[plug] Re: "stealing"?

[Russell]

On Sun, Nov 17, 2002 at 10:53:33AM +0800, garry wrote:
> Using the same logic, I paraphrase..
> 
> The notion of powered flight did not always exist. To include it as a
> given in a statement which is presented as an immutable truth is to beg
> a couple of questions.

This is not a great analogy, for a couple of reasons.

. Powered flight could exist without any laws regarding flight or
power, or laws regarding taking friends along for free on a flight
that you paid for.  Copyright only exists because there are laws that
make it exist.

. If you take a person on a flight, something has been lost by the
provider of the flight: the ability to take someone else.  This loss
occurs regardless of the existence of laws that prevent you doing so
or not.  In contrast, making a copy of a copyrighted work without
permission does not directly involve the loss of something by the
copyright owner.  In the current legal situation, the copyright owner
loses the ability to charge for the copy, but that is an effect
entirely created by copyright law.

I agree wholeheartedly with Colin (in the message to which you
replied) that I'll respect copyright law because it is the way that
we've currently arranged our society.  However I think that that
arrangement is far from perfect, and history shows that copyright is
not necessary in order for people to produce great works (eg
Shakespeare, da Vinci).