> Date: Thu, 06 Sep 2001 14:10:10 -0400
> Subject: Re: [NTLK] Shareware/Freeware Licenses
> From: "Eric L. Strobel" <fyzycyst_at_home.com>
> What you describe is theft and has nothing to do with the present
> discussion. Let's revisit that out-of-print book. Suppose that it's not
> only out-of-print, but the publisher has been out of business for years --
> not just bought out, but truly bankrupt, defunct, no longer existing, cannot
> be found. Now, if you sell that book, is that theft or not?
Sell the book? No problem. The publisher is legally allowed to be paid only
once for the sale of a book. Software is *copied*. To put this in
comparative terms, if a person had an out-of-print book from a publisher who
has apparently vanished, and started running off *copies of the book in its
entirety* for fun or profit, that person would probably be in a legally
culpable position. Similarly, if you distribute apparently abandoned
software, you're probably keeping a copy for yourself. That's copying, and
short-circuiting the invisible publisher's chance of ever getting back on
its financial feet. What's at question is whether its copyright
infringement. IANAL, but let's compare like with like.
It's tricky, too, with the Newton, that if I have a bit of software I used
to use, and have a friend who'd like a legal copy and can't find the
publisher, I'd like to be able to legally transfer my license and
registration code to my friend. But there are now 2 things against me: the
registration code is tied to my NewtonID, and we can't find the publisher to
issue a reg code tied to my friend's NewtonID. That's tough, but that's
life.
I have a couple of out-of-print CDs from a musician whose work I know well
enough to be considered an expert on his music. He's dropped out of music
for the time being, and people *beg* me for these 2 out-of-print CD's in any
form: cassette, MP3, or CD, anything. I won't copy them because this
musician might get the funds together to reissue these CD's as a boxed set.
I don't want to short-circuit his opportunity to get back on his
professional footing. Maybe we don't know software developers' oevres like
we know musicians', and maybe we don't know programmers personally, but
what's wrong with approaching this situation with the same civility as we
would walk past an apparently abandoned vehicle on the road without taking a
few coins from the ashtray 'because it's there and no-one's looking'?
Now, can we please hold our opinions and get back to *Newton* topics?
ANP
--Take a break (from Brian Eno's Oblique Strategies) Andy Pasulka www.imaxx.net/~anp/ anp_at_imaxx.net
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