www/philosophy philosophy.html the-danger-of-eb...

[Jason Self]

CVSROOT:        /web/www
Module name:    www
Changes by:     Jason Self <jxself>     11/07/07 04:54:43

Modified files:
        philosophy     : philosophy.html 
Added files:
        philosophy     : the-danger-of-ebooks.html 

Log message:
        Adding new philosophy article from RMS, RT # 697619

CVSWeb URLs:
http://web.cvs.savannah.gnu.org/viewcvs/www/philosophy/philosophy.html?cvsroot=www&r1=1.328&r2=1.329
http://web.cvs.savannah.gnu.org/viewcvs/www/philosophy/the-danger-of-ebooks.html?cvsroot=www&rev=1.1

Patches:
Index: philosophy.html
===================================================================
RCS file: /web/www/www/philosophy/philosophy.html,v
retrieving revision 1.328
retrieving revision 1.329
diff -u -b -r1.328 -r1.329
--- philosophy.html     8 May 2011 17:52:53 -0000       1.328
+++ philosophy.html     7 Jul 2011 04:54:05 -0000       1.329
@@ -15,6 +15,7 @@
 <p>Hot off the presses, here are the latest published articles on free
 software and the GNU project.</p>
 <ul>
+  <li><a href="/philosophy/the-dangers-of-ebooks.html">The Dangers of 
E-Books</a></li>
   <li><a href="/philosophy/practical.html">The advantages of free 
software</a></li>
   <li><a href="/philosophy/assigning-copyright.html">When a Company
       Asks For Your Copyright</a></li>
@@ -135,7 +136,7 @@
 <p>
 Updated:
 <!-- timestamp start -->
-$Date: 2011/05/08 17:52:53 $
+$Date: 2011/07/07 04:54:05 $
 <!-- timestamp end -->
 </p>
 </div>

Index: the-danger-of-ebooks.html
===================================================================
RCS file: the-danger-of-ebooks.html
diff -N the-danger-of-ebooks.html
--- /dev/null   1 Jan 1970 00:00:00 -0000
+++ the-danger-of-ebooks.html   7 Jul 2011 04:54:05 -0000       1.1
@@ -0,0 +1,159 @@
+<!-- Parent-Version: $Revision: 1.1 $ -->
+
+<!-- This is the template document for GNU web pages.  We use
+     server side includes (#include) for common elements, for
+     instance, the very first line of the file.  If you're reading
+     this in its expanded form, you can retrieve the original source,
+     with the SSI statements intact, from
+     
http://web.cvs.savannah.gnu.org/viewvc/*checkout*/www/server/standards/boilerplate.html?root=www&content-type=text%2Fplain
+-->
+
+<!-- Instructions for adapting this boilerplate to a new project: -->
+
+<!-- 1. In the line above starting "Parent-Version:", remove the
+        "$Revision...$" from around the revision number,
+        leaving just Parent-Version: and the number. -->
+
+<!-- 2. Replace "baz" with the name of your project.
+        You should be able to do this with search and replace;
+        making sure that the search is case insensitive and
+        that the case of the replacement matches the case
+        of the string found. In Emacs, query-replace will do this
+        when case-fold-search and case-replace are both non-nil
+        and both search and replacement string are given in lower case. -->
+
+<!-- 3. Of course update the actual information according to your project,
+        such as mailing lists, project locations, and maintainer name.  -->
+
+<!-- 4. You can use the patch-from-parent script to semi-automate
+        merging future changes to the boilerplate with your file:
+        
http://web.cvs.savannah.gnu.org/viewvc/*checkout*/www/server/standards/patch-from-parent?root=www&content-type=text%2Fplain
+-->
+
+<!--#include virtual="/server/header.html" -->
+<title>The Danger of E-Books
+- GNU Project - Free Software Foundation</title>
+<!--#include virtual="/server/banner.html" -->
+<h2>The Danger of E-Books</h2>
+
+<p>In an age where business dominates our governments and writes our laws, 
+every technological advance offers business an opportunity to impose new 
+restrictions on the public. Technologies that could have empowered us are 
+used to chain us instead.</p>
+
+<p>With printed books,</p>
+<ul>
+<li>You can buy one with cash, anonymously.</li>
+<li>Then you own it.</li>
+<li>You are not required to sign a license that restricts your use of it.</li>
+<li>The format is known, and no proprietary technology is needed to read the 
+book.</li>
+<li>You can give, lend or sell the book to another.</li>
+<li>You can, physically, scan and copy the book, and it's sometimes lawful 
+under copyright.</li>
+<li>Nobody has the power to destroy your book.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<p>Contrast that with Amazon e-books (fairly typical):
+<ul>
+<li>Amazon requires users to identify themselves to get an e-book.</li>
+<li>In some countries, Amazon says the user does not own the e-book.</li>
+<li>Amazon requires the user to accept a restrictive license on use of the 
+e-book.</li>
+<li>The format is secret, and only proprietary user-restricting software can 
+read it at all.
+<li>An ersatz "lending" is allowed for some books, for a limited time, but 
+only by specifying by name another user of the same system. No giving or 
+selling.</li>
+<li>To copy the e-book is impossible due to 
+<a href="/philosophy/right-to-read.html">Digital Restrictions Management</a> 
+in the player and prohibited by the license, which is more restrictive than 
+copyright law.</li>
+<li>Amazon can remotely delete the e-book using a back door. It used this 
+back door in 2009 to delete thousands of copies of George Orwell's 1984.</li>
+</ul>
+
+<p>Even one of these infringements makes e-books a step backward from 
+printed books. We must reject e-books until they respect our freedom.</p>
+
+<p>The e-book companies say denying our traditional freedoms is necessary to 
+continue to pay authors. The current copyright system does a lousy job of 
+that; it is much better suited to supporting those companies. We can support 
+authors better in other ways that don't require curtailing our freedom, and 
+even legalize sharing. Two methods I've suggested are:</p>
+
+<ul>
+<li>To distribute tax funds to authors based on the cube root of each 
+author's popularity. See 
+<a href="http://stallman.org/articles/internet-sharing-license.en.html";>
+http://stallman.org/articles/internet-sharing-license.en.html</a>.</li>
+<li>To design players so users can send authors anonymous voluntary 
payments.</li>
+
+<p>E-books need not attack our freedom, but they will if companies get to 
+decide. It's up to us to stop them. The fight has already started.</p>
+
+<!-- If needed, change the copyright block at the bottom. In general,
+     all pages on the GNU web server should have the section about
+     verbatim copying.  Please do NOT remove this without talking
+     with the webmasters first.
+     Please make sure the copyright date is consistent with the document
+     and that it is like this: "2001, 2002", not this: "2001-2002". -->
+</div><!-- for id="content", starts in the include above -->
+<!--#include virtual="/server/footer.html" -->
+<div id="footer">
+
+<p>Please send general FSF &amp; GNU inquiries to
+<a href="mailto:address@hidden";>&lt;address@hidden&gt;</a>.
+There are also <a href="/contact/">other ways to contact</a>
+the FSF.<br />
+Please send broken links and other corrections or suggestions to
+<a href="mailto:address@hidden";>&lt;address@hidden&gt;</a>.</p>
+
+<p>Please see the <a
+href="/server/standards/README.translations.html">Translations
+README</a> for information on coordinating and submitting translations
+of this article.</p>
+
+<p>Copyright &copy; 2011 Richard Stallman</p>
+
+<p>This page is licensed under a <a rel="license"
+href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/3.0/us/";>Creative
+Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 3.0 United States License</a>.</p>
+
+<p>Updated:
+<!-- timestamp start -->
+$Date: 2011/07/07 04:54:05 $
+<!-- timestamp end -->
+</p>
+</div>
+
+<div id="translations">
+<h4>Translations of this page</h4>
+
+<!-- Please keep this list alphabetical by language code.
+     Comment what the language is for each type, i.e. de is German.
+     Write the language name in its own language (Deutsch) in the text.
+     If you add a new language here, please
+     advise address@hidden and add it to
+      - /home/www/html/server/standards/README.translations.html
+      - one of the lists under the section "Translations Underway"
+      - if there is a translation team, you also have to add an alias
+      to mail.gnu.org:/com/mailer/aliases
+     Please also check you have the language code right; see:
+     http://www.loc.gov/standards/iso639-2/php/code_list.php
+     If the 2-letter ISO 639-1 code is not available,
+     use the 3-letter ISO 639-2.
+     Please use W3C normative character entities.
+
+     See also '(web-trans)Capitalization':
+     
http://gnu.org/software/trans-coord/manual/web-trans/html_node/Capitalization.html
+     -->
+
+<ul class="translations-list">
+<!-- English -->
+<li><a href="/philosophy/the-danger-of-ebooks.html">English</a>&nbsp;[en]</li>
+</ul>
+</div>
+</div>
+</body>
+</html>