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From: dlr@ihdev.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.emacs
Subject: Re: Swedish copyright laws
Message-ID: <1082@ihdev.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 16-Dec-86 19:34:57 EST
Article-I.D.: ihdev.1082
Posted: Tue Dec 16 19:34:57 1986
Date-Received: Wed, 17-Dec-86 22:49:57 EST
References: <961981.861214.KFL@MX.LCS.MIT.EDU> <8612160134.AA08428@prep.ai.mit.edu>
Reply-To: dlr@ihdev.UUCP (55224-D. L. Ritchey)
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories
Lines: 92


The following is a gist of some of R M Stallman's article on "software
ownership.  The article is a collectivist diatribe against the very
foundations of western democracies.  Read on...
.
.ai.mit.edu> rms@PREP.AI.MIT.EDU ("Richard M. Stallman") writes:
>...
>
>Why should all of us tolerate a practice where some people (software
>"owners") pressure members of the public (software buyers) to promise
>to refuse to cooperate with other members of the public? ...
>...
>								Nobody
>cooperates, nothing works as it is supposed to, and we all become poorer.
>This is social decay.  This is how the US is going.
>...
>Even if we decide, in the name of personally liberty, to tolerate such
>activity on a small scale by individuals, we can still discourage it
>on large scales through industrial regulations, and keep our personal
>freedom intact.  We can still raise the public consciousness as to
>the wrongness of hoarding information and thus inspire a general
>refusal of consumers to accept it.
>
>...

(	The remainder of the article was deleted to surve the purge
	imposed by our newsposter that requires more new text than
	quoted text.  )

I am appalled that the the author of this article would use his standing
as (a/the) developer of one of the best known editors on this network to
mount a political soap-box to post such a vituperative diatribe. 

Competition and pay for services is the foundation of democratic
capitolist civilization.  The call for "industrial regulation" goes
completely again the desire for freedom of expression and creation that
he urges we accept.  The so-called "hoarding of information" and
"wrongness" of someone selling software for a profit are what has
produced much of the software used to operate and use the network we are
now reading article from.

If we deny the ability of people to create and sell software for a
living, where are the talents of all of us reading the news here going
go?  I submit that we will all find ourselves seeking another trade and
starving on the streetcorner.  If someone does not work for "profit" and
make enough at it to pay taxes on those profits, where are the
governmental tax dollars going to come from to pay for the chosen few to
write software.

The idea that a government should decide what a product is worth, what
it should cost, who shall be rewarded for it being produced, etc. are
all hallmarks of communism.  We all have read about how well the Soviet
government manages its economy.

Each of you who is old enough to be in college (or beyond) remembers (or
should) the fiasco that was the Nixon era's Wage and Price Controls. 
Look at how well government regulation has strengthened our farms and
agricultural states economies.  Remember that the oil price fluctuations
have been directly and indirectly caused by governmental (ours and
others) manipulation of world markets.

Do you want ALL software development managed by that group of "proven
performers"? 

I do not argue with the place of public domain software.

I do not want to interfere in Mr. Stallman's right to place his work in
the public domain and refuse to let it be sold.

I do not want to interfere in the altruism or other motives of people
who produce excellent (or otherwise) products for the use by the public
and encourage the copying or free distribution of those products.

When, and if, I produce some program that has general usefulness on my
free time, I will probably donate it to the net, after all I have gotten
quite a few very nice and helpful products off of this network.

But, and a very large but, I will resist with all my influence the idea
that we should each be producing all our software free and for public use
and expecting the government to pay us for our daily bread.  That way
lies stifling government regulation and total loss of individual liberty
and creativeness.  Do you trust some government bureaucrat to recognize
your worth as a programmer, writer, or any other profession?


D. L. Ritchey (Don)             AT&T Bell Labs
IH 6h-313                       Naperville, IL
(312) 979-6179
-- 
D. L. Ritchey (Don)             AT&T Bell Labs
IH 6h-313                       Naperville, IL
(312) 979-6179