ROSETTA: FYI: Report on Ethics Wkshp

[Larry Gorbet]

You wrote:

>>* "Publishing" on the web is different from publishing on paper.
>>It has different consequences for the authors of the texts and
>>should be treated differently.
>
>This is true today, but by the end of the decade or sooner it
>wouldn't be true.

Even if, as I understand your claim, publishing on the web and
publishing on paper at the end of the decade are ethically the same,
it does not follow that they will be what publishing on paper is
today.  In which case considering how the ethics should change with
such changes is entirely appropriate.  I frankly don't know anybody
who thinks that publishing on the web now or ten years from now
is/will be like publishing on paper now.

>Building an ethical system upon this first and prime point is
>setting it up for collapse. All publishing is not equal, but the
>grand distinction between web and paper will erode quickly.

As I suggested, what is critical is how the difference might decrease
--- by web publishing becoming like paper publishing is now or by
paper publishing become more like web publishing is becoming.  If the
difference does decrease significantly, my money is on the latter.

- Larry

--
Larry Gorbet                         lgorbet at unm.edu
Anthropology & Linguistics Depts.    (505) 883-7378
University of New Mexico
Albuquerque, NM, U.S.A.