Excerpted from Rick Falkvinge, explaining why he consistently uses the concept of ‘copyright monopoly’:
“If you listen to copyright lawyers discussing in courtrooms, they never use the casual language of “we hold the copyright to this movie”. Rather, they will use the legalese expression “we hold the exclusive rights to this (…)”.
Now, legislative language and legalese can be very complex, and we all have a duty to explain the complexities of the copyright monopoly to the public in as easy-to-grasp terms as we can.
An exclusive right is something theoretical and mystical for most people. Therefore, I much prefer the semantically and thesaurusally identical monopoly.
Now, it should be carefully noted that I use the copyright industry’s own language here, only replacing a term with a more widely-understood synonym.
There is another point to this. By always saying “the copyright monopoly” instead of “copyright”, you reinforce the nature of the legislation — that it is an exclusive right, or a monopoly, that is in opposition to property rights, and is not a property right itself. Just this straightforward use of accurate, descriptive language will accomplish that.
I spoke with two legal professors yesterday, and they had no problems whatsoever using the “monopoly” term when discussing the legislation, as it is fully correct. (Although, when challenged on this by a third legal scholar, I clarified that I speak of a statutory monopoly — de jure — rather than an abused dominant market position — de facto. After that, everybody was happy and the discussion continued.)
Finally, the copyright industry hates when I say “the copyright monopoly”, just because it describes the legislation’s nature to those who haven’t yet taken time to delve into the issues. Also, monopoly is a negative word. But it is negative for a very good reason. If people react negatively when I use correct and easy-to-understand words to describe the legal situation, that’s not because of me; that’s because of the situation itself.”
The lawyers use ‘exclusive right’ as shorthand for ‘legislatively created exclusive right’ (all created ‘rights’ are unethical) and primarily because ‘right’ can be confused with right, i.e. a natural right (one that exists in man by nature, not through royal grant or legislation).
Copyright is the right to copy annulled in the majority to be left, by exclusion, in the hands of a few – ‘copyright holders’.
The only natural right to exclude is better known as privacy – the right to exclude others from the objects and spaces you possess or inhabit. It is this natural exclusive right that the US Constitution recognises and empowers Congress to secure in terms of an author’s writings or an inventor’s designs.
Copyright (the Statute of Anne enacted in Britain 1709, US 1790), by effectively annulling the people’s natural right to copy, thereby creates the privilege to exclude others from copying their own possessions, a quasi ‘exclusive right’. Obviously, in nature, no-one has the natural power to prevent others making copies of what they possess (whereas they do have the natural power to exclude burglars).
Today, far too few people know the difference between a right that exists in man by nature and a ‘right’ created by legally annulling or abridging a natural right.
Copyright lawyers are happy to conflate unethical ‘rights’ (created by law) with ethical rights (natural) – because most people have picked up the residual folk memory that rights are a priori good (but that monopolies are a priori bad).