[getoj]

Note that none of these sources are by any means the complete works of Orwell. Much of his writing was done in newspaper columns that were never collected during his lifetime or, due to resistance from his widow, for many years after his death. The true complete works was published in 20 volumes in 1998, of which the latter 10 volumes were content previously not published in book format (afaik). Unfortunately, though understandably, this set was a small run and mainly ended up in the hands of collectors and academic libraries. Anyone who has access to it would do the world a great service by scanning and uploading it to libgen or similar.

[barrysteve]

What would be the service in that?

Let people keep their works exclusive if they so wish.

We don't publish the formula for Coca Cola, but somehow an author (or his estate) has less entitlement to his own work, than an a flavour technician at Coca Cola.

Stop cheating the rules. It makes me not want to write, not want to work.

The strongest desire I have for an authoritarian leadership is to keep sticky hands and brazen heads off works, that took a lifetime to make.

People say we don't need the wrath of god, but we also don't need the double standard of "secrets for me, openness for thee".

[getoj]

We’re not talking about private correspondence or unpublished drafts here. Orwell clearly didn’t want these works to be secret, given he published them in the newspaper.

His widow wanted them forgotten because she wanted to control his image. He is a controversial figure whose ideas changed a lot over the course of his life. After her death, they were collected, presumably with permission from the family.

That they are not in wide circulation now is because they are voluminous and obscure, so there is no market to sell them. I certainly am not interested in reading all of his book reviews and political reporting. But many more people are interested in reading them than have the university connections required to do so.

There is nothing to be lost and everything to be gained by making the complete works available to anyone for free, or even for a normal amount of money. But no publisher is going to because it’s not profitable. That’s fine, they don’t have to, but that fact undermines any argument that a volunteer who does this archival work is somehow acting immorally.

[lazzlazzlazz]

Yes, we should allow Orwell to keep his works private (that is, printed in newspapers for the public as he did himself) and not public (that is, in the hands of the small number of private collectors who would be interested in preserving these works).

Incredible example of doublespeak!

[atoav]

How much worse of a world would you be willing to accept if it being worse gave you the slim chance that you'd profit a small bit longer if you ever had success?

Would you close public libraries if you believed it gave you a 3% profit increase when you do so? (In fact having a library opened will generate more readers, so more customers will be buying you book even if some can rent it for essentially free).

These are not a trick questions, they are the actual ethical questions at play here — and the reason you are being downvoted.

As a European it is also crystal clear that this kind of thinking is the root of most major social problems the US is experiencing for decades now (in comparison to nearly all other similar wealthy nations). The US would be in a much more economically sustainable place now if it wasn't for the constant "privatize gains socialize losses"-game.

[Thorrez]

He published them in newspapers. They weren't secrets.

Trade secret laws and copyright laws are different things.

[skeaker]

> What would be the service in that? Let people keep their works exclusive if they so wish.

Who are you to assume that he wouldn't want his works remembered, and that this would be a disservice to him? Who are you to assume his wishes?

>We don't publish the formula for Coca Cola

We should.

>Stop cheating the rules. It makes me not want to write, not want to work.

Then don't. If the destruction of knowledge is what you want, you would be better off burning books than writing them.

[Larrikin]

Don't write and prove to the world that all the things you didn't make made the world worse.