[Ilugc] Is the proprietary camp winning ?
- From: ramanraj.k@xxxxxxxxx (Ramanraj K)
- Date: Wed Oct 11 19:53:29 2006
Chakkaradeep C C wrote:
Shocking News !!
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/10/10/BAGERLM3RR15.DTL
A very sad story indeed. The report says:
<quote>
Hans Reiser was accused earlier this year of failing to pay medical
and child-care expenses...
</quote>
No father - much less a free software developer - would have the heart
to bear that.
Macaulay had spoken strongly in favour of copyrights (read as
"proprietary software" for the purposes of this thread) and the entire
speech is available at :
http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2002/4/25/1345/03329
The speech was made in the House of Commons, when an attempt was made
to increase the term of copyrights from 20 years from date of
publication of the work to that much time after the life time of the
author. The bill was defeated then, but the law at present is on the
lines of the then defeated bill. Some of the key points made by
Macaulay in his speech are:
* Copyright is a form of tax - albeit very evil* but a *necessity*.
* Without copyrights, authors would have to depend on the government
or others for support - which would only give room for more evil.
Macaulay based his arguments upon careful reasoning and forcible
examples - nothing much has changed today.
It may be fair and just to have a clause in the license that *if* the
software is redistributed under any arrangement for money, 10% thereof
should be paid as royalty to the author(s). ISPs and others could be
asked to pay the authors and content providers - it may be just a few
units of money or a fraction thereof per download or distribution, but
given the volume, it should yield enough for projects worth it to
survive, keep going and flourish.
The proprietary camp should never be seen to be winning and smiling.
-Ramanraj K
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