h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

There is a complex and interesting history to the idea
of copyright. And not surprisingly the British notion
of fair play may be at the heart of it.

The guy who invented the first reliable working ships' clocks
is for me the benchmark of society recognising the notion of
paying fair dues. It took a long time for him to get paid.

>>...a long-sought device in solving the problem of
establishing the East-West position or longitude of
a ship at sea, thus revolutionising and extending the
possibility of safe long distance sea travel in the
Age of Sail. The problem was considered so intractable
that the British Parliament offered a prize of £20,000
(comparable to £2.87 million in modern currency) for
the solution.
(John) Harrison came 39th in the BBC's 2002 public poll
of the 100 Greatest Britons. <<

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Harrison#The_first_three_marine_timekeepers

Should Harrison's descendants continue to recieve a fee
for every clock sold? Should Archimedes be getting a cut
on new bathtub designs?

There are at least two points on the issue of copyright
and the duration of such property rights that continue
to be debated:

There's a positive and negative to the Yes side:
An innovator or creator should enjoy the greatest benefit
from his discovery and be protected from infringements for
some period of time. (20th century arbitrations have set new
extended and renewable copyrights in works of art such as
music and literature and many descendants and heirs of folks
like Ian Flemming continue to control the use of the James Bond
name and image and enjoy huge financial compensations. Meanwhile
other descendants of famous writers, composers, inventors and
artists have nothing but hell to pay.)
It's become a side-bar industry of the legal professionals.

The No side also has two edges:
The time limits on patents do allow for further development and
advancement to occur. And in the case of patent medicines we see
how generic drugs can become more cost effective.

That wiki entry on Harrison goes on to describe how subsequent
advances were made when early patents expired and fresh approaches
were allowed to be based upon established methods and practices.

Ironically, these developments made it possible for Captain Cook
to be sent to NZ and become the first to shoot a Maori warrior.


~ ~
HtH

>>, who in an act of cynism at the BBC said that the world was ruled by Goldman and Sachs?

Only he wasn't being cynical, he was straight-faced serious about it


*mutters '... backs against the wall when the revolution comes... *

>>..just by following the news, you get a pretty gloomy picture
about Greece, and the rest of us... <<

Indeed.

But a large part of that unreasonable media view is nothing more
than a denial of the injustice of the situation. We hear that the
Greeks are lazy and don't like to work. Well maybe they should be
free to enjoy the rewards of residual payments for their historic
contributions. Why not?

Then again, how much would it really cost us to honour our debt
to them? Not very much compared to the hundreds of billions being
spent on Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan who have given us nothing
but grief.

And as I've said, failure to find some good rationale for giving
them what they need from us now will likely result in the whole
deck of cards collapsing. It just has to be sold to the banks and
the governments as the right thing to do.

I feel the same way about Spain BTW. The British empire stole the
whirled from them by the most awful crimes of piracy in the 17th
century. Spain had found the gold and silver and other riches of
the western hemisphere and the British stole it from them again
and again over a period of two hundred years. I'll try to get the
Queen to write you a cheque.



~ ~
HtH

<>

That's a joke, right?

>> That's a joke, right? <<


Argh....No, not really.
Just food for thought.
If Britain pays back Spain then Spain has to pay
back the colonies they exploited.

The whole question of retroactive retributions
repatriations and reparations is perhaps getting
a bit carried away. Nations like the US, Canada,
NZ and OZ are now in a state of guilt management
over aboriginal rights. The US Govt was recently
obliged to pay out hundreds of billions to honour
treaties with native populations based on promised
royalties for land usage and minerals exploitation
that had never been paid out. That was an actual
legal battle based on archived treaty contracts but
it sets off a series of ethical questions and moral
obligations.

Not so long ago Britain was obliged to return the
Stone of Scone to Scotland and is under pressure
about the Elgin marbles and all sorts tribal skulls
and burial treasures brought back from many colonies.

Is there to be some universal statute of limitations
on how far back we can go to make amends for the sins
of our ancestors? Should Rome give back all the Egyptian
obelisks and Greek sculpture the legions stole?

In many of these cases of the spoils of conquest the items
in question were not just consumables like cattle, women
and lumber. They are still visible, viable and valuable.
Like Euclidian geometry, Royal jewellery, military tactics,
Roman roads, Indian rubber and Arabic numerals.

These things must be considered if we are, as I claim,
obliged to pay compensation for ideas and inventions
from earlier civilisations?

Expropriate, borrow, steal, discover, liberate...
One man's grave robber is another man's archeologist.

~ ~
HtH

There is a substantial difference between reparation for ongoing injustice (eg treaty violations in ex colonies), and going back in time far enough that there has been a big block of time between the injustice that ended and the current day (which is why I don't feel like I need anything from the descendants of Vikings for instance).

Maori have been trying to get treaty issues address from when the treaty was signed. It's not their fault that the colonial machine and later the post-colonial machine was incapable of acknoweldging those things. So I don't think it's valid to see those claims as something in the past. They are historic claims, but they're continuous historic claims.


I also see a substantial difference between relics and things like land and resources that are essential to making a living.

The morning news tells me things are getting very serious
on the European financial scene and another emergency
meeting is going on among EU heads of state and finance
even as we speak.

How about someone in that neighborhood print out a copy
of this thread - at least the OP - and run on down there
and shake things up.

The solution seems obvious to me. Just pay Greece some
small percentage of what we really owe them and their
debts will be paid. They can get back to lolling about
in the warm Mediterranean sunshine, sucking up wine and
Oozo, picking grapes and contemplating their navels.
And we can all stop worrying about a global depression.

Their total debt is less than what we're pissing away
in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan every year.



HtH

~jwf~, you make an interesting point that we owe so much to Greece. But the Greece we owe it to is the ancient Hellas of the city states. Modern Greece has very little to do with ancient Hellas, despite their protestations that they are the same country.

Most modern Greeks are of Slavic origin, as the country was overrun by Slavs in about the 6th Century. They got most of their cultural traditions from the 400 years of Turkish 'oppression', and what they didn't came from Christianity which certainly wasn't around in the time of Ancient Greece.

When the modern Greek state was set up, they had the interesting problem of having too much history. So they chose which history they were going to keep and threw out all the rest. For example, the Acropolis, that shining example of Ancient Greek architecture, had a Turkish mosque and some Roman temples as well as the "Greek" ones. They chose to demolish them, leaving only the ancient Greek stuff.

Thank you Gnomon. It was my hope that my 'interesting point'
might somehow be construed into a legitimate rationalisation
for a bail-out of the Greek economy.

The nature of western capitalist finance is essentially one
of greed and profit. Charity hardly ever comes into it; yet
there seems to be no other way out of the current impasse.

So if the idea of Charity is abhorrent, what about some sense
of social responsibility? Can we appeal to the newer, younger
nations to turn about and support their aging forebears, just
as many individuals today asssist their struggling parents or
grandparents?

Even that emotional appeal may not be powerful enough motivation
because some people just don't really care about their elders.

But all modern capitalists realise and recognise patents and
copyrights and fully expect to pay royalties or license fees
when they use other people's ideas and innovations.

By couching the argument as one of fair trade practice and
legal obligations I hoped to create a reason to do the right thing
that might be more palatable to capitalist tastes.

~ ~
HtH

PS:
Your challenging point about the changing demographics
of ancient Greece is well taken and has given me pause
to consider just how much Greece has been a melting pot
over the centuries.

Perhaps it is the first true melting pot of cultures and
nationalities ever since Alexander starting sending home
slaves and prisoners and skilled artisans and engineers.

At the height of the Hellenistic empires, folks from Egypt,
Palestine, Syria, Persia and beyond were ending up in Greece.
And as you say there have been some rather rude displacements
and settlements ever since. Romans, Barbaric Slavs, assorted
midle eastern tribes and the predominantly Turkish Ottomans
have all distilled the already mixed race of Greeks.

Unlike the neighboring Balkans where hills and valleys have kept
the many passing tribes somewhat isolated and separated, Greece
is the first true crossroads of civilisations and very likely
the first true melting pot.

But as you say, even the modern mongrels they have become see
the most ancient classical Greek culture as their high point,
their most valued history.

It is of that value I want to remind the EU economists. And only
to give them a rationalisation to be generous. I wonder if the
story of Androcles and the Lion would move them at all. Or will
a gangrenous infection be let loose on the whirled economy and
we will all be left bleeding in the dust of the arena.

~ ~
HtH

I see by today's news:
"After marathon talks in Brussels, European leaders agreed"

Marathon, eh.

I knew they'd come to their census.


Here's the BBC story that used that expression.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-15478358

They even threw in a reference to shields:
"It is hoped that this will help shield the banks..."
Just don't let them be carried home on them.

~ ~
HtH

Oh, the drama of it all. It's tragic isn't it? Although some might see it as a comedy, or just the action of the fates.

Sheesh! The Euros finally came to their consensus
after the Angela of Murkle threatens war and they
manage to find a trillion in loose change down the
back of the couch and what does Greece do?!

They decide to have a Vote, a Referee-endum to let
the Peeple have a say on whether they want hand-outs.

Gives a hole nude dimension to the Tyranny of Democracy.

As if the Greek peeps are gonna vote themselves out
of their cushy lifestyle and 12 week vacations just to
make Euro-bankers feel some satisfaction in losing
50cents on the dollar.

Just when it looked like it might not end in tears.

Alas poor Sisyphus, I knew him... well, I thought I knew him.


~jwf~

Hmm. How will British, German and American banks make money if they're not able to lend to Greece? Without loans...how will Greeks buy German and French manufactured goods?

Take home message: don't buy the commonplace culturally hegemonic assumption that we are bailing out Greece. We our bailing out Greece's debtors. It is to them that our tax money will be going.

The global markets are reacting savagely this morning.
No one expected the Greeks would be looking a gift horse
in the mouth - they forgot about the Trojan horse.
Once again we see Greece as the progenitor of ideas we
take for granted until they bite us in the behind.

~ ~
HtH

The Irish Government accepted a 5 billion euro bail-out from Europe to try and get our economy working again. One of the conditions was that the Europeans should have some say in how we run our economy in the future.

Many Irish people are up in arms at this. They think we should go back to Europe and force them to offer us a better deal.

This post has been removed.

It's amazing how similar the Greek/Turkish situation is to the Irish/English one. Except that the Greeks are more violent.

As things are Greece can have all 'we' have to offer. The problem is what is it they want, how is it to be delivered and how are they going to 'pay' for it. Of course 'we' could have a referendum.

It just strikes me as cruelly ironic that they fall back on
the idea of democracy (ie: having a vote) to decide if they
want to become the 'poor man of Europe' as a result of the
un-democratiic way their economy has been mismanaged.

They live next door to the 'sick man of Europe'.
That's what the Czar called Turkey.
http://www.turkeyswar.com/prelude/sickmanofeurope.htm


~jwf~