Copyright is NOT Censorship

Copyright is NOT Censorship

Posted Aug 2, 2005 5:08 UTC (Tue) by rknop (guest, #66)
In reply to: Copyright is NOT Censorship by AnswerGuy
Parent article: Microsoft's DRM vision

Yes, it's hyperbole.

But it's not non-sensical hyperbole.

Copyright *is* censorship. That doesn't mean that it's therefore necessarily wrong and should be completely thrown out. We accept other limitations on free speech -- clear and present danger, yelling "fire" in a crowded theater, etc.

My point is that the debate might be a lot more balanced if we recognized copyright for what it is -- a limitation on the freedom of expression. Calling it "intellectual property" makes people feel all warm and fuzzy about property rights. If we recognzied it as a limitation on the freedom of expression, then we might recognize that more copyright isn't necessarily better. We'd be much more considered going in to figure out just how much of our freedom of expression we are willing to sacrifice to accomplish the goal of copyright (i.e. to promote the progress of the arts, to allow creators to survive at doing what we as a society value).

-Rob

---

(Log in to post comments)