Linus Torvalds et al. on Napster

ContinuousPark writes "MSNBC/WSJ has this piece with brief comments on Napster by Linus, Larry Wall, Bruce Perens and Eric Raymond. "

Re:This should have been on the front page, but..

[Rares Marian]

Paying for a copy of a CD for every place I use it is theft by the author. The same way I wouldn't send a check to a public copier owner when I can scan and print at home.

Use-licensing is seriously immoral in my opinion.

Re:RMS...

[kz45]

you should be the one to fucking wake up...from your fantasy communist bullshit world of richard Stallman. What you're proposing, violates the rights of many artists, which shows the world what a hypocritical asshole you really are.

What RMS wants is the world to fulfill his needs, while still following a license as restrictive as the copyright. If what RMS wanted came true, there would be very little REAL artists left. This is not because "they are greedy bastards" or that "they are only in it for the money". It is because if there is no revenue in something you love to do, your time will have to be spent at something you don't like doing...like working at McDonalds.

But...since you are a follower(and greedy I might add), and obviously not an Artist...You will never understand this.

Re:Why don't these show up on the main page?

[jellicle]

Some stories (an increasing number, actually) are posted under the sections, see links, left side of the screen, in a grey box. Going to the BSD section, for example, includes both front-page and section-only BSD stories.

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Michael Sims-michael at slashdot.org

This should have been on the front page, but..

[IO ERROR]

..that wasn't James Hetfield saying "Grabasses Bad," it was Linus himself.

"Piracy is bad," says Linus Torvalds, creator of Linux, when asked about the matter. "Of course you should be able to sue over copyrights. The one good lawsuit in the whole Napster case is by Metallica: a suit by the actual authors. While it's probably motivated mostly by money, I can still at least hope that there is a strong feeling of morals there, too."

This isn't what your average /. reader wants to hear. They're looking for the "Oh, it's okay, go ahead and steal all the music you want!" Still think it isn't theft? Listen to Larry Wall:

"Open Source should be about giving things away voluntarily," [Wall] says. "When you force someone to give you something, it's no longer giving, it's stealing. Persons of leisurely moral growth often confuse giving with taking."

In other words, if Metallica doesn't want you to have free MP3s of their work, they don't have to let you. Sure, they may be shooting themselves in the foot by alienating their fans, but it's their right to do so!

If artists are going to jump on the MP3 bandwagon, what they don't need is for people to go downloading their music without permission. They need to be educated as to why MP3 is in their best interest, i.e. how it can make them money, and how they can use it to escape the RIAA's iron grip.

Personally I think Linus hit the nail right on the head when he said, "And then [the RIAA] have the gall to use the holy word 'copyright' to try to protect their shipping control. That, I consider to be immoral. Go, Metallica. Die, RIAA."
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Re:This should have been on the front page, but..

[IO ERROR]

Oops, this story did make it to the front page [slashdot.org].
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