Saving the Net

An anonymous reader writes "Doc Searls, editor at Linux Journal, has a very insightful editorial that brings it all together - the FCC media consolidation ruling, SCO vs. Linux, why broadband is under attack by telcos and cable systems, why we lost Eldred vs. Ashcroft, what's really interesting about Howard Dean's presidential campaign, and a very astute observation about the vast gulf between Liberals and Conservatives."

Comments

Dean for President

[BWJones]

From the article: But they avoid visiting a fact that should be deeply troubling to every candidate running (and then governing) for money rather than for voters: Dean's lead is owed to a huge number of small donations, not to a small number of large special interests. If he's being bought, it's by his voters. This is a New Thing. It's also been made possible by the Net.

This was part of what the internet was all about: democratizing the ability of an individual outside the established powers to enter into competition or publication or public recognition. Dean has been smart about this and so far, he certainly has my vote.

Re:Dean for President

[ih8apple]

One thing you're neglecting is that President Bush's money also comes from a huge number of small donations. A lot of them are "bundled" into a lump sum by lobby groups and corporations, but they are comprised of individual donations. Republicans tend to have an advantage during most election cycles in terms of the sheer number of individual donors. The influence still lies with the groups, not the individuals. Does this equal democratization? Or does this equal a small number of groups forcing employees or members to pony up so as to not violate campaign finance laws? (and Democrat groups do the same thing, btw, especially unions. The most ironic thing about campaign finance reform being pushed by the Democrats is that they were hurt the most by it.)

Re:Dean for President

[Arker]

The most ironic thing about campaign finance reform being pushed by the Democrats is that they were hurt the most by it.

That's not actually true.

The class hurt most by it is non-incumbents. Incumbents get free postage and lots of opportunities to effectively campaign from their official position and get plenty of free media coverage. Incumbents have little difficulty raising enough money to wage an effective campaign, both because they have the advantages mentioned above and so need less money, and also because donors know incumbents are likely to win and thus are better bets.

It's challengers of any party, particularly from third parties of course, that this 'reform' hurts. It forces them to spend even more time and effort raising money, instead of campaigning, and it makes it even harder for them to raise enough money to make a viable campaign effort, particularly in the face of the advantages incumbents hold by default.

The 'reform' is a fraud, whose primary effect is to make both Democratic and Republican incumbents even more safe from challengers, particularly from smaller parties like the Libertarians and the Greens.

Conspiracy?

[arth1]

To paraphrase a common saying, do not attribute to consipracy that which can be adequately explained by greed.

There's little doubt that there's movements working against what much of the Linux communities believe in, but there's no Big Bad hidden agenda here -- just simple, petty and local greed.

Regards,
--
*Art

Did I miss something?

[Anonymous Coward]

That article just seemed to be a collection of random quotes thrown together without one original thought from the author or even an underlying explanation of how they fit together.

A great example is the quote from the National Review. It is a great quote and specifically attacks the changes that have happened in copyright law. At the end of the quote the article "author" says "National Review is a conservative magazine. John Bloom is a conservative columnist. This is significant." But he doesn't go on to explain WHY this is significant. Is it because the author is surprised that a conservative can have an intelligent thought?

In other things he is just plain wrong. He states that "Liberals often are flummoxed by the way conservatives seem to love big business (including, of course, big media)." Yet it is the democrats who are most in the pocket of big business. Here is a clue - Hollywood is 99.9% liberals. The other 0.1% is Drew Carey. Senator Hollings is a Democrat. DMCA was signed by a Democrat into law. Mary Bono may be a Republican but only in name.

If you think that the internet is failing than this article is a great sign it isn't. The fact that any unintelligent schlub could post an article like this and receive praise for it proves it.

These are the people to watch

[Featureless]

Very smart.

The author does an excellent job of synthesizing a number of disparate, troubling issues going on in our society at the moment into a very coherent whole.

If you can understand that democracies are only as good as their voters' information systems, or that markets are only as healthy as the exchange of goods, services, and ideas in them is free, then you should be able to appreciate where the author is going.

The reason esoteric issues like telecom and media regulation, and intellectual "property" law end up commanding such a large amount of attention in the community is because both of these, people are realizing, are not just important, but absolutely essential, to maintaining those very important American principles.

A cheap, ubiquitous communications medium. The free flow of information which respects, but it is not outrageously hobbled by, the rights of authors... It's only our economy, and our democracy, at stake.

I think we need a galvanizing issue. I suggest Saving the Net. To do that, we need to treat the Net as two things:

1. a public domain, and therefore
2. a natural habitat for markets

In other words, we need to see the Net as a marketplace that has done enormous good, is under extreme threat and needs to be saved.

Conspiracy vs Greed

[dpilot]

I once told a friend, "There is far more Stupidity than Evil in the world."

I have since unfortunately found the corollary, "Sufficient Stupidity combined with enough Power is effectively indistinguishable from Evil."

Something like that applies here, "Sufficient Greed combined with enough Power/Wealth can effect the appearance of a Conspiracy."

Think "Greedy Lemmings," and it can look like a Conspiracy.

In defense of "conservatives"...

[Ethelred Unraed]

...while I'm more or less a liberal (in the old-style Jeffersonian or European sense) and nearly always vote for Democrats, this particular comment struck me as unfair to conservatives and their ilk:

The other [factor] is the high regard political conservatives hold for successful enterprises. Combine the two, and you get conservatives eagerly rewarding companies whose primary achievements consist of successful long-term adaptation to highly regulated environments. That's what's happened with broadcasting and telecom.

Lest we forget, it is actually the Democratic Party that is more in the pocket of Hollywood and the media companies, while the Republican Party tends to favor "big business" in general. Both parties have their share of guilt in all this mess. The DMCA was passed with bipartisan (i.e. substantial Democratic) support and was signed into law by a Democrat (Clinton). Trial and IP lawyers also tend to support the Democrats (cf. John Edwards). (Over-)deregulation of the media and telecoms industries took place largely during the Clinton Administration (though it started in the first Bush Administration).

I seriously doubt that Howard Dean is any angel on this, either. He's just as much a politician as any other. His rhetoric about being from the "Democractic wing of the Democratic Party" is a little ironic, given that he's against gun control, is hardly a pacifist (he supported Gulf War I and interventions in Bosnia and Kosovo), etc. etc. etc. I don't see him as being a liberal at all (neither in the modern "leftist" sense nor in the older Jeffersonian sense), but an opportunist like any other.

FWIW given my own political positions I'll probably be voting for "anything but Dubya", but I dislike the idolizing that Dean has been benefitting from of late. And I also dislike disingenuous attacks on one party or the other...

Cheers,

Ethelred

The Heart of the Matter, right here...

[David Wong]

This is the key point from the article, the heart of what's wrong with the anti-IP movement and the Slashdot crowd:

On such a simple scale, it was clear how the majority of the Court would vote. Not because they are conservative, but because they are Americans. We have a (generally sensible) pro-property bias in this culture that makes it extremely hard for people to think critically about the most complicated form of property out there--what most call "intellectual property." To question property of any form makes you a communist. Yet this is precisely our problem: To make it clear that we are pro-copyright without being extremists either way.

So deep is this confusion that even a smart, and traditionally leftist, social commentator like Edward Rothstein makes the same fundamental mistake in a piece published Saturday. He describes the movement, of which I am part, as "countercultural," "radical," and anti-corporate. Now no doubt there are some for whom those terms are true descriptors. But I for one would be ecstatic if we could just have the same copyright law that existed under Richard Nixon..."


Through history the "there should be no such thing as private property!" movement has been driven by those who simply don't have much private property of their own and thus would like some of yours. This is the perception most of the mainstream has of the "it's our right to download movies and software!" crowd; that they simply want something for free because they lack the resources to pay.

You ask why we middle-Americans side with the big-media companies, but the answer is we don't. We side with the very basic American idea of you not being able to move into my houses with twenty of your hippy friends in the name of "property belongs to everybody!!! Who cares that we didn't build or maintain or earn or buy it!!!"

Someone will shout back that this isn't the argument of the anti-IP side, and I understand; but that's how it sounds to us. You didn't write or film or fund the movie. So why do you claim a "right" to see it free?

The author of the article is absolutely right; if you want to win the debate you must make it more about reforming copyright laws to make them more reasonable (the mainstream can get down with that), and less about "YOU EVIL CAPITALISTS DON'T HAVE THE RIGHT TO KEEP ANYTHING TO YOURSELVES WITHOUT SHARING WITH US!!!" The average American will NEVER come over to that side.

The ability to own property is as fundamental a freedom to this country as free speech or the right to privacy. If you want to change the minds of the masses (and you must if you want the politicians and CEO's to change theirs; bribes or no bribes they will go with the flow of public opinion in order to stay in office) you must re-frame the argument in that way... or watch your movement slowly die as the open-trading technology window closes. And it WILL close.

Do the math, buddy

[dachshund]

Who is not paying their share? Certainly not any taxpayer in the United States

I don't know where you've been, but we currently have a $450bn projected deficit for the year 2003, and that number may grow to $500bn by the end of the year. This number, along with the trillions of debt that Reagan and Bush created, are essentially a loan taken out in your name, and in the name of every taxpayer in the USA.

After the Bush tax cut, the rich still pay a much higher percentage and actual amount than the non-rich.

Ah yes. Because you're one of the millions of people who don't actually look at your paycheck before you cash it. Maybe I can help you, by pointing out the 7.5% Social Security tax that the government withdraws from your check, along with the additional 7.5% that the government demands from your employer (money that you could be getting paid, otherwise.) And even though this isn't "income tax", it's being used to fund the war in Iraq, Congressional Pork, and who knows what else. If it looks like a tax, smells like a tax... Then it's a tax.

But the great thing about Social Security tax is that you only pay that 15% on the first $88,000 of your income. So under Bush's new tax cuts someone who declares $70,000 of income pays 35.03% of their income to the Federal Government, while someone who makes $1,000,000 pays only 33.81%. So much for fair.

And that's without any fancy deductions, which the wealthier earner will almost certainly be better able to take advantage of. Ask George Bush, who only paid 29% in 1999, on $900,000 worth of income. It's without counting the dividend and capital gains tax cuts which are likely to disproportionately benefit the wealthier person (I don't ever make more than a few hundred per year in dividends.)

Basically, anyone who believes this shit is pulling out their wallet and handing it over to someone who makes more than 10 times what they do. They're doing this, while our budget bleeds, because they think it's "fair"-- though they obviously haven't done the math. They're doing this because they feel that making the wealthy wealthier will somehow help our economy, when the problem currently on the demand side, eg it's people like the middle class and working class that we need to have extra cash to burn.

And somehow, the Republican Party is able to raise ever larger amounts of money. Hmm. I wonder where it's coming from. Basically, if you believe any of this is right, just or fair, then you're a sucker.