Monday, September 19, 2005

Rights to Life

“Here mommy I picked these for you!” A girl about four of five years old comes skipping into the kitchen, back from visiting a friend’s house.
The mom smile turns to a frown when she sees the flowers. “Oh, honey, you know we don’t have the Rights for these in this house. Remember only yellow flowers with six petals, and smooth leaves... this one has furry leaves.” Her mom looks down from the table at the girl holding the flowers.
“But I picked ‘em cause they are pretty, and I love you.” She says holding them up for her mother too see.
“Honey, we can’t afford to have them, could you please take them out of the house before the Bio-Scanners find them?” Her mom points her back to the front yard.
“But mommy they are for you.” The girl holds them even higher, hopping that her mom will accept her gift.
“No, I can’t take them, we can afford only one type of flower in our house, you must take those outside, now.” Her mom stands up from the kitchen table.
“But, I thought they were pretty...” the girl starts to cry and runs outside with the flowers.
The mom sits back down, saddened because she made her daughter cry. But at least they won’t have to pay for the Rights, which is more than they can afford, especially after they bought a year of Rights for “Happy Birthday To You” after a kid at her daughter’s birthday party broke out with that song.
The “Rights to Life” machine starts to whir in the corner of the room.
“Oh no...” The mother says, sitting back in her seat.
The printer slowly prints out its receipt:

Order Conformation: Thane, Samantha
Cost: $250.00
Rights purchased: Flower, Sunburst, yellow, tall variety
Length: One year
Area: House, backyard, any one (1) vehicle owned by Rights holder.
Rights owner: Bio-Free
Thank you for enjoying our products in your house!

The mom puts her head on the table, the bill for the Rights for the flowers takes up the last free money that was in her budget. It looks like they will, once again, have to watch ads before dinner tonight to afford the Rights to the recipes that they were planning to make.
“How did people afford recipes before DirectAds?” the mom wondered.


***
Sure it is a bit far fetched, but I think if it was possible, all flower makers would love to get in on the copyright action if they could. Heck, renting things instead of having the customer buy them is a cash cow for any copyrights holder. Unless something changes we will own nothing, and will be living in a time reminiscent of the dark ages, where we feudal peasants will work hard to rent the copyrights from our “kings”, the copyrights holders, to be able to live life.

2 comments:

nettymus said...

The story is very well written. I'm impressed. You should expand it... make it more in depth, and then send it to a magazine...there are a lot of Sci Fi magazines that would like it, and probably some current magazines that would like the idea.... actually, you could probably sell it as a short-short to some places.

Also, yes, probably a little extreem, but the point is made with it.

Michelle said...

good work shan my man (*laugh* oh my) me and ma were talking over dinner whether you wrote it or not...figured you did. you KraZY. I should send the link to the attorney who's doing MAD's stuff. That'd learn her reeal quick.