However, as discussions go, the points are valid and have some merit, although I’d value if it’d be reduced to the actual points and discussion, without the incessant pointless mudslinging.

Thank you for the enlightenment and opinions of all participants.

Thanks again for proving your utter incapacity for grasping the issues at hand here. Not only do you now understand the diff between gpl and public domain, you refuse to expend any effort on doing so all the while insisting you knw what “most people” do or do not – including developers, which is doubly ironic considering you’re obviously not a developer and never were, at least in any sense beyond the lone masturbatory geek stereotype.

No, I have nothing substantial to add because it’s pretty obvious we’re the only two even reading this shit, and you’re just plain not listening.
Dude; you’re (allegedly) a lawyer, surely you can afford to buy yourself a clue.

No. People can, of course, publish copies of public domain works. But they can’t remove works from the public domain.

If Linux were in the public domain, yes, Microsoft could publish their own version of it. But all the parts of it that were copied would remain in the public domain. All the parts they didn’t register would be in the public domain. And since registration would involve full deposit of well-commented source, which would be available for public viewing, it would not be difficult to to strip out any new, registered, copyrighted material they had added. Meanwhile, anyone else could continue to publish Linux, regardless of whatever Microsoft was doing.

they would have zero responsibility to share how they did that with any of us

I think that this point is fairly well negated by the formalities I’d like to see. Either their new material is a public domain trade secret, in which case you can copy the binaries and reverse engineer them as much as you like, or they’re registered, copyrighted, and fully visible. You can’t make copies of the new material during the term, but you can look at and learn from the complete and well-commented source code, which would be available at the Library of Congress.

Given that the term would only be a few years for software anyway, as it ‘ages’ much more rapidly than other kinds of works, after a brief hiatus you’d have public domain source and binaries for whatever they had added anyhow.

license it however they please

Well, I’m against allowing adhesive licensing (save for a few good licenses such as the GPL) so unless they were willing to negotiate back and forth with you (as might be the case with really big customers), they couldn’t license it at all. They could really only sell copies outright, as is the case for books, movies, CDs, paintings, etc.

If code has to be “registered” with the government at every goddamned turn then TREMENDOUS obstacles would be placed to the very creation of that software

Oh, you wouldn’t have to register it. You’d only have to do that if you want a copyright. There would be no obstacles whatsoever to stop people from releasing public domain works. After all, the public benefits the most from having as many public domain works as possible. Then, once you’ve got all of those, you mete out a little copyright in order to get all the works that can only be created with copyright as an incentive, and even then you limit the amount of copyright (and thus the number of works created) so that the public still comes out ahead. And finally, the works that would cost the public more than they would benefit from them are not incentivized. They come at too high a price; as much as we’d like them, we can’t afford them.

we individuals would have to pay the government for our own fucking generosity, and pay parasitic lawyers (tempted to say like yourself as it seems obvious this is your inten, but I will save that particular character assasination until you have, once again, proven me right with your own words) who present zero value to the world but only serve to obfuscate “justice” while reaching for our pocketbooks.

No. You have to pay the government to demonstrate that you really want a copyright and would otherwise not have created the work. Remember, a copyright isn’t free. It is a burdensome monopoly that is costly to the public. They should not be handed out ever, unless necessary to yield a greater public benefit than they cost. Right now you are saying that the world should fork out to you always and automatically, but in the form of a copyright, rather than dollars. I won’t tolerate that kind of public waste.

As for lawyers, just like I said before, copyrights are now, and would continue to be, so easy to get that no one has to go to a lawyer in order to get one. It is about as difficult as filling out a change of address form with the Post Office. I encourage you to look at the actual registration forms at the Copyright Office. They are incredibly easy to complete and send in. I’d even support making it easier, with additional Internet-based registration, 24 hour multilingual toll free help lines, etc.

Remember: I just don’t want to give out copyrights automatically. If someone is willing to expend even the teeny tiny effort of going to get one, then I have no problem with giving it to that person. I want to give it to that person, whoever they may otherwise be.

The formalities are valuable in their own right. For example, deposit ensures that copies are preserved in the Library of Congress so that they won’t be lost in the future. But their other significant purpose is to indicate a desire for a copyright as a motive for having created the work to begin with, since those are the only kinds of works where we want to grant a copyright at all.

* Freedom 0 is the freedom to run the program, as you wish, however you wish, for any purpose.

I know the technical reasons for counting from zero, but it is silly in this context. Anyway, I support this one.

* Freedom 1 is the freedom to study the program’s source code, and change it so that it does what you wish.

I support the study part of this one; that’s a large part of why I’ve got the beefed-up deposit formality for software as part of my plan. As for changing it, this conflicts with the derivative right of copyright. I support works being in the public domain, in which case there is no copyright. I support the GPL, in which a copyright holder chooses to allow people to make derivatives of his copyrighted work (in exchange for them doing likewise). But while I’m concerned with the expansiveness of the derivative right, I think that whether and how much to allow others to engage in preparing derivatives is largely best left to a copyright holder.

* Freedom 2 is the freedom to help your neighbour. This is the freedom to distribute copies when you wish, including publishing them.

As above, I’m all for copyright holders getting the choice of whether to do this, and for it to be perfectly allowable for public domain works, but I wouldn’t be likely to take the choice away from the copyright holder.

Freedom 3 is the freedom to help your community. This is the freedom to distribute modified versions when you wish, including publishing them

Ditto.

The GPL supports the anti-corproate structure that has, at last, given the microsofts and apples of the world some compelling competition.

I don’t know if I’d say compelling. Linux, for example, has yet to catch on in large segments of the market, and while I applaud and recognize its technical excellence, it’s a piece of crap as far as usability goes, and probably is unsalvagably so. To be fair, so is pretty much everything else. Having worked on UI projects in the past, I’m a real usability snob. Nothing currently shipping is any good AFAIC. This is often rather frustrating, as I am good at identifying problems and possible solutions which would need to be investigated and tested. But I don’t have the skill to write or modify software to implement the possible solutions. And since I’m a lawyer now, I don’t have the time, either.

Anyway, I digress.

You claim to want freedom. Your “freedom” is irresponsible and short sighted and serves the interests only of corporations and lawyers. Well, fuck you and your zealous quest for power and job security; What we need is liberty, and the GPL and copyright are doing a fantastic job at providing that… even as things are now.

I disagree. I want freedom, but the public domain is the most freedom available. It’s not short-sighted, as things simply remain in that state. They can be added to — Disney can make their own movie version of Aladdin — but not removed — just as anyone else can still make their own Aladdin movie even today. Even well-meaning restrictions, such as those in the GPL, are ultimately not acceptable in the long run; they are not substitutes for good copyright and a healthy public domain. I think your failure to understand the nature of the public domain (i.e. you keep imagining that using public domain works to create derivatives involves any rights over the public domain works) is what’s sending you off on the wrong track.

I am certainly not interested in serving the interests of any specific group. I am solely interested in the public interest. As it happens, I fully expect that if I am successful that it will cause a big contraction in the market for copyright lawyers. So be it. I’d rather be out of a job than continue to suffer under bad copyright laws. I am confident that I, and my bretheren in the copyright bar, are fully capable of finding other work. We don’t really need to worry about ourselves.

But copyright, as it is now? It’s crap, and the sooner we scrap it, and replace it with a smaller and better system, the better. Even tempered by the GPL, which I like, and would like to see continue, copyright law is still too awful to be allowed to continue in its current state.

Public domain is NOT FREEDOM. Public domain is a free ride, but it is not freedom – it means any work can be coopted by anyone, anytime, and locked away AGAIN in a proprietary package. If the linux kernel were “public domain” then Microsoft could take the kernel, link in whatever crap they wanted, and come out with a new windows that ran linux or whatever, and they would have zero responsibility to share how they did that with any of us; they could charge whatever they wanted, license it however they please, and none of us would have the fredom to redistribute our own goddamn works in that form.

That is not freedom, it is tyrrany. It is, in essence, slavery. Not slavery of the programmers who created the original code, but even worse – slavery of the code itself. the GPL is what protects the fruits of my labor; the creative offspring of my loins, from being hauled off in chains to do the bidding on the corporate massahs.

If code has to be “registered” with the government at every goddamned turn then TREMENDOUS obstacles would be placed to the very creation of that software – we individuals would have to pay the government for our own fucking generosity, and pay parasitic lawyers (tempted to say like yourself as it seems obvious this is your inten, but I will save that particular character assasination until you have, once again, proven me right with your own words) who present zero value to the world but only serve to obfuscate “justice” while reaching for our pocketbooks.

The fact everything I create is copyrighted is what allows me the freedom to collaborate with others in an open and productive manner without fear of my code being dragged away in chains by some proprietary venture who cares less about helping society than making money – copyright serves the public greatly in this manner. It serves the public a hell of a lot more than allowing a bunch of teens the “freedom” to post torrents of every goddamned DVD they can lay hands upon, which seems to be the only “freedom” you are able to recognize.

“Free Software” means that the users have four essential freedoms. Freedoms that every user of software should have.

* Freedom 0 is the freedom to run the program, as you wish, however you wish, for any purpose.
* Freedom 1 is the freedom to study the program’s source code, and change it so that it does what you wish.
* Freedom 2 is the freedom to help your neighbour. This is the freedom to distribute copies when you wish, including publishing them. and
* Freedom 3 is the freedom to help your community. This is the freedom to distribute modified versions when you wish, including publishing them.

The GPL (in some form) is inarguably the most popular “free” license. The GPL supports the anti-corproate structure that has, at last, given the microsofts and apples of the world some compelling competition. The GPL (and copyright) is exactly what secures for us all those “essential freedoms” outline by RMS. This has created a pressure on EVERY corporation to loosen the reigns a bit on their products, improving access to software of all types to virtually everyone throughout the world.

If you undermine copyright (which, as I said before, you’re not going to do anyway since your ideas would hold virtually no appeal to ANYONE except those of the most self-serving, short sighted desires) then you undermine LIBERTY. it is as simple as that.

You claim to want freedom. Your “freedom” is irresponsible and short sighted and serves the interests only of corporations and lawyers. Well, fuck you and your zealous quest for power and job security; What we need is liberty, and the GPL and copyright are doing a fantastic job at providing that… even as things are now.

Sorry, but no. I’m on the side against the copyright maximalists. I want to bring copyright back in line with the public interest. You might disagree with my suggestions for doing so, but don’t make up lies about my ultimate goals.

The “reforms” you put forth here don’t even address the core of the problems we are now experiencing.

The core of the problems we’re facing is that authors and publishers have hijacked copyright for their own benefit. Dealing with that is a political problem, and other than raising public awareness, lobbying Congress, voting, and seeking allies (e.g. librarian associations, home electronics manufacturers) there’s not a whole lot else to do. Although I’d be happy to hear some suggestions.

What I’ve been doing is focusing on public awareness but also in preparing some ideas for what our ultimate agenda is. Just saying ‘fix copyright’ isn’t good enough, so I’ve been tinkering with drafting legislation. I don’t really expect that my suggestions would get endorsed widely or even passed, but it’s a start. It’s a foundation to build upon and change, and something to point to in the meantime to help back our efforts.

Making it harder to copyright stuff only benefits the corporations and other wealthy interests

No, it doesn’t. In fact, it’s relatively neutral in that regard, in that non-wealthy authors generally don’t pursue copyrights anyway. For example, under the current law, all of your posts here are copyrighted (though mine are not). Do you actually care, however? Are you planning to compile them and publish them for money? I doubt it. And so I wouldn’t give you an automatic copyright on them. If you took some affirmative steps indicating that you really did plan to exploit the copyright, and if they were near in time to the creation and publication of the posts so as to indicate that this had been your intent at the time, then by all means, I’d be happy for you to get a copyright on them.

So as I said, most people don’t care about copyrights on their own works. Those that do tend to act in a business-like manner about it. Just as people who want to start a business have to get licensed, think about forms of organization, tax implications, etc., so too do business-minded authors of any size actively think about copyright. It’s really no different than patents. The patent system isn’t set up to favor industrial inventors over people working in a garage. But it is set up to favor serious people over amateurs who ignore patents and thus reveal themselves as not having been incentivized by them and thus not deserving of them.

he ones who are going around suing indivudals for nonsense like trying to erect municipal Barney Fife monuments

Yeah, that is pretty stupid. Except that that has absolutely nothing to do with copyright, AFAIK. That is the Don Knotts’ estate using publicity rights. And while I don’t normally deal with that sort of thing, I do think that it’s stupid to have publicity rights that persist beyond one’s life. I would support the statue-makers.

You’re trying to rob from the poor to feed the rich

Not at all. No one inherently deserves copyrights. They are granted by the public only when they serve the public interest. They only serve the public interest when the public reaps a greater benefit from the copyright than the cost to the public of having to suffer the copyright’s ill effects. Copyrights can only be beneficial when they are in fact incentivizing authors (along with some other things). If a copyright is not incentivizing authors, then it is not beneficial to the public, and should not be granted.

I don’t care about whether an author is big or little. Only that he is an author that would not have created his work if not for copyright. If he would have done it anyway, then we don’t need to incentivize him. He was willing to work for free and I’m willing to let him.

anyone who wants to wash a car for free still doesn’t get to do it because Bill Gates and the government controls the flow of water so they get paid anyway

I really fail to see what you’re trying to say here. Remember, I’m very much against DRM, and I’m very much against allowing copyright holders to engage in rent-seeking. Perhaps you could clarify your statement in light of this?

In your brave new world all those people giving away car washes are simply providing free labor to the man who owns the car wash.

Yes. In fact, they’re providing free labor to everyone. That’s what the public domain is. It is totally unrestricted. While I do prefer the GPL over the BSD license, I ultimately prefer the public domain to both. Neither is an acceptable substitute.

provides the very incentive to create those works

If they have an incentive then I’m sure they’d be happy to evidence that with the standard formalities. If not, then I guess they weren’t really incentivized after all.

But in your nirvana, anyone who wants to wash a car for free still doesn’t get to do it because Bill Gates and the government controls the flow of water so they get paid anyway. In your brave new world all those people giving away car washes are simply providing free labor to the man who owns the car wash.

Fuck you, Josh. Copyright is the walking papers for the GPL world. If you cannot even understand that, and how that emancipation of code (and real work by authors) from corporate tyranny provides the very incentive to create those works, then maybe you should burn that degree you got from a matchbook cover and come down here to Ole Miss where you can get a proper legal education.

More proof of your complete ignorance to the new world. Your thinking is as dated as the worse of any Hollywood stereotype.

Copyright is in my interest and in my girlfriends, and in my neighbor’s. They may not all realize just how much at this point, but their ignorance is certainly no greater than yours – in fact, I would give them more credit, since as an allegedly educated “lawyer” you should at least know better, but don’t. There’s a different word for that than ignorance.

How many thousands of developers are there contributing to gpl products? WHY are they contributing to GPL products and not BSD or “public domain” products? Fuck with that and you rob them all of that incentive and you rob everyone who benefits from their efforts of that utility. I cannot fathom how someone can claim to be educated (and a lawyer no less) and not fathom this very simple concept. Perhaps if you would spend a bit more time listening to people who tell you how your ideas are already antiquated you would have less of that prodigious free time and more clients and opportunity to actually do something useful with your time.

Most people cook food, but usually just to feed themselves and their family. They aren’t interested in doing it as a business, most of them. When a business cooks food, however, they almost always do so for profit. The same is generally true for works.

GPL. Shareware. BSD. Public domain…. look into it and tell me where most of the activity is going on now.

I’m really not trying to favor individual authors over corporate authors with my reforms.

Duh. It’s pretty fucking obvious you are, in fact, trying to do the very opposite – raise the barriers to protected free works in the interest of corporations. I don’t know who you think you are fooling, but it’s pretty fucking obvious to me you are simply trying to hone a message of deceit in your own self interest as a wannabe corporate publishing lobbyist. Too bad for you… if the law thing isn’t working out, maybe you have career potential as a pornographer.

The “reforms” you put forth here don’t even address the core of the problems we are now experiencing. Making it harder to copyright stuff only benefits the corporations and other wealthy interests (like the lawyers they employ) – the ones who are going around suing indivudals for nonsense like trying to erect municipal Barney Fife monuments. How many indie bands are suing their listeners because of p2p activity? You’re trying to rob from the poor to feed the rich while casting yourself as some robin hood. You ain’t fooling me, and I doubt you’ll fool anyone else with your obviously contorted “message.” You may or may not be a capable lawyer, but you completely suck at politics – and, apparently, even at logical thought.

I disagree. As I said, I like the GPL, I think it’s a good idea, and I’d like to see it continue. However, my main priority is in fixing copyright law as a whole. I am confident that doing so will not imperil the GPL (unless it were to make it unnecessary because the law performed the same functions). But if I had to choose, I’d rather fix the law.

you’re a lawyer of the worse kind – oine who thinks he knows what the fuck he’s talking about when he’s out of his depth, and who refuses to listen to those who really do know what they are talking about.

How’s that? I’m quite knowledgable with regard to copyright law and policy, the various fields and industries involved with copyright law (both their commercial and noncommercial aspects), and the GPL. I’ve considered using the GPL for some of my own projects, but instead I have opted for the public domain since I know that copyright has not been an incentive for me and therefore would be inappropriate to claim.

Forcing registration in order to protect copyright would completely destroy the GPL.

I don’t think so. It would simply require authors who wanted to, or who were required to, place their works under the GPL, to register. Given that the US has had formalities for centuries, it’s hardly odd to require it. What’s unusual and unjustified is the current (hopefully short-lived) practice of not requiring it.

If the authors don’t care enough about their works to seek out a copyright so as to make the GPL functional for their works, then I don’t see why I should care either. Remember, copyright is meant to benefit the public. It does this, in part, by acting as an incentive to authors to create that which they otherwise would not have created. But if an artist would have created a work sans copyright, then it would be quite wasteful to give him a copyright. The public benefits more from letting him create works anyway and not protecting them, then it would from not incentivizing him and protecting his works.

Think of it this way: if you have a car, wouldn’t you prefer to have someone wash your car for free instead of charging you ten dollars to do it? All else being equal, only a fool would pay money for something he could get for free. Copyright is the same way; if authors aren’t incentivized by copyright, they shouldn’t get copyrights. When they are, they should get copyrights. Formalities are the best system we have for distinguishing the former artists from the latter on a work-by-work basis.

GPL authors who care about copyright will register. Authors who don’t care, won’t. In this way, the public maximizes its benefit.

Every new version of a piece of code would have to be re-registered.

Yes, for whatever portions had changed. Probably the best solution is to have fewer, larger new versions. Remember that a work can have multiple authors and can be assembled over time. As I’ve mentioned before, I think a year between publication and registration is the most grace period that is acceptable. And even that isn’t great; I don’t like the public ending up uncertain as to whether or not an as-yet unregistered work is really copyrighted.

The developers are already donating their time and effort to this work, now you want to tax their generosity

Not at all. I’m not trying to use copyright registrations as a source of revenue. In fact I’m against that. I just want the registrations to be just barely more than trivial so that authors will really have to consciously decide whether or not they want a copyright. It’s not automatic. Since copyright is an economic monopoly, i.e. the incentive to authors is the opportunity to make money, a token investment discourages authors from pursuing copyrights on absolutely everything in a shotgun approach. Again, they are forced to make a consicous decision; do they invest a little sum, or is it not worth getting any protection at all?

you want to make it harder to obtain and secure copyrights without people having to depend on more lawyers and spend more money

You’re wrong there. I want copyright registration to be simple and easy for anyone to do, provided that they take it seriously. No lawyers should be required. In fact, they’re not required for registration now, and I’m quite happy with most of the current registration system, if only it were required in order to get a copyright. The form is clear and short (one of the more complex parts is the author’s name and address), the fee is small and reasonable, and the deposit requirement (which I would beef up) is important but not difficult in the least. Adding notice is trivial and is commonly done anyway. And that’s basically it.

I would be quite happy if, under a reformed copyright system, no one ever had to come to a lawyer to have a copyright registered.

I’m sure you’ll have no problem getting the publishing cartels to support you.

Oh, I doubt it. Another part of my agenda is that everything done by a natural person, noncommercially, should be made noninfringing. Copyright would only be relevant to authors and to commercial entities or people involved in business. I’m also very strongly opposed to DRM. And I want extremely short overall terms.

I feel quite confident in pointing out you’d likely find great resistance from groups like the EFF

What I find funny about this is that my dream job would be to work for the EFF. I don’t think that they’d be opposed to it.

Fuck you and you bourjois elitism, Josh,

Am I elitist if I point out that the word is bourgeois? 😉

Anyway, I’m not being an elitist. As I pointed out earlier, I would never grant a copyright to anyone who had not been motivated by copyright in creating a work. To give them a copyright would be undeserved and wasteful. They should be given out only to the authors who were in fact motivated by them. This is simple thrift.

Most creative works were not created by a desire to get a copyright and exploit the work financially. This is a simple fact. They’re created instead for other reasons that copyright is not an incentive for: fame, art for art’s sake, to sell an individual piece, personal fulfillment, school or work assignments, etc.

Generally, businesses are going to be more interested in deliberately creating works with copyright as a motive. But then, how is that odd? Most people cook food, but usually just to feed themselves and their family. They aren’t interested in doing it as a business, most of them. When a business cooks food, however, they almost always do so for profit. The same is generally true for works.

I’m really not trying to favor individual authors over corporate authors with my reforms. Instead I’m trying to limit copyright so that it is only granted when necessary to incentivize authors, and not granted when it is not needed to incentivize authors. And I’m doing this because it benefits the public to not grant copyrights unduly. When someone will wash your car for free, you let them.

Fuck you and you bourjois elitism, Josh,

You’re insignifant exept to your clients (whom I pity). Ergo, I am done with you.

No. I support the GPL, but I have larger concerns. What I want to do is to limit copyright so that only those authors that want it for a particular work, as evidenced by a token effort to get it, will have it.

No, you don’t support the fucking GPL at all. you’re a lawyer of the worse kind – oine who thinks he knows what the fuck he’s talking about when he’s out of his depth, and who refuses to listen to those who really do know what they are talking about.

Forcing registration in order to protect copyright would completely destroy the GPL. Thousands off individuals contribute to GPL code – so what happens to the developers who submit patches and revisions, etc? Every new version of a piece of code would have to be re-registered. Who the fuck pays for it? The developers are already donating their time and effort to this work, now you want to tax their generosity

Dude, you’re fucking insane.

You’re a lawyer, and you want to make it harder to obtain and secure copyrights without people having to depend on more lawyers and spend more money… so what else is new?

I’m sure you’ll have no problem getting the publishing cartels to support you. What I cannot believe is how clueless you are about the real impact you “reforms” would have. I feel quite confident in pointing out you’d likely find great resistance from groups like the EFF, but of course when have they ever made a difference?