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Round 3 Of TAP Forum By ESR, Lessig, Et Al.

Posted by Hemos on from the good-reading dept.

Iambic Pentametor writes "Back in April, Slashdot had a story covering the first two rounds of a forum at The American Prospect between Eric S. Raymond, Lawrence Lessig, Nathan Newman, Jeff A. Taylor, and Jonathan Band. The third round is here. ESR's latest is pretty inspiring and despite some squabbling, each of the combatants make some good points."

3 of 91 comments (clear)

  1. "Co-opting the system" can mean policy too by inkydoo · · Score: 4

    I think perhaps ESR and the others are not as far apart as they might imagine. In the third round, ESR states that "we [hackers] are very, very good at co-opting the system". What he doesn't seem to realize is that there are two entities in his statement, the co-opter and the system being co-opted.

    From my reading, I believe that what Lessig in particular is saying is that the system exists in the form of policy, and that system has already been co-opted by the Microsofts, MPAAs and other large corporate interests to pass things like UCITA and DMCA. Lessig seems to be suggesting that if we don't co-opt the policy process the way we've done in other areas, somebody else will, much to the open source movement's detriment.

    ESR seems to be arguing that we don't need no stinking system, because hackers are the real creators of the digital revolution. What he is ignoring is the fact that without a system, there is nothing to co-opt. For instance, if there had been no ARPA in 1969 with money to spend on a massive networking experiment and politicians nervous about mobile military communication, then it wouldn't have mattered how many hackers like JCR Liklider and Robert Taylor there were.

    PS. I also grow weary of ESR as my "tribe's" representative. We are too diverse a group of people for any one (or two) people to really represent our views. Otherwise slashdot wouldn't be as interesteing as it is.

  2. ESR's presumptuousness by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4
    Anyone else annoyed that this guy goes around talking about what "we hackers" think?

    (AC 'cuz who knows how much today's moderators like ESR)

  3. I think ESR did miss Lessig's point by Jerf · · Score: 5
    I think ESR did miss Lessig's points about laws concerning IP and contracts mattering more then it might seem. While hackers may route around damage to freedom, it'll do no good when there are no safe havens... and we as a species are working towards that goal with all available speed.

    While you may never corral those last few hackers, the ones who write FreeNet and change it in the face of all attacks and figure out how to disguise it yet again so it evades the law this week... so what? Freedom for the .01% is not freedom at all.

    I agree with Lessig; it's dangerous to assume hackers uber alle. Barring a large scale move out into space, the policians still have a lot of power here. There's no natural law of the universe that the they can't destroy all the routers of the world, confiscate computers, and kill the ringleaders of any resistance movement. You think they need us? Those who would fight freedom this hard would have no problem moving the world back to feudalism, as long as they are in power.

    Do not underestimate your enemies. They like it when you do that.