more copyright

[Laura Quilter]

Apologies to those who are already tired of this topic.

On Mon, 27 Jan 1997, Millard Johnson wrote:

> Laura Quilter said:
> While I think the
> question of whether librarians should or should not be copyright police is
> perhaps debateable (I think we should NOT) - I think the obvious &
> simplest solution is for would-be policers to police themselves.
> *******
> One wonders if she would give the same advice to us if 
> we were observing her being mugged on the street.  I tend
> to think an ethical responsibility of citizenship is 
> to report violations of law - even if we are sympathetic
> to the violator (in race riots, for example, beatings
> should not be allowed to go on simply because our race
> happens to be doing the beating) or the law is a bad
> one (civil rights laws were not enacted until unjust
> laws were publically enforced).  In our particular 
> case, the one list member did not turn another into 
> the law, but merely warned of a likely violation of 
> copyright law.  Furthermore, librarians have a special 
> responsibility with respect to copyright because 
> information is our business.  

Two distinctions are important here.
	One, the distinction between law and ethics.  Without resorting to
the Germany-30s comparison, I could point out a number of historical
antecedents that would make this distinction startlingly clear.  Fugitive
slaves in the 1850s; Jim Crow laws in the 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s; etc., etc.
You may argue that a particular law ought to be followed for ethical
purposes but you cannot sensibly argue that one must in all cases follow
the law in order to be an ethical person.
	A second important distinction is between OBEYING the law and
ENFORCING it on others. 

A third, perhaps not less important, is the distinction between a third
party being MUGGED and having their intellectual property copied for
further discussion and improvement of the intellectual world.   A not
insubstantial distinction, I would think.

A fourth distinction can be made between the rights of the CREATOR
(author, etc.), presumably an individual human being, and the rights of
a corporate entity, which, while legally a person in some cases, in my
opinion does not qualify as subject for the ethical considerations I
grant to fellow human beings.

BTW, I would think that an ethical responsibility to interfere with a
physical assault on a human being has nothing whatsoever to do with
CITIZENSHIP in one or another nation-state.  Nothing whatsoever to do with
the law.  I do not abstain from murder, for instance, just because it's
(technically) against US law for private citizens to murder. 

And one final note:  If we remember, intellectual property law is really
meant 1) to further the quest for knowledge; and 2) to protect the rights
of the creators (presumably, so that they will be able to continue to
create and further expand human knowledge).  I think we can safely agree
that there is in many cases a difference between obeying the INTENT and
obeying the LETTER of the law.  Since I think the original post was meant
to further intellectual discussion and the pursuit of knowledge, blah blah
blah, I think that while it *MAY* have fallen outside the LETTER of the
law with regard to fair use (or may not, since electronic info is still
being litigated) it still fell within the INTENT of the law.

> If we have moral convictions against the copyright law,
> civil disobedience is an option.  But lets be upfront
> about what we are doing.
	Regarding this, civil disobedience can, of course, be used in
everyday life, and you can regard ignoring laws you don't believe in as
civil disobedience.  But CD is usually used in a directed way to make a
point. 

> Tom Kriz said:
> Suppose I've worked for
> years to develop the best tasting butternut squash this side of heaven.
> (Yeah, I'm a vegaholic). You'd like to have some, but I don't want to sell
> them. You'd especially like the seeds so you could grow your own next year.
> My crop of wonderful squash is just lying out in my garden, and I can't
> possibly eat them all. They are just going to rot. Would that entitle you
> to enter my garden and take the squash I wasn't using? Would you want to
> authorize the government to confiscate the squash I had grown and give it
> to you so you could give the seeds to all your friends? 

If I'm starving, yeah, I think I do have the right to eat your squash,
regardless of what lengths you went to develop it.  Authorizing the
government to confiscate your squash (and store it in a warehouse, which
is more likely) or its seeds is a different thing (and an issue I don't
want to get into).

> *******
> We do not know.  You have raised an issue of patient.
> Our discussion concerns copyright.  If you read the 
> copyright law, however, it clearly states that the 
> OBJECTIVE of the law is to encourage the creation and
> dissemination of information.  Protecting the private 
> property rights of copyright holders is pretty clearly 
> subordinate to, and a means to, the end that information 
> is created and disseminated.
> **********************************************************
> Millard F. Johnson zendog at incolsa.palni.edu
> "I would rather risk failure than achieve it without risk"
> **********************************************************
> 

Laura M. Quilter   /   lauramd at uic.edu
Electronic Services Librarian
University of Illinois at Chicago
http://www.uic.edu/~lauramd/

"If I can't dance, I don't want to be 
in your revolution."  -- Emma Goldman