Jefferson: Nature Wants Information to Be Free
Since many have said that my view of copyright and patent law is childish and held merely because I grew up with Napster and do not write for a living, I thought I’d investigate some more respectable views on the subject. And who better than those of our thoughtful third President, Thomas Jefferson?
Judging from his letter to Isaac McPherson, Jefferson’s thoughts are thus:
Sorry, you’ll have to go to the weblog entry linked above to read on.
My question is, why paraphrase or “modernize” Jefferson’s writing? It’s hardly opaque prose: I think Aaron undermines his case by assuming he can update Jefferson: if we’re to understand his ideas as he expressed them, it would be better to hear them in his voice. And yes, I know there’s a link to the original, and I plan to read it as well.
[Posted with ecto 0.1.8.1]