Re: [OT] Droit d'auteur vs. free software? (Was: query from Georg Greve of GNU about Debian's opinion of the FDL
On Mon, Apr 28, 2003 at 12:34:36PM +0200, Stephane Bortzmeyer wrote:
> Can you explain the above? I do not see why and in which way the
> "Droit d'auteur" system is more hostile to free software. There is
> currently a lot of lobbying in Europe and in the world against this
> "Droit d'auteur" system and pro-copyright and this lobbying is mostly
> driven by the same companies that oppose free software...
I guess the reason for that opposition is because it empowers the
original, human, author in such a way that the large publishing company
cannot possibly disenfranchise him by conning him into signing a
particularly vicious contract when he desperately needs their money.
The motivation of that company is evidently to make lots of money doing
whatever the hell they like with the author's work, having paid the author
a pittance in the first place. The fact that the author still has a degree
of control of the work makes the company's investment in distribution
more risky.
Our problem is not that we want to make lots of money, but that our
investment in distribution and in building other systems/documents
using the work in question as a starting point is more risky.
Both the nasty big company and the nice free software distributors
are at the mercy of the author's whim.
There are provisions in the law to mitigate that risk, but...
Cheers,
Nick
--
Nick Phillips -- nwp@lemon-computing.com
You will feel hungry again in another hour.
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