[GPSCC-chat] DA GREEN PARTY CLUB - A2K IS A HUMAN RIGHT - FORUM AT 1:30 PM WED MAY 1
Drew
rainbeaufriend at yahoo.com
Tue Apr 30 20:02:18 PDT 2013
Hey Spencer, your summary why copyright reform is needed for A2K human rights is very helpful and I'll look for a way to include it in the material.
:-)
Green is GO!
Drew
~*~*~*~
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>________________________________
> From: Spencer Graves <spencer.graves at prodsyse.com>
>To: perrysandy at aol.com
>Cc: sosfbay-discuss at cagreens.org; Drew <Rainbeaufriend at yahoo.com>
>Sent: Friday, April 26, 2013 4:31 AM
>Subject: Re: [GPSCC-chat] DA GREEN PARTY CLUB - A2K IS A HUMAN RIGHT - FORUM AT 1:30 PM WED MAY 1
>
>
>
> I wish to share a perspective on this as the author of 2 books, 30 published technical papers, 3 patents and software used all over the world:
>
>
> 1. The copyright clause in the US constitution says,
that "To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by
securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive
Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries." Virtually
all the changes in copyright law over the past 40 years have
violated this purpose, extending the copyright period from a max
of 28 years to 99 and essentially infinite, and broadening the
range of application to "derivative works" with such vague
language as to give the major media conglomerates legal grounds
for SLAPP (Strategic Lawsuit against Public Participation) suits
against potential competitors. My primary reference on copyright
law is the Wikipedia article on "Free Culture (book)". The
industry successfully sued lawyers who represented MP3 and venture
capitalists supporting Napster on questionable grounds with the
sole purpose reducing competition to the major media
conglomerates. The industry won, because the lawyers and venture
capitalists knew that they could not afford the legal fees to
fight the cases because the copyright laws were too vague; they
settled out of court. This and other actions have a chilling
effect on creativity. Lessig in "Free Culture" claims the first
commercially successful Mickey Mouse cartoon movie, "Steamboat
Willie", might not have been produced under current copyright law,
because that cartoon might have been considered a "derivative
work" of a Buster Keaton film, "Steamboat Bill, Jr.", produced
earlier that year. The most dynamic comics industry in the world
is in Japan, because the Japanese simply refuse to use the
existing copyright law (written to comply with international norms
established essentially be US law).
>
>
> 2. Virtually 100% of the application of current US
copyright law to technical articles violates the provisions of the
US constitution "to promote the progress of science and useful
arts". I'm an author on 30 published technical papers. I was
required to transfer the copyright to the publisher for the vast
majority of those in exchange only for the privilege of seeing the
work published. That made sense prior to the Internet. It no
longer makes sense, even for archives of journals published prior
to the Internet. These could be digitized at a relatively low
one-time cost and made available to the world for free. They
aren't, because US copyright law is outdated and maintained by the
legalized bribery of our current system of private financing
political campaigns in the US.
>
>
> 3. I've received small royalty payments for one of
the 2 books. The royalty is nice, but it's so small, it was NOT
even considered in my decision on whether to write that book. The
only reason I agreed to have the book published by Springer was
because they have established distribution processes. I would
have preferred web publishing, but my lead co-author had a
relationship with Springer, so I didn't fight that. However,
again, the my motivation in producing that work was unrelated to
what the publishers tell congress about that, and the copyright
violates the constitutional purpose of copyright law.
>
>
> 4. Popular textbooks may be different: I don't know
for sure, but I believe that the royalties from popular textbooks
for established technical authors can be substantial and can
encourage the production of such textbooks. However, Wikiversity
provides a platform for collaborative production of training
materials under the Creative Commons attribution share-alike
license. Wikimedia projects include a feature to "Create a
book": Any prof can create the book they want from established
content in Wikimedia projects tailored to what they think should
be taught. Profs all over the world collaborate to create that
content. This is a mechanism for providing access to the best
available knowledge selected by local profs that does not rely on
established book publishers, which justify huge royalties based on
the relatively low production volumes. Once again, we don't need
to pay individual authors to write popular textbooks: We can get
better textbooks from committees of profs teaching similar
material all over the world, kept as current as profs can keep
themselves current. And again, the constitutional purpose for
copyright law is violated but too a lesser extent than for
published technical papers and research monographs.
>
>
> Thanks for organizing this event. Feel free to quote me if
you think it could be useful.
>
>
> Spencer
>
>
>On 4/25/2013 10:51 PM, perrysandy at aol.com wrote:
>
>
>>frE uR tXbk$!
>>A2K: Accessto Knowledge
>>“Information is power. But like all power, there are those who want to keep it for themselves. The world’s cultural heritage … locked up by a handful of private corporations … The Open Access Movement has fought valiantly to allow anyone to access it.”
>> – Aaron Swartz 1986 – 2013, A2K hero & martyr.
>>May Day A2K!
>>A2K = a human right
>>On May Day the traditional celebration day for liberation join DR. CRYSTALLEE CRAIN, and DA Student Trustee VINCE MENDOZA, to learn about De Anza Student Advocacy Group’s work on
>>OER (Open Educational Resources)
>>TIME: Wed. May 1 from 1:30 – 3:30 pm
>>PLACE: Student Center Conference Room A
>>Sponsors:DA GREEN PARTY CLUB
>>Institute of Community and Civic Engagement
>>Office of Equity, Social Justice and Multicultural Education
>>
>>
>>_______________________________________________
sosfbay-discuss mailing list sosfbay-discuss at cagreens.org http://lists.cagreens.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/sosfbay-discuss
>
>
>--
Spencer Graves, PE, PhD
President and Chief Technology Officer
Structure Inspection and Monitoring, Inc.
751 Emerson Ct.
San José, CA 95126
ph: 408-655-4567
web: www.structuremonitoring.com
>
>
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