[sldev] Re: SLDev Digest, Vol 18, Issue 66

[JB Kraft]

SL is certainly not a web browser, or more precisely, should not be
approached with that metaphor, I agree.

As to digital IP, to a lawyer the notion of copyright, be it a digital asset
or an equity asset is the same thing. To a programmer a digital asset is
most certainly not the same thing as an entry in a ledger. Computers do two
things and that is all they do; they they copy information and they make
mathematical calculations based on those copies. That is all they do in the
end and they do those things very well and they must do both of them to be
useful. The gap in the dialog of IP regarding computers will never be
bridged I think becuase lawyers seek to make copying difficult or impossible
and the only way to do that is to curtail, even cripple somehow the
computers ablity to copy and thus take away the one of the intrinsic things
that makes computers useful. It just can't happen. The programmer will
always simply see the thing as a "right-click away" because, well, it is. I
think a far better way to approach the problem of digital IP to is quit
trying to apply a legal model that does not fit. Realize that computers make
things inifinitly copiable becuase they need to and therefore the path is to
find ways to bend legal concepts to fit that reality rather then trying to
bend the computer to fit existing legal concepts. I think, in this case,
it's the lawyers that need to be flexible and creative, not the programmers
per se. As a professional musician I have a very personal and economic
interest in digital IP. Every time I see one of my discs on someones iPod or
hear it in a bar, I wonder where that money went. However, as a professional
programmer I realize the approach taken by the RIAA, for example, and others
is completely futile. I believe what is needed to bridge this gap and
address the issue properly is a different legal model and discourse and
metaphor, and to quit talking so much about different programming model and
metaphor. Just my 2 cents.

Apologies for my last empty post. Mouse mis-cue.

JB

On Tue, Jun 10, 2008 at 8:11 AM, Random Unsung <ravenglassrentals at yahoo.com>
wrote:

> Second Life is not a web browser. It is a world. It is a world with an
> economy based on intellectual property and real property rights. If you want
> a web browser, go outside to the Internet; if you want a world with people
> in it, and not merely a abstract platformist sandbox, you will have to
> accommodate the needs of non-scripters and non-coders who make up the
> business people supporting the costs of this platform and making a profit
> for the platform providers.
>
> The concept that right-clicking thereby enables stealing of proprietary
> images and codes everywhere else on the Internet is false, and a tendentious
> reading along the extremist Stallmanite lines.
>
> Any discussion of obfuscation should be reviewed on its merits, in good
> faith, both to determine whether it assists in the matter of copyright theft
> and preserving the integrity of the original permissions system, and also
> with a view to functionality and scaling.
>
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