[Fsf-friends] Re: [bytesforall_readers] Microsoft to share Windows code withIndia

V. Sasi Kumar vsasi@vsnl.com
17 Dec 2002 10:28:06 +0530


Dear Satish,

As CMD of James Martin & Co I may be able to understand your inclination
towards the present regime of "intellectual property" and "copyrights".
But I cannot believe that you are naive enough not to be able to
distinguish between alphabets and property. I try to explain briefly, in
case I am wrong.

Alphabets are nobody's property. Nobody needs to be paid royalty to use
it. Anybody can learn alphabets if they want to. Anybody can teach
alphabets to anybody else, and nobody can question his(her) rights to do
so. Can you claim the same about land? Can you claim the same about any
copyrighted material or patent (knowledge)?

Regards
V. Sasi Kumar

On Tue, 2002-12-17 at 00:21, satish jha wrote:
> sunil:
> 
> before we learnt to use alphabets, there were no illiterates either.
> so let us not have alphabest??
> ________________________________
> satish jha
> cmd, james martin & co
> www.jmcin.com
> president, digital partners india
> n-103, panchsheel park,
> new delhi - 110 017
> v: 649 9384/5; 649 4384/5
> f:  649 4380
>  
>   ----- Original Message ----- 
>   From: sunil 
>   To: bytesforall_readers@yahoogroups.com 
>   Cc: linux-india-general@lists.sourceforge.net ; fsf-friends@gnu.org.in 
>   Sent: Monday, December 16, 2002 5:21 PM
>   Subject: Re: [bytesforall_readers] Microsoft to share Windows code withIndia
> 
> 
>   Dear Satish,
> 
>   Free Software is not Open Source Software. Access to code is not the main
>   issue. Free License implies Ownership and Control. It is not the recipe of
>   coke but the ownership of coke.
> 
>   Copyrighting is the root cause of the digital divide... here is an
>   oversimplification so that you can understand..
>   ------------------------------------------------------
>   Before the concept of Private Property:
>     No Economic Divide
>   After the concept of Private Property:
>     Land Owners
>     Landless
>     Economic Divide
>   ------------------------------------------------------
>   Before the concept of Intellectual Property:-
>     No Digital Divide
>   After the concept of Intellectual Property:
>     Those with Knowledge
>     Those without Knowledge
>     Digital Divide
>   ------------------------------------------------------
> 
>   You will notice this trend in all forms of privatization:- water, phrases,
>   gestures, ideas, products etc.
> 
>   General Public License transfers ownership of digital assets to the poor.
>   To use a Marxist phrase - the means of production in the knowledge economy
>   will be transfered to the poor. This is a 'critical' component of any
>   digital divide intervention.Without this type of systemic intervention all
>   other ICT is merely technology band-aid. 
> 
>   Please see my IIM-B presentation for more details:
>   http://www.mahiti.org/events/Event.2002-12-16.3025/view
> 
>   Thanks,
> 
>   Sunil
>   Thanks,
> 
>   Sunil
> 
>   =====
>   Sunil Abraham [MAHITI]
>   314/1, 7th Cross, Domlur
>   Bangalore - 560 071 Karnataka, INDIA
>   Ph/Fax: +91 80 5352003. Pager: 9624 279519
>   sunil@mahiti.org http://www.mahiti.org
> 
> 
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