Intellectual Property Legislation Proposed

[Rodney Clowdus]

I have to say Kirk that this is the correct place to discuss this as this
very list could be in danger of not being here anymore in the future due
to the nature of open source software not meeting the requirements of the
proposed bill that is before congress as we discuss these matters.  I love
this list and to here the many wonderful things folks are doing with
speakup.  It's all about freedom of the speech for the blind and all
people of the world.  Richard Stallman is asking us all to write our
representative about this.  Richard is very concerned and see's that this
is the greatest threat yet against the GNU foundation and all what it
stands for.  I know for a fact that the government is in the very act of
making it illegal to use software that's written by what they negatively
call hackers.  All my favorite software and my way of communicating is in
danger.  The big corporations are trying to think of every means possible
to shut down the GNU movement which promotes free software for the good of
the blind community as well as the good for all communities.  I hope we
win this one.  Power to the speakup list and may she speak forever!

The Weaving Beaver
rclowdus at kcnet.com
"Chop your own firewood and it will warm you twice."
"Weave your own cloth and it will reward you twice."

On 17 Sep 2001, Kirk Reiser wrote:

> Well, I feel I need to say something on this topic.  This should be a
> subject which is near and dear to blind peoples hearts, access to
> information.
>
> If any of these laws pass I am afraid that all access will become more
> difficult.  Your rights to even complain about the problem could get
> curtailed based on what media you use to object.
>
> In general I believe that all intellectual property laws should be
> systematically torn-down. If this does not happen I suspect we will
> lose our freedom of speech as we are about to do with our privacy.
> The national security agencies are in Washington today requesting more
> relaxed laws on law enforcement groups for invading our privacy.  It
> is sad that a national disaster such as the events over the past week,
> will play right into the hands of organizations wishing to become your
> big brother.
>
> This is not the forum for this type of discussion, however, I often
> wonder how many people actually understand what is being done to the
> rights they worked so hard for, sometimes with their lives.
>
>   Kirk
>
>
>   Kirk
>
>
> --
>
> Kirk Reiser				The Computer Braille Facility
> e-mail: kirk at braille.uwo.ca		University of Western Ontario
> phone: (519) 661-3061
>
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