Christians and copyright

Remember, integrity is not the only part of copyright law. I am all for integrity. Someone could release a work under the Creative Commons Attribution (must give author credit and include full printed license with work), No-derivatives (cannot change any of the content) license. This maintains the integrity of the author, yet still allows the freedom the redistribute.
I would favor attaching the Noncomercial clause to the license as in my above scenario to gaurantee that the original author is the only one that can legally sell the work.

I would call it "unauthorized redistribution" or "copyright infringement" rather than "theft", but still absolutely wrong and illegal nonetheless. Theft implies removing an asset from someone wherein that person then no longer has that asset. Copyright infringement dips into the intellectual potential for profitability, but no tangible property has changed hands. Copyright infringement and theft are two different crimes that are handled by two different laws.

If they allow it, then yes it would be . In fact, every time you view a copyrighted web page on the World Wide Web, your web browser makes two copies: one in your browsers cache on disk and the other in RAM memory. Double copyright infringement! Well, seriously, because of computer-related concerns, special clauses had to be added to copyright law with the advent of computers, because things like RAM memory technically would have constituted copyright infringement. Even installing purchased software on your computer would have been copyright infringement; therefore most software developers had to explicitly allow such in their licensed.

I know that even with the Internet around, we are still mostly stuck in the idea of traditional publishing companies. These companies, of course, only exercise copyright the traditional way. Now that we have the Internet, anyone can be a publisher. We don't technically need a publisher to get our works out to people. I just hope some Christians can study this out, become knowledgeable of our own laws, and search for way to utilize the Internet for what it is designed for, and find ways to make money in the process. Copyright is a template law: there is more than one way to make money from your work.

 

Of course, I am all for obeying copyright laws and not for infringing them. I do wish to inform authors that there are countless other ways to utilize copyright law than the traditional means through a publishing company (which was necessary before electronic media). Please don't take anything I have said as encouraging people to break the law. God forbid! I am only trying to (1)educate people about how the copyright system works, and what powers they really have under these laws, and (2) encourage (Christian) authors to see other financially beneficial ways of legalizing more freedoms for users.
It is not illegal to download that MP3 from the Internet if the author allows and encourages it. That is what I am trying to get across and hope to present business models for Christian authors that take advantage of the easy dissemination of information via the Internet instead of the great technology of Internet becoming a financial curse. Do you see my point?

 

Of course, it makes it easier if some artists had some permissions present in their license up front, so that those feeling the need to copy know what the author has explicitly allowed, and if the author knew about all his options under copyright.

 

Copyright law is not the same in all countries and not all countries have as broad a "fair use" specification as the U.S. Remember, copyright is not a "divine right" or even a "natural right." It is a social contract granted by a government between authors and users to keep more knowledge and creativity flowing into the public domain by securing an author's exclusive right to his work for a limited time.
Now, where would we be if the "perpetual copyright" lobbyists of today were around back in the day of John Newton, where when he died, some publisher continued to perpetually own the copyright on "Amazing Grace" and continued to exercise it through the centuries, being successful at lobbying the government to extend copyright terms because the copyright holder--the current publisher--is still alive, effecting a "perpetual copyright" on "Amazing Grace". Disney lobbied the government to extend the copyright to Mickey Mouse even though it was going to expire and Walt Disney was dead, but because Disney still saw some profit possibilities, the Sonny Bono Copyright Extension Act was passed and Disney apparently can keep a perpetual copyright as long as they keep applying for extensions.
What would happen if the King James Bible were still under copyright (it was actually the Crowne Copyright; not really the same thing) because some publishers could get the goverment to extend copyright as this asset was bought and transferred by various acquisitions, and the author (I mean the copyright holder) could never really die.
I love my King James Bible. I can teach it, preach it, copy it, and spread it to the far reaches of the globe. I am KJVP (not KJVO as defined by critics), and this is one of the many reasons why I strongly prefer the KJV. Although the KJV is in the public domain many publishers still continue to print it, and many people still continue to make lots of money, too.

Let us remember that copyright is not an end in and of itself, it is a means to and end--the progress of science and the useful arts. It is a necessary social contract based on the depravity of man: motivation to create for more than spite.

Shouldn't we as Christians have a much higher view of our duties to God than the world? I don't mean eliminate copyright--please don't. I mean take advantage of copyright and use it spread God's message in a way that promotes freedom and provides a revenue stream.