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Run a poll of file sharers or record execs have you? Performed a psychological study perhaps?

Actually, yes, my background is in research psychology and I am familiar with scholarly articles on this topic. (here's a quick couple one-off: http://www.firstmonday.dk/issues/issue5_10/adar/index.html or maybe: http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1083-6101.2006.tb00301.x. There's a lot more out there and the consensus is that basically, a very small percentage of people host a majority of the content and that "free-riding" is more of a threat to P2P networks than litigation.

Anyway, I have also spent enough time with a significant number of file sharing users that I did, in fact, feel that my statement was reasonably well substantiated by my own experience -- and clearly, it was a statement of opinion, albeit an informed one rooted in facts, but had I wanted to (or felt the need to make an airtight case), I would have gone into more depth.

I find it interesting how quick you were to judge my background and make your own suppositions while disparaging me for what you were assuming about me. Ironic, and not even in that Alanis Morissette kind of way. Good for you!

Run a poll of file sharers or record execs have you? Performed a psychological study perhaps?

Actually, yes, my background is in research psychology and I am familiar with scholarly articles on this topic. (here's a quick couple one-off: http://www.firstmonday.dk/issues/issue5_10/adar/index.html or maybe: http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1083-6101.2006.tb00301.x. There's a lot more out there and the consensus is that basically, a very small percentage of people host a majority of the content and that "free-riding" is more of a threat to P2P networks than litigation.

Anyway, I have also spent enough time with a significant number of file sharing users that I did, in fact, feel that my statement was reasonably well substantiated by my own experience -- and clearly, it was a statement of opinion, albeit an informed one rooted in facts, but had I wanted to (or felt the need to make an airtight case), I would have gone into more depth.

I find it interesting how quick you were to judge my background and make your own suppositions while disparaging me for what you were assuming about me. Ironic, and not even in that Alanis Morissette kind of way. Good for you!

Schneier described the same thing in his Street Performer Protocol paper. There are variations proposed by others, and wikipedia mentions some current implementations.

Uhhh, actually, you are

You know, First Monday, Second Monday, Third Monday, [... coupla inbetween...], Googolth Monday.

;)

"That Gore wrote about a national "data highway" as far back as 1986 is extremely significant. It is important to make clear the context of the state of computing at that time. The IBM PC was only four years old. The Apple II computer was still in widespread use. The number of hosts on the Internet numbered, as counted by Mark Lottor's Internet Domain Survey, was 5,089. Entire universities (such as Michigan State University) made their initial connection to the Internet in 1986. In order for Gore to make this kind of speech in 1986, he had to have been conversant with the thinking of computer scientists and Internet pioneers. Such pioneers included such as Vint Cerf, Steven Wolf, and Larry Smarr - then director of the National Center for Supercomputer Applications at the University of Illinois (NCSA), where Mosaic would be born some seven years later."

Speaking of Vinton Cerf, who might be trusted to have an informed opinion on this, this is what he had to say about Gore:

Al Gore was the first political leader to recognize the importance of the Internet and to promote and support its development.

No one person or even small group of persons exclusively "invented" the Internet. It is the result of many years of ongoing collaboration among people in government and the university community. But as the two people who designed the basic architecture and the core protocols that make the Internet work, we would like to acknowledge VP Gore's contributions as a Congressman, Senator and as Vice President. No other elected official, to our knowledge, has made a greater contribution over a longer period of time.

Last year the Vice President made a straightforward statement on his role. He said: "During my service in the United States Congress I took the initiative in creating the Internet." We don't think, as some people have argued, that Gore intended to claim he "invented" the Internet. Moreover, there is no question in our minds that while serving as Senator, Gore's initiatives had a significant and beneficial effect on the still-evolving Internet. The fact of the matter is that Gore was talking about and promoting the Internet long before most people were listening. We feel it is timely to offer our perspective.

As far back as the 1970s Congressman Gore promoted the idea of high speed telecommunications as an engine for both economic growth and the improvement of our educational system. He was the first elected official to grasp the potential of computer communications to have a broader impact than just improving the conduct of science and scholarship. Though easily forgotten, now, at the time this was an unproven and controversial concept. Our work on the Internet started in 1973 and was based on even earlier work that took place in the mid-late 1960s. But the Internet, as we know it today, was not deployed until 1983. When the Internet was still in the early stages of its deployment, Congressman Gore provided intellectual leadership by helping create the vision of the potential benefits of high speed computing and communication. As an example, he sponsored hearings on how advanced technologies might be put to use in areas like coordinating the response of government agencies to natural disasters and other crises.

As a Senator in the 1980s Gore urged government agencies to consolidate what at the time were several dozen different and unconnected networks into

The most efficient employee, in terms of work per unit of compensation, is a slave laborer...

Actually the best employee from an employers standpoint is a non-existent one that has been replaced completely via automation.

We are rapidly moving into such a society. Every year more and more jobs are being done by some form of automation including the servicing and production of those automations.

I think it is not too bold to predict that in the next 50 years most jobs related to the production of physical goods will in fact be done by machine. Everything from digging the ore out of the mines to the friendly fedex robot that will deliver it to your doorstep.

http://www.plyojump.com/qrio.html

In my mind labor laws are just accellerating this change by making the cost of human workers that much more expensive. But really it is going to happen no matter what bacause machines are quite simply getting better and better than men at producing goods and services more cheaply, faster and with higher quality.

So the real question then is how does a person get what he desires in the way of physical goods and services in an environment of increasing competition and falling costs for goods and services?

Ultimately we seem to be moving away from a monetary physical goods trading economy and into what some are calling an 'attention economy':

http://www.firstmonday.dk/issues/issue2_4/goldhabe r/index.html

However until we are safely in that future how does one survive now?

1. buy imported/auto-produced goods/services cheaply.
2. find some facet of the current economy that is hard to outsource and/or automate and/or that you have a special talent for such as: (artist, musician, blogger, podcaster, plumber, engineer, cook, etc...)
3. if you don't like what you are currently doing then do something else.

It sounds basically the same as the Street Performer Protocol, which was proposed as a way to make money from music without relying on copyright (the work would be made public-domain after enough donations were received).

This seems like an implementation of the Street Performer Protocol that he proposed. This only implements the first half of it though, in which the fans pay up for a work. The second half is that the work is then released freely. I doubt Paramount would be open to that part of it.

The fact that this bazaar style seemed to work, and work well, came as a distinct shock. As I learned my way around, I worked hard not just at individual projects, but also at trying to understand why the Linux world not only didn't fly apart in confusion but seemed to go from strength to strength at a speed barely imaginable to cathedral-builders.

Now the news and editorials come from everywhere. We can discuss the same issue with hundreds of people in a day. Opinions can be formed with the help of a diverse and eclectic group of people. While this system scares traditional news outlets like daily papers, local tv and radio stations, it works very well. It is the bazaar.

Even though I don't think when Eric wrote his landmark article about the history of GNU/Linux it could or would be applied to politics, I think parts of it fit this issue quite well.

The Internet and FOSS have truly changed the way we live. Is it any surprise that it's also changing politics too? BTW, if you haven't read "The Cathedral and the Bazaar" read it soon. It's great stuff.

What he said was "I took the initiative in creating the Internet" on CNN in an interview with Wolf Blitzer (March 9, 1999). He was referring to his having introduced the National High-Performance Computer Technology Act which funded an expansion of the Internet 1989. The bill supported research and development for an improved national computer system, and assisted colleges and libraries in connecting to the new network. He essentially knew about the Internet and saw its potential, the provided $1.7B to expand it.

He also said "I genuinely believe that the creation of this nationwide network will create an environment where work stations are common in homes and even small businesses," to a congressional committee in 1989. So he some idea of what the Internet could become when it was expanded beyond the research and educational institutes that had monopolized the Internet until then.

Here is a good source of information on that: http://www.firstmonday.dk/issues/issue5_10/wiggins /

(btw, just added you to my friends list - you say the same things I've been saying in regards to solutions in a world where enforcing and extending artificial scarcity is insanity.)

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but where is the financial incentive for programmers?

The answer is complex and multi-part...

First, not all programmers require financial incentive. Where is the financial incentive for, say, musicians? Someone who starts a band for the money is a fool. Some Free software will be written just because the person loves doing it. Some will be written because the author wants the product for themselves.

Second, huge numbers of programmers write software that is strictly used by their direct employer. Making GM's payroll reporting code open source won't change a thing; it's specific to GM. Since it's not distributed outside of the company, it doesn't even need to leave the company. Similarlly, lots of software is custom written by third parties for a single purpose; the same behavior will apply.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, I have faith in the market. Programmers will want money and have the ability to write software. Businesses have money and want software. Something will be worked out. Some might use the Street Performer Protocol. For some packages a large company, or a consortium of companies might simply hire someone to write or maintain software (if a fraction of the companies that purchase Microsoft Office were to pay a fraction of what they pay for Microsoft Office, they could easily hire a team to work on and extend OpenOffice). For some products (games come to mind), the software may be open source, and the data (images, levels, audio) would be what you pay for. Companys will likely spring up to offer paid support for open source products; companies actually hiring developers who work on the product will have an edge in providing high quality support.

If everyone had to go Open Source tomorrow the industry would have a serious shakeup. And in the end it may very well be a small industry. But by no means would it be the end of programming as a job.

I work in a small medical device company writing java, and I could not imagine them using my software for free -- I need to eat too.

I find it unlikely that Joe Random Hacker will write them software for free (lacking the hardware or the desire). So they'll still need to pay someone to write it. Open source effectively ignores copyright; but you're not getting paid based on copyright. You're getting paid to work for them and general software they need. They're not really getting paid for copyright either (although I'm sure they copyright your work), they're getting paid for the device they sell, and they need to provide software with it. Realistically, what would change if your software was Open Source and widely available tomorrow? I suspect very little. I doubt your company would just ask random external people to write updates for their software. If your competitors start using your software on their devices, they might take their competitor's code and try to reuse good bits; but that will still require a skilled programmer to review, consider appropriateness, and integrate it. They're going to pay someone to worry about it.

Similarlly, IBM resells a bunch of Open Source software like Apache; they maintain their own teams to polish, refine, and extend that software to satisfy their customers. IBM seems to be doing okay.

Never.

Economics is about how we distribute scarce resources among unlimited needs and wants. However, information is *NOT* scarce, but you know what is? The time and effort of the creator required to forge a GOOD first instance; THAT is the naturally scarce SERVICE that we should be modeling our new payment systems around in the face of the reality of free-flowing bits.

Since artificial scarcity isn't enforcable (except in a global police state with DRM up the wazoo), the "next best" thing is getting paid upfront in escrow by distributed patrons who've seen your other stuff and want to trade their money to have more unique creations instantiated into the public domain.

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Why is it harsh? If you crack the software, you pay the consequences. You're not owed anything at that point. As far as ethics is concerned, the app could do anything it wanted.

Bullshit. Active attempts to cause harm (likely financial in this case) are completely unethical and probably illegal. No, you're not owed anything (and you're certainly entitled to be able to use the software), but lashing out is dangerous. A legit customer might use a cracked code because they lost theirs (possibly illegal, but is it really worth trashing their data?). A potential customer might have been "sold" an illegal copy without realizing it (in which case you should disable the copy, explain the situation, and make it easy to buy a legit copy).

It's illegal to set traps in my house, even if they're intended for burglars. It's just as illegal to set traps in your products.

We've already seen game companies transitioning more and more to consoles (and the games suffering as a result). They're doing this because of the extra protection from piracy.

Perhaps they also like the fact that the system is stable in a way PCs simply aren't? Or that because consoles are so cheap that there is a larger target market? Yes, the increased difficulty in making illegal copies is something the companies like, but it's far from the only reason.

As more and more people pirate the fuck out of everything, the system will eventually completely crumble, and nobody will be able to make a living off of any software.

Inaccurate. If you were to completely destroy the off-the-shelf software market with piracy, most programmers would never notice. Most software never ends up in the shrinkwrapped box. Most software is either written in-house for large businesses or on a per-contract basis. This is the software running banks, brokerages, inventory systems and the like. Add in off-the-shelf software only ever sold to other businesses; they won't take the risk because it's too easy to get caught. This includes medical systems software and the like.

Yes, if piracy becomes too rampant, it will harm the software industry. But the industry won't disappear. Much of the industry won't notice. The remainder will deal. As you say, you want and demand Cubase and those cool plugins. The market will cope. Perhaps the new system will be something like the Street Performer Protocol. Maybe something else. Ultimately, you want the product and will pay for it. The software developers can create the product and want your money. The end of off-the-shelf software will free up your money and the developers time. The market will figure something out. It might not be ideal, but something will happen. Even when governments try to stamp capitalism out, it manages to sneak back in in the form of black markets and secret trades. Speakeasies were capitalism working around Prohibition. The black markets in the USSR were capitalism working around any entire economic system. Like it or not, the various trades in illegal goods and services all represent capitalism refusing to bow down; the cost of evading the law is simply worked into the price of business.

Capitalism is a robust system; it will cope. It's a bit earlier to proclaim it's death.

Why is this modded +4 funny? Al Gore does deserve to be remembered for his involvement in the creation of what we now know as the Internet.

sounds like your having a bit of a hippy flashback.

• ... His fortunes changed in 1999. Red Hat and VA Linux, both leading purveyors of Linux-based software packages tailored for large enterprises, had granted him stock options with no strings attached, thank-yous from entrepreneurs who hoped to grow rich off his creation. When Red Hat went public that year, Torvalds was suddenly worth $1 million. On the day VA Linux (now VA Software) went public, Torvalds was worth roughly $20 million, though by the time he could sell his shares, they were valued at only a fraction of that. ... [Wired Magazine, Gary Livlin, 11.11, Leader of the Free World]

Vinton Cerf (generally acknowledged as the father of the Internet):

I am taking the liberty of sending to you both a brief summary of Al Gore's Internet involvement, prepared by Bob Kahn and me. As you know, there have been a seemingly unending series of jokes chiding the vice president for his assertion that he "took the initiative in creating the Internet."

Bob and I believe that the vice president deserves significant credit for his early recognition of the importance of what has become the Internet.

LOCKSS-DOCS and even the US GPO Access have already been doing this. But I suppose that given how online government information can go poof or be altered, this project sounds like a good idea, albeit a partisan one.

Artificial scarcity enforcement will always fail.

Even in the face of a draconian future where DRM is mandated to be wired into all hardware, and each person needs an identifying digital certificate to access the "SECURE internet", there will STILL be huge subchannels where information flows freely as well as a huge blackmarket for open hardware (from China no doubt).

The best business model for CREATORS to switch to in the face of this new reality is to GET PAID UPFRONT FOR THE SCARCE ACT OF (GOOD) ORIGINAL CREATION, instead of relying on many small forced payments for an artifically scarce copy (carried over from when the media itself was scarce and distribution expensive). The Street Performer Protocol is one such model; there are many more variations. These kinds of distributed patronage systems are the way to go, IMO; not lock and key.

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Claiming that Reagan ended the cold war is the equivalent of stating that Al Gore invented the internet; Both politically played an important role in those events but none did it by themselves and none started the process.

The only difference here is that the Gore thing was some badly formulated sentence that he pronounced once in an interview, for what he never meant to give the meaning that the propaganda machine of some party gave it and that he rapidly corrected in subsequent interviews.

On another hand the Reagan thing is something that republicans are repeating over and over without any shame of the exaggeration like if repeating it enough times will make it more believable.

Don't you think that this guy deserve the credit for the changes in is country who made possible the scenario of a peaceful end to the cold war? ... as he also deserve the credit for the economic collapse of is country ;)

The funny thing is that this information won't even help to catch any terrorists. How often can a suicide bomber be caught repeating his crimes? All that terrorist groups have to do is to send previously unknown people.

How will the 'traditional' vision/scope> requirements> features> >recode> retest> demo> cycle expand to include the user community in the financing?

The conclusion I came to was that there just isn't a fair way to split the credit for large collaborative projects. If you think the linux kernel is hard, what about a nifty embedded gadget or something which relies on the kernel for 90% of its functionality, but was made by completely independent developers?

The situation is a bit better if you offer payments in advance for specific features, as per the Wall Street Performer Protocol or IBM's patent.

You've been manipulated by the machine. Educate yourself and free your mind.

Well, according to the Attention Economy principles, you're doing M$ a favor.

Feel free to repost this (with attribution if you feel like it) in response to reposts of the above article.

And that (the parent), folks, is called generalization, and is the song of the hypocrite, one who won't bother to read any rational arguments and instead, much like the people parent mentions in their post, takes a sample (chosen by the parent to support his argument) instead of considering the true point of some of us here.

We have the internet now. We have discovered that digital information can be copied flawlessly in seconds, millions of times over. Hence, we use this ability, combined with having media in a file, to access the media we want to watch. Is it wrong to access information that isn't yours? Yes, of course it is. Is it wrong for recording companies to try to suppress the internet as a way of distributing music because it would force them to innovate and create subscription services that would benefit both themselves, the artists, and their customers? Yes, it is.

Recording companies realize that they have a pretty sweet deal as it is with their current, fully controlled distribution system (CD, radio, TV). Of course, these media are also largely controlled by the recording companies. ClearChannel. MTV. Resellers that, like the recording companies themselves, will not create a subscription service that benefits customers.

Do you not think that if a service was put in place that charged a nominal monthly rate for unlimited download access to a fast peer to peer network and benefitted the artists who made their work available to it that people would use it? As good as Kazaa and many of the other peer to peer networks are, they are often filled with spyware and other ways that the programmers can make money, often in annoying and legally questionable ways. If a service was in place where people could access fast downloads of the music (or other media, though starting with music would probably be best) they want, without any of the crap that comes with many P2P services, I believe that many would want to use it.

But back to the rebuttal. I admit that many of the points the parent makes are true. Sharing is not free advertising. Sharing is illegal. Sharing is piracy. Wait... Did I just admit half of the parent's post? Oh yes... that's because it was misguided attacks at only a few other posts, none of which really had any merit. Scratch that. ONE other post. Once again, the hypocrite is very good at taking the words of some and indicating that these are the words of all.

Why should the record companies invest in a subscription service for their works? Well, for one thing, it's what their customers want. For another, their industry is on the verge of collapse as it is. The internet is an enabler for artists, as well. If artists created their own distribution system, and distributed their works through digital file formats, what would be left for the recording companies to claim? CD pressing? Entirely unnecessary. Talent finding? If you have talent, distribute your files though this service and you will be heard. Studio recording? Can be found through independant shops. Marketing? Perhaps, but again, go to a marketing company. If they feel that you have talent and are a good risk, they'll help you.

Additionally, without such a distribution system, artists may go alternative routes and try new methods of releasing works while gaining funds, like the Digital Art Auction (finally starting to get ready for actual auctions) or the Street Performer Protocol. These make copyright entirely unnecessary, and if they gain popularity, may make much of the media on peer to peer networks fully legal.

But perhaps it's because I'm not an apologist that some of the things I am saying here make sense. In that form it shows that the parent is targetting the unrational trolls of our side and misrepresenting us as being

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The continuing rise of open source and open content will have more impact than any of these crackdowns will. In fact, the crackdowns on "IP theft" only accelerate the progress toward an open future. Copy-prevention is just a stopgap by the old regime.

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Of course it's morally wrong.

You know what else is morally wrong? Suing your customers because you're not willing to explore other, decent ways of selling a digital product.

Copyright DOESN'T WORK with digital, copyable works. If the RIAA et al wanted people to respect them more while simultaneously stopping the need to sue their own customers, they would explore some of the new ways of selling works in this age, such as the Digital Art Auction or the Street Performer Protocol, where basically, money, or offers to purchase a work at a specified price, and the work is released to the public domain when the artist gets the money offered for the creation of the work and the offers reach a certain, specified level.

One of the problems is that these both have a one-time payment, and don't offer a renewable source of income from a work, but really, we want to pay for the work itself, not the marketing, advertising, and so forth that go along with it, right?

With DRM, the data has to be decrypted on my machine. Therefore, the key is on my machine. Therefore, DRM can be broken. That's why DRM is snake oil. You can try to obfuscate things, but that's not the same as encryption. Opensource DRM is impossible, because obfuscation is your only option.

Bruce Schneier, noted cryptographer, agrees about the infeasibility of DRM, and proposes a solution to the "pay the artist" problem.

I'm of the mind that the genie can't be put back - that open hardware will prevail, DRM will fail, and that alternative means of funding digital works will emerge such as variations on the street performer protocol, where it's the SCARCE act of creation that is funded, rather than the zero marginal cost of reproducing abundant old data.

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I mean, 10 years for "expropriating" the potential sale of proprietary data that a judge deems "worth" more than $10,000? Give me a break. Actually, they probably will give me a break; 10 years is more than they want, and they'll compromise downward a bit for what they really wanted in the first place.

Still, the chilling effect of a law like this would only hasten the inevitable development of more secure P2P, and the spread of open source and open content.

Enforcing perpetual copyright is next to impossible without a global police state, and I'm much more likely to fund the Bruce Perens and Corey Doctorows of the world because they've earned my respect by choosing open licenses over the default "AllmineMineMINE!(C)(R)!".

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Since he knows both about energy and the Internet

I just happened to see your name while meandering around the site. So I thought I'd give a shout out to ya.

I'm going to read through this, this, and this. (should be old stuff to you) among other things to provide a more informed response in the morning. (I'm a slow reader...:-) At this point , after taking a quick glance, you almost have me convinced. In this money mad world that we are prisoners of, a case possibly can be made for copyrights. One of the things I particularly(?) liked in the original copyright law in 1710 was that if anyone thought the price was too high for a copyrighted work, the gov't could step in and set a "fair" price. This makes sense to me. If you want copyright protection, then you have to accept the price set by the "protectors".

I just happened to see your name while meandering around the site. So I thought I'd give a shout out to ya.

I'm going to read through this, this, and this. (should be old stuff to you) among other things to provide a more informed response in the morning. (I'm a slow reader...:-) At this point , after taking a quick glance, you almost have me convinced. In this money mad world that we are prisoners of, a case possibly can be made for copyrights. One of the things I particularly(?) liked in the original copyright law in 1710 was that if anyone thought the price was too high for a copyrighted work, the gov't could step in and set a "fair" price. This makes sense to me. If you want copyright protection, then you have to accept the price set by the "protectors".

Escrow is the answer to getting paid.
You work once, you get paid once, just like the rest of us.
See the street-performer protocol for just one possible implementation.

Street Performer Protocol

Any files you release should be considered advertisements for your future work, for which you take payment in advance.

Interesting, but could use some references to sources / related material, e.g.:

Andrew Odlyzko's paper Content is Not King which I often point to - it's that good :), and the groundbreaking Understanding Media by Marshall McLuhan (written in 1964, in which he coined the phrase "the medium is the message". First 7 chapters also available online.).

Okay, there are lots of silly things you can believe about Free Software. Believing that no one should ever make money selling software seems daft to me. Some people believe such things, I don't. However, I do believe than an increasing amount of software should be Free Software.

When I was a young child I knew that I wanted to write software. When I actually started programming it was every bit as satisfying as I had hoped. That youngster stumbled across some piece of Free Software and I was confused. Giving it away for free? How do you pay the bills? This Free Software thing is clearly bullshit.

Since then I've regularlly rethought the issue. As I learn more and more about how the world works Free Software makes more and more sense. When I graduated from college I felt that some core software (operating systems, compilers) should be free, some other things might be free, and some things (games, for example) should never be free. Now, as I continue to look back on what I've seen I think even more software should be free and I can reasonably imagine a world in which everything is Free Software. I'm a programmer by profession and this brave new world of Free Software doesn't worry me in the slightest.

So why aren't I worried?

First, the vast majority of programmers don't write software that is sold for a profit. Most software is used internally to the business or organization that commissioned it. If the market for software suddenly dropped to zero these programmers would still have jobs.

Second, of the remaining software, that software which is sold, much of it derives most of its value from supporting data sold with the software. The most obvious example is video games. Without the level design and graphics and sounds the software itself is basically useless. Sure, you competitors will appreciate being able to take your great engine and reusing it, but you'll at least have a lead; they only start work when your product is on shelves with all its shiny graphics and level design tuned by people who worked on the core engine.

This does leave the minority of software where the value is really in the software itself and the money comes from selling the software. Do these poor programmers starve to death? Of course not! People clearly want the software and are willing to pay for it. Programmers are capable of writing the software and want to be paid. Ultimately I have faith in the free market to work it out. We might see software sold using the Street Performer Protocol. Users are generally going to trust the original developers more than people who just copy it; this means that software can be sold on the basis of that trust (Sure, you can get it for free, but do you trust those guys?), or to convince users to accept ad-ware. Yet other software might be supported wealthy patrons. Also, some of those users are large businesses; they might band together to fund a team of developers to develop software they all need. In practice I would expect all of the above and some innovative ideas.

The world of 100% Free Software is in the distant future and may not ever exist. But the near future, the one in which Free Software is a small but significant force, isn't some doom-and-gloom situation. Most programmers wouldn't notice a thing. Of the remaining number, ultimately capitalism will figure something out. Clemens compares the situation to communism, which is an interesting comparision. One of the best things about various attempts at communism is that the free market inevitably sneaks out (often in the form of black markets).

Please consider these links, then:

Regarding GNUTella

"The Free Software Foundation is concerned with the freedom to copy and change software; music is outside our scope. But there is a partial similarity in the ethical issues of copying software and copying recordings of music. Some articles in the philosophy directory relate to the issue of copying for things other than software. Some of the other people's articles we have links to are also relevant.

"No matter what sort of published information is being shared, we urge people to reject the assumption that some person or company has a natural right to prohibit sharing and dictate exactly how the public can use it. Even the US legal system nominally rejects that anti-social idea."

Selling Free Software

"Many people believe that the spirit of the GNU project is that you should not charge money for distributing copies of software, or that you should charge as little as possible -- just enough to cover the cost.

"Actually we encourage people who redistribute free software to charge as much as they wish or can."

The Street Performer Protocol

"The artist offers to continue producing their freely-available creations so long as they keep getting enough money in donations to make it worth their while to do so."

Hopefully these links will provide you some food for thought about the 'party line' on how "liber" books and pieces of artwork could work out economically, tavarich. Except that few people bother to think such things through these days, do they?

Check this, a fairly academic review of the usability of open source sofware.

Tests have determined that people (even young people who grew up with computers) retain better from reading books vs reading from a screen. Which means the utility of ebooks and codexes are different. Ebooks are great for searching, quick reference look-ups, cut-and-paste, short browsing. Codexes are great if you acctually want to absorb (grok) the material.

I have doubts that the codex will actually be diminished by ebooks, I also note that Barnes & Nobel can make money by publishing classics that have been out of copyright for generations. Copyright was invented (after the printing press) to solve an economic problem in getting new material printed the first time. (see Copyright and Authors).

"The content is the only thing of importance once the medium becomes stable infrastructure which simply fades into the background."

Please read: Content is Not King. Thank you. HAND.

D'oh Sorry. I really was trying to hit "Preview." I swear. Here is what I meant to post:

There's an interesting book called Open Networks Closed Regimes that looks at Internet censorship in China. Basically, the book is in response to the technodeterminists of the early 90s who believed that you could simply add the Internet to an authoritarian country, stir, and get a thriving democracy. The book makes a few flaws and omissions (most notably ignoring the impact of email), but the overall point is pretty sound. It's gross oversimplification to say so... but I will: the Internet is a tool, a tool that crafty people can use for control as much as it can be used to promote openness.

I only mention this because frequently these articles still take a subtly (or not so) technodeterminist slant-- "Hey, look what Internet is doing in China." --When really the credit belongs to determined individuals who are using whatever tools they get their hands on to challenge an oppressive regime. If you really want to promote democracy in China you need to find more ways to help these folks out, not just build bigger pipes.

There's an interesting book called that looks at Internet censorship in China. Basically, the book is in response to the technodeterminists of the early 90s who believed that you could simply add the Internet to an authoritarian country, stir, and get a thriving democracy. The book makes a few flaws and omissions (most notably ignoring the impact of email), but the overall point is pretty sound. It's gross oversimplification to say so... but I will: the Internet is a tool, a tool that crafty people can use for control as much as it can be used to promote openness. I only mention this because frequently these articles still take a subtly (or not so) technodeterminist slant--"Hey, look what Internet is doing in China."--when really the credit belongs to determined individuals who are using whatever tools they get their hands on to challenge an oppressive regime. If you really want to promote democracy in China you need to find more ways to help these folks out, not just build bigger pipes.

Kelsey and Schneier's Street Performer Protocol article has priority, however, and the fact that the patent does not cite it, could be significant.

Kelsey and Schneier's Street Performer Protocol article has priority, however, and the fact that the patent does not cite it, could be significant.

How much do people pay the recording industry to listen to music versus how much people pay the telephone industry to talk to their friends and family? The recording industry is a $12 billion a year business, compared with the telephone business, which is a more than $250 billion a year business. That is what economists call a "revealed willingness to pay," a clear preference for a technology that allows you to participate in work, socializing and interaction in general, over a technology that allows you to be a passive consumer of a packaged good. ...
[emphasis mine]

Unfortunately for these [mass media] companies, content is not the key. Content certainly has all the glamor. What content does not have is money. This might seem absurd. After all, the media trumpet the hundred million dollar opening weekends of blockbuster movies, and leading actors such as Julia Roberts or Jim Carrey earn $20 million (plus a share of the gross) per film. That is true, and it is definitely possible to become rich and famous in Hollywood. Yet the revenues and profits from movies pale next to those for providing the much denigrated "pipes." The annual movie theater ticket sales in the U.S. are well under $10 billion. The telephone industry collects that much money every two weeks! Those "commodity pipelines" attract much more spending than the glamorous "content."
[emphasis mine]