> Scripsit Raul Miller <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > Except, the copy is being made on the server.
On Fri, Jun 04, 2004 at 01:27:00AM +0100, Henning Makholm wrote: > When I download something, the copy is being made on a hard disk that > sits in a box below my desk. Current is being modulated and passed > through a coil, which causes an area of the disk surface to be made > into a copy of the work. Fundamentally, the way computers work, is by making copies of everything they're working on. There's a copy on disk, it gets copied into the hard disk controller, then into memory, then into L2 cache and L1 cache through the cpu, resulting in more copies being made in the ethernet controller, then out onto the network. Many other copies are made (at least one at each router) before it finally winds up on the user's machine where a similar process results in a copy being made on disk. This is all really fundamental and basic. But the thing is, almost all those copies are transient -- they're destroyed shortly after they're made. From a non-technical point of view, the concept of "transmission" is more relevant than the concept of "copying". It's only at server where there's an original which lasts from before the copying started till after it's concluded. The server makes another copy by transmitting it to the client machine. > But that is actually irrelevant. The relevant part is that no matter > where you consider the copy to be "made", *I* am the one who is > causing the computers (my own and the server) to make a copy at that > particular time and place. You're neglecting the person running the server -- if they want to stop you from making a copy, they're free to do so. In essence, putting something up on a publically reachable server is an act of distribution. If this were not the case, everybody on the internet would be violating copyright every time they downloaded a page which doesn't have an appropriate grant of copyright on it. If I accepted your logic, I'd think that people listening to the radio or watching TV are liable for copyright violation, and that the people transmitting that content are uninvolved in making these copies. > When I knowingly cause machines to make a copy for me, I am doing the > exact thing that copyright regulates. Are you suggesting that copyright law is preventing you from making a copy of nothing? You don't have a copy until after you've received it. -- Raul
