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Must have missed this yesterday...

What that clause actually states is that the Congress has the right to grant additional monopoly control over their works to authors and inventors, and to do so to "promote the progress of science and useful arts".  It makes no mention of inherent right, and seems to assume the opposite, since an inherent right does not need to be "granted".

That's one of the primary problems with current thinking on copyright and patent.  People have been misled to think that there is an inherent right to control one's creative work.  There most definitely is not.  The Congress is merely permitted (but not required!) to grant special rights, presumably in return for some societally valuable consideration such as publication.

If we start to realize that authors and inventors have no *special* rights beyond that explicitly granted by law, we start to recover balance in our view of copyright and patent.  Please note that every person has certain rights of property which *are* inherent, but these are far exceeded by those of copyright and patent, and the latter must be viewed as granted special privilege, not guaranteed right to achieve a balanced perspective.

==Joseph++

Daniel P. Stasinski wrote:
> On Mon, 2005-05-02 at 18:59 -0700, Jason Spatafore wrote:
> 
> 
>>Just keep in mind that original copyright law was designed to prevent somebody 
>>from stealing your work and claiming it as their own. (Such as me doing a 
>>rendition of Riverdance and saying that I created the dances, music, etc.) It 
>>was not originally designed to prevent me from performing Riverdance while 
>>stating in absolute fact that you, indeed, created what I was about to 
>>perform.
> 
> 
> United States Constitution, Article I, Section 8: to promote the
> progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to
> authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings
> and discoveries;
> 
> This says nothing about making sure you don't get cheated out of fame,
> but rather it recognizes that you have exclusive rights to your works,
> including the right to charge for use and set specific requirements for
> use.
> 
> Daniel
> 
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