yes. Since after all he has been accused repeatedly of stealing other comedian's jokes, I would say that plenty of other people have already stood up and recited 'his' lines and gotten laughs.

Also, you are taking this all too seriously.