Timmy's a dick and he damn well knows it.Faqa wrote:Except that I'll wager that in cases that evilsoup is thinking of, we do pretty much know why Timmy wouldn't give you a copy - he can't be fucked to just now. Maybe later, if it's not too hard. Whenever he gets around to it. And it's not personal to you - the friends he gave it to just happened to be the closest people. Also, Timmy knows you'd like a copy. But, you know, whatever, he'll get around to it whenever. Maybe. And it might not even be the same diary, but some version copied by Bob, who has bad handwriting, and lives 30 miles further away than Georgie.
In that case, I find it quite a bit harder to condemn taking up Georgie on his offer. Yes, Timmy still has the right to not make you a copy of the diary - but he's treating you fairly shabbily to begin with.
The problem with a diary in this example is that it's not something made for monetary gain, unlike the software and entertainment media. In this case, yes, Timmy did make it and he made copies. HOWEVER... he never filed for a copyright because he's a lazy prick. Yeah Timmy, I said it, whatcha gonna do about it ya little bitch? Anyway, had he pursued a copyright just for the sakes of keeping it all to himself (the selfish good for nothing) then he has every right (hence the key word in copyRIGHT) to dictate exactly how it's handled and distributed. If he wants to charge money then for you to get a copy, that's his right. However, without a copyright and without dictating to his friends that they cannot make copies, then what if Bob with the bad handwriting (Mrs. Warner is very disappointed Bob. She taught you better than that) could take Timmy's work, copyright it himself, and then tell everyone "If you give away Timmy's diary, I have the right to sue you." Now, is that fair to Timmy? Yes, but only because he's a little asshole. If it were anyone else, no. Because then it's not the author who's making the money for their work, it's now Bob.
Now suppose Tina (I like Tina better because she's cute) writes a story, but doesn't have a home printer. She copyrights it, but then gives it to Greg and asking him to make copies and give them out. Suppose Greg makes the copies, but then charges people a quarter to read it, claiming that it's to cover the expense of printing, and then out of that quarter, gives Tina a penny, even though the cost of printing was only ten cents? In this case, it's Greg making the money, with Tina making very little despite doing the hard work of actually producing the story. Or suppose they're all in a creative writing class and the teacher tells them that they must each write a story containing unique elements like robots or ninjas. Let's say Greg goes first (Because Greg's an asshole like Timmy) and Greg announces his grand story will include ninjas, dragons, unicorns, vampires, werewolves, zombies, Frankenstein's monster, pirates, cowboys, horses, princesses, castles, spaceships, aliens and a partridge in a pear tree. Now, that leaves very little for the others to work with but he'll gladly let them use any element... provided they pay him for the privilege. Otherwise, the teacher knows he's claimed everything. So if Tina wants to include unicorns, princesses and castles, she'll have to pay Greg for the right to use them.
Isn't metaphor fun?
