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EJournal Volume 01 Number 03-2
From LISTSERV@uacsc2.albany.edu Tue Jan 5 16:04:59 1993
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September, 1992 _EJournal_ Volume 1 Number 3-2 ISSN# 1054-1055
There are 449 lines in this issue.
An Electronic Journal concerned with the
implications of electronic networks and texts.
2632 Subscribers in 38 Countries
University at Albany, State University of New York
ejournal@albany.bitnet
CONTENTS (Second supplement to V1N3 of November, 1991):
Editorial Notes - This Issue; List purging; money;
readers' survey [ Begins at line 53 ]
CREDIT, COMPENSATION AND COPYRIGHT: [ Begins at line 91 ]
OWNING KNOWLEDGE AND ELECTRONIC NETWORKS
by John B. Dilworth
Department of Philosophy
Western Michigan University, U.S.A.
Dilworth@gw.wmich.edu
Information - [ Begins at line 340 ]
About Subscriptions and Back Issues
About Supplements to Previous Texts
About Letters to the Editor
About Reviews
About _EJournal_
People - [ Begins at line 411 ]
Board of Advisors
Consulting Editors
********************************************************************************
* This electronic publication and its contents are (c) copyright 1992 by *
* _EJournal_. Permission is hereby granted to give away the journal and its *
* contents, but no one may "own" it. Any and all financial interest is hereby *
* assigned to the acknowledged authors of individual texts. This notification *
* must accompany all distribution of _EJournal_. *
********************************************************************************
Editorial Notes - This Issue; List purging; money; readers' survey
This issue consists principally of an intriguing contribution to the polylog
about who owns electronic texts. Professor Dilworth argues that the difference
between intellectual property and legal property makes copyright essentialy
irrelevant, at least for electronic publications in an academic context.
This issue also carries an announcement about the journal "Simulation &
Gaming."
About e-mail and subscriptions to _EJournal_: We delete addressees when our
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EJOURNAL@albany.bitnet .
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CREDIT, COMPENSATION AND COPYRIGHT:
OWNING KNOWLEDGE AND ELECTRONIC NETWORKS
by John B. Dilworth
Department of Philosophy
Western Michigan University, U.S.A.
Dilworth@gw.wmich.edu
Recently _EJournal_ contained a stimulating paper by Doug Brent
("Oral Knowledge, Typographic Knowledge, Electronic Knowledge:
Speculations on the History of Ownership," _EJournal_ Volume 1
Number 3, November 1991) on the subject of ownership of knowledge
and related issues. An additional useful exchange between Brent
and Bob Hering (_EJournal_ Volume 1 Number 3-1, July 1992) on the
subject showed (among other things) some of the fundamental
disagreements which are easily possible on these topics. A key
issue raised was whether ownership and property rights must be
protected in a workable and generally acceptable dissemination of
knowledge in "cyberspace".
Instead of directly addressing Brent's paper and the exchange, I
shall briefly develop an alternative view, according to which
copyright or other property rights are relatively unimportant. In
my view, publicly giving credit to authors for original ideas is
much more important, and it can also help to ensure long-term
compensation for authors even in the case of electronic
dissemination of works. Hence I am optimistic that electronic
media can flourish, whether or not capitalism and concerns about
personal reward remain part of the dominant world economic
system.
1. Intellectual Priority versus Legal Property Rights
A key distinction which needs to be made is that between
intellectual or conceptual priority and legal property rights. A
person who first conceives an idea is both its discoverer or
inventor, and the source of any publicly communicated form of the
idea. If we wish, we may say that such a person has "intellectual
ownership" of the idea, but it is important not to confuse this
intellectual or conceptual ownership with any legal ownership or
right. [line 133]
For example, note that one cannot steal or destroy intellectual
ownership of an idea, however much one tries to appropriate it as
one's own or meld it with other material. Nor could this
"ownership" or priority be transferred or sold to others. Of
course, in specific cases it may become unclear who originated an
idea, and credit or acknowledgement may wrongly be given to
various borrowers or secondary sources for an idea. But
intellectual priority with respect to an idea is a historical
fact which cannot itself be stolen or misappropriated.
Another reason why 'priority' is a more appropriate term than
'ownership' here is that there is clearly a sense in which any
ideas whatsoever are owned (or, if one prefers, not owned at all)
by all thinking beings capable of critically considering them.
Any thinkable ideas are part of our intellectual heritage. We
"own" them by participating in the culture of which they are a
part. A more specific sense of ownership along these lines is
that in which one owns an idea, or makes it one's own, by efforts
to understand or master it. In these senses too, ideas cannot be
stolen or misappropriated, and no rights are violated by sharing
them.
Returning to the main topic of intellectual priority, what should
our social attitudes be toward it? Broadly, we should give
people credit or acknowledgement for initiating ideas. But it is
a mistake to equate such credit with an ineffectual, minor social
politeness or etiquette (see later).
How should we reward or compensate intellectual priority? One
reason why there is a strong tendency to confuse intellectual
"ownership" of an idea with legal ownership is that it is
widely assumed that the only adequate reward or acknowledgement
for priority consists in the granting of legal property rights,
such as copyright, to the originator of an idea (or more
specifically, to an idea as expressed in a definite linguistic
way). [line 139]
This is indeed one reasonable way of rewarding conceptual
innovators, but it is not the only defensible one. We should not
forget that most people work for corporations, under legal
agreements such that any ideas originated in the workplace by an
employee automatically become the property of their employers.
This system is defensible insofar as employees are adequately
compensated for their efforts.
Current copyright law (at least in the U.S.) further encourages
the confusion of intellectual priority and property rights,
because simply by authoring a manuscript one automatically
acquires copyright or legal property rights in it, in the absence
of prior agreements with employers, etc. (In the U.S.,
registering such a copyright does not create it, but merely
provides evidence which would make it easier to legally defend
the copyright later if necessary.)
However, it remains important to distinguish priority and
property even in such cases of very close legal connection
between authorship and property rights. For if we examine the
actual workings of our capitalist commercial system for
distributing or publishing original manuscripts, it becomes clear
that copyright or ownership plays only a minor (and somewhat
paradoxical) role in the actual ways in which private authors are
compensated for their original work.
One might expect that the normal or standard case of compensation
in the current system would be that in which the author as owner
of the copyright receives payment for giving permission for
others to read or otherwise use her work. But in actual fact,
cases where an author publishes his own work under his own
copyright are relatively rare and inconsequential.
Instead, the almost universal actual model is one in which
authors engage in a contract with a commercial publisher, in
which the author unconditionally assigns or entirely gives up her
copyright to the publisher in exchange for certain benefits or
compensations. A main reason for this practice is that with
traditional media, the costs of publishing and distributing are
so high that contracting with independent publishers becomes
almost a necessity for authors. But then the "pound of flesh" of
having to give up one's legal ownership rights almost inevitably
ensues. In such cases we must distinguish between an author's
originality and her copyright ownership, because of course when
her work is being distributed she no longer owns the copyright,
in spite of the originality of her work. [line 218]
Because of this confusion or misconception, the whole issue of
whether electronic media involve threats to individual property
rights is misconceived from the start. Paradoxically, it is only
such innovative media which potentially could make widespread,
inexpensive distribution of manuscripts feasible while yet
maintaining individual copyrights. Thus there are initial
grounds for hoping that electronic media might provide the last,
best hope of preserving private property rights in manuscripts
against the authoritarian rule of corporate publishing.
However, things are more complex still because of another aspect
of copyrights, namely that as legal rights they may need to be
asserted and defended. These issues are particularly intractable
in the case of a journal or other compilation which may accept
manuscripts from several authors simultaneously. How are these
individual copyrights to be protected in the case of copyright
infringements? No journal could afford to separately defend
each of its individual authors in the courts against such
threats, and almost certainly the individuals couldn't afford it
either.
Thus here we have another main reason why publishers require
copyright assignment from their authors, and in this case it
applies just as much to electronic publishing as to more
traditional media. As long as our legal systems require
traditional judges, courtrooms and lawyers, all publishing which
involves protection of copyrights will have essentially the same
basic legal problems, whatever the publication medium.
2. Defending Priority and Providing Compensation, Independently
of Ownership Issues.
The upshot of the previous discussion is that intellectual
priority and legal ownership rights must be distinguished, and
that even in the present commercial system, issues of financial
compensation for authors are largely independent of property
rights issues. Here are some further points suggesting more
positively that, as long as authors get credit for their work,
and some reasonable compensation for it (even if indirectly),
issues about legal ownership can safely be put aside as merely
secondary or peripheral issues. [line 261]
To begin with, a useful concept for the purposes of the present
discussion is that of deferred or indirect compensation.
Compensation is deferred if it is not a direct or immediate
benefit of an activity, but instead occurs only as an indirect or
later consequence of the activity. However, in terms of an
author's long-term 'bottom line', deferred compensation can
provide just as much money in the bank as could direct
compensation.
In view of this possibility, even if there is no direct or
immediate financial compensation for authoring and distributing a
manuscript in a medium, we cannot assume that therefore in the
long run such dissemination is bound to be unsuccessful. Even if
it is true that authors will not write or publish without
compensation, as long as some form of compensation (even if
highly indirect) is available, authors will continue to be
motivated to write.
For example, academic authors producing scholarly papers are
already very much aware that most academic journals pay no fees
to authors. Neverthess, because there is an indirect but very
powerful link between publishing credits and future or continuing
academic pay raises, promotion, and employment, such publishing
does virtually guarantee substantial deferred compensation to an
author.
Such kinds of case are already more common than is generally
realized. An otherwise very different example is provided by
various collaborative commercial authorship cases. For example,
a copywriter for an advertising agency is admittedly paid for
what she does, but if she has some strikingly original idea she
is unlikely to see any immediate increase in her compensation
because of it. However, in the future she is likely to get to
work on more prestigious accounts, get increased pay raises and
promotions, etc., because her employers give her credit for the
originality of her earlier ideas. Here too it would be a mistake
to concentrate exclusively on immediate compensation for
authorship. For in commercial as well as academic settings,
building a 'track record' of original achievements, which give
good prospects for future or indirect compensation, is extremely
important to authors. [line 303]
Next we should ask, where does credit for intellectual priority
or originality come into the picture? In my view, the
recognition and acknowledgement of intellectual or conceptual
priority is not merely a minor matter of etiquette or politeness
>from one author to another. Instead, it should be seen in the
broader context of an author's reputation, success and long-term
financial compensation. Whether in academic or other contexts, a
writer's influence and earning power depends on recognition by
his peers of his original contributions. The acknowledgement or
crediting of an author with an idea is an essential part of
building that social recognition, and hence it is much more
important to success as an author than copyright or other
ownership rights could ever be.
In conclusion then, provided we give adequate credit and
acknowledgement to authors for their original contributions,
generally they will in one way or another receive adequate
compensation for their efforts. And since these points apply
just as much to electronic media as to more traditional kinds,
we can justifiably be optimistic about their long-term viability
as vehicles for the encouragement and dissemination of knowledge.
John B. Dilworth
Department of Philosophy
Western Michigan University, U.S.A.
Dilworth@gw.wmich.edu
[ This essay in Volume 1 Number 3-2 of _EJournal_ (September, 1992) is
(c) copyright _EJournal_. Permission is hereby granted to give it away.
_EJournal_ hereby assigns any and all financial interest to John B. Dilworth.
This note must accompany all copies of this text. ]
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About "Supplements":
_EJournal_ is experimenting with ways of revising, responding to, reworking, or
even retracting the texts we publish. Authors who want to address a subject
already broached --by others or by themselves-- may send texts for us to
consider publishing as a Supplement issue. Proposed supplements will not go
through as thorough an editorial review process as the essays they annotate.
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About Letters:
_EJournal_ is willing publish letters to the editor. But we make no
predictions about how many, which ones, or what format. The "Letters" column
of a periodical is a habit of the paper environment, and _EJournal_ readers
can send outraged objections to our essays directly to the authors. Also, we
can publish substantial counterstatements as articles in their own right, or as
"Supplements." Even so, when we get brief, thoughtful statements that appear
to be of interest to many subscribers they will appear as "Letters." Please
send them to EJOURNAL@ALBANY.bitnet .
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About Reviews:
[line 653]
_EJournal_ is willing to publish reviews of almost anything that seems to fit
under our broad umbrella: the implications of electronic networks and texts.
We do not, however, solicit and thus cannot provide review copies of fiction,
prophecy, critiques, other texts, programs, hardware, lists or bulletin boards.
But if you would like to bring any publicly available information to our
readers' attention, send your review (any length) to us, or ask if writing one
sounds to us like a good idea.
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About _EJournal_:
_EJournal_ is an all-electronic, Matrix distributed, peer-reviewed, academic
periodical. We are particularly interested in theory and practice surrounding
the creation, transmission, storage, interpretation, alteration and replication
of electronic text. We are also interested in the broader social,
psychological, literary, economic and pedagogical implications of computer-
mediated networks. The journal's essays are delivered free to Bitnet/Internet/
Usenet addressees. Recipients may make paper copies; _EJournal_ will provide
authenticated paper copy from our read-only archive for use by academic deans
or others. Individual essays, reviews, stories-- texts --sent to us will be
disseminated to subscribers as soon as they have been through the editorial
process, which will also be "paperless." We expect to offer access through
libraries to our electronic Contents and Abstracts, and to be indexed and
abstracted in appropriate places.
Writers who think their texts might be appreciated by _EJournal_'s audience are
invited to forward files to EJOURNAL@ALBANY.BITNET . If you are wondering
about starting to write a piece for to us, feel free to ask if it sounds
appropriate. There are no "styling" guidelines; we try to be a little more
direct and lively than many paper publications, and considerably less hasty and
ephemeral than most postings to unreviewed electronic spaces. We read ASCII;
we look forward to experimenting with other transmission and display formats
and protocols.
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Board of Advisors:
Stevan Harnad Princeton University
Dick Lanham University of California at L.A.
Ann Okerson Association of Research Libraries
Joe Raben City University of New York
Bob Scholes Brown University
Harry Whitaker University of Quebec at Montreal
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Consulting Editors - September 1992
ahrens@hartford John Ahrens Hartford
ap01@liverpool.ac.uk Stephen Clark Liverpool
userlcbk@umichum Bill Condon Michigan
crone@cua Tom Crone Catholic University
dabrent@acs.ucalgary.ca Doug Brent University of Calgary
djb85@albnyvms Don Byrd University at Albany
donaldson@loyvax Randall Donaldson Loyola College
ds001451@ndsuvm1 Ray Wheeler North Dakota
erdt@pucal Terry Erdt Purdue Calumet
fac_aska@jmuvax1 Arnie Kahn James Madison University
folger@yktvmv Davis Foulger IBM - Watson Center
george@gacvax1 G.N. Georgacarakos Gustavus Adolphus
gms@psuvm Gerry Santoro Pennsylvania State University
nrcgsh@ritvax Norm Coombs Rochester Institute of Technology
pmsgsl@ritvax Patrick M. Scanlon Rochester Institute of Technology
r0731@csuohio Nelson Pole Cleveland State University
richardj@surf.sics.bu.oz Joanna Richardson Bond University, Australia
ryle@urvax Martin Ryle University of Richmond
twbatson@gallua Trent Batson Gallaudet
wcooper@vm.ucs.ualberta.ca Wes Cooper Alberta
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University at Albany Computing Services Center:
Isabel Nirenberg, Bob Pfeiffer; Ben Chi, Director
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Editor: Ted Jennings, English, University at Albany
Managing Editor: Ron Bangel, University at Albany
Assistant Managing Editor: Dan Smith, University at Albany
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University at Albany State University of New York Albany, NY 12222 USA
