Jump to content
Objectivism Online Forum

Judge makes Youtube(Google) show Viacom viewing habits of users

Rate this topic


progressiveman1

Recommended Posts

In this thread I have already addressed the notion that publication of a work automatically implies consent to quote from it.
No, in fact you did not. You may think you "addressed" it, but you have not once come to grips with what it means to "make public". Copyright law is the objective means of unifying an author's right to his product with the concept "making public". In general, one keeps something private and having complete control over it by keeping it private. If you don't want otherws to look at something, don't show it to them. Copyright law specifies particular implicit permissions attaching to making something public. The solution, if you want absolute privacy, is to not make your work public and to keep it entirely in your control. Not only did you not address this point, you ignored it.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Replies 114
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

Thus there is no such thing as an implied or automatic grant for short excerpts.

Wrong. Do you think Terry Goodkind bothered to give the official site for his books express permission to quote from his books? I bet he didn't. When an author authorises a web site to be the official site for his books he need not give express permission for them to quote the books; it is an automatic part of being the official site.

Those saying that she owns only a portion of it, must explain why part of her creation could be used freely by someone who was not a party to the creation. So far I have read no logical justification of such an arrangement

You might want to consider that that is because no one has argued that and in thinking they have you have misconstrued them.

Edited by DragonMaci
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I did not ignore implied consent. I dealt explicitly with it in my Post #54. Kindly explain how my contractual stipulation that my work on family genealogy “not be reproduced in part of in whole without the consent of the author” constitutes authorization to reproduce it in part!

There is no reason why an author’s intellectual property rights over her writings should be lessened once they are published. Let’s examine what if anything changes when a writer goes public. Suppose Ayn Rand had never brought Atlas Shrugged to a publisher and someone, whom she had let borrow the manuscript, submitted it to a publisher under his own name. No one would question that this is an act of theft.

But fundamentally nothing changes when, of her own free will, an author has a book printed and makes copies available to the public for a price. Once Atlas appeared in print, Rand (or her estate) could rightfully seek damages if someone else were to issue a separate edition of Atlas without her consent. The fact that Rand had her book reproduced and made available for sale does not imply that anyone else may do the same.

With those principles in mind, it is easy to see that unauthorized reproduction in part is also theft, not different in kind, only in degree. If we can see that issuing the entire text of Atlas Shrugged in an unauthorized edition is illegitimate, then we should have no trouble seeing that an unauthorized abridged version of half Atlas’s original length would also be wrong. Further, if an unauthorized half-length reproduction is an act of theft, so is 1/8, 1/32, 1/128 and so forth. This is no different than telling a bank robber that not only may he not have the contents of the safe, neither is he allowed to keep a penny that rolls out of the teller’s drawer. The only permissible form of reproduction would be to use combinations of words that were not unique to Ayn Rand, such as “Brother, you asked for it.”

Now I have not ignored your reference to what existing copyright law says. But it is really beside the point. My focus all along has been the moral basis for any objective form of intellectual property law. And this much should be clear: if I write a book under my own intellectual powers, that book should belong entirely to me. If I wish to sell copies of that book under the condition that unauthorized reproduction is prohibited, I should be permitted to do so and to collect appropriate damages from those who violate those conditions to any extent.

As for your claim that copyright law is the “objective” means of certifying property rights, why is it even the U.S. Copyright Office concedes that fair use is “unclear,” not easily “defined.” How objective is law that eludes definition?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Welcome back to the debate! (Again!)

1. I have already told you I am not familiar with the Goodkind case. In any case, it would have no bearing on the rights of an author who did not wish to be quoted, even in small excerpts (measurement omitted).

2. I did not attribute the following position to anyone in particular: "Those saying that she owns only a portion of it, must explain why part of her creation could be used freely by someone who was not a party to the creation." I dealt with it in theory to show that absolute protection of IP is the only consistent position.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Kindly explain how my contractual stipulation that my work on family genealogy “not be reproduced in part of in whole without the consent of the author” constitutes authorization to reproduce it in part!
You seem not to have read what I said about making works public. As I said, if you manage to keep the work private and can reduce the question to contract conditions, then you can bind the signatories to whatever conditions that you wish and they agree to, completely independent of contract law.
There is no reason why an author’s intellectual property rights over her writings should be lessened once they are published.
You know, there really is no reason why you can't read what I said about making works public. I think I understand the basis of your decision to not quote other authors: it gives you a pretxt for completely ignoring their arguments, as you are doing. I've explained the nature of "making public" and its relationship to copyright law, and all I see you doing is mechanically saying "There is no reason for the law". I guess I no longer see any point in feeding you, if you are not willing to actually engage the central issue. If you want absolute control over the book, don't publish it. Once you make it "socially available" in a manner that extends beyond physical control of the specific object and outside the reach of contract law, then by invoking IP law, you are making a claim on other people's lives, claiming the right to restrict their actions. You don't apparently object to the protection that is extended by the government outside of contract obligations, and yet do not grasp the necessity of a "fair use" concept when you make a work public. In other words, you want to have your cake and eat it too.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I did read what you wrote in your previous answer but saw right away that it did not address my argument. Your answer referred to existing copyright law. All along I have made it plain that I am examining the moral basis, i.e. the natural law, that must underlie any legal system, present and future, before it can be regarded as legitimate.

Nothing in your response explains why the right to control reproduction of one’s creation should not be total and eternal. Why should expanding the social availability of a work automatically mean expanding the number of people who can legally reproduce portions of the work? We are never told. I have argued that by creating a work, an individual has justly earned the right to own that work (or sell it or give it away). So far, no one has contradicted that. Given that premise, by what logic does social availability justify forced sharing with non-creators the right to reproduce the work? Unless, the author explicitly says otherwise, making a book widely available does not represent an implied license to reproduce it in part, anymore than manufacturing and selling tens of thousands of telephones implied a license for anyone other than Alexander Graham Bell to reproduce and sell the phone or parts of it. You could also have said to Bell, if you don’t want your invention stolen, keep it a secret from the world!

My book had a printing of a thousand copies. But what if it had been 5,000 or 100,000? At what objectively observable point does “private” become “public”? And exactly how would the printing of one copy above the maximum limit of “private” (whatever that means) constitute implied consent to quote excepts? How in the world can an author who has placed an explicit warning that no part of the book be reproduced without her consent be said to have “implied” her consent for others to reproduce it in part?

In short, I am waiting for an explanation of how it can be moral for property to be transferred against the rightful owner’s will.

As for my alleged restricting of other people’s actions, why would prohibiting the unauthorized reproduction of a paragraph from Atlas Shrugged be a claim on another person’s life, but prohibiting unauthorized reproduction of the whole not be? We are talking about the very same type of action. It is only a matter of degree. It is up to you to show how the line between “fair use” and infringement is clear, objective and non-arbitrary.

Edited by Unknown Idealist
Link to comment
Share on other sites

1. I have already told you I am not familiar with the Goodkind case.

Firstly, I was trying to use Goodkind as an example of the general point not as the point. The point was that you were wrong when you said there is no such thing as automatic permission. The official Goodkind website was merely an example of how automatic permission sometimes occurs.

In any case, it would have no bearing on the rights of an author who did not wish to be quoted, even in small excerpts (measurement omitted).

This comment is just silly. I clearly never meant it has such bearing and you have no reason to think I did.

I see you haven't given up on misconstruing me. I highly doubt that you will ever do so.

You might also want to consider what the publishers would do if an author didn't let quotes be used. They'd probably not publish a book by such an author. They wouldn't want to lose out on the potentially positive effect of quotes appearing in a good review, a fan site, etc.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

If Mr. Goodkind uniformly grants permission, that certainly is his right. Similarly, the publishers for Rodgers and Hammerstein could openly extend permission to any and all groups who wished to perform their musicals. The critical issue, however, is with regard to those writers and artists who do not wish any part of their work reproduced by others. In such a case we cannot say that that reviewers and critics may presume automatic or implied consent to quote. And this is especially true if authors have expressly stated their opposition to any reproduction.

But how would one know whether permission to quote would be granted on not? The burden would fall on the one who proposes to do the quoting to find out what the author's policy is. He would have to use the mails, a phone, or a web-connected computer. In the absence of a statement from the author, he could not presume. Thus, there is no general "automatic" or "implied" consent.

Here, then, is what is wrong with the "fair use" doctrine that is now a key feature of copyright law in the U.S. and elsewhere. Creators of intellectual property who do not want portions of their work reproduced are prevented from enforcing their property rights by courts that rule that excerpts are permissible (and keep expanding how much is permissible without ever precisely defining the formula). This is a classic case of the rights of the productive individual being violated for the alleged needs of others.

If a publisher wants to give a writer the boot for not cooperating with critics or interviewers, that is entirely a separate matter. It is unrelated to the question of the natural right of an author to have full control over reproduction of his work, which, by the way, is what I am discussing here.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

All along I have made it plain that I am examining the moral basis, i.e. the natural law, that must underlie any legal system, present and future, before it can be regarded as legitimate.
You have to explain where you get the right to prohibit me from commenting on your public statements. You have no right to do so. If you write your family history in a book and you keep that book in your possession, you own that book eternally. If you let another person see that book and do not contractually restrict them from copying it (which you can certainly do), then you must recognise the posibility that another person may make a copy of the book before returning your book to you. From that copy, they can make other copies, and they will not have deprived you of your property. This is why you should not let others use your book, if you want to keep it secret.
Nothing in your response explains why the right to control reproduction of one’s creation should not be total and eternal.
Nothing in your posts have explained why you think you have a natural right to restrict my rightful actions, as long as I have possession of the book by permission or right, and have no contractual obligation to maintain your secret. As long as you don't put your work out in public for all to see, you can control your work to your heart's content. I'll stay out of your house and honor any contracts that we have, and otherwise you have no claim on what I do. Since you reject the Objectivist account of intellectual property, I don't know how you can justify claiming a "natural right" to copyright.
Why should expanding the social availability of a work automatically mean expanding the number of people who can legally reproduce portions of the work?
I don't really care what social network you're involved in -- the minute you go beyond contracts, you're then in the realm of actual law.
In short, I am waiting for an explanation of how it can be moral for property to be transferred against the rightful owner’s will.
You have yet to demonstrate that the notion of intellectual property is coherent in a non-Objectivist ethics.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

If Mr. Goodkind uniformly grants permission, that certainly is his right.

You misconstrued me again. I said automatic permission not universal permission. Also, you ignored me saying Goodkind was an example not the point and treated my comment about him as the point not an example. You have developed a trend of such behaviour in this debate, one that is clearly deliberate.

Thus, there is no general "automatic" or "implied" consent.

There is and I already gave an example of it - and author authorizing a website to be the official website for his books but not expressly giving permission to quote. Remember that the official website comment is an example not the point. The point is that automatic permission does exist.

Here, then, is what is wrong with the "fair use" doctrine that is now a key feature of copyright law in the U.S. and elsewhere. Creators of intellectual property who do not want portions of their work reproduced are prevented from enforcing their property rights by courts that rule that excerpts are permissible (and keep expanding how much is permissible without ever precisely defining the formula). This is a classic case of the rights of the productive individual being violated for the alleged needs of others.
'

They are not forced. They can, as DavidOdden said, keep it private, which is not dependent on the amount of copies published as you assumed. Keeping it private means not publishing it, not placing it in the public eye.

If a publisher wants to give a writer the boot for not cooperating with critics or interviewers, that is entirely a separate matter. It is unrelated to the question of the natural right of an author to have full control over reproduction of his work, which, by the way, is what I am discussing here.

Dirstly, I said not publish him. I didn't say "give him the boot". The former means he book never gets published, the latter means they stop publishing his book.

Secondly, it is related. The conditions the publishers set for him to publish his works are related, it is a matter of his rights and their rights. They have the right to refuse to publish an author that will shoot himself and, more importantly, the publishing company in the foot in such a manner. And the author has no right to forbide quotes when the publisher made him not doing so as a condition of publishing.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I claim no right to prohibit you from commenting on my public statements. Comment all you want. I claim only the right to prohibit you from reproducing my words in part or in whole.

Regarding copies of my book that come into the possession of those other than the original buyers, my intellectual property right includes authority over all reproductions of my words. I still retain ownership of the right to copy, even if one of my books falls into the hands of someone I have never directly made an agreement with. Similarly, I do not have to have a pre-existing contract with someone who trespasses on my land in order to eject him from my land.

It is a false dilemma to say that an author must either keep his book a secret or lose his right to control reproduction of the work. Bell did not have to keep the telephone a secret in order to enjoy the right to control production and sale of his invention.

It would not matter if one of Bell’s telephones comes into possession of Mr. Smith who had never met Bell and knew nothing of his claims as inventor. If Smith starts making copies of that telephone and markets them, then he has violated Bell’s intellectual property rights. Under any objective system of law that honors intellectual property, Smith would have to cease production and compensate Bell appropriately.

Regarding actual law, I do not dispute that my views on IP would not be held up by any current court in the U.S. But so what? Business owners have a natural right (i.e. a just claim derived from man’s nature) not to serve certain minorities, manufacturers have a right to “fix” prices, and people have a right to keep all of their income. The fact that courts today do not recognize such rights does not mean that such rights are imaginary. They exist by virtue of man’s nature, whether legal authorities recognize them or not.

Regarding Objectivist ethics: I have read Ayn Rand’s VOS and CUI and am familiar with her views on intellectual property. Since Rand has defended patents and copyrights on the grounds that the products of man’s mind are his property, I see nothing in what I’ve said that contradicts Objectivist fundamentals.

Obviously, I do not agree with limiting the term of ownership, but I had supposed that we as thoughtful, curious people could explore our differences in a productive way.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I claim no right to prohibit you from commenting on my public statements. Comment all you want. I claim only the right to prohibit you from reproducing my words in part or in whole.

Regarding copies of my book that come into the possession of those other than the original buyers, my intellectual property right includes authority over all reproductions of my words. I still retain ownership of the right to copy, even if one of my books falls into the hands of someone I have never directly made an agreement with. Similarly, I do not have to have a pre-existing contract with someone who trespasses on my land in order to eject him from my land.

It is a false dilemma to say that an author must either keep his book a secret or lose his right to control reproduction of the work. Bell did not have to keep the telephone a secret in order to enjoy the right to control production and sale of his invention.

It would not matter if one of Bell’s telephones comes into possession of Mr. Smith who had never met Bell and knew nothing of his claims as inventor. If Smith starts making copies of that telephone and markets them, then he has violated Bell’s intellectual property rights. Under any objective system of law that honors intellectual property, Smith would have to cease production and compensate Bell appropriately.

Regarding actual law, I do not dispute that my views on IP would not be held up by any current court in the U.S. But so what? Business owners have a natural right (i.e. a just claim derived from man’s nature) not to serve certain minorities, manufacturers have a right to “fix” prices, and people have a right to keep all of their income. The fact that courts today do not recognize such rights does not mean that such rights are imaginary. They exist by virtue of man’s nature, whether legal authorities recognize them or not.

Regarding Objectivist ethics: I have read Ayn Rand’s VOS and CUI and am familiar with her views on intellectual property. Since Rand has defended patents and copyrights on the grounds that the products of man’s mind are his property, I see nothing in what I’ve said that contradicts Objectivist fundamentals.

Obviously, I do not agree with limiting the term of ownership, but I had supposed that we as thoughtful, curious people could explore our differences in a productive way.

How would one comment on another's comments if he couldn't quote them? How would anybody that is an outsider to the public discussion even understand what is being debated or discussed? Would one have to paraphrase everything the other person said or would that not even be allowed according to you? If so how is this essentially not the same thing as a direct quote which is less liking to be misinterpreted?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I claim no right to prohibit you from commenting on my public statements. Comment all you want. I claim only the right to prohibit you from reproducing my words in part or in whole.
Such quotation is necessary for effective commenting.
Regarding copies of my book that come into the possession of those other than the original buyers, my intellectual property right includes authority over all reproductions of my words.
You have yet to prove this, based on your ethical theory. Nor have you even objectively stated what right you think you have (for example, do you claim to have the right to control all uses of the word "reproducing"?). Until you provide evidence for your position, you are just spewing wishes. I will wait until you set forth your own objective definition and defense of the concept "intellectual property" and the correlated legal rights before pursuing the discussion further. The libertarian line of discussion on rights always falls apart at the point of trying to reconcile contextless rationalism and actual application to man's actions, in line with the general subjectivist, utopian view that libertarians have of law. This is exactly why I gave up on libertarianism -- because you cannot know what is required of you to act morally, you can only know that when the aggressors attack you it will be with the accusation that in their view you "violated somebody's rights".

If you would like to understand how your theory of IP contradicts Objectivism (once you've developed your theory), I'd be happy to explain. I suggest that you start with the "indestructability" and "permanency" problems, both of which are developed in Rand's essay. Of course having an understanding of the concept "rights" as explained in Objectivism would be an obvious prerequisite.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

If we can see that issuing the entire text of Atlas Shrugged in an unauthorized edition is illegitimate, then we should have no trouble seeing that an unauthorized abridged version of half Atlas’s original length would also be wrong. Further, if an unauthorized half-length reproduction is an act of theft, so is 1/8, 1/32, 1/128 and so forth.

If we can see that an adult having sex with an 18-year-old woman is not rape, then we should have no trouble seeing that the adult having sex with that same woman five minutes before her 18th birthday is also not rape. Further if it's not rape to have sex with a 17.99 year old, then neither is it for a 17.98-year-old, or a 17.97 year old, and so forth. So is statutory rape is an invalid term and are paedophiles in prison victims of injustice? Clearly, a .000000001% blood-alcohol level does not impair a driver so neither does a .000000002% blood alcohol level...(skip a few)...and neither does a 0.2% blood alcohol level. To cross a room, I must first cross half the room, but then I must first move half that distance, then half that distance...do you see the flaw in this style of argument? (in fact, I think Ayn Rand called it the Fallacy of the Borderline Case: attempting to use incremental transitions to erase the distinction between two different things).

Quoting a sentence for a review or a criticism is not the same as reproducing the book, and it is not a violation of IP rights because it does not deprive the author of income or benefit from his work, which is the whole point of protecting intellectual property in the first place. IP does not exist so the author may gag his critics or silence other people's discussions (even the title of Atlas Shrugged is copyrighted--ie, no one can use that name as a title of another book--so your argument essentially makes it a crime to even mention the book by name!) That is why financial harm is one of the main standards governing Fair Use, because it is irrational, immoral, and anyway impossible to publish and distribute a work yet bar people from quoting it, discussing it, or even mentioning(!) it. You're taking a concept meant to protect intellectual freedom and turning it into a noose.

It would not matter if one of Bell’s telephones comes into possession of Mr. Smith who had never met Bell and knew nothing of his claims as inventor. If Smith starts making copies of that telephone and markets them, then he has violated Bell’s intellectual property rights...

making a book widely available does not represent an implied license to reproduce it in part, anymore than manufacturing and selling tens of thousands of telephones implied a license for anyone other than Alexander Graham Bell to reproduce and sell the phone or parts of it. You could also have said to Bell, if you don’t want your invention stolen, keep it a secret from the world!

Copying and marketing a patented invention is a violation, the same as copying and marketing a copyrighted work. However, to get a patent the inventor must make the plans publically available, and anyone may copy, discuss, evaluate, and criticize the invention and those blueprints, even though they are prevented from harming the inventor by actually constructing or copying the item for sale, distribution, or personal use. Just the same, I can quote excertps from my friend's book but I may not copy it for sale, distribution, or personal use. And in fact there is a provision for keeping an invention out of the public eye: it is called Trade Secrets, and as long as an individual or company takes steps to keep his invention or process secret then it's a crime to even attempt to discover it. If an author wants a complete gag order on his works, then he must keep them to himself. To make ideas public and then demand complete control over them is a contradiction: it is, in effect, declaring the right to control the minds of others.

The reason intellectual property is different from physical property in this regard is because there is only one instance of each item of physical property, and when someone else uses it it deprives the owner of some or all of the usefulness (and in fact, if he is not using it and makes no attempt to stop someone from say squatting on his land, eventually it can become the squatter's through adverse possession). Ideas are not solely incarnated in one physical instance and so others using them only damages the owner if it deprives him of the income or benefit due him. Further, controlling a piece of physical property only imposes the negative obligation on others to refrain from certain acts, but absolute control of ideas and words means controlling people's minds.

Does this resolve your objections to Fair Use? Keep in mind that property rights are not a fundamental, unquestionable, all-encompassing axiom: they are derived from the nature of man, and are a tool to to enforce the moral principle that man be the beneficiary of his own work. Trying to apply them to cases that present no threat to the copyright owner means unrightfully restricting others and violating their intellectual freedom, thus obliterating the purpose of defining and defending rights in the first place.

Edited by Vital Signs
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Update:

Viacom has agreed to let Google strip identifying information from YouTube viewers’ data before complying with a judge’s order to hand over the records as part of a copyright infringement lawsuit.

~Q

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...