> Date: Fri, 19 Apr 96 13:37:41 +1000
> From: Judy Seigel <jseigel@panix.com>
> To: Multiple recipients of list <alt-photo-process@cse.unsw.edu.au>
> Subject: Re: Gum prints with the enlarger
>
>
> On Fri, 19 Apr 1996, Claude Seymour wrote:
> > Knowledge should be free.
> >
>
> Well, as I was saying, seems to me that for someone who has not themselves
> "freely given the world" a comparable or even lesser invention such dicta
> are......um, what shall I say?, have a hollow ring. Do you mean there
You don't _know_ this.
> should be no patents, no copyright, no trade secrets, no proprietary
> information? Do doctors give their "knowledge" for free? Or lawyers?
> Teachers either, for that matter. Not to mention architects, librarians,
> engineers, beekeepers, accountants, actuaries, and vetinarians. In our
> culture, when someone has worked to develop a speciality, it is considered
> appropriate for them to charge for consultations.
Greed seems a poor motivation for _any_ profession. To apologise for it
perpetuates the status quo, which, in my opinion is undesirable.
> In any event, the statement "knowledge should be free" is rather loose,
> about the equivalent of "love should be pure," or "people should be good."
> If it has any meaning at all, it would be that it's not nice to suppress
> ideas and information.
If you disagree that information should be free, does this mean that you
think love shouldn't be pure and people shouldn't be good? I don't think
so. I don't think you disagree that it's not nice to suppress ideas and
information, either.
>It doesn't mean & was never intended to mean that
> you are entitled, without effort or input on your part, to every discovery
> people not in your employ have made.
If I discovered a cure for AIDS, would you think it's proper for me to
charge each patient, say, $100,000 for the cure, knowing full well that
some could pay and live and others who couldn't pay would die? I couldn't
do that. If I discovered the fresco painting process, would it have been
proper to deny Michaelangelo the use of the process to paint the Sistine
Chapel ceiling because he couldn't come up with the licensing fee? I
couldn't do that either. Either way, the world would be a better place
with _knowledge being free_.
Claude Seymour