summaryrefslogtreecommitdiff
path: root/talermerchantdemos/blog/articles/scrap1_5.html
diff options
context:
space:
mode:
Diffstat (limited to 'talermerchantdemos/blog/articles/scrap1_5.html')
-rw-r--r--talermerchantdemos/blog/articles/scrap1_5.html464
1 files changed, 464 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/talermerchantdemos/blog/articles/scrap1_5.html b/talermerchantdemos/blog/articles/scrap1_5.html
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..bf1a922
--- /dev/null
+++ b/talermerchantdemos/blog/articles/scrap1_5.html
@@ -0,0 +1,464 @@
+<!-- This is the second edition of Free Software, Free Society: Selected Essays of Richard M. Stallman.
+
+Free Software Foundation
+
+51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor
+
+Boston, MA 02110-1335
+Copyright C 2002, 2010 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
+Verbatim copying and distribution of this entire book are permitted
+worldwide, without royalty, in any medium, provided this notice is
+preserved. Permission is granted to copy and distribute translations
+of this book from the original English into another language provided
+the translation has been approved by the Free Software Foundation and
+the copyright notice and this permission notice are preserved on all
+copies.
+
+ISBN 978-0-9831592-0-9
+Cover design by Rob Myers.
+
+Cover photograph by Peter Hinely.
+ -->
+
+
+ <a name="Why-Software-Should-Not-Have-Owners">
+ </a>
+ <h1 class="chapter">
+ 5. Why Software Should Not Have Owners
+ </h1>
+ <a name="index-competition_002c-impact-on-2">
+ </a>
+ <a name="index-copyright_002c-digital-technology-and">
+ </a>
+ <p>
+ Digital information technology contributes to the world by making it
+easier to copy and modify information. Computers promise to make this
+easier for all of us.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Not everyone wants it to be easier. The system of copyright gives
+software programs “owners,” most of whom aim to withhold
+software’s potential benefit from the rest of the public. They would
+like to be the only ones who can copy and modify the software that we
+use.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The copyright system grew up with printing—a technology for
+mass-production copying. Copyright fit in well with this technology
+because it restricted only the mass producers of copies. It did not
+take freedom away from readers of books. An ordinary reader, who did
+not own a printing press, could copy books only with pen and ink, and
+few readers were sued for that.
+ </p>
+ <a name="index-ownership_002c-and-Soviet_002dstyle-information-control">
+ </a>
+ <p>
+ Digital technology is more flexible than the printing press: when
+information has digital form, you can easily copy it to share it with
+others. This very flexibility makes a bad fit with a system like
+copyright. That’s the reason for the increasingly nasty and draconian
+measures now used to enforce software copyright. Consider these four
+practices of the
+ <a name="index-Software-Publishers-Association-_0028SPA_0029">
+ </a>
+ Software Publishers Association (SPA):
+ </p>
+ <a name="index-copyright_002c-enforcement-measures">
+ </a>
+ <ul>
+ <li>
+ Massive propaganda saying it is wrong to disobey the owners
+to help your friend.
+ </li>
+ <li>
+ Solicitation for stool pigeons to inform on their coworkers and
+colleagues.
+ </li>
+ <li>
+ Raids (with police help) on offices and schools, in which people are
+told they must prove they are innocent of illegal copying.
+ </li>
+ <li>
+ Prosecution (by the US government, at the
+ <a name="index-Software-Publishers-Association-_0028SPA_0029-1">
+ </a>
+ SPA’s request)
+of people such as MIT’s
+ <a name="index-LaMacchia_002c-David">
+ </a>
+ David LaMacchia, not for copying software (he is not accused of
+copying any), but merely for leaving copying facilities unguarded and
+failing to censor their use.
+ <a href="#FOOT22" name="DOCF22">
+ (22)
+ </a>
+ </li>
+ </ul>
+ <p>
+ All four practices resemble those used in the former
+ <a name="index-Soviet-Union">
+ </a>
+ Soviet Union,
+where every copying machine had a guard to prevent forbidden copying,
+and where individuals had to copy information secretly and pass it
+from hand to hand as samizdat. There is of course a
+difference: the motive for information control in the Soviet Union was
+political; in the US the motive is profit. But it is the actions that
+affect us, not the motive. Any attempt to block the sharing of
+information, no matter why, leads to the same methods and the same
+harshness.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Owners make several kinds of arguments for giving them the power
+to control how we use information:
+ <a name="index-ownership_002c-and-Soviet_002dstyle-information-control-1">
+ </a>
+ </p>
+ <a name="Name-Calling">
+ </a>
+ <h3 class="subheading">
+ Name Calling
+ </h3>
+ <a name="index-ownership_002c-arguments-for">
+ </a>
+ <a name="index-users_002c-arguments-used-to-justify-control-over">
+ </a>
+ <a name="index-terminology_002c-importance-of-using-correct">
+ </a>
+ <a name="index-_0060_0060piracy_002c_0027_0027-erroneous-use-of-term-2">
+ </a>
+ <a name="index-_0060_0060intellectual-property_002c_0027_0027-bias-and-fallacy-of-term-_0028see-also-ownership_0029-2">
+ </a>
+ <a name="index-_0060_0060theft_002c_0027_0027-erroneous-use-of-term">
+ </a>
+ <a name="index-_0060_0060damage_002c_0027_0027-erroneous-use-of-term">
+ </a>
+ <p>
+ Owners use smear words such as “piracy” and
+“theft,” as well as expert terminology such as
+“intellectual property” and “damage,” to
+suggest a certain line of thinking to the public—a simplistic
+analogy between programs and physical objects.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Our ideas and intuitions about property for material objects are about
+whether it is right to
+ <em>
+ take an object away
+ </em>
+ from someone else. They
+don’t directly apply to
+ <em>
+ making a copy
+ </em>
+ of something. But the owners
+ask us to apply them anyway.
+ </p>
+ <a name="Exaggeration">
+ </a>
+ <h3 class="subheading">
+ Exaggeration
+ </h3>
+ <p>
+ Owners say that they suffer “harm” or “economic
+loss” when users copy programs themselves. But the copying has
+no direct effect on the owner, and it harms no one. The owner can
+lose only if the person who made the copy would otherwise have paid
+for one from the owner.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ A little thought shows that most such people would not have bought
+copies. Yet the owners compute their “losses” as if each
+and every one would have bought a copy. That is exaggeration—to
+put it kindly.
+ </p>
+ <a name="The-Law">
+ </a>
+ <h3 class="subheading">
+ The Law
+ </h3>
+ <p>
+ Owners often describe the current state of the law, and the harsh
+penalties they can threaten us with. Implicit in this approach is the
+suggestion that today’s law reflects an unquestionable view of
+morality—yet at the same time, we are urged to regard these
+penalties as facts of nature that can’t be blamed on anyone.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ This line of persuasion isn’t designed to stand up to critical
+thinking; it’s intended to reinforce a habitual mental pathway.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ It’s elementary that laws don’t decide right and wrong. Every American
+should know that, in the 1950s, it was against the law in many
+states for a black person to sit in the front of a bus; but only
+racists would say sitting there was wrong.
+ </p>
+ <a name="Natural-Rights">
+ </a>
+ <h3 class="subheading">
+ Natural Rights
+ </h3>
+ <a name="index-programmers_002c-and-creativity-and-entitlement-2">
+ </a>
+ <a name="index-users_002c-premise-of-author-supremacy-_0028see-also-ownership_0029">
+ </a>
+ <p>
+ Authors often claim a special connection with programs they have
+written, and go on to assert that, as a result, their desires and
+interests concerning the program simply outweigh those of anyone
+else—or even those of the whole rest of the world. (Typically
+companies, not authors, hold the copyrights on software, but we are
+expected to ignore this discrepancy.)
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ To those who propose this as an ethical axiom—the author is more
+important than you—I can only say that I, a notable software
+author myself, call it bunk.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But people in general are only likely to feel any sympathy with the
+natural rights claims for two reasons.
+ </p>
+ <a name="index-software_002c-overstretched-analogy-with-material-objects">
+ </a>
+ <p>
+ One reason is an overstretched analogy with material objects. When I
+cook spaghetti, I do object if someone else eats it, because then I
+cannot eat it. His action hurts me exactly as much as it benefits
+him; only one of us can eat the spaghetti, so the question is, which one?
+The smallest distinction between us is enough to tip the ethical
+balance.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But whether you run or change a program I wrote affects you directly
+and me only indirectly. Whether you give a copy to your friend
+affects you and your friend much more than it affects me. I shouldn’t
+have the power to tell you not to do these things. No one should.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The second reason is that people have been told that natural rights
+for authors is the accepted and unquestioned tradition of our society.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ As a matter of history, the opposite is true. The idea of natural
+rights of authors was proposed and decisively rejected when the
+ <a name="index-Constitution_002c-authors_0027-natural-rights-and-US">
+ </a>
+ US
+Constitution was drawn up. That’s why the Constitution only
+ <em>
+ permits
+ </em>
+ a system of copyright and does not
+ <em>
+ require
+ </em>
+ one; that’s why it says that copyright must be temporary. It also
+states that the purpose of copyright is to promote progress—not
+to reward authors. Copyright does reward authors somewhat, and
+publishers more, but that is intended as a means of modifying their
+behavior.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The real established tradition of our society is that copyright cuts
+into the natural rights of the public—and that this can only be
+justified for the public’s sake.
+ <a name="index-programmers_002c-and-creativity-and-entitlement-3">
+ </a>
+ <a name="index-users_002c-premise-of-author-supremacy-_0028see-also-ownership_0029-1">
+ </a>
+ </p>
+ <a name="Economics">
+ </a>
+ <h3 class="subheading">
+ Economics
+ </h3>
+ <p>
+ The final argument made for having owners of software is that this
+leads to production of more software.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Unlike the others, this argument at least takes a legitimate approach
+to the subject. It is based on a valid goal—satisfying the
+users of software. And it is empirically clear that people will
+produce more of something if they are well paid for doing so.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But the economic argument has a flaw: it is based on the assumption
+that the difference is only a matter of how much money we have to pay.
+It assumes that
+ <em>
+ production of software
+ </em>
+ is what we want,
+whether the software has owners or not.
+ </p>
+ <a name="index-software_002c-overstretched-analogy-with-material-objects-1">
+ </a>
+ <p>
+ People readily accept this assumption because it accords with our
+experiences with material objects. Consider a sandwich, for instance.
+You might well be able to get an equivalent sandwich either gratis or
+for a price. If so, the amount you pay is the only difference.
+Whether or not you have to buy it, the sandwich has the same taste,
+the same nutritional value, and in either case you can only eat it
+once. Whether you get the sandwich from an owner or not cannot
+directly affect anything but the amount of money you have afterwards.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ This is true for any kind of material object—whether or not it
+has an owner does not directly affect what it
+ <em>
+ is,
+ </em>
+ or what you
+can do with it if you acquire it.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ But if a program has an owner, this very much affects what it is, and
+what you can do with a copy if you buy one. The difference is not
+just a matter of money. The system of owners of software encourages
+software owners to produce something—but not what society really
+needs. And it causes intangible ethical pollution that affects us
+all.
+ <a name="index-users_002c-arguments-used-to-justify-control-over-1">
+ </a>
+ <a name="index-ownership_002c-arguments-for-1">
+ </a>
+ </p>
+ <br>
+ <p>
+ What does society need? It needs information that is truly available
+to its citizens—for example, programs that people can read, fix,
+adapt, and improve, not just operate. But what software owners
+typically deliver is a black box that we can’t study or change.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Society also needs freedom. When a program has an owner, the users
+lose freedom to control part of their own lives.
+ </p>
+ <a name="index-citizen-values_002c-cooperation">
+ </a>
+ <a name="index-_0060_0060piracy_002c_0027_0027-erroneous-use-of-term-3">
+ </a>
+ <p>
+ And, above all, society needs to encourage the spirit of voluntary
+cooperation in its citizens. When software owners tell us that
+helping our neighbors in a natural way is “piracy,” they
+pollute our society’s civic spirit.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ This is why we say that free software is a matter of freedom, not price.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The economic argument for owners is erroneous, but the economic issue
+is real. Some people write useful software for the pleasure of
+writing it or for admiration and love; but if we want more software
+than those people write, we need to raise funds.
+ </p>
+ <a name="index-developers_002c-funding-for">
+ </a>
+ <a name="index-programmers_002c-income-for-7">
+ </a>
+ <p>
+ Since the 1980s, free software developers have tried various methods
+of finding funds, with some success. There’s no need to make anyone
+rich; a typical income is plenty of incentive to do many jobs that are
+less satisfying than programming.
+ </p>
+ <a name="index-Stallman_002c-Richard-2">
+ </a>
+ <p>
+ For years, until a fellowship made it unnecessary, I made a living
+from custom enhancements of the free software I had written. Each
+enhancement was added to the standard released version and thus
+eventually became available to the general public. Clients paid me so
+that I would work on the enhancements they wanted, rather than on the
+features I would otherwise have considered highest priority.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ Some free software developers make money by selling support services.
+In 1994,
+ <a name="index-Cygnus-Support">
+ </a>
+ Cygnus Support, with around 50 employees, estimated that
+about 15 percent of its staff activity was free software
+development—a respectable percentage for a software company.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ In the early 1990s, companies including
+ <a name="index-Intel-_0028see-also-_0060_0060trusted-computing_0027_0027_0029">
+ </a>
+ Intel,
+ <a name="index-Motorola-1">
+ </a>
+ Motorola,
+ <a name="index-Texas-Instruments">
+ </a>
+ <a name="index-Analog-Devices">
+ </a>
+ Analog Devices
+Texas Instruments and Analog Devices combined to fund the continued
+development of the
+ <a name="index-GNU_002c-GNU-C-compiler-_0028see-also-GNU_002c-GCC_0029-2">
+ </a>
+ <a name="index-GNU_002c-GCC-2">
+ </a>
+ GNU C compiler. Most GCC development is still done
+by paid developers. The
+ <a name="index-GNU_002c-GNU-compiler">
+ </a>
+ GNU compiler for the
+ <a name="index-Ada-language">
+ </a>
+ Ada language was funded
+in the 90s by the
+ <a name="index-Air-Force_002c-US">
+ </a>
+ US Air Force, and continued since then by a company
+formed specifically for the purpose.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ The free software movement is still small, but the example of
+listener-supported radio in the US shows it’s possible to support a
+large activity without forcing each user to pay.
+ </p>
+ <a name="index-citizen-values_002c-cooperation-1">
+ </a>
+ <p>
+ As a computer user today, you may find yourself using a
+proprietary program. If your friend asks to make a copy, it would be wrong to
+refuse. Cooperation is more important than copyright. But
+underground, closet cooperation does not make for a good society. A
+person should aspire to live an upright life openly with pride, and
+this means saying no to proprietary software.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ You deserve to be able to cooperate openly and freely with other
+people who use software. You deserve to be able to learn how the
+software works, and to teach your students with it. You deserve to be
+able to hire your favorite programmer to fix it when it breaks.
+ </p>
+ <p>
+ You deserve free software.
+ </p>
+ <div class="footnote">
+ <hr>
+ <h3>
+ Footnotes
+ </h3>
+ <h3>
+ <a href="#DOCF22" name="FOOT22">
+ (22)
+ </a>
+ </h3>
+ <p>
+ The charges were subsequently
+dismissed.
+ </p>
+ </hr>
+ </div>
+ <hr size="2"/>
+ </br>
+