为什么软件不应被任何人私有

　　Digital information technology contributes to the world by making it easier to copy and modify information. Computers promise to make this easier for all of us.

　　当今世界的数字信息科技使信息能被方便的复制和修改。计算机技术更加速了这一趋势的发展。

　　Not everyone wants it to be easier. The system of copyright gives software programs ``owners'', most of whom aim to withhold software'spotential benefit from the rest of the public. They would like to be the only ones who can copy and modify the software that we use.

　　但这样的事情并不是每个人都喜欢看到的。所谓的版权制度给了软件制做者该软件“私有者”的权力。而大多数这些人都是利用这样的权力来控制软件进而从社会中获得利润。

　　The copyright system grew up with printing---a technology for mass production copying. Copyright fit in well with this technology because it restricted only the mass producers of copies. It did not take freedom away from readers of books. An ordinary reader, who did not own a printing press, could copy books only with pen and ink, and few readers were sued for that.

　　最早的版权是随着印刷术而出现的。版权制度很适合印刷术，因为其仅限制了大量的复制。另一方面，它并没有剥夺书籍拥有者对所购书籍的自由。既一个与出版社毫无关系的普通读者可以用纸和笔把书籍复制下来，实际上也没有人因为这样做而被起诉过。

　　Digital technology is more flexible than the printing press: when information has digital form, you can easily copy it to share it with others. This very flexibility makes a bad fit with a system like copyright. That's the reason for the increasingly nasty and draconian measures now used to enforce software copyright. Consider these four practices of the Software Publishers Association (SPA):

　　数字技术据有比印刷术更大的灵活性：当信息以数字形式存在的时侯，人们可以非常方便的拷贝和分享。这种特性使的它与版权制度显的格格不入。这一点导致了我们现在所能看到的日益增长在版权实施上的丑事。看一下这些个出版协会的发：

　　Massive propaganda saying it is wrong to disobey the owners to help your friend.

　　大量的宣传声称违反(软件)“拥有者”的意愿去帮助你的朋友是不对的。

　　Solicitation for stool pigeons to inform on their coworkers and colleagues.

　　Raids (with police help) on offices and schools, in which people are told they must prove they are innocent of illegal copying.

　　侵入办公室和学校，要求人们证明他们没有使用非法使用软件。

　　Prosecution (by the US government, at the SPA's request) of people such as MIT's David LaMacchia, not for copying software (he is not accused of copying any), but merely for leaving copying facilities unguarded and failing to censor their use.

　　(在出版商协会的要求下，美国政府)起诉如MIT的David LaMacchia这样的人，并非因为他自己复制软件(他也并不是以该原因被控)，而仅仅因为没有管理好自己的复制设备和没有及时进行删除。

　　All four practices resemble those used in the former Soviet Union, where every copying machine had a guard to prevent forbidden copying, and where individuals had to copy information secretly and pass it from hand to hand as ``samizdat''. There is of course a difference: the motive for information control in the Soviet Union was political; in the US the motive is profit. But it is the actions that affect us, not the motive. Any attempt to block the sharing of information, no matter why, leads to the same methods and the same harshness.

　　上述这四种做法完全翻版了在前苏联的做法，在那里每个复印机都有警卫看守以防止非法复印，其结果是人们不得不私下里交流信息，这被称作“samizdat”。

　　当然这里是有区别的：前苏联对信息的控制是处于政治的考虑，在美国则是为了利润。问题是这些行为本身损害到我们，而非其动机。任何阻碍信息交流的企图，无论处于何种目的，都必将导致同样的方法和其损害性的后果。

　　Owners make several kinds of arguments for giving them the power to control how we use information:

　　拥有者有各种各样的理由来证明他们有权力控制我们如何使用信息：

　　Name calling.

　　贬低性语言

　　Owners use smear words such as ``piracy'' and ``theft'', as well as expert terminology such as ``intellectual property'' and ``damage'', to suggest a certain line of thinking to the public---a simplistic analogy between programs and physical objects.

　　拥有者使用各种具有贬低性的词语，如“盗版“，”偷窃“，还有同类但比较专业的如”知识财产“，”损害“，来引导公众的舆论，其原理是简单的将程序和普通物体进行了类比。

　　Our ideas and intuitions about property for material objects are about whether it is right to take an object away from someone else. They don't directly apply to making a copy of something. But the owners ask us to apply them anyway.

　　我们直观概念中的“财物”，或者说“实物”是从它们是否能被从一个人那里夺走而判断的。这并不直接适用于某种东西的复制。不管我们怎么想，那些所谓“拥有者”们非要用这样的逻辑。

　　Exaggeration.

　　夸大其辞

　　Owners say that they suffer ``harm'' or ``economic loss'' when users copy programs themselves. But the copying has no direct effect on the owner, and it harms no one. The owner can lose only if the person who made the copy would otherwise have paid for one from the owner.