Re: Signatories to the Declaration of Software Freedom

[Atul Chitnis <achitnis@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Fri, 2 Mar 2001, Raju Mathur wrote:

> Yes.  /Intellectual/ property.  I believe that vital drugs should be
> made available at manufacturing cost.

I agree with this.

> I believe that music should be free for all to hear, not only to those
> who're willing to give their money to robber-baron music companies.

I do not agree with this. The robber-baron is *not* the author (whose
decision free/non-free should be).

If (for example) Paul McCartney puts out a song and says "this is free",
there should be nothing in his way to do this, and I should be able to
download and listen to it for free.

If on the other hand he says "I want to be paid a dollar for this", then
this is OK with me as well, because I know that I am paying the artist,
not a robber baron.

Stephen King made this concept clear with his recent exploration into
ebooks, which (while not a raving success) did prove the viability of this
approach.

We cannot *enforce* free'ness (speech, beer). It is a priviledge that the
actual author bestows on his work, and *that* we should honour.

I am not a professional license advicate, so my perception of things may
be different, but this is the way I see it, anyway.

Atul

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