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Re: Read only if you love TREK
In article <59br36$ovs@csu-b.csuohio.edu>,
Dennis Iannicca <drsoran@ni.cba.csuohio.edu> wrote:
> You guys are never going to settle this issue. There just seems to
>be a natural division of people: on one side you have filthy rich corporate
>executives looking to pad their pockets as much as they can and on the
>other you have people who wonder why *copying* something equates to
>stealing when in fact the original is left untouched. I never could
>quite grasp that concept. Stealing cars is one thing, but "stealing"
>someone's photo by making a copy of it seems like a ridiculous crime.
Because they took the photo; it's their creative work.
If you now sell copies of it, you are taking money for something which someone
else made. Even if you merely distribute it free to all your friends, you are
reducing their ability to sell it and make some money to compensate their
creative act. Even if they weren't going to sell it, your distribution of it
violates their rights. If someone creates something, they control it. That's
the basis behind copyright law. In the case of books, movies, plays, scripts,
and so forth, what is created is not the physical object, but the information
within. The protection of large greedy corporations is merely an unfortunate
byproduct of the protection of hardworking individual creators.
Todd
References: