5 ms·

Agreed! ... Anyone have suggestions on what idealistic things to ask for?

• marshray 15y ago
  Let's be sure to stick to things that are plausible and would represent an actual improvement if implemented. * Copyright reform would be great, but seems like a lot of it is international treaty. * Real net neutrality * More and better broadband. * Support for net security (DNSSEC) and anonymity (e.g. Tor), maybe IPv6. * In defense of the first-sale doctrine and promote compatibility - eliminate the anti-circumvention provisions of the DMCA * Truth in labeling - all systems using DRM have to be fully described on the outside of the box and all advertising materials Ideally we'd want regulations on the other guy more than on the yourself. But just because Hollywood doesn't want it doesn't mean it we would. For example Hollywood would fight tooth and nail against something like "Free trade for DVDs - End region locking" but it would probably only help them in the long run.
  • jeffool 15y ago
    I think net neutrality and proper labeling work perfectly with his list. And I don't think that "bad for established media" should be the guiding principe, just "good for people". To that end, "no artificial geographic restrictions" seems reasonable to me. That said: * Legal recognition of public domain donations. * Legal recognition of public domain recursive work (in the vein of the GPL, where work from it must also be in the public domain.)
  • lancewiggs 15y ago
    * Copyright reform would be great, but seems like a lot of it is international treaty. -> treaties where the USA is the driving force behind making them ever more onerous. The rest of the world would love it if the wish list came to pass, and it would make a whole lot of other things (e.g. Free trade agreements) a lot more palatable.
• Hemospectrum 15y ago
  Total abolition of the copyright and patent systems. That's a start.
  • saryant 15y ago
    Come now, that's not good for anyone. The GPL/BSD/Apache licenses are all fairly useless if they aren't backed up by copyright law.
    • burgerbrain 15y ago
      I for one would be willing to part with all of those, in exchange for a world without copyright.
    • pjscott 15y ago
      I don't see a whole lot of difference between the BSD and Apache licenses and just putting software in the public domain. And maybe also tacking on a SHOUTY ALL-UPPERCASE DISCLAIMER OF LIABILITY so you don't get sued for not having a shouty all-uppercase disclaimer of liability. The GPL does have some extra requirements, in the form of source code sharing requirements for derivative works, but judging by how many people use more permissive open-source licenses, the difference here seems to be pretty slight in practice.
    • Hemospectrum 15y ago
      Reverse engineering would be a lot less of a pain without the clean room requirement, so I'm not worried about that. Anyway it's a pony suggestion, not a serious proposal for a law. What I'd actually like to see is reduction of copyright/patent terms, abolition of certain patent types, expansion of fair use boundaries, and explicit rules for determining fair use without going to court.
  • SoftwareMaven 15y ago
    As a stance for the Overton Window, I wouldn't be opposed to this. In the extreme case (eg this passed), it might not be too bad (I'm not convinced of that, but I can see the arguments). In the sliding window case, we get a reduction in the outrageousness of current IP laws, which I know would be a good thing.
• Natsu 15y ago
  If you want reasonable, moderate opinions on copyright reform, read the works of William Patry. He's a copyright expert who actually believes in the progress clause. He makes a good contrast with the copyright abolitionists, because he believes that it's valuable and fixable, even though it seems to have gone off the rails lately.