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

We all know that Bill Gates has plenty of money and I'm sure Vonnegut is reasonably well off. But it is not up to us to say, this guy has enough money, he should give it all away. We also have lots of money compared with the poor people of this world.

Downloading books which are still in copyright is stealing. You are a thief if you do it. It may be that you don't get caught, but that doesn't change the morality of it. The book belongs to the author and the publishers. If I had spent years of my life writing a book, I would not like to see it stolen and broadcast on the internet.

arguments valid. i understand the capitalist viewpoint. well, then at least let us say this, the truth is we have actually come to a compromised solution, with a limited patent on things. But then the argument extends to things like the human genome project. To do this reserach, money too is required. So why make it public property? Because it can contribute to a greater cause. Is the edification of our minds not such a cause too? We are just searching for a solution. The capitalist solution just appears at the moment to be what works best, but really, it isn't the BEST solution

The non-capitalist system can work as well. h2g2 itself is an example of people donating their work for the greater good. This does appear to be working at the moment. If we can get ways of putting music and pictures into it, we will have the beginnnings of something great.

Right, but breaking copyright is stealing from the author, and _most_ authors _don't_ have enough money. Copyright pirating is becoming a increasing problem lately, and I know of at least one musician (can't remember the name at the moment) who went bankrupt because everyone was downloading his music instead of buying it.

H2G2 is also run by capitalism. Remember the people who made it were planning to earn money by selling merchandise.

You could say that things beneficial to humanity should be free for everyone. But if that was made so, nobody would try and find the cure for cancer. Because suddenly they wouldn´t get any money out of doing it. If we used that system, we wouldn´t have progressed anywhere near the level we are at now. What you are talking about is basically what they did in Russia, and look what happened to them. There are many of the things in genetics that should not be patented however. But the politicians are too stupid to stop it.

following your thread of argument, in that case, why should people work on the human genome project, if they cannot patent it? they would have to work for free?

It seems that I have started a very serious argument here.
My point of view - it's not my fault that I have born in such part of the world where I can't afford myself buying a book from Amazon or something like this. One book from there will take my full income of 2 months. I work as hard as you do but the money here has a little different value. Does it mean that I have to live without the best pieces of the worlds literature? I'll better be a thief.

This is exactly my opinion. Capitalism suits the rich just fine, but consider all the other people, why should they be deprived just because of some random act of God? Well, put it this way, I am sure if Vonnegut(who owns the work) knows, he'd give you the book.

I´m not saying some people in the world aren´t nice to each other. There just aren´t enough of them to make it valid as a way to build a society. Besides, even though they can´t patent the human genome(I actually think they can) they can use the information to build things they can patent. Like a gene therapy device to get rid of diabetes.

It seems Wizards of the Coast are putting some of the DragonLance books up on the internet. Go to their homepage for more about it.

Thanks.
I checked it, seems that they have some good ideas. The authors were quite unknown for me though. It happens if you live on the edge of nowhere.