From: owner-ecto-digest@smoe.org (ecto-digest) To: ecto-digest@smoe.org Subject: ecto-digest V6 #199 Reply-To: ecto@smoe.org Sender: owner-ecto-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-ecto-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk ecto-digest Thursday, July 13 2000 Volume 06 : Number 199 Today's Subjects: ----------------- Re: ecto-digest V6 #196 [John Sandoval ] copyright law [burp@mindspring.com (Scott Burger)] Re: Spamster Spasms [Ted ] Re: Spamster Spasms [jason and jill ] Re: Spamster Spasms [Ted ] copyright law [Steve VanDevender ] Re: copyright law [jason and jill ] Book-on-demand (was: Spamster Spasms) [eat99203 ] Re: Spamster Spasms [Michael Bowman ] Re: Spamster Spasms [Tracy Benbrook ] Re: Spamster Spasms [Ted ] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue, 11 Jul 2000 23:04:17 -0700 From: John Sandoval Subject: Re: ecto-digest V6 #196 >From: johann johann > But a decade later the Director's Cut edition - although > deliberately ambiguous - convinced many that the > hero was indeed a replicant and in a Channel 4 > documentary Scott at last reveals they are correct. > >the rest of the poop is at: > > > >now we know. For the movie, that's fine. For the book however (which I think is *much* better than the movie), the answer still isn't clear. Amazing that my first post in I-don't-know-how-long is at least somewhat Happy related. :) Life's taken some good turns in the past year... John Sandoval (used to be sandoval@stsci.edu ... :) ) ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 12 Jul 2000 08:14:22 -0500 From: burp@mindspring.com (Scott Burger) Subject: copyright law >Does this spell things out clearly enough? > >> An author of a copyrighted work has the following exclusive rights >>conferred by 17 USC ß106: Do not necessarily fuck the artists but definitely Fuck The Lawyers! The copyright law is outdated. If the copyright law stays the way it is, then we all should buy IBM stock for the ridiculous number of software patents they own. To me this the equivalent to reading some antiquated anti-sodomy laws that are still around. Get real. - -Scott P.O. Box 14738 Richmond, VA 23221 ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 12 Jul 2000 11:14:53 -0400 From: Ted Subject: Re: Spamster Spasms Michael Bowman wrote: > > Libraries pay the same for books as anyone else does. If we buy in > quantity we even get a discount. > > Now, libraries *do* pay extra for many scientific society journals, but so > would anyone else who isn't a member of the society in question. > > Michael Bowman Can we infer that librarians and library go-ers equal thieves from this set of facts? How many more jail cells is that gonna be? ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 12 Jul 2000 12:08:43 -0400 (EDT) From: jason and jill Subject: Re: Spamster Spasms On Wed, 12 Jul 2000, Ted wrote: > > Can we infer that librarians and library go-ers equal thieves from this set of facts? > How many more jail cells is that gonna be? > Oh shut up with this library bullshit already. The library lends out only as many copies as it has on the shelves. You are free to lend out any of your own books that you like. The point in both cases is that no copies are being made--there's a single instance of fixation, and no additional instances are being made. What you lend, and what the library lends, is what it bought, and while a library patron has a book nobody else can check out the book (unless, of course, the library has bought additional copies.) As such, your point is complete crap and can be flushed. The napster/internet debate has plenty legitimate points of contention without wasting time on brainfarts like the above-quoted. On the other hand, any library photocopying books to lend out additional copies without paying the publisher would very quickly be in serious trouble, as they would be for wholesale copying of magazines and newspapers. Jason ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 12 Jul 2000 12:29:32 -0400 From: Ted Subject: Re: Spamster Spasms Something tells me you've been avoiding paying royalties by going to the library. Are you guilty of this? jason and jill wrote: > > Oh shut up with this library bullshit already... ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 12 Jul 2000 09:41:49 -0700 (PDT) From: Steve VanDevender Subject: copyright law Scott Burger writes: > >Does this spell things out clearly enough? > > > >> An author of a copyrighted work has the following exclusive rights > >>conferred by 17 USC ß106: > > Do not necessarily fuck the artists but definitely Fuck The Lawyers! > > The copyright law is outdated. If the copyright law stays the way it is, > then we all should buy IBM stock for the ridiculous number of software > patents they own. > To me this the equivalent to reading some antiquated anti-sodomy laws that > are still around. > Get real. If the original poster had quoted the portions of copyright law that cover fair use as well as the portions that describe an author's rights, it would have been a much fairer representation of the law. If we lose fair use in a rush to adjust copyright law to deal with digital copying, we will have lost a major right. I think copyright law serves a useful purpose, but it was developed in a time when copying tended to have these properties: 1. Copying usually involved significant cost. 2. A copy was usually physically distinguishable from and inferior to the original. This tended to make it preferable to go directly to the author or the author's authorized publishing and distribution agents to get copies of the author's works. Unfortunately digital copying has changed those assumptions. It costs very little to make a copy of a string of bits, and the copy is not physically distinguishable from the original. (The sound output from decoding an MP3 is distinguishable from and inferior to the original input used to make the MP3, but the MP3 itself can be copied cheaply and exactly). ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 12 Jul 2000 18:18:02 -0400 (EDT) From: jason and jill Subject: Re: copyright law On Wed, 12 Jul 2000, Steve VanDevender wrote: > If the original poster had quoted the portions of copyright law that > cover fair use as well as the portions that describe an author's rights, > it would have been a much fairer representation of the law. If we lose > fair use in a rush to adjust copyright law to deal with digital copying, > we will have lost a major right. Actually, fair use has nothing to do with crapster. Fair use is a set of statutory exceptions whereby a limited amount of copyright material can be used for specific purposes. For example, if you want to quote a small section of a book in book review, you can. If you want to parody a song, you can use enough of a song for people to know what you're parodizing. However, a major part of fair use determination is how much of the original you use. You can't, for example, include a sample chapter in a book review, nor could a journalism textbook run an entire article from the New York Times without paying to do so. So no matter what fair use analysis you use, copying an entire song would not be considered fair use. You might be able to argue that providing thirty second samples from song was fair use for preview purposes, but not an entire song, and certainly not the full contents of an album. Jason ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 12 Jul 2000 10:08:41 +0300 From: eat99203 Subject: Book-on-demand (was: Spamster Spasms) three damons wrote: >and not just record artists, there are machines now, which cost >[last i heard] about 500k, which can print a professional book in single >copies, >with the printing cost per copy sdomething like 10 bucks or maybe a bit >more. I think your numbers are too high, there's a book-on-demand print shop in Helsinki that sells books printed in single copy batches at prices starting at below 10 USD. See http://kirja.lasipalatsi.fi/english/index.html - -- Markku Kolkka markkuk@iki.fi ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 12 Jul 2000 08:17:16 -0700 From: Michael Bowman Subject: Re: Spamster Spasms >> Libraries pay the same for books as anyone else does. If we buy in >> quantity we even get a discount. >> >> Now, libraries *do* pay extra for many scientific society journals, but so >> would anyone else who isn't a member of the society in question. >> > > sorry. > i was under the distinct impression that scientific journals had a > special library rate, and assumed this applied to all books. We certainly pay more for some society journals. I believe the institutional rate is higher than the individual non-member rate, but that probably depends on the society in question. There is certainly a very big difference, sometimes as much as a factor of 10, between the member rate and the institutional rate. Michael ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 12 Jul 2000 12:23:42 -0500 (CDT) From: Tracy Benbrook Subject: Re: Spamster Spasms Regarding libraries and royalties - that was rather a flip answer...my response, although I didn't make the original statement: Not quite - I pay taxes. My taxes (some, I wish more) go to libraries. The libraries buy books, paying the royalties, with my money. I borrow books. Therefore, I have contributed to the authors. That's in theory more than reality - I rarely borrow library books anymore, I prefer owning my own copy that I can read whenever I want. On a side note, with existing books on-line and honesty, check out: http://www.baen.com/ws_faq.htm It's about Baen Books' eWebscriptions These are current books published by Baen, which are placed online to be purchased. You can read them through a browser, or download them to a Rocket eBook or some sort of PDA (I usually do the latter) Because the primary cost in books lies in their physical nature - printing, distribution, warehousing, etc, the authors actually receive MORE money per book sold online, in royalties, than they do in the paperback version. This despite the fact that a current hardback still goes for roughly $2.00-$3.00. It's my understanding - I read the boards occassionally, and Jim Baen and his authors post a lot - that people are being very honest about their purchases and not giving out duplicate copies, in either newsgroups or through other means. What I'm actually meaning to say in that is that the Internet is a great resource and should be used to it's fullest advantage. However, I don't believe any artist or author should be forced to give away their hard work. Tracy, lurker On Wed, 12 Jul 2000, Ted wrote: > Something tells me you've been avoiding paying royalties by going to the library. > Are you guilty of this? > > jason and jill wrote: > > > > > Oh shut up with this library bullshit already... > > > ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 13 Jul 2000 01:19:17 -0400 From: Ted Subject: Re: Spamster Spasms So let me get this straight, you and every member of your community chip in tax money that goes toward the purchase of one or two copies of any given book at market price, then the book is shared by every member of your community (what is that 2 or 3 thousand people?) and the author gets royalties from the purchase of 1 or 2 books, is that roughly how it works? jason and jill wrote: > Moron, the library paid the royalties. ------------------------------ End of ecto-digest V6 #199 **************************