gunnar, and rob
you are not pedantic. legal issues relate to the laws as written and
enforced, copyright laws, for example. ethical issues refer to human
conduct, e.g., respecting the integrity of others, not acting to harm
someone. so they are indeed not to be confused.
i might indeed take a somewhat radical position in regard to plagiarism,
mainly i wish to protect public goods: parks, the use of words, democratic
freedoms, including designs that are made publicly available. i believe
nobody should own public goods and this includes the forms of industrial
products. can you imagine copyrighting a mathematical curve or the use of a
common word?
i know an academic who coined a word. it caught on, but acquired a slightly
different definition. he gets upset when someone else uses that word in
ways he did not intend. in my opinion, one can push the use of a word,
encourage others to use one's definition of it, but there is no way to
enforce an intended use. the same is true for forms. once one chooses to
put them on the market and in the open, they should be available for
rearticulation, unintended uses, and competition.
gunnar, you are right in saying that plagiarism entails an intent to
deceive. but deception makes sense only if illegitimate advantages can be
taken. for example, producing fake rolex watches. rolex is a brand = name
of an author.
very few designers sign their designs with their name. a company may have
an interest in preventing competitors from copying what they spent time
developing. i understand that.
in my opinion, there are two attitudes in conflict.
the traditional one looks backward and gives legal rights to originators,
authors, inventors, and producers of cultural objects to control how they
are to be used. this has created all kinds of institutions, patent offices,
law enforcement, and the like with the overall effect of constraining
cultural/technological developments.
the more contemporary one encourages designers and producers to be faster in
rearticulating a useful design, making them better each time, and bringing
them on the market, aware that the competition will imitate what works.
this approach cannot harm the authors as long as they stay ahead of everyone
else, on top of the adoption curve. the ipod is a good example. apple made
a huge step forward. now there are many producers of hand held media
players, mostly not as good. as long as apple looks forward, it rides the
wave of public/market success.
klaus
-----Original Message-----
From: PhD-Design - This list is for discussion of PhD studies and
related research in Design [mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf
Of Gunnar Swanson
Sent: Thursday, December 16, 2004 3:19 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: my thoughts on plagiarism
Rob,
I hate to be pedantic but the confusion between the legal and ethical
questions of copying and the ethical question of plagiarism plagues too
many design discussions. If they "quite openly" copy designs then they
are NOT plagiarizing. Plagiarizing is explicitly or implicitly making a
false claim of authorship. If they make no such claim they may be all
sorts of things we hope we are not but they are not plagiarizing.
Gunnar
On Dec 16, 2004, at 11:19 AM, Rob Curedale wrote:
> Some manufacturers quite openly copy their designs from other
> manufacturers. The products that win the plagerism awards (Golden
> Knome)
> openly are exact imitations of existing products and they break
> international conventions of what is ethical or legal to copy.
[snip]
>> Gunnar Swanson <[log in to unmask]> 12/16/04 01:11PM >>>
>> I think to qualify as plagiarism work product cannot be used generally
>> as a public good; it is the act of pretending that the work is
>> original
>> to the plagiarist that makes it plagiarism. As such, Rob's example of
----------
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