A Legalistic Thing Called Love by Daniel Clausen

[kailhofer]

A the lawyers gain more and more strength over our society, I think the notion proposed in the story, that someone could actually own a word we use all the time, to be legitimately frightening.

Don't you?

This is such a tightly well-written story and so much fun.

But working for lawyers and seeing how completely they rely on previously written material (these are the people who invented "boilerplate") I have a hard time seeing them agreeing to, let alone lobbying for, ownership of words.

And it's not that they aren't that egotistical; it's just when it comes to writing they have a fairly high threshold for wholesale plagiarism.

Still, this character and his paranoia (and obvious relationship issues) is a riot.

[Lester Curtis]

Peculiar and amusing little bit of fantasy.

Not gonna happen. In order for his plan to be effective, he'd have to get worldwide rights, in every one of 6000+ languages, just to keep damn near everyone from just grabbing a substitute and thumbing their noses at him. No one could live that long, and besides, the pissed-off public could just pass the word to all use his 'property', in public, on the same day, and dare him to sue them all. A sort of vocal version of a DoS attack.

How would he enforce it anyway?

Fun story, though, and I think the point of it isn't so much about owning a common word as it is about the kind of person who'd be obsessed with doing that.

This is such a tightly well-written story and so much fun.

But working for lawyers and seeing how completely they rely on previously written material (these are the people who invented "boilerplate") I have a hard time seeing them agreeing to, let alone lobbying for, ownership of words.

And it's not that they aren't that egotistical; it's just when it comes to writing they have a fairly high threshold for wholesale plagiarism.

Still, this character and his paranoia (and obvious relationship issues) is a riot.

You are so smart! You're the best editor I've encountered anywhere. I can imagine this site's leadership must really appreciate having you at the helm.

I like the deep way you express things, seeing into the structure of a plot and pointing out things the author has eluded to within their story.

I must write something and send it to you for review so I can benefit from your commentary.

Doug