February 07, 2012

Tim O'Reilly quotes Thomas Jefferson on celebrating sharing

Via Michael Pinchera on Google+ comes this quote from one of my favorite and most clued-in people in the digital content and publishing space, Tim OReilly.

"I just came across a fabulous quote from Thomas Jefferson celebrating the benefit of the spread of many copies for the preservation of history: "Time and accident are committing daily havoc on the originals of the valuable historical and State papers deposited in our public offices. The late war has done the work of centuries in this business. The last cannot be recovered but let us save what remains not by vaults and locks which fence them from the public eye and use in consigning them to the waste of time but by such a multiplication of copies as shall place them beyond the reach of accident."

Thomas Jefferson to Ebenezer Hazard, Philadelphia, February 18, 1791. In Thomas Jefferson: Writings: Autobiography, Notes on the State of Virginia, Public and Private Papers, Addresses, Letters, edited by Merrill D. Peterson. New York: Library of America This is a Jeffersonian quote with some relevance to the SOPA/PIPA discussion, though its proponents doubtless will not see it as such...."

Indeed.

@gleonhard sharing is the default mindset

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Feb 7, 2012 5:00:24 PM | Copyright, People, Piracy, Smart People

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Gerd Leonhard

Keynote Speaker, Think-Tank Leader, Futurist, Author & Strategist, Idea Curator, some say Iconoclast | Heretic, CEO TheFuturesAgency, Visiting Prof FDC Brazil, Green Futurist

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