ISP Pac Bell files suit against RIAA

[multi]

Ladies and Gentlemen of the jury...
there is a time in human history ...when the truth must be presented...as we aproach the threshold , the balance if you will of the future of mankinds creativity...

we as humans are natrual born creators.. of works of art ,ideas and many a fanciful story..i speak not now only for the creators of the past but for the creators yet to be born..those creators still within the heart of creation so to speak..

in the days prior to the advent of the printing press there was a similar time when the wealthy started investing in the new technology...and the work they could buy for small sums..and of course resell at a profit..

then there was those that would create to entertain their fellow man, for a small return or maybe even just the pleasure of it...

they had one off performaces..or handwritten creations on offer..but the medium was limited...and many were commisioned away from their audiences
the printing press soon changed all that..

i would like to draw attention to:

Millar v. Taylor

The court of King's Bench, the highest court of the common law, divided on the question, the majority supporting Lord Mansfield, who went to the furthest possible extreme in his identification of the right of exclusive copying and selling the copies of one's manuscript with the right of exclusive holding and selling physical things and their products… copyright … like the ownership of physical objects, the perpetual property of the author, his heirs and assigns forever.
This outcome Mansfield expressly contemplated, saying, "property of the copy thus narrowed (i.e. defined as a common-law right] may equally go down from generation to generation, and possibly continue forever." This conclusion was vigorously protested by Justice Yates, the only dissenting justice, saying, "This claim of a perpetual monopoly is by no means warranted by the general principles of property." (Commons 1924: 275)

and from..the proceedings from the trial which finally ended the so called battle of booksellers, that had been going on since the passing of the statute of Anne in 1710. In several trials during more than 60 years both the book industry and the judges had been fighting over the question whether the statute of Anne really abolished a common law perpetual copyright. The trial betweeen the Scottish booksellers Messrs. Donaldson and the London bookseller Mr. Beckett concerned the rights to Thomson's "The Seasons", the same book that had also caused the Millar v. Taylor trial. Donaldson v. Beckett finally settled this matter, with only one vote's majority among the 11 judges. The decision held that authors, according to common law, had the exclusive right to the first publication for perpetuity, but the right was annulled once the work was published. London, 1806-1820, vol. XVII.)


from the Donaldson v. Beckett case..

”The booksellers, he observed ... had not, till lately, ever concerned themselves about authors, but had generally confined the substance of their prayers to the legislature, to the security of their own property ...”

”... what property can a man have in ideas? whilst he keeps them to himself they are his own, when he publishes them they are his no longer. If I take water from the ocean it is mine, if I pour it back it is mine no longer.”


(v) The Statute of Queen Anne, 1710

An Act for the Encouragement of Learning, by Vesting the Copies of Printed Books in the Authors or Purchasers of such Copies, during the Times therein mentioned, more commonly called the Statute of Queen Anne, had three objectives. First, it was intended to prevent any future monopoly of the book trade. Second, it was intended to draw Scotland under a common copyright law to resolve the ‘piracy’ controversy. Third, it was intended to encourage production and distribution of new works. The vehicle chosen to achieve all three objectives was the Creator.

Until the Statute, the Creator had no economic and limited moral rights to a work after it was sold. Generally, a work was bought outright by a printer/bookseller/publisher for a flat one-time fee much like an ‘all-rights’ or blanket license today. No royalties flowed to the Creator from subsequent sales. Creators did enjoy certain ‘moral rights’ including the right not to have the text changed and the right of attribution. Such rights, however, were based on ‘ethical’ practices of the printers’ guild, not the law. from

and it seems when music became recordable the same happened again as well ,to that facet of creativity



...you wil notice ladies and gentlemen i am not using the word "ART"..for that i fear is really what is being bought and sold here...

public opinion proclaims somthing to be a work of art or even an art form..


but I ask" what about creativity"..how much should we limit the scope of this human asset...withold it from any that cannot pay the price?
its not something that can be witheld...it is not a tangible thing... it really cant be stopped ..or bought and sold for that matter....but art can....
there for the bussines of proclaiming somthing to be "art" and therefore ownable and marketable..or deemed to be rubbish..
when someones creativity becomes popular...it is because of the creator...and now for the first time creators can breakout of the cycle of "if i want to publish my words or music publicly i must pay someone to do it for me.."
people in the music industry are scared of loosing their existance..but how many existaces will they be denying..

to tamper with the freedoms of the internet is to stifle an evolving facet of human creativity...creativity on a scale never witnessed on this planet..

i believe the forces at work to change laws in the way the internet works and how its users are allowed to interact...run the risk of destroying that unique creativity wich is the nature of the web and replacing it with a bland "one size fits all"corporate approved replacement...

you maybe thinking "whats your point" right now..
well the point is my friends..we have come full circle ...the point of no return..

that concludes my opening argument..
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