Re: [PLUG] Reg: You thought you bought software

Re: [PLUG] Reg: You thought you bought software – all you bought was a lie

On Wed, Oct 5, 2022, 22:38 JP Vossen via plug <plug@lists.phillylinux.org> wrote:

> Suppose you go to a store and buy a box that has software in it, and
> you open the box, and it has a big label on the disc that says "This
> software is licensed for your use. This is not a sale." That is a
> lie. You bought it. You own it. Period.

But you don't own it. At all. Not when the vendor has complete control over when and if it even works, due to timed licenses, or requiring a DRM server to be online and working, or some other insanity. How many games that people "bought" have gone away due to crap like that? How many ebooks that people "bought" have been erased from Kindles later? And that copy of Windows you "bought," but now want to move to a different PC? Maybe, maybe, if you catch just the right alignment of tech support folks in a really good mood, you MIGHT be permitted to do that. Maybe. Once. Just this time. With the software you "bought."

This is the crux of it. Why can't you rip *and distribute* a song om a CD or a movie on a DVD you purchase?

Because it was not *sold* to you, it was *licensed* to you. The terms *of that license* keep you bound to DMCA. Not the terms *of the sale*.

Don't get me wrong, there WAS still a sale, but that only extends to the media *on which the content is*. That physical media was sold to you. You own it.

But, of course, let's look at the legal definition[0] of the word "sell":

....

"To sell means to transfer property from a seller to a buyer via a sale."

....

Let's see.

Was property (intellectual or otherwise) *transferred*[1]? No! There was no *transferrance*, only *duplication* and *distribution*. By the precise legal definition of transfer. (Commissioned creative works are MUCH closer to actual sale.)

No, "license(d)"[2] describes *precisely* what this software is. Quite notably, refer to its definition's outlining of intellectual property.

[0] https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/sell

[1] https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/transfer

[2] https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/license

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