RE: Where information comes from

[Wally <Wally -at- pctrader -dot- com>]

Andrew wrote: ... The Internet has forced us to challenge many ideas and
notions of
commerce, business, freedom of speech, and so forth. ... What bothers me is
not so much the justification for illegal activities, but the notable
"anti-business" tone that is emerging from many Internet-related issues. ...


I think these notions/ideas are at the heart of the current issue. In the
older days most of us undoubtedly copied records (!?) tapes and CDs so we
could play the music in our cars, walkman's, etc. When copy machines became
widespread and cheap, we did the same with print materials. This has been
going on for decades, and copyrights were violated regardless of the degree
of "fair use" activity. However, the scale or scope of these activities was
low or small. With the relatively primitive copying techniques available to
most of us, none of us were going to make 100, or more, copies of anything
and send them off to friends, family, etc. And, as Andrew stated elsewhere,
the quality was always degraded to some degree or another so we weren't
getting 'the real thing.' Finally, we all knew, at least the people I
associated with, that we were either violating a copyright or were right on
the edge of the issue.

We have a 9 year old and an 11 year old at home. They've had broadband
internet access for a couple of years. We have had zero problems with
"explcit" materials/sites. BUT, we have a seemingly never ending problem
with them wanting to download pirated games. At times thay have even wanted
to buy hardware plug-ins that would allow them to download games that could
then be uploaded into their handheld gaming devices. Despite hours and hours
of discussions about how the programmers and companies are cheated out of
revenues for their labor, investment and risk; it just doesn't seem to sink
in. The ideas that it's there for the taking, that "everyone else is doing
it," and that they are very unlikely to get legally caught (I check their
drives regularly, along with handing out access suspensions when necessary)
just seems overwhelming. And, these are good kids who are excellent students
and are very honest, otherwise. If they were older and into music or
software, we'd have a larger/different problem. Other parents we talk to
have the same problems/experience.

So, to all of you on this list who think it's a trivial issue, please think
again about where this might go in the future if we end up with entire
generations who have little or no respect for the process of creating
intellectual property or the intellectual property rights of others.
Certainly the internet and related technologies are challenging our ideas of
these rights, but I'm sure the printing press did the same thing in its time
and way, yet those rights survived in some form. IMO, it is up to us, those
in the technology game, to be spokespersons and examples for maintaining
these rights. 

Wally Glassett
Technical Documentation
Digital Integrator, Inc.
Incline Village, NV

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