[aklug] Re: !~

On 10/30/2013 02:28 PM, Arthur Corliss wrote:
>
>> It's also ironic that until just after the turn of the 20th Century
>> US publishers profited by publishing works that were granted a
>> monopoly in the United Kingdom - laws which didn't apply here. So,
>> at least historically, the publishing business in the US (now owned
>> primarily by Germans) established itself and profited immensely by
>> printing works "pirated" from Europe. Sound familiar? Isn't that
>> what all the movie folks here are now complaining that folks in Asia
>> are doing to us?
>
> :-) The lack of internation IP treaty agreements at the time is well
> out of
> my scope of concern at the moment. I'd just be happy if we could quit
> getting screwed by our own *in* America. One would think that a purely
> domestic issue would be solvable... but who are we kidding.
>

Of course, Arthur, it is convenient to ignore some things, even though,
as I think most historians would admit, the past informs the present.
The profits from publishing European titles without having to pay
royalties are significant and bear heavily on the IP law that we live
under now and there is an irony considering who made off with the gold.
That leads me to wonder about, oh say slavery in the United States. The
history of slavery and the wealth the slave trade provided to a
developing infrastructure in the United States is not insignificant
(Harvard, Yale, Princeton, William and Mary for example). For at least
some contemporary political arguments, especially if they are based on
history, the profits from the slave trade and heinous practices and how
those profits were invested are not insignificant. I don't think we can
pick and choose which historical events are of significance when arguing
current affairs. For our nation inconvenient truths abound I think.
We could talk about mineral rights on indigenous property too?

--greg

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