The End of Ownership: Why You Need to Fight America’s Copyright Laws
http://www.wired.com/opinion/2014/01/174071/
The End of Ownership: Why You Need to Fight Americas Copyright Laws
By Kyle Wiens
01.17.14
9:30 AM
Just the other day, I got a card in the mail for my 30th birthday. When I opened it up, the card started singing Happy Birthday. And that little thing pealing out at the top of its automated lungs made me laugh. What a strange thing to computerize.
But it suddenly occurred to me that this silly card was the perfect example of what I call The Law of Electronic Eventuality: If something can have a computer in it, eventually it will have a computer in it. Our physical objects arent just physical anymore. Code runs unseen through phones, watches, smoke alarms, birthday cards, and more like connective tissue. As with muscle, its that connective tissue that makes a thing work.
Without code, without software, our Things become inert. Dead.
While this ushers in a whole new world of possibilities, its also redefining ownership. Because when you purchase a physical object, you dont actually buy the software in it that code belongs to someone else. If you do something the manufacturer doesnt like repair it, hack it, unlock it you could lose the right to use their software in your thing. And as these lines between physical and digital blur, it pits copyright and physical ownership rights against each other.