ebooks.html (9125B)
1 <!--#include virtual="/server/header.html" --> 2 <!-- Parent-Version: 1.96 --> 3 <!-- This page is derived from /server/standards/boilerplate.html --> 4 <!--#set var="TAGS" value="essays cultural access" --> 5 <!--#set var="DISABLE_TOP_ADDENDUM" value="yes" --> 6 <title>E-Books: Freedom Or Copyright 7 - GNU Project - Free Software Foundation</title> 8 <!--#include virtual="/philosophy/po/ebooks.translist" --> 9 <!--#include virtual="/server/banner.html" --> 10 <!--#include virtual="/philosophy/ph-breadcrumb.html" --> 11 <!--GNUN: OUT-OF-DATE NOTICE--> 12 <!--#include virtual="/server/top-addendum.html" --> 13 <div class="article reduced-width"> 14 <h2>E-Books: Freedom Or Copyright</h2> 15 16 <address class="byline">by <a href="https://www.stallman.org/">Richard 17 Stallman</a></address> 18 19 <p>Once upon a time, in the age of the printing press, an industrial 20 regulation was established to cover the business of writing and 21 publishing. It was called copyright. Copyright's purpose, stated in 22 the US Constitution, was to “promote progress”—that 23 is, to encourage publication. The method used was to make publishers 24 get permission from authors for using recent works.</p> 25 26 <p>Ordinary readers had little reason to disapprove, since copyright 27 restricted only publication, not the things a reader could do. If it 28 raised the price of a book a small amount, that was only money; it did 29 not contort readers' way of life. Copyright provided a public benefit, 30 as intended, with little burden on the public. It did its job 31 well—back then.</p> 32 33 <p>Then a new way of distributing information came about: computers 34 and networks. The advantage of digital information technology is 35 that it facilitates copying and manipulating information, including 36 software, musical recordings and books. Networks offered the 37 possibility of unlimited access to all sorts of data, an 38 information utopia.</p> 39 40 <p>But one obstacle stood in the way: copyright. Readers who 41 made use of their computers to share published information were 42 technically copyright infringers. The world had changed around this 43 law, so that what was once an industrial regulation on publishers 44 had become a restriction on the public it was meant to serve.</p> 45 46 <p>In a system of real democracy, a law that prohibits a popular, 47 natural, and useful activity is usually soon relaxed. But the 48 powerful publishers' lobby was determined to prevent the public 49 from taking advantage of the power of their computers, and found 50 copyright a suitable weapon. Under their influence, rather than 51 relaxing copyright to suit the new circumstances, governments made 52 it stricter than ever, imposing harsh penalties on readers caught 53 sharing.</p> 54 55 <p>But that wasn't the last of it. Computers can be powerful tools 56 of domination, when a few people control what other people's 57 computers do. The publishers realized that by forcing people to use 58 specially designated software to read e-books, they could gain 59 unprecedented power: they could compel readers to pay, and identify 60 themselves, every time they read a book! That is the publishers' 61 dream.</p> 62 63 <p>So they prevailed upon the US government to give them the 64 Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998, a law giving them total 65 legal power over almost anything a reader might do with an e-book. 66 Even reading it without authorization is a crime.</p> 67 68 <div class="announcement comment" role="complementary"> 69 <hr class="no-display" /> 70 <p><a href="https://www.defectivebydesign.org/ebooks.html">Join our mailing list 71 about the dangers of eBooks</a>.</p> 72 <hr class="no-display" /> 73 </div> 74 75 <p>We still have the same old freedoms in using paper books. But if 76 e-books replace printed books, that exception will do little good. 77 With “electronic ink,” which makes it possible to download 78 new text onto an apparently printed piece of paper, even newspapers 79 could become ephemeral. Imagine: no more used book stores; no more 80 lending a book to your friend; no more borrowing one from the public 81 library—no more “leaks” that might give someone a 82 chance to read without paying. And judging from the ads for Microsoft 83 Reader, no more anonymous purchasing of books. This is the world 84 publishers have in mind for us.</p> 85 86 <p>Why is there so little public debate about these momentous changes? 87 Most citizens have not yet had occasion to come to grips with the 88 political issues raised by this futuristic technology. Besides, the 89 public has been taught that copyright exists to “protect” 90 the copyright holders, with the implication that the public's 91 interests do not count.</p> 92 93 <p>But when the public at large begins to use e-books, and 94 discovers the regime that the publishers have prepared for them, 95 they will begin to resist. Humanity will not accept this yoke 96 forever.</p> 97 98 <p>The publishers would have us believe that suppressive copyright 99 is the only way to keep art alive, but we do not need a War on 100 Copying to encourage a diversity of published works; as the 101 Grateful Dead showed, copying among fans is not a problem for the 102 artists. By legalizing the noncommercial copying of e-books, we can 103 turn copyright back into the industrial regulation it once was.</p> 104 105 <p>For some kinds of writing, we should go even further. For 106 scholarly papers and monographs, everyone should be encouraged to 107 republish them verbatim online; this helps protect the scholarly 108 record while making it more accessible. For textbooks and most 109 reference works, publication of modified versions should be allowed 110 as well, since that encourages society to improve them.</p> 111 112 <p>Eventually, when computer networks provide an easy way to send 113 someone a small amount of money, the whole rationale for restricting 114 verbatim copying will go away. If you like a book, and it pops up a 115 box saying, “Click here to give the author one dollar,” 116 wouldn't you click? Copyright for books and music, as it applies to 117 distributing verbatim unmodified copies, will be entirely obsolete. 118 And not a moment too soon!</p> 119 120 <div class="announcement comment" role="complementary"> 121 <hr class="no-display" /> 122 <p>Also consider reading <a 123 href="/philosophy/ebooks-must-increase-freedom.html">E-books must 124 increase our freedom, not decrease it</a>.</p> 125 </div> 126 127 <div class="infobox extra" role="complementary"> 128 <hr /> 129 <p>This is a slightly modified version of an article published in 130 <cite>Technology Review</cite> in 2000.</p> 131 </div> 132 </div> 133 134 </div><!-- for id="content", starts in the include above --> 135 <!--#include virtual="/server/footer.html" --> 136 <div id="footer" role="contentinfo"> 137 <div class="unprintable"> 138 139 <p>Please send general FSF & GNU inquiries to <a 140 href="mailto:gnu@gnu.org"><gnu@gnu.org></a>. There are also <a 141 href="/contact/">other ways to contact</a> the FSF. Broken links and other 142 corrections or suggestions can be sent to <a 143 href="mailto:webmasters@gnu.org"><webmasters@gnu.org></a>.</p> 144 145 <p><!-- TRANSLATORS: Ignore the original text in this paragraph, 146 replace it with the translation of these two: 147 148 We work hard and do our best to provide accurate, good quality 149 translations. However, we are not exempt from imperfection. 150 Please send your comments and general suggestions in this regard 151 to <a href="mailto:web-translators@gnu.org"> 152 <web-translators@gnu.org></a>.</p> 153 154 <p>For information on coordinating and contributing translations of 155 our web pages, see <a 156 href="/server/standards/README.translations.html">Translations 157 README</a>. --> 158 Please see the <a 159 href="/server/standards/README.translations.html">Translations README</a> for 160 information on coordinating and contributing translations of this article.</p> 161 </div> 162 163 <!-- Regarding copyright, in general, standalone pages (as opposed to 164 files generated as part of manuals) on the GNU web server should 165 be under CC BY-ND 4.0. Please do NOT change or remove this 166 without talking with the webmasters or licensing team first. 167 Please make sure the copyright date is consistent with the 168 document. For web pages, it is ok to list just the latest year the 169 document was modified, or published. 170 171 If you wish to list earlier years, that is ok too. 172 Either "2001, 2002, 2003" or "2001-2003" are ok for specifying 173 years, as long as each year in the range is in fact a copyrightable 174 year, i.e., a year in which the document was published (including 175 being publicly visible on the web or in a revision control system). 176 177 There is more detail about copyright years in the GNU Maintainers 178 Information document, www.gnu.org/prep/maintain. --> 179 180 <p>Copyright © 2000, 2021 Richard Stallman</p> 181 182 <p>This page is licensed under a <a rel="license" 183 href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">Creative 184 Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License</a>.</p> 185 186 <!--#include virtual="/server/bottom-notes.html" --> 187 188 <p class="unprintable">Updated: 189 <!-- timestamp start --> 190 $Date: 2021/09/11 09:37:22 $ 191 <!-- timestamp end --> 192 </p> 193 </div> 194 </div><!-- for class="inner", starts in the banner include --> 195 </body> 196 </html>