The New Information Exchange (Copyright on the Internet)

Member Name: imagin8or

Product:	Copyright on the Internet
Date:	08/07/01 (29 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Data types split, validation protection

Disadvantages: C-type will roam, forever!

I'd like to personally welcome you to the future of information and how you share it.

Information is, by its own definition, like a virus. Can't stop it moving from one place to another without stopping all communication between the two. So much of the internet has to stay free because any attempt to copyright material in an attempt to prevent people copying it is flawed. Information cannot be retrieved. You can't give someone some information, then attempt to get it back. Information can only spread. So the only way to keep hold of things like intellectual rights is either to make the information freely available, or to play on information's one vice, validity. Of course a piece of music is a piece of music and at the moment you can't really do anything about it. If you encrypt the music, people will just record the output from the player and share that. No, we can only control information whose validity is paramount.

If you need information on the dimensions of a secret spyplane which your political enemy is building, you want to know what the truth is. You don't want to know the dimensions if they're going to be wrong, because you could over- (or worse under-) -estimate your opponent. It's the same with all information. If you have come up with a new idea that will revolutionise some industry or other, the best thing to do is use a technology that is based on one-time validation. You give someone the information complete with a checker that checks back with your server, say. If the validation number it gives you is on the list, validate it and delete the validation number from the server. If the person you gave the information to tries to sell it on as their idea, the server will not find the number and it'll return 'invalid'. This way noone can sell on your ideas.

Of course, sometimes it would work, particularly for conceptual things like a new dot com idea, or a new design for a washing mach
ine. These things are concepts and you can tell someone about a concept without it needing validation, as the information is now more important than the validity. Validity would work, however, for blueprints, software code and many other things that are specifics. In this way, you can class mp3 track as Concepts, as you don't need to check that the track is what it says it is - and its probably free anyway. Similarly, you can class software as Specifics. As software gets ever more complicated, when you download a piece of warez, you could be unwittingly using bugged software. So to a business it is imperative that it's the right stuff, particularly if the software tells you scientific results or measurements that are critical.

So I see a future ahead, of Concepts and Specifics. C-type information will continue to roam the net, free to do as it wishes. S-type will, however, be considered shakier. Of course some people will risk S-type, and take unvalidated data as true. But the risks will increase. So data can be indexed on its criticality for S-type or C-type nature.

Happy data transfer.

Summary: