Copyrights and patents are totally different issues. Patents were created to give the inventor of a machine the right to control it's creation in commerce. So, the owner of the patents behind the Segway has the right to prevent companies from taking their product, figureing out how it works, and selling it for a cheaper price. This "right" is given to patent owners so they will invest their time and energy into making something new. No patents, not much research being done because it's not cost effective.

Copyrights on the other hand try to achieve the same goal for things that have no physical use. IE, they are meant only to be read/heard and interpreted in our minds. They also serve the same purpose of encouraging production of writing/art/musc/etc by creating an artificial right.

The issue that MP3's bring up, is that in the creation of those rights, the legislature has given normal people (Through the AHRA of 1992) exclusions so that the products they buy can be used by the owner. So that just because you bought an audio cd, you can still listen to it on your old magentic tapes, or whatever new technology comes out. This means that people have a right given by this law to convert CD's into MP3's, and that they can't be prosecuted for doing so.

The fundamental difference between patents and copyrights, is that patents don't prohibit you from making a copy of the thing covered by the patent, and giving one to a friend. Copyrights on the other hand, do. Sure I think it's stupid, but with the technology sector producing new products as it has in the past 10 years, I'm pretty sure that the war against MP3's was lost 5 years ago, they just haven't figured it out yet. I know I said that fair use lets you give copies to friends, but after looking into it, I was mistaken. Fair use is to allow for research/comment on copyrighted works, not for the use of those works. What I was thinking about was the mix-tape/bootleg issue that came up in the AHRA.. The thought then, was that copies of tapes degraded after each copy, so the spread of illegal copies would be self limited. They just now realized that MP3's are easy, exact copies and there's no stoping their acceptance by the public.

What I have a problem with, is that they are attempting to prohibit the spread of illegal copies of music by dissalowing technology that can be used for legal copies. So, the courts find themselves in the situation where they can only stop things that are blatently used only for illegal purposes (napster/etc), but can't exactly prohibit mp3 technology.

I'm a realist, I know that music sharing programs/websites are going to get killed as long as the RIAA thinks they can win. But I also know that annother will sprout up to fill the gap, so as a user, I have no worries. What I worry about is that the CD companies will start prohibit me from making MP3 copies of music that I own, and have a right to copy, simply because they don't want me to have the _chance_ of giving it away. To remove a right because it might be used for ill-purpose, is wrong. (So argues the NRA..)