one thing that is always forgotten in IPR debates (on copyrights, patents, etc...) is that while we have a progressive alternative in the GNU/GPL copyright (copyleft) license the root of the problem is the very idea of copyright itself (be it in the form of MS copyright or GNU/GPL). the restriction imposed to users or other people by law in favor of the "inventor, creator, etc" to avail critical or useful information or software.
we should start finding ways how to reward innovators without running against the interest of the society to copy/use/etc their innovations. > Date: Fri, 11 Mar 2005 11:38:49 +0800 > From: Rafael 'Dido' Sevilla <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Subject: Re: [plug] Re: Linux trends in the Philippines > To: Philippine Linux Users Group Mailing List <[email protected]> > Message-ID: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii > > On Thu, Mar 10, 2005 at 04:57:15PM +0800, Zak B. Elep wrote: > > Indeed. Which begs the question: Why are these channels operating at > > all? Answer: it is because we have nowhere else to get money for our > > daily bread. Or so it seems, because most of us have no motivation at > > all to improve ourselves both for our own benefit and for the benefit > > of humanity. > > The reason why the black market for contraband software, movies, music, > and so forth exists at all is because the prices for legitimately > licensed versions of these works is much greater than what the market > will bear, in this country anyway. Few people can afford PhP 25,000 for > a legitimate Microsoft Office, and getting legitimate licenses for every > installed MS Office installation would most likely bankrupt many small > to medium-scale businesses, to say nothing of individuals. Also, > copyright enforcement is not incredibly strict here. If copyright > enforcement became a lot more stringent than it is today, I imagine > people would migrate to OpenOffice in droves. > true. the existence of illegitimate software is mainly due to high cost of acquiring them. i doubt if strict copyright enforcement will drive people to FOSS. Certainly, it will increase its users. lobbying for its strict enforcement would still be counter-productive. what we should be lobbying should be the junking of the IPR laws and WTO-imposed TRIPS instead. "...information belongs to the world..." -- RICARDO BAHAGUE JR ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Every valuable human being must be a radical and a rebel, for what he must aim at is to make things better than they are ... Neils Bohr, qouted in Nielson, pg. 27 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ -- Philippine Linux Users' Group (PLUG) Mailing List [email protected] (#PLUG @ irc.free.net.ph) Official Website: http://plug.linux.org.ph Searchable Archives: http://marc.free.net.ph . To leave, go to http://lists.q-linux.com/mailman/listinfo/plug . Are you a Linux newbie? To join the newbie list, go to http://lists.q-linux.com/mailman/listinfo/ph-linux-newbie
