"Pirating ebooks is an offence against moral justice" says... GoodEreader!?

[Timboli]

Originally Posted by pwalker8

Well, gosh, as a programmer, I would love it if I could copyright my code and get paid everytime it gets called. Doesn't mean that my particular desire to get rich has any real moral obligation on society.

Exactly.

In general, artists like public domain. It allows them to climb on the backs of previous generations and "borrowing" is most common in music and movies. For very common examples are MC Hammer's "Can't Touch This" whose beat is almost an exact replica of Rick James "Super Freak". Up until 1988, most artists were fairly open about borrowing. Currently, rappers like to mix in beats and extracts from other artists. In the US, this is considered fair use.

Can't argue with that.
Everything is climbing on the back of something else in any case, just some are more blatant and more obvious. Nature & Nurture, as they say.
Things are never as unique as many seem to think.

Authors seem to be a bit more caught up in the idea that copyright is property, perhaps because while music and movies is general a collaborative effort and the creator may not be the performer, authors are both the creator and performer, assuming you ignore the work done by editors and the like.

Hard work should always be rewarded, but more often than not it isn't, because there is an element of judgment involved. Very little is guaranteed, and things often get distorted when it comes to expectations.

Once again, I suspect that the vast majority of the public are indifferent towards the idea of copyright, just so long as they can get their books, music and movies at what they perceive as a fair price. To a great extent, copyright as it currently exists, is driven by the small group of companies that benefit from it and ignored by everyone else.

Can't argue with that either.

As I have said previously, I am not sure that historical elements are all that relevant, in our so called enlightened age. Digital, has certainly disrupted things from a copyright point of view, because of ease or fear of duplication ... not to mention a huge increase in quality, basically a clone.

A physical item has a cost to produce, that needs to be recouped at the very least. A digital copy of a copy costs virtually nothing to produce. Because of that, copyright has entered a new age, where it is based on something other than just physical. In principle, many elements are still the same, but not all.

[Timboli]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

I find it slightly humorous that someone would suggest that the very laws which first gave creators the chance to earn a living at their craft (without having to rely upon a benevolent patron) is now somehow preventing them from providing for their descendants. In the U.S., copyright has already been stretched and extended to greatly favor the the rights-holders over the public (who were supposed to benefit after the brief monopoly granted to the creators expired). They (the rights-holders) have already received far and away more benefit than what the biased, fallible, human element who originally drafted the original copyright laws ever envisioned. It is the public (copyright's other affected party) who have already had their benefits reduced to the point of being negligible. Authors are not the aggrieved party in this copyright/PD partnership by any means.

Personally I agree, but I also accept that for some it is about perspective. I am not saying they are right in the overall scheme of things, as I don't think they are. But we live in a very possessive orientated society, and things seem to increasingly be geared that way. Though with the shift toward licensing, it is more about control than the physical.

Humans so love to be in charge and have control, often at the expense of others. The few in charge of the many. I personally believe most of us are transitioning into a new form of slavery.

[meeera]

Originally Posted by pwalker8

Well, gosh, as a programmer, I would love it if I could copyright my code and get paid everytime it gets called. Doesn't mean that my particular desire to get rich has any real moral obligation on society.

Yeah, I figure I should still be getting paid annual royalties for every year someone whose life I saved lives on. And onward through the generations, for every child they produced after I treated them. That sounds only fair.