Plan 9 license

[John Cowan]

On Sun, 3 Sep 2000, David Johnson wrote:

> Another 18th century term for property was "pursuit of happiness".

Unlikely.  "Happiness" in this context almost certainly means "public
happiness", the participation in republican governmental institutions.

> "right of property" is a dangerous concept, meaning that someone else
> can be compelled to hand over their property to you, whereas the right
> to pursue property  means that you can use voluntary means to acquire
> property but cannot coerce it from anyone.

Coercion, like property, can only be defined within the context of a
specific legal system.  It has no natural existence.

>  But another definition of property is that it can be defended
> and controlled through voluntary means. In terms of land ownership, it
> can be defended and controlled in the absence of trespass laws through
> the use of locks, fences and guards. Likewise, information can be
> defended in the absence of IP laws through encryption, registration and
> time limitations.

Hmp.  Just try defending property rights in -- or even the existence of --
stock certificates in the absence of a legal system.

> Since information has been created by the author and
> can be defended by the author, it counts as a form of property.

IP rights only become significant when the content *is* publicly
known.  Secret books aren't that useful or profitable.

> But even if the copyright laws were repealed tomorrow, software
> developers can still privately protect their works.

Indeed, the copyright license for closed-source software is no problem:
"All rights reserved".  Since you do not own the software anyway,
your other rights don't exist.

> What I find most interesting though is the relationship between Free
> Software (as the FSF defines it) and property. By licensing Free
> Software, ownership over it *is* asserted. If no one should have the
> right to regulate how I distribute or modify their works, then why
> don't I have the right to distribute a binary-only modification of
> emacs?

"To protect your rights, we need to make restrictions that forbid
anyone to deny you these rights or to ask you to surrender the rights."
	-- the GNU GPL

> Or if copyright is the only thing holding back software from
> being free, why isn't my public domain binary considered Free Software?

You cannot create a "public domain binary" of a copyrighted work, since
it is a derivative work and you cannot dedicate it to the public domain
(even assuming that it is possible to do so at all).

> Getting back to freedom as I finish off this rant, tell me how I am
> denying you life, liberty or property when you have voluntarily and of
> sound mind purchased my proprietary and closed source software, knowing
> full well in advance that you would not be able to modify and
> redistribute it? How can I possibly be coercing you if the exchange was
> completely open and voluntary?

If it were *completely* open and voluntary, you couldn't.  Few transactions
actually meet that standard.  Typical shrink-wrap contracts are
not only contracts of adhesion ("take it or leave it") but are not
even known to you until you have purchased the software.

-- 
John Cowan                                   cowan at ccil.org
"[O]n the whole I'd rather make love than shoot guns [...]"
	--Eric Raymond