Slashdot Mirror
Interview With Pirate Party Leader Rick Falkvinge
mmuch writes "In the wake of the recent copyright debate in Swedish mainstream media, the P2P Consortium has published an interview with Rick Falkvinge, the leader of the Swedish Pirate Party. He comments on the mainstream politicians starting to understand the issues, the interplay between strict copyright enforcement and mass surveillance, and the chances for global copyright reform." Some choice Falkvinge quotes: "What was remarkable was that this was the point where the enemy — forces that want to lock down culture and knowledge at the cost of total surveillance — realized they were under a serious attack... for the first time, we saw everything they could bring to the battle. And it was... nothing. Not even a fizzle. All they can say is 'thief, we have our rights, we want our rights, nothing must change, we want more money, thief, thief, thief'... Whereas we are talking about scarcity vs. abundance, monopolies, the nature of property, 500-year historical perspectives on culture and knowledge, incentive structures, economic theory, disruptive technologies, etc. The difference in intellectual levels between the sides is astounding... When the Iron Curtain fell, all of the West rejoiced that the East would become just as free as the West. It was never supposed to be the other way around."
I'm 24 years old. I don't want to go through the next 50 years of my life living in an international air of worry and uncertainty. I don't want to live in a permanent state of fear, generated by a megalomaniacal American government taking advantage of the majority low IQ populous' capacity for being brainwashed.
I don't want to live like Israel, fighting militant Muslims round every corner. The problem of Muslim extremists exists and needs to be dealt with, not encouraged by invading innocent countries and waging war on people who have done nothing to deserve it. I want my children to grow up in a world free from military oppression and I want a government that understands that the wars of the future are guerrilla ones which can never be won, even if they are waged for noble purposes (which theirs never are).
The world is fu*cked up enough as it is. The food chain has been poisoned so badly the average human is full of chemicals normally found in plastics and toxic waste. I'm sick of global warning and environmental damage to the planet and the fact the all this time the greenies were right. I'm sick of America being the biggest wilful contributor to the pollution of the planet.
I'm sick of an American school system that produces children who are brought up to believe that America IS the world and anything that goes on outside is irrelevant. Children so stupid they think America invented the Internet, computer, motor car, light bulb, telephone etc ad infinitum....
The Internet or it's successor is the future of entertainment and I'm sick of stupid low IQ, ignorant Americans infecting every corner of it with their insular, jingoistic mindsets, their whiny voices and manifestations of their low self esteem driven by the fact that despite it being their turn as the world's super power, no one actually takes them seriously or gives them the respect that the British or the Ancient Greeks got because a superpower best known for producing mass produced crap is never going to get the respect that one who gave the world Shakespeare, culture, philosophy or mathematics will get.
I'm sick of hypocrisy and two facedness. I'm sick of Gangsta Rap and hamburgers, Political Correctness and TV programmes that begin with 'When' and end in 'go bad and attack people'. I'm sick of reality TV and I'm sick of news programmes that are more censored than accurate. I'm sick of tokens, token minorities, token universities, token degrees, token attempts at the truth, tokens. I'm sick of fat people, ugly people, stupid people, gay people, coloured people, female people, whiny people all complaining they don't have the opportunities in life they would like and it must be someone else's fault. I'm sick of women that act like men and femininity being a crime, unless you're a man in which case you're a new man which nobody ever wanted because there was nothing wrong with the old one. I'm sick of people falling over and suing the ground and people watching nipples and suing the TV and I'm sick of coffee cups with 'don't pour over yourself, you may get burnt' on the side to try and counter this.
I'm sick of stupid Americans who don't know the difference between patriotism and jingoism and who think flag waving should be an Olympic event. I'm sick of Americans who cry that people hate them or are jealous of them or who are anti them because someone dares to point out that the America they've been programmed to believe in from birth bears no relation to the one that exists in real life.
and I'm free to cease producing works.
surveillance of a government by all of its citizens
this tech can be used the other way around you know
and for those who wish to inject the concept of governmental control over these devices (cell phones cameras, the internet, etc.), please don't forget that this is a thread about the pirate party, which was born of file traders doing something entrenched interests hate
in other words the control you imagine is phantom: these devices, the internet, it's out there, and it isn't being controlled
no, the west can't stop surveillance of government by its citizens. iran and china are trying to control from above. let us see just how successful they are with that. my guess is, not so much. but others will imagine that the kind of control being attempted in china and iran will begin in the west under the radar without a hiccup of notice. really?
people wring their hands about 1984 constantly. but the problem of orwell's vision is that it assumes the government has a monopoly on the technology
on the contrary, ever since rodney king in LA in 1991, the opposite has proven a more viable concept of our future
big brother is a defunct, antiquated expired model of our future
little brother is the real future
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
You could exchange America with what ever you want, you can still do this rant. Blame Comunism, blame capitalism, blame stupidity, but in the end you are just shifting the blame from yourself.
Now try to change stuff instead, do something positive, join a recycle program, an SCI International Voluntary Service program. Just do stuff for yourself that makes you feel better, but in the same time helps others. I'm sure that will help you get over your angst.
You are 100% free to cease producing works.
If you're trying to argue that cultural production will stop if copyright is somehow weakened, however, it's not a very strong point. By way of example, I point to the total of human cultural output before, say, the invention of the printing press.
A reasonable middle position does exist. People probably should be able to make some money off of their creative endeavors. On the other hand, the current duration of copyright in the US is silly - 120 years after creation or 95 years after first publication? That's insane.
... supposed to respect a man with such a simplistic view of the situation on hand? He can't seem to properly distinguish between the music labels and copyright, or music and politics. His philosophy just takes and takes and takes from artists, and when they complain, they're basically just told to deal with it. His philosophy abuses anonymity, and then whinges loudly when there are pushes to take that anonymity away. I'm sorry to everyone who liked this interview, but this guy's a complete hypocrite.
You know, there is a difference between trolling and pointing out the flaws in your reasoning. Just saying.
My one bit of advice to these folks would be to not make this overtly political. People are going to begin to lose respect for the people behind torrent sites if they start spewing pseudo-Marxist ideas as their defense. Look where it got RMS -- no one takes him seriously anymore and the project that put him on the map clearly considers him irrelevant (linux/gplv3).
People who download music and movies aren't doing it to assert their solidarity with the Sandinistas, they're doing it because they can, and frankly most of us don't have enough cash free to go buy the entire discography of say Miles Davis or Bob Dylan.
Stick to the 'we're not providing content, only torrents' line. I think they'll find a more sympathetic client base.
You're not required to respect me in the slightest, but I think you are jumping to conclusions. We've been discussing this full time for the past three or four years (with the Pirate Party being founded on Jan 1, 2006) -- it's a rare day I get a new question.
:) Which president said "If I knew I would make president, I would have studied harder"?
I've been exposed to pretty much every argument, angle, and corner out there in this debate. Obviously you don't have to respect me for that, but you'd do well to assume that I've seen the pros and cons of most dimensions of this structural shift.
Oh, and as always, if I had known in advance this interview would end up on Slashdot, I would have spent more time on it.
... because he's really trying to articulate the possibilities for new business and political models that the Internet presents us with. The EFF, the Pirate Party, RMS, Cory Doctorow, hell, even Slashdot - they're all part of the same revolution that most of us who read /. are part of - and we need to take what Falkvinge says seriously.
Remember - big businesses, media empire, the government they've all got a natural, and completely understandable, vested interest in not letting the Internet become the medium for new business and political models - and only guys like Falkvinge are standing up to them.
We may not agree with everything they say but we all need to support them vocally and financially so there are at least some counterbalances to the opposing forces.
I've always believed that the incumbents in any situation should be challenged and attacked (non-violently) - the bigger the incumbent, the greater and more vociferous the challenge.
The EFF and the Pirate Party aren't big enough yet - so let's support them - I know I'm going to right now.
The system of copyright we have today is already voluntary. Any producer who wishes to release something from copyright can do so. How many of you file sharers in this forum have produced creative works and released it from copyright? Do you walk the walk or are you just whining? Post your copyright free work URLs here. Right now please.
Since you didn't actually read the interview, or at least doesn't show any signs that you did, it would be strange if you gained any form for respect for the man from it.
You do however seem to exemplify the "no intellectual capital" quote. Rather than take up a single point from the interview, you invent some of your own, and then "argue" against them. I put "argue" in quotes because you don't actually argue against the points you invented, you just dismiss them. Sad really.
It's called activism or acting, as apposed to whining.
I'd like to express my support for the Mr. Falkvinger. I look forward to the day when musicians will again be forced to perform live fairly frequently to make a living. I've had enough of this overproduced shit with pitch shifted vocals and talentless anti-creative jingle-like songwriting spawned by the music industry. The concept of copyright in music has no moral basis, other than the fact that technology was discovered to record and reproduce music. Well you know what? We've discovered technology to distribute this music -- how that is any less of a moral justification I don't know.
The days of bands releasing a shitty album every 5 years, touring for 6 months then retiring to their mansion in LA are over, and thank God. Will we see less people going into the business? Yes. And again, thank God -- art should be made by people with a passion for the art, not by people with simplistic dreams of fame who will do anything to get publicity.
"Orthodoxy means not thinking--not needing to think. Orthodoxy is unconsciousness." --Eric Blair
Ever had an argument with a religious person? As the saying goes, if this is to be a battle of wits I'm not fighting an unarmed man. But we all know how pervasive indefensible ideas are and that intellectual and moral superiority do not mean the race is to the swift. In the 10 or 15 years I have been saying intellectual property is a bankrupt idea I have had many arguments and listened to many points of view. Twisted moral outpourings about artists rights by people who have never and could not exhibit creativity if their life depended upon it. Cowardly legal arguments by appeal to authority. Specious economic arguments from armchair CEOs (ever notice how everyone thinks they know something about the pseudo-scientific quackery known as economics?). People will go enormous lengths to confirm their own beliefs, erect a veil of denial that avoids cognitive dissonance with the bad ideas they have already absorbed.
But there is one argument that never fails to elicit at least a shadow of doubt in the most hardened advocate of intellectual property and I believe this "Pirate Party" not only understand it but know it is a nuclear option in this debate. It is the the apparent paradox that intellectual property is simultaneously anti-capitalistic and anti-socialistic, it cuts across orthodox political divides because it goes against our most fundamental human nature. Intellectual property damages culture and social structure, so it offends conservatives and progressives alike. Patent wars are strangling industry and holding back essential progress now. We need to revise or abolish the entire system. As said in the interview the proponents of IP really do not have any other argument that stands up, only "We want our money", "We are the self appointed gatekeepers of knowledge and culture and you will pay us or...or.... we'll shout about it even louder!!" As far as I can see the old notion that IP promotes the arts and sciences has been knocked down, it is no longer relevant in the 21st century where the means of production are commodities and there is abundance of resources. There are 6 billion of us. Our ideas, whatever our status, are no longer special, unique or valuable. That we share culture and knowledge is what makes us human, so IP, what history will show to be a short lived facet of the industrial revolution, goes against 5000 years of human culture and our needs for the future. It only remains to perpetuate growth in de-industrialised nations.
Anyway, that said, IP being a self-evident absurdity and the arguments of its proponents being weak does not make it just go away. There is long hard fight ahead before people start to wise up and see that concepts like copyrights, patents and trademarks are the fictions of a bygone ruling class.
So good luck to them. I believe a world without intellectual property of any kind would be a much better place. This is an issue of our time, and the main parties would do well to be bold, turn their backs on the small but powerful vested interests of the media and embrace the issue, because if we had a Pirate Party in my country I would vote for them.
I'm sick of hypocrisy and two facedness.
So am I.
The world is full of problems. No doubt about it. But it's a mixed bag, too. Life expectancy has gone up everywhere but in sub-Saharan Africa over the last 50 years. You're too young to remember the Cold War, but for those of us who were around, it sucked. The likelihood of a catastrophic global nuclear conflagration has gone down over the last 50 years.
You're not alone in being sick of the status quo, but I find it humorous that you equate anyone who doesn't share your opinion as being a whiner or someone with a low IQ. For example, you wrote:
Perhaps if you studied the history of systematic racism and sexism in Europe and America, you might recognize why equality of opportunity still doesn't exist in those places. Civil rights are not where they should be, but they have been advancing in the western world. America, for all its faults, has been trying to move beyond racism and sexism. America also has a far more sophisticated understanding of religious tolerance than Europe. For all the talk of naive and barbaric Americans, why is it that Western Europe is having such a difficult time integrating Muslim immigrants?
As for your bizarre comment about "women that act like men," what is that supposed to mean? Are you saying that you and those who follow your beliefs should be the arbiters of what constitutes acceptable female behavior?
If you're sick of lame TV, here's a newsflash: You don't have to watch television. Believe it or not, some of those moronic Americans (such as myself) have elected to get their news and most of their entertainment not from the idiot box, but from other sources like news magazines (one of the best is even produced in Britain) and international websites. Nobody is forcing you to watch the crap on TV.
I'm sick of Americans who cry that people hate them or are jealous of them or who are anti them because someone dares to point out that the America they've been programmed to believe in from birth bears no relation to the one that exists in real life.
There is nothing daring about anonymously pointing out in an online forum that the American government has been fearmongering and failing in its relations with the rest of the world. Here's another newsflash: When Shrub was elected the first time, half the country voted against him. When he was elected the second time, a slightly smaller percentage, but still almost half the voting public voted against him. Domestic opposition to this most pathetic American government has been loud and angry. The last seven years have been terribly divisive times in America. With any luck, this time around we'll elect a much more capable president, and we'll start restoring our reputation around the world.
Here's a tip: The next time you go ranting about hypocrisy, examine your own hypocrisy first. Then try posting with an account. It's still just a pseudonym, but at least it's a small form of taking responsibility for your writing.
Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ
I'm sorry, anyone who uses "war" metaphors when it comes to downloading movies and compares not being able to download movies as worse than life in the former Soviet Union REALLY needs to get a grip. Which is worse, having to pay $10 to see the latest Hollywood claptrap or being forced to go fight in a bloody war when you are just a teenager and given less than a 50% chance to live? Which is worse, having to pay $10 for a Soundgarden cd or having someone in your family "disappeared" because they said something that could be misconstrued as being against the party?
GET A FUCKING GRIP!
I instantly lose respect for someone who tries to make this out to be the greatest injustice in the history of humanity. Maybe if you could frame the debate in less grandiose terms I could be bothered to listen to you, but until then grow up.
Monstar L
My personal belief is that copyright is a good thing and should also apply to digital material (no difference, other than that it is easier to copy). Someone providing something for others to enjoy and use should have the right to claim compensation from the users.
/Bus
I also believe that the record companies have created this situation with their own greed.
I strongly believe that most people are fairly honest and would prefer to be paying customers for music and film.
The problem is the gap between what producers claim and what the users deem a fair price.
If the price for a music album on MP3 was set to say $6 (compared to $20-$30 for a CD) then I think that a lot more people would buy the album and also like the feeling of supporting the artist and being honest.
Of course there are people that never will pay, but does it really matter? In any system there are parasites. A system with decent pricing would have removed most of the problem if the record companies had realised it in time. Now it can be tooooo late. It would be nice to see them try though. The group (was it Radiohead?) that "sold" the album for your own price sort of indicated that a lot of people are honest when they can afford it.
BR
Programmers and musicians have one thing in common, they mostly make their money from non-copyright sources. The vast majority of programmers (no, I don't have recent numbers to back it up) make their money doing in-house programming. The vast majority of musician make their money on live performance, even if the occasional album sale feels nice.
The interesting issue is what will lack. For musicians, the underground will hardly be affected, they make their money on live performance. The established names ditto, as well as merchandise. Even the "boy bands" and other label made concept will likely continue, with other sponsors (currently TV seems to love the process of creating pop bands).
For programmers, free software is already everywhere, about half of it produced by professionals according to the EU sponsored FLOSS report. Anything that can be created incrementally can be created by people paying for features the need.
For movies, outside the big languages (English, Spanish, Hindi) production is heavily subsidized, so generally not profitable.
Books will continue to be written (a writer has no choice but to write) but getting paid might be a problem (unless you are into propaganda). Again, for smaller languages government subsidies are already needed. In Denmark it takes the form of a library fee, authors of Danish language books gets a sum proportional to how many people borrow their books. Yes I know tax is stealing, but the majority in my country for some reason want to preserve our quaint language, even if it means higher taxes.
So what we lose out is international blockbuster movies (which is sad, while I likes Clerks which is the type of movie that would continue to be made, I loved Lord of the Rings), some types of "movie like games" that cannot be created incrementally, and maybe a system to pay authors in some countries. Music will be mostly unaffected.
RIAA astroturf is flying thick and fast today. A content free propaganda first post mod'ed up to +5 to try to neutralize the article and direct the debate. I wonder how that happened?
Be careful people; there's a lot of astroturf and probably sock puppets on /. these days. It's amazing how every time there's a story with a point of view that the software or media industries don't like you'll get numerous weasels popping up who "just happen" to repeat tired old propaganda we've all heard and dismissed many times before. Treat these lowlifes with the contempt they deserve.
Redundancy and repetition are a strong sign that marketing parasites are involved. They don't care if they waste/steal people's time and attention as long as they achieve mind share at the expense of other points of view.
---
Astroturfing "marketers" are liars, fraudulently misrepresenting company propaganda as objective third party opinion.
"All they can say is 'thief, we have our rights, we want our rights, nothing must change, we want more money, thief, thief, thief'... Whereas we are talking about scarcity vs. abundance, monopolies, the nature of property, 500-year historical perspectives on culture and knowledge, incentive structures, economic theory, disruptive technologies, etc."
Beautiful!
The eternal struggle between intellectuals and business politics, it looks just like this in every battle.
I say this sentence ranks up there with various quotes of Caesar, Churchill et al.
...freed humanity of thousands of years of lords and kings and emperors and other assorted assholes. Without those rights, the property belongs to the ones with the biggest swords or guns.
Sorry, but show me a man who questions the concepts of property, and I'll show you a man who wants a piece of what I've worked hard for.
This is fucking music files, folks. Can't we search for a better business model without going batshit insane over the cliff at the Left side of the political spectrum? How about placing a NEW idea under then sun. eh?
Not a new point, but authors who have works available via the Baen Free Library [http://www.baen.com/library] generally seem to see more sales as a result, not less. I hope um Heap Big Pirate Chief remembers to mention this when interviewers say, 'But think of the chi^H^H^Hartists!' If not, I do hope he starts doing so.
I've gotta say, I'm getting very sick of the Shill accusations. It's like you stupid, narrow-minded people can't wrap your head around the fact that there are people who disagree with you. Burn me if you will mods, but this whole astroturfer witch-hunt is extremely offensive to me.
To set the record straight, NO I AM NOT A SHILL! I hate the RIAA too! I encourage you, if you are offended by them, to boycott them completely! Show the fuckers what we do with companies who sue 10-year-olds, and who don't just try to erode our freedoms, but try to blast them apart one chunk at a time. However, don't confuse that (like the man being interviewed does) with copyright. Copyright is a great method for keeping our culture commercially viable. The RIAA only uses copyright to make money. It's not copyright that's proposing laws, that's threatening to sue you, it's the RIAA, and don't forget it, even in this age of madness.
You know, there is a difference between trolling and pointing out the flaws in your reasoning. Just saying.
We replaced lords and kings with the super-rich. The major difference between then and now is perception.
Even in the past, there was the chance for "bettering" yourself-- getting yourself a knighthood, for instance. Most peasants really didn't have that chance, just as the current poor have no real chance to better themselves. Some do, certainly, but there are only a few slots available for betterment.
It's not just "fucking music files." This is about the concept of ownership of ideas. This is about the ownership of culture, the very framework of our society. (There is an intimate relationship between art, ideas, and culture.)
Anyway, we still have the assholes, and they still stand on the heads of those less fortunate than themselves. Now, property rights might not belong to those with the biggest swords or guns, but they *do* belong to those with the biggest bank account. It's less bloody, and probably a better proposition. But just because the serfs aren't beat bloody by their lords doesn't mean they aren't serfs just the same.
Microsoft is to software what Budweiser is to beer.
- Agree with the mindless stream of lawsuits
- Agree with DRM
- Agree with an overreaching and unbalanced copyright law
No, you simply feel that those who are opposed to you are wrong or are here speaking artificially.
Just like all the people who make their examples but only point to musicians, or cite the production costs of a DVD or CD as the only expense in the creation of something.
I think we should get rid of you instead.
Of course the creator of a specific work will tend to want to keep copyright for as long as possible to extract as much money as possible out of it. I wasn't thinking about the insanity from the creator of the individual work.
From the perspective of the consumer of works, i.e., everyone else, it's insane.
He was "on the map" before linux and is of course irrelevant to linux code because it was done by other people without his involvement (and with his ridicule for a while which can be excused due to rivalry with the hurd). The v3 vs v2 debate is really about convincing people that there is a very good reason to change licences - the initial drafts had some problems that got attention here.
Apologies, "content producers are allowed to make copyright from their work" should have read "content producers should be allowed to make profit from their work". Artists should also remain free to choose whatever record companies they want (and they are), under whatever conditions they want and are willing to negotiate for the services of the record companies (which is technically a free market, even though there is a cartel, that is a separate issue to copyright).
I'd like to add that if copyright could be any specifiable length, authors that chose 1000 or more years would actually lead to their own works ending up 'locked up in vaults' (so to speak) years down the line because it would compete with comparatively more open content that would inevitably eventually flood the market (content is growing exponentially, content consumers have their pick). Most authors and content producers in general at least want to be remembered after their deaths and have their works read fairly widely someday - their work is their 'mark on society' - so there would be natural "competition" and pressure to choose more reasonable copyright duration.
What really offends in the music industry is the cartel and it's bullying behaviour - not copyright itself - people shouldn't confuse the two.
Unfortunately you rather prove the original posters point. I'll give you the internet and joint credit on the computer but...
- The car was invented by Nicolas-Joseph Cugnot(French) in 1769. This was before America existed as a separate country so it is a little hard to see how an American could have invented it. His was steam powered but even the internal combustion engine was a Swiss invention by François Isaac de Rivaz who put it in a car in 1807.
- The telephone was invented by Alexander Graham Bell who was a British (a Scot in fact) living in Canada in 1874 when he invented the phone. He registered the patent in the US and later also acquired US citizenship but that does NOT make it a US invention in my book.
- Edison did not invent the light bulb. He bought the patent for a carbon filament bulb from Woodward (a Canadian) and then copied the developments of Swann (a Brit) who was using tungsten filaments. He was successfully sued by Swann in the UK for violating his patent (for which Swann was given a majority share of Edison's UK company which is why early UK bulbs are all 'Swann-Edison') but in the US case there is considerable evidence to suggest that Edison significantly misrepresented the facts to the judge and that, coupled with the known bias of the US patent courts towards US claimants that exists even today, was enough for him to win the US case. There was an excellent book on this. I don't have it to hand to give you the reference but IIRC it was by a US author. The result is that claiming Edison invented the light bulb is akin to claiming that Gates invented the operating system.
What is interesting is that the US contribution to the inventions you think of as American appears to be the mass production and marketing. It is clear that both Edison and Ford were fantastic businessmen. They knew what people wanted and what they would pay and found a way to deliver wildly popular products. This, in itself, is a very worthy and useful contribution to society...but it does not mean that they actually came up with the original invention. A more modern equivalent would be Gates. Whatever you say about Windows he is a fantastic businessman. He knew what businesses wanted and delivered it.(...look around to see if there are any Ron Paul's SS storm-troopers...)
PIRATE PARTY 2008!!!! NO OBAMA, NO HILLARY! BLACKBEARD PRESIDENT!!!
*BSD also uses copyright, but that's because both GNU/Linux and *BSD operate within the framework of copyright. They *both* use the current system to work around the current (ab)use of the system.
They both have very different aims, politically. GPL-licensed works are inherently more idealistic and political in nature. *BSD-licensed works are inherently closer to public domain works. (The major difference is copyright attribution.) Both turn the whole "copyright" ideal on its head.
However, the politics of the GPL are specifically anti-copyright. (Or pro-copyright, in the sense that *everyone* has the right to copy.) The GPL's strength and ingeniousness is in its use of the copyright system against itself.
Microsoft is to software what Budweiser is to beer.
So if I spend months toiling away writing a book, you would think it's "insane" to not be allowed to read it for free? I don't get that, sorry. Sorry if I just straw-man'd your argument, it's not clear to me how you are arguing things should work. Let me put it another way, if I spend months putting blood, sweat and tears into my book, why shouldn't I be allowed to charge you whatever I want for it if you want to read it? You're free not to buy/read it. But are you entitled to be able to read it under your own conditions? I'm not entitled to be able to listen to Britney's latest airheaded songs for free, I'm not entitled to play the latest computer games for free, etc. (again, you didn't say things should be free, I'm not sure what you're suggesting really)
As an author, I would of course be competing for your money not only with 3000 other new books a day that you could choose to read instead, and not only with all the free stuff to read on the Internet, but all the other ways you could choose to spend your time/money (e.g. comics/movies/games etc.), so market forces would dictate that I can't really charge "whatever I want"; on the contrary, content is currently exploding exponentially - e.g. just looking at books, there are literally more good books being published now than anyone can even feasibly read even if all they did was read all day.
(Just for the record I am all in favour of file sharing *networks* - a network is just a network, you can send legitimate files over it too.)
Strange how a discussion about the link between liberty and artistic expression degenerates into a simplistic two-sided rant about money.
The world is much more complex than simply, "musicians should be paid." If that were true, they'd actually get *paid* for their artistic output, rather than the middle-man. The discussion of musicians and payment is a simple one of business models, which may or may not work in an emerging culture where freedom of speech allows easy copying and distribution.
The discussion as framed is more about the curtailing of liberty and freedom in subservience to the interests of big business, due to the strawman of copyright infringement. As this also serves the interest of government (the constant surveillance of citizens), it's easy enough for these cartels to get their way, at the expense of culture and individuals.
I personally believe that individuals are more important than business. I am also of the opinion that businesses are actually *hurting* the economy by insisting on their own dominance. But that is secondary. The real issue is liberty (and by extension, democracy), and whether or not we'll give that up.
Microsoft is to software what Budweiser is to beer.
Sure thing, Mr. RIAA Representative. I promise I'm deleting all my P2P software as we speak...
Copyright really is entirely unenforceable these days, and it takes a pretty sheltered mind to think otherwise. For every professional out there working on a system to prevent people from using unauthorized copies of an artistic work on their home computers, there are a dozen equally talented people working on ways to circumvent that. For years now, it's been far easier to obtain material illegally than it has been to purchase and download the same content through legitimate services. Even putting the whole money issue aside, in most cases, there simply isn't a service in place to allow people to download the content they're after.
Yes, we now have iTunes for our music needs, but there are strings attached. You can only play most of your songs on your iPod, and you're prevented from burning them to a CD so you can listen to them on the way to work in your car. The very systems that have been created to prevent unauthorized use of copyrighted content are driving people away from those services, even if we have no intention of doing anything illegal with that content. So, once again, the pirated version is a better choice. I know that I'm getting files free of any horrible protection mechanism, so I can listen to them on any and all of my different mediums as I see fit.
I personally thank God that we have some dedicated people out there breaking these ridiculous copy protection mechanisms as soon as they're developed, and giving us back some of our freedom. Having a pretty good understanding of how this technology works, I also rest assured that these systems will continue to be broken time and time again, until the various greedy industries realize they can't win.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
This is your future:
:)
Link to your future
Enjoy.
Someone bitchslap this fart, please? Same flamebaits over and over again even in offtopic places.
Many people seem to forget that the whole concept of intellectual property is entirely unnatural and the word 'property' in this context is a misnomer. Without some very strong reason no-one should have the right to stop me from copying something. There is no natural ownership to the intangible. We only extend 'rights' to intangibles if it benefits all of us. Quite often the applications of intellectual properties do not benefit 'the whole' on balance. Rather quite perversely they simply protect private interests. There is also a vast difference between theory and practice. In theory we have fair use. In practice the courts have severely limited its application. So frequently even in educational institutions, materials are denied to students because of fear of copyright (unless they cough up very big bucks). Many types of copyright of simply unnecessary for creativity. We had no copyright on buildings before December 1, 1990 but we do after that date. Did that damage creativity there? No of course not. But now they are copyrighted.
We also quite often forget that preventing people from speaking, or singing, or playing an instrument, or creating a DVD or using a photocopier in a way they deem proper takes away from their personal freedom and their economic freedom. Does anyone take into account the money saved on allowing people to use more copyrighted, trademarked and patented concepts with greater ease. Does the $15 I save because an album is 30 years old and 'could' be actually out of copyright count? Take that $15 and multiply is by 10 million. Now people have saved $150 million. You have to weigh their costs and benefits against the artists. And let us not forget that the artist and the corporation that has been putting out their music has been making money off the copyright for 30 years. They have made a fortune.
What about the right to use copyrighted material as part of a large of a larger whole? Eg a documentary film that wants to use short copyrighted clips. Often the cost of obtaining them makes their use uneconomic. Here commercial prorogation of something new is inhibited by 'Copyright' despite the fact that the reason d'etre of 'Copyright' was to encourage commercial prorogation of new ideas and art. Copyright owners who extol the value of copyright often 'forget' quite conveniently that IP may actually supress creativity. Often copyright is used simply to deny public use of material. So let me get this right. You need copyright law that allows the complete prevention of artistic material from circulating at all so you can encourage future creativity. Because mr/ms creative would only produce something for the public if they knew they could prevent any public dissemination. Right?!
I always get a laugh out of the heirs who already enjoy copyright revenues. So they didn't do jack sh*t but they are an heir so they should rake in cash for doing nothing. There was a New York Times article that had the audacity to argue for perpetual copyright. So you want to put on a Shakespeare play - better pay his descendants or some rich corporation. You want to read your bible in the church. Not before you hand over some cash. This idea is absurd but it's scary that the copyright crazies are advocating it. They claim they own ideas. We get this...no-one owns ideas! IP is not susceptible to ownership. We just put restrictions on IP for societal benefit not for the narcissistic desires of the original producer and certainly not their descendants.
Some of the restrictions of IP impinge on free speech. Sometimes you need to be able to film some event that has political implications without worrying about the 'person' rights. Eg Police brutality. Think this is an exaggeration? Just wait till you hear that free speech is cool but because some political speech intruded on commercial ri
You did strawman my argument, but probably not intentionally.
I don't think you should have to give away your book. But I also don't think that you (or your estate or whomever buys the rights from you) should have exclusive rights to it, or any "intellectual property" you produce for a period of 120 or 95 years. That's what I was calling insane.
15, 20 years? Fine. A century? Not so good.
mod parent down! obvious RIAA astroturfing..
PS: You probably won't read this but..dude, your job involves posting nonsensical and/or blatantly wrong stuff on various internet message boards. How do you feel about your life? Maybe suicide is a viable option..here, let me Help You(TM)
""What was remarkable was that this was the point where the enemy -- forces that want to lock down culture and knowledge at the cost of total surveillance -- realized they were under a serious attack... "
Well I'm post number 179 and I'll put in my two cents in. Despite the pretenousness of the arguments presented I've always said that the IP argument is about more than just little men vs big organizations. Framing it in the former way ignores all the little day to day iinfractions fellow men do against fellow men and that has a bigger impact than anything the big vs little does.
Also as has been pointed out the argument is more than just big IP vs little men. It's also about IP in general and how that affects everyone in all aspects of one's lives (hint it's more than just about entertainment).
Yeah, it wasn't intentional, I only afterwards noticed the earlier post higher up in the thread was you.
... I try to be appreciative of what I do have, not angry about what's "denied" me.
For me, arguing over whether it should be 0 or 20 or 120 years etc., just seems like arguing over different *degrees* of entitlement. It's that 'entitlement' that feels off to me; no matter what the duration, it still boils down to a law mandating that after some period, everybody (just for existing) becomes entitled to the fruits of my/your efforts. That doesn't feel right. If I worked while some kid sat on his butt, I should get to be as stingy as I want. I sort of have this mental image of someone walking up to an author and saying 'OK, 20 years has passed, gimme your work now' (OK, not 'gimme' though in the sense of taking some physical copy, but just the idea of it).
I'm not sure why we should ever necessarily be entitled to anything we haven't earned unless it's been granted; that kind of thinking leads to all sorts of other nasties (e.g. corruption)
OTOH, you'll find plenty of GPL developers here. I've got some GPL software in my sig, and more on SourceForge. The GPL isn't technically "released from copyright", but it's as close as you're going to get to a simulation of a post-copyright world: it turns copyright against itself, giving back the freedoms that copyright takes away.
Visual IRC: Fast. Powerful. Free.
If you read more about the GPL, you'll find that RMS accounted for the possibility of copyright being reformed or removed and thinks that it is a virtue of the GPL that as copyright gets weaker, so does the GPL, because the GPL becomes less necessary the weaker copyright is.
Granted, not everyone shares that view, but it's not some new argument considering that it was among the things that went into consideration in how the GPL was drafted, long before any sort of meaningful copyright reform was even on the map.
Ironically, perhaps, the GPL exists to recreate the environment of respectful sharing that RMS once found at MIT, before everyone went copyright-crazy.
I see you point, but allow me to make a counter point.
It's the copyright holder that receives an entitlement to earn money on his works that's arbitrarily mandated by law. Absent a government with copyright laws and enforcement, the creator of a work can either keep it to himself, or publish and let what happens happen. And it's the latter state of affairs that obtained through the majority of human history. The modern case, where a creator owns the intangible part of his work, is a fairly recent development. We still have Shakespeare, and he managed to support himself during his lifetime based on his works.
I'd also argue that releasing work into the public domain after a period of time helps foster new works based on the old ones. Whatever you think of sampling in music, for example, it's commonplace to make new works out of pieces of old ones (and it's not a new development - plenty of classical works are based on traditional melodies which must have been composed by someone at some time). Similarly for literary works - how many tellings of various Arthur legends are there through the literature of Europe? If someone had held the rights on the Homeric epics, would they have had the cultural influence they did in Ancient Greece?
Maybe the better question as one post pointed out is why the "right side" needs to use the same debate tactics as the "wrong side"? Personally both sides have agendas and the enemy of my enemy doesn't make them my friend.
Maybe one of these days both sides will get some perspective and stop trying to play me for a fool. They're both right and wrong in different places and much like the present political playing against each other for MY vote.
It's that 'entitlement' that feels off to me; no matter what the duration, it still boils down to a law mandating that after some period, everybody (just for existing) becomes entitled to the fruits of my/your efforts. That doesn't feel right.
Can you imagine the world today if Plato, or Aristotle, or Galileo thought like this? This is certainly a valid point of view, but it's both selfish and short sighted.
All that work that you've created, you did not create out of thin air. It was created using a base of knowledge to which an uncountable number of individuals before you created, and left behind for you to build upon.
The only thing those individuals ask (well they're dead, so lets just say 'Society' asks on their behalf) is that after a reasonable amount of time, you too release your work for the next generation to build upon and benefit from such that eventually it's the entirety of the human race which benefits.
It is this trade-off between the rights of the content producer to receive compensation for their contributions and the right of society to ultimately benefit from those contributions that Copyright attempts to capture into law, and the length of time a work is protected is actually very important. Set too short, and the balance swings too far towards society and creators suffer, set too long and the balance is too far towards the creators and as a result society suffers.
DJ kRYPT's Free MP3s!
and I'm free to cease producing works.
If your only incentive is to make money, then I guess you've defined what is not art. It might look like art to the casual observer, but it has no substance, and is only an echo of the real thing. So lets find a business model that works please.
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
Alberto Santo Dumont's machine could not be steered in any direction. It was not controlled flight. This is why the Wright brothers took Europe by storm when they demonstrated "true mastery of the air" in their steerable flying machine, much to Dumont's dismay.
He very nearly invoked Godwin's Law (As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches one), except he didn't compare the copyright holders to Nazis, but Communists.
Admit it. You post strawman arguments as AC so you get modded Insightful for refuting them, rather than Troll
We Canadians are going to form a nation with Cuba and Mexico and SURROUND you.
Mwahahahahahaha.
Then we're going to write you a stern letter about many things really.
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
You're probably right. There are probably puppets on /.
However, your diatribe sounded frighteningly orwellian. If we KNEW for a fact which posters were owned by corps, then you would have a point. But you don't know. Since you don't know, you are basically saying that everyone who doesn't agree with the slashdot meme MUST be an astroturfer who needs to be looked down upon. If a person thinks that IP should be treated as a tangible asset, they are an astroturfer, not someone with an opinion. Or if someone supports closed-source software for whatever reason, they must be ASTROTURFERS! For Micro$oft! Eeek.
Slashdot is about hearing different opinions on issues (for me, at least). I wouldn't come here if every +5 insightful post simply boiled down to, "Yeah, me too, I agree."
-b
No offense, but I've stopped responding to AC's.
"It's not copyright that's proposing laws, that's threatening to sue you, it's the RIAA, and don't forget it, even in this age of madness." Actually it's the individual companies that compose these cartels that are suing you and bribing your politicians into revoking your freedoms. Choose your battles, don't support companies that feel it's their right to abuse the system to extract every last penny out of you, the "consumer". Yeah yeah, it's all been said before, but maybe eventually people will wake up and stop the nonsense.
"Personally, I find it difficult to like someone whose arguments always seem to rely upon how nasty the enemy is,"
Pray tell, what are your feelings when the enemy truly is nasty?
Do you dislike churchill as a historical figure?
And before you misunderstand, no I'm not comparing anyone to churchill, I'm poking holes in your argument.
Humanity breeds creativity, success, innovation, art, theory, math, science, medicine, technology, history ....
...) understands their transient-power is expressed with war, genocide, god, pseudo-history ....
... the megalomaniac dogmatist/demagogue (almost any politician or cleric) will use the most illiterate and mentally/emotionally disturbed citizens to attack, destroy, and murder potential opposition. Hitler, Napoleon, Stalin, Alexander TG, Mao, Caesar ... their lieutenants were evil sick perverts that derived delusional pleasure from mass murder and destruction of prior human achievements and the death of their fool-followers.
... does write the history-spin, faux-morality, pseudo-justification (god, patriotism, value ...).
The megalomaniac dogmatist (mythic leader/politician, cleric, murderer, plutocrat
As proven by abridged and hubris-edited human history
The mythic dogmatist/demagogue provide nothing, but the victor
Unaccountable leaders are masters, and unrepresented people are slaves. How do US and EU fare?
"It's not just "fucking music files." This is about the concept of ownership of ideas. This is about the ownership of culture, the very framework of our society. (There is an intimate relationship between art, ideas, and culture.)"
And yet you all had no problem with Torvald's saying "those who write the code dictate the license". It's all fine and dandy to talk about culture and other high sounding ideas. it's quite another when it's YOUR ideas and culture people will be doing something with. I'll be more impressed with pirates when I see them as part of the process of the creation of ideas, and less excluding themselves economically from the process that fosters creation and directs resources towards better creation
"Even in the past, there was the chance for "bettering" yourself-- getting yourself a knighthood, for instance. Most peasants really didn't have that chance, just as the current poor have no real chance to better themselves. Some do, certainly, but there are only a few slots available for betterment."
Another high minded post. It's not the ownership of ideas persee that holds the "peasants" back. It's the inability to not only not own the product of their time and effort, but an inability to enter into recirocal agreements with their fellows to facilitate trade. Piracy is a modern day slavery because while an artists can create. they no longer can enter into reciprocal agreements because there's always that disgrunteled person(s) willing to undermine the whole process backed by technology that didn't exist during "peasent" times. That forces artists into a hardship laden lopsided agreements with society were they give it away and hope they can survive by other means. Or find another line of work were they can earn a living free of the interference of those who presume to know how their fellows SHOUILD live and not how they desire to live (a freedom the pirate enjoys no doubt).
You're perfectly right. Like I said in a previous post, it sounds like a witch-hunt. If you have a view that's a bit weird, you must be a witch^H^H^H^H^H shill, and you^H^H^H your karma must burn at the stake.
What's even worse is that it shows deep insecurity, that people don't seem confident that they can competently argue against an astroturfer. If the opinion is corporate bullshit, then you should be able to argue against it without having to prematurely halt the argument. If you can't argue against them, then perhaps you should be listening to them, rather than just burning burning them.
You know, there is a difference between trolling and pointing out the flaws in your reasoning. Just saying.
That's what a society is. You give as well as receive.
I'm not sure why we should ever necessarily be entitled to anything we haven't earned
Consider a few bon mots: "No man is an island." "I stand on the shoulders of giants." "Bad artists copy. Great artists steal." All artistic work is a part of a culture. The creators borrow/reinterpret works of others. Do you really want people to consume your work and not think about it, not comment on it, not recycle it? Can you create an art work from a vacuum?
Consider how this ends up. I would need your permission to quote your lines above before commenting on them. Or consider Disney, how they have taken control of parts of our shared culture and locked it up in copyright and trademark law. And now they want to take control of my computer, TV, and communications in order to safeguard their revenue stream. so they can be sure I do not enjoy the "fruits of their labour" without paying over and over for the privilege.
I have the url to a slashdot argument thread that basically said that the elimination of copyright would mean an end to privacy (nevermind the privacy erosion we presently have). You wouldn't have it, and even if you did you couldn't defend against it's loss.
"By defeating copyright 'law' all that changes is that purchasing digital work will become more complicated, contractually."
Even worse DRM times two meets DMCA times three. Quite frankly the "baby bathwater" copyright must go group hasn't fully thought things to their conclusion. All their stuff sounds like "I wish it would come out like this" but fails against human nature.
"Copyright is a social contract, not an absolute right. It is granted in order to enrich us all by encouraging people to produce."
Apparently not, otherwise people wouldn't need encouragment.
"...and the ever increasing copyright terms and assertions of ownership of intellectual property are damaging to society."
Is it? Apparently piratebay has finally figured out a way to determine harm when it comes to digital goods were no one else has.
"Over the last few decades various corporate interests in various countries, coupled with international agreements, have seen massive, one sided change in the laws surrounding copyright."
While there's a valid point here it fails on one aspect. Piracy isn't about the little guy "borrowing" the big guys stuff. It's about an entitlement driven society having zero respect for those who create. That means EVERYONE who creates, not just big organizations.
"We're in the midst of many countries pushing it even further. And we live in a world where DRM means that in future, were keys to be lost, some cultural artifacts could be lost to us forever."
Another valid point that fails on another aspect. We got to this point in part because of the group I mentioned previously. We also have another group join this discussion. The "I don't do civil duty" group. I can't feel too much sympathy for groups that simply are built around self-centerness and apathy.
"What this party and what many people truly believe is that it's time to examine the situation and restore some sanity and restore the balance."
It's not the examination that concern us. It's what the doctor's prescribing.
"And some would say that those names and their work have become so much part of our culture that you shouldn't have to pay. It's been a few decades since they started. They made some money, they made their names. Now maybe it belongs to all of us."
On limited terms we can both agree.
It's not the ownership of ideas persee that holds the "peasants" back.
There are two ideas going here, not one. They are inter-related, but not to the extent you claim here.
The thing holding the "peasants" back is lack of economic and social opportunity. There can only be so many rich people, and most of those slots are filled. This has nothing to do with writing a book, or recording a song. It has to do with distribution of a set amount of aggregate economic wealth, and the fact that a *very* small minority of the people control the vast majority of the wealth.
Ownership of ideas is merely one small facet of this. Those with economic wealth wish to control distribution of culture, because people are willing to pay for culture. The tension between the minority wishing to control the majority creates the tension.
For example, in 2006, corporations were granted about 10 times as many patents as all the individuals combined. That is, 90% of all patents were granted to corporations, *not* to individuals. Corporations are keen on owning and controlling access to ideas. By extension, and by the actions of the RIAA and MPAA, they are also keen on controlling access to culture. (Both film and music are central to our culture.) (Disclaimer: yes, I am using hard statistics for patents to help back up an argument about culture. I believe both patents and copyrights are inextricably joined at this point, as is evidenced by the dual patenting and copyrighting of software. Further, I believe the ratio of corporate patents to individual patents demonstrates corporate dominance in the field of ideas.)
But really, those are two ideas that you have so conveniently combined into one. Intertwined ideas, yes, but two separate ideas nonetheless.
Microsoft is to software what Budweiser is to beer.
You honestly don't see a major difference between pointing a gun (or sword) at someone, and handing someone a wad of cash?
Uhm, sorry for the double response, but this has been bugging me, and I couldn't figure out why.
Then I realized, you think that everyone has an opportunity.
Do you know why the unemployment rate is so important? It's a sign of national economic health. It's not an indicator of how many lazy people there are-- it's an indicator of how many people are not being offered a wad of cash, no matter how small a wad it might be. It's a sign of how many people who wish to work, can't.
Now, there are also a *large* number of people who are handed a wad of cash in exchange for work, but that wad is too small to provide anything but bare-minimum subsistence, if that. This number isn't included in unemployment, and so is harder to track, but we do that with the number of people living below the poverty line. About 12% to 17% (depending on if you subscribe to US or UN definitions of "poverty line") currently live below the poverty line.
So my question is this: why are people so unemployed, or living below the poverty line? Do they like it like that? Are they not working hard? Have they just made bad choices in their life?
In any case, it doesn't matter. These people are either unemployed or not making a living wage. That means there either aren't enough jobs (for the unemployed) or the jobs that *are* available, don't pay a living wage. Since the unemployment rate varies due to economics, this rather proves *this isn't by choice.* These people did not *choose* to be unemployed, or to work for wages that can't really support them.
The fact is, the number of jobs that provide a living wage accounts for *no more than* 88% of the population. These are the jobs supported by the economy. And if you lived at the poverty line, I don't think you'd feel too comfortable knowing you were making a "living wage."
As I said in my original post, our current system doesn't involve getting a sword upside the head, and so it is an improvement in that way. Also, the standard of living is greater for a larger number of people. But that doesn't mean those at the bottom (greater than the 12%-17% living below the poverty line) aren't any less serfs, subject to the whims of the very rich. Even upper-middle-class workers are subject to the whims of the very rich-- witness the uncertainty over outsourcing, for instance. (Which I'm all for. It opens up the world economy to the US, though it has the unfortunately side-effect of making the ultra-rich ultra-richer.)
So, not everyone has opportunity. Not everyone is offered a wad of cash. Further, many who *are* offered a wad of cash, are offered a wad of cash smaller than needed to decently live on.
Microsoft is to software what Budweiser is to beer.
Oops, sorry, didn't meant to infringe on Abba's intellectal property. However, isn't it true that people used to say that you become an artist because you've got something inside that must get out, find and expression? Even if it means giving up the prospect of being wealthy? So what is all this about artists not wanting to produce music or whatever if they can't maximize their profits? To me it sounds like they aren't really artists.
Don't get me wrong - I'm all for paying artists decently, but I think it is fair to expect that they are actually real artists, not just production line text and song engineers. And I do object to paying over the odds into the pockects of rich, predatory corporations, who aren't in it for the money. Give me a true artist and I'll be willing to pay the normal, full CD price for downloading an album, if I know the money goes to the musician, not some greedy corporation.
As for the Iron Curtain: It may have been a device for oppressing the population in USSR, but it was used in the west to scare the population into submitting to an absurd, extreme capitalism that we would never have accepted if it wasn't for the Iron Curtain. Now that is is gone, those in power need something else: the so-called war on terror. They were never interested in freedom, but I think we knew that - the question is, when do we stop them?
Free Speech as in "free to agree with anything you say"?
___
No power in the 'verse can stop me
That first step is where you fall down hard.
What if you thought it was new but someone got there first? Shall we share it now?
Now, if you share your idea what have you lost that you didn't have before when we share it freely? Nothing.
So your point falls down twice.
To start a revolution you need the support of the masses. 'Piratpartiet' got 0,63 % of the national votes last election (2006).
Break the sound barrier - bring the noise.
I believe many Americans are afraid to share (bittorrent or whatever) music, books, movies etc. Here in Sweden, nobody (at least not that I know of) is afraid of that. You'll never get cought. This is almost identical to actually removing copyright laws. However, Swedish writers are making very good money from their books, which sells extremely well (even in Sweden). The same goes for music artists or movie producers. Why, you might ask? Because a lot of people will still buy their books, songs, whatever.
In this world of ours, we have had libraries for centuries. This is essentially the same as removing copyright on books. It enables poor people (which we don't have many in Sweden, as opposed to the US where the differences in "financial freedom" is extreme) to read any amount of books they like, for free. You have had this opportunities in the US too, for centuries. Still, in Sweden, the US and everywhere in the world, people buy books.
People buy music. People buy movies. People go to concerts, and to the cinemas.
Allowing people to share any information (be it text [books], audio [music] or moving pictures [movies]) doesn't automatically make us go back to stone age. Quite the opposite. It will force artists into being even more creative in how they attract their audience.
I believe we can have a world completely without patents and copyrights. I'm absolutely certain that business will flourish as they always have. Copyright only makes it easy for (large) businesses to excercise oppression on citizens (RIAA, MPAA, BSA). It has, in real life, nothing to do with getting paid for what you do.
And quite frankly, I think it's pathetic that some frightened writers or song writers asks "how will I get paid?". I don't ask them how I will get paid. If I don't get paid, I change job. You can't make money out of your job? Change it. Surely a lot of intelligent artists will be able to make money off their work, without crying out in media "but how will I get paid??". That's really not my problem.
And, as I stated, they do get paid now, even though many people get their works for free (and have done, for centuries). Just remove the money sink aka "production companies", and the audience will pay the artist directly. They'll easily be rich (if that's what they want), if their work is appreciated.
I find that for every track I get for free from an artist, I tend to want to reward the artist fairly. This weekend just gone, I came across the CASH music site, linked to from Kristin Hersh's blog (http://www.throwingmusic.com/blog). I downloaded both the tracks she'd put up there, though "Hey, this is pretty good..." and decided to do the 3 dollar one-off donation that they ask for but don't force from you. Then as the tracks grew on me I thought "I could do with more of this..." so I went & bought her latest album from iTunes. The point being that for a lot of people, file-sharing is merely like a form of advertising, a free sample or loss-leader that gets the customer into the metaphorical showroom so they can buy more. Kristin's doing a great thing by releasing her work under a Creative Commons attributable, changeable share-alike license - people are free to remix it, mash it up, change the lyrics, cover it, do derivative artwork, sculpture or whatever, as long as they link back to their work & publish it under the same license. Her wish is that we regain the sort of musical communities we had back in the heyday of folk & blues, where a song remains after the artist has travelled elsewhere, & it takes on a local aspect, different chords, lyrics etc.
It's fun you mention Atanasoff. I just shows a trend that is even getting worse these days in the USA : Atanasoff was Bulgarian.
These day the tendency is even getting worse : more and more foreign brain go in the USA to obtain PhDs and other academic achievement, whereas the US government is fucking-up it's own school system (see the "No More Teaching Evolution" fiasco mentioned on
It's really sad when a country with so much academical achievement has to count on foreigner for them as it is completely unable to supply its own brains for it.
And also, to go back to the grand parent poster I may, add
CERN (Geneva, Switzerland) - designers of the WWW, the internet as Joe-6 pack knows it.
Yes, of course it's a question of which layer you're speaking about, as the infrastructure on which the web runs does predate it with Arpanet, but the data exchange system that most of the people use today (yeah, that and MSN & Bittorrent protocols) and that actually brought internet to the masses was developed here in Switzerland.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
no text
There is something symptomatic in the appearance of an "issue" (one issue, or a set of issues in one area) parties like Pirate party or Green party. It seems that they won't be able to play a leading role in the society, only as a "constructive" (or not) opposition influencing the decisions of more traditional ruling parties. I think it would be more honest to call those parties what they are: lobby parties or party lobbies - lobbies that created their own parties.
I am sure this idea could be continued further to understand why should we or should not vote for such parties, support them, etc...
May be lobbies and parliaments should be separated, giving space in those elected bodies for representatives of the people, not groups.
I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.
my my my resorting to a personal attack
it's all that is left to you when you are looking at what is right and proper and you can't admit it to yourself
Falkvinge's definition of fascism is an interesting one - it makes Hong Kong probably the most fascist state in history, far more than Nazi Germany.
Interesting as well that he believes it is possible to have a fascist state without a curtailment of civil liberties - perhaps he's referring to California Uber Alles?
Does anyone care to speculate which "lexicon" he got this definition from?
After Rick's talk at Google entitled "Copyright Regime vs. Civil Liberties", you can read "Copyright 2007 Google, Inc. All rights reserved. Other uses, either in whole or part, are strictly prohibited without express permisson of the copyright owner."
Great talk by the way. Worth looking at.
Welcome to DeusEx AGE.
Wanting to abolish copyright law in favour of all arts being state-funded is just a misguided pipe-dream.
It doesn't even sound very dreamy to me. It's basically another flavour of socialism, which would inevitably suffer from the same major problem of any socialist policy: when you start redistributing the wealth via government enforcement, you hurt those who are successful and benefit those who are not, thus reducing (or, taken to the logical extreme, outright removing) any incentive to be successful. In this context, being successful pretty much means making works that people want. Why bother with niceties like making your product better when you're going to get paid the same anyway?
The only alternative to blanket state funding is some sort of on-merit scheme, as you get with things like research grants in some places today. But then who decides what is meritorious and what is meretricious? I know I wouldn't want either pop culture or highbrow critics deciding on what I was going to get to watch/read/listen to!
We have market economics for a reason. It's not perfect, but it's a pretty good way of finding what people want. And the thing about copyright, which none of the alternative approaches often suggested around here can match, is that it effectively allows the costs of an expensive but good product to be shared between many people, each of whom may enjoy the benefit of that work for a much smaller cost. If something costs more to make, then in order to return a profit it requires either more people to benefit from it, or that people perceive a greater benefit and so are willing to pay more for it. Isn't a system that rewards making works with wider and/or stronger appeal a good thing?
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
" ... because he's really trying to articulate the possibilities for new business and political models that the Internet presents us with "
... that's it!
1) Get bought by Google or Yahoo!
2) er...
3)
And a happy 1995 to you too. You're a funny guy...
"How perfectly Goddamn delightful it all is, to be sure" Charles Crumb
"The likelihood of a catastrophic global nuclear conflagration has gone down over the last 50 years."
No. It is only a matter of time until nuclear weapons find their way into terrorist hands. Think of a bomb smuggled into New York or LA, detonated, with no one claiming responsibility.
"Perhaps if you studied the history of systematic racism and sexism in Europe and America, you might recognize why equality of opportunity still doesn't exist in those places."
Equality of opportunity exists nowhere on this planet. Nice of you to single out Europe and America though. You betray your own bigotry there.
"America also has a far more sophisticated understanding of religious tolerance than Europe"
Anti-religious intolerance is everywhere. No place is more "sophisticated" than any other regarding this.
"why is it that Western Europe is having such a difficult time integrating Muslim immigrants?"
Take a look at your own borders. And don't you know that "integrating" immigrants is "racist"? Why should their languages and culture have to give way to yours?
"women that act like men"
Haven't you heard of the term, "Female Chauvinist Pig"? I'll bet you've heard of "Male Chauvinist Pig" though. Ask yourself, why the double standard.
"When Shrub was elected the first time, half the country voted against him. When he was elected the second time, a slightly smaller percentage, but still almost half the voting public voted against him. Domestic opposition to this most pathetic American government has been loud and angry."
Your point? You merely illustrate that you are a member of the whining minority refered to in the OP.
"The last seven years have been terribly divisive times in America. With any luck, this time around we'll elect a much more capable president, and we'll start restoring our reputation around the world."
Ah, now we know. A dumbocrap spouting propaganda. FYI, the president is only one factor among many regarding how American policy is set.
"Here's a tip: The next time you go ranting about hypocrisy, examine your own hypocrisy first."
Likewise. Also, your thinking is not precise. Review all the factors that go into an issue. Not just the usual bogeymen trotted out by the MSM.
If books become more prone to "thievery", publishers will recoup costs by increasing the amount of advertisements per copy. Paperbacks already host a slew of ads for other books by the same publisher. I'm sure that we can soon look forward to more product placement and ad-inserts, particularly in pop-lit.
So some people have found a way to make a profit by competing with free, but you can't? Furthermore, they are making a profit off of a "pittance." So at the low end, you should be able to make money, what about at the high end? Without copyright it wouldn't be possible to make quality large-scale films? Have you heard of a country called China that is famous for neglecting copyright laws? Have you seen any of their blockbuster movies from the last 20 years? They have huge resources poured into these films, some good, some bad just like hollywood. They keep coming out too, despite the fact that pirates sell knock-offs for a pittance. Mainland China also has a new generation of film-makers who are underground. They command none of these resources and are facing persecution by the government, yet they are still making award-winning films.
I think the real problem is that you are afraid. You are afraid of adapting to a new environment, and you are not alone. Most people are afraid of change, but you are the one that will lose when you "stop producing." So go ahead, quit. It will be easier than adapting your skills and talents to an environment where distribution is no longer an economic factor.
"how can they call it a MINE if everything here is THEIRS?!?!" -Straight Jacket
I used to think like this guy, but I changed.
It's simply not ours to decide for what reason anyone should be in the business. If they are in it for the sake of art, so be it. If they are in it to earn a living and maybe, just maybe a family with kids, who are we to think they shouldn't be in it? Who are we to decide they should work for free? Who are we to slap away the only weapon they got in this digital age, and be it DRM?
If you have to work for a living, you just have to ask yourself on whether it's the right of the community to decide that you should be in it for free. Than ask the same question to the musician, artist, whatever. Same answer? I suppose.
And if you dare to answer different, that music and art should be free but your work should not be, all I got to say to you is that you can hardly say to value art the way you should do. Fortunately, society answers differently.
I've seen this exact rant pasted before. Please just let this crap die and stop modding it up.
imagine i was at concert and told you what i saw?
do i need to pay to someone for that?
imagine i was at concert and just have sung to you what i heard at concert (just another way of telling you what i saw)?
do i need to pay to someone for that?
imagine i was at concert and i'm such a great singer i did it even better than the original singer?
imagine i was at concert and was also able to show you dancing which i saw?
imagine i was at concert and was better in both singing and dancing later on when trying to say to you how much i liked it?
imagine i was so good in that that you called some of your friends to join us to see how good i am?
imagine some of your friends invited even more friends?
imagine i didn't know all of the people which appeared there?
do i need to pay to someone for that?
imagine i'm quite bad in both singing and dancing?
what's the fucking difference?
fuck copyright.
Anyway, all I have to say is that artists will get paid. It'll happen. The market will change, the way information spreads will change, the way the various forms of art and how it's made will change, and the way art is spread will change. Artists will get paid. It may not be a fair pay, it could be many times better or many times worse. Artists will get paid.
Throughout history artists have created and have received some sort of payment in some way. I'm sure that the cave painters of prehistory got a sizable amount of berries for creating artwork on the cave walls. And even if they didn't get paid for it, they still did it. That's a key point to being an artist. You may end up toiling in obscurity, creating images only you will see, but if you love doing it, you'll never stop.
The artists of Greece and Rome received commissions to sculpt and paint the various gods in the various pantheons in existence at the time. I would assume some sort of payment was received for those works. Even if they didn't get a cash or store credit, they created the works just the same. Renaissance artists had only two clients, the king and the church. They got paid. They got to paint portraits of the nobility, portraits of Popes, the ceilings of chapels, vast landscapes, stunning Religious battles and triumphs.
In the early 1900s there were these two large wars, you may have heard of them, World War I and World War II. Artists made propaganda posters related to the war. But also, anti-war demonstrators had their posters and pamphlets, as well. Not to mention, there were still heavy demands for domestic publications, most (if not all) used Illustration, as photography still hadn't matured yet. So, for better or worse, artists still got paid. After the wars, the major commissioners of Illustration were magazines. That's how Norman Rockwell made a living. He got paid from magazine Illustration (covers of the Saturday Evening Post, mainly). There used to be a market for movie posters, as well. Look at films throughout the mid 1900s into the 1980s, most movie posters were painted.
Here's the point I'm trying to make. The king and the church, magazine publications, propaganda posters, movie posters, they're all gone. None of them are viable means to make a living as an artist anymore. Sure, there are still a few artists who make a living off of them, but it's very few, you can count the number of artists on one hand. The point is that the source of money for artistic people has always changed, and will continue to change. Just because there's file sharing and the Internet, where people can get these things for free, doesn't mean artists won't get paid. Most people just make the assumption that this is the way it is, was, and ever will be, and it's not. With several large corporations holding all the cards, deciding who gets paid, who doesn't, and decided whether or not to sue someone who turned their mascot into a piece of art composed of cans of poo.
I don't know what the next big wave of artistic revenue is going to be, but artist will get paid. For example, I have all of my personal artwork on the Internet. I haven't received a dime for it. No one buys the prints, no one clicks the ads on my Blog (http://www.wolflog.com/), but I don't really care. I'm creating the artwork because I enjoy it. I receive small commissions here-and-there and that's it. It's not glamorous...and my name will probably never be noticed in the art world, but I don't really care.
So, as an artist ignored by companies, who doesn't receive a huge cash influx from them. I say, screw the bastards. Maybe then, when the next form of payment for artists comes around, I'll actually receive some green.
OK, I know you're joking and all, but here's why it'll never happen. Given that even far right-wing politicians here support universal health care, the reason Canada will never get statehood, (no matter what happens with quebec separatism) because the GOP will never allow a new state to join the union that will be guaranteed to send two democrats to the senate, forever, or at least until the heat death of the universe.
(same thing goes for PR as well...)
The plural form of "anecdote" is "anecdotes", not "evidence".
Let me ask you the same question that I ask anybody who asserts that position:
Given that, in economics, something only has value if it has scarcity and utility, how do we make sense of a situation where the marginal cost of production approaches zero? If your software/movie/album that I'm about to buy costs you effectively zero to produce another copy of it, what should be the appropriate price?
I'm not saying this to troll or pick a fight, I really am curious as to what copyright
Personally, the only way I see out of this mess is a statutory license. An extra charge per month on your ISP bill, distributed to artists, using the royalty system for radio airplay as a guide/model. As far as I can see, the only alternative is to allow a truly draconian intrusion into all of my internet traffic...
The plural form of "anecdote" is "anecdotes", not "evidence".
So yes, copyleft would not exist without copyright, but copyleft would be much less needed without copyright as well.
En riktig idiot, tjock som en tysk korv, full som fan, en liten skit tjuvjävel.
As much as I don't admonish the subject line (I'm biased for women of any nationality) the OP was correct, if not a bit rude, to state that American's did not invent these things.
For example, Germans are greatly responsible for inventing the automobile, not the US or the UK. http://inventors.about.com/library/inventors/blcar.htm
America's contribution was mostly in assembly and manufacture (sounds like US-China today....something to consider from a historical perspective) as Henry Ford was so well recognized for.
I could go on with the other examples, but I think I've got enough cannon fodder for you folks. The Internet I have to give to the US however since ARPA funded it, and Gore commercialized it. However we can still see the problems with such a singular approach to its development.Jeruvy
"Apparently piratebay has finally figured out a way to determine harm when it comes to digital goods were no one else has."
Pirate Party != Pirate Bay
Nobody gets fooled this badly, unless they WANT to be fooled. Unless they're TOO WEAK to face the truth.
We've been reaping our foul harvest, no doubt about it. Laziness breeds laziness. Indifference breeds indifference. It's only when our slot gets us in serious trouble that we face up to our problems. The sad part is that the rest of the world has to pay for it, too.
Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ
You didn't read closely. One bomb does not make a catastrophic global nuclear conflagration.
The focus of your (I assume it's you, but I'm not sure because both you and the original poster are ACs) initial discussion was on America, and I brought in Europe by way of comparison. By using two cultures as points of comparison, I may be betraying bias, but not bigotry. if I were a Brazilian having a discussion about racism I'd likely talk about the racism and sexism I see in my own country. I wouldn't be bigoted in doing so.
I see. So the level of religious intolerance is the same across the globe. Although the United States has enshrined religious freedom in its constitution, and has a long tradition of diverse religions, the U.S. is no more tolerant of religion than China. And although Hindus and Muslims have been killing each other on the Indian subcontinent for decades, they're no less tolerant of religious differences than Singaporeans. I guess I'm just missing the obvious.
Nice deflection. I was talking about religion. Integrating immigrants into a society economically, while not attempting to strip them of their religious beliefs is not racist. Besides, I don't have a problem with people speaking Spanish or French or Swahili inside the U.S. and keeping their own cultural traditions. Spend any amount of time in the the southwestern United States? It's a quite different culture from the American midwest or east coast.
I still don't really understand what you mean by "women that act like men." Besides, why do you care what women act like? Do you have a great deal of concern about how other men act? Do you seriously think of yourself as a victim of some sort of assault on male rights? You can't honestly believe that men don't still call the shots pretty much everywhere and in pretty much all the things that matter.
Ah, I see. You'd have been out on the streets throwing bombs. You're disgusted that there wasn't armed revolution here in America when Bush won a second time. I guess the wheels of representative democracy move too slowly for some, but the violent overthrow of governments is overrated, too.
Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ
At a guess, I'd say the difference has nothing to with anyone's "sophisticated understanding" of anything.
I agree. But I do think that the American legal, political and social tradition is more sophisticated than Europe's, because the American tradition of religious tolerance stemmed from the desire of so many early American emigrants to escape persecution in Europe.
I also agree that large minorities tend to segregate. But the point remains that there is something about European societies that makes it more difficult for Muslims in Europe to "fit in" with the larger society while maintaining their religious traditions. The isolation you speak of is a two-way street, no doubt. But America has had more than two centuries of experience folding new religions into the national fabric, while wars over religion are still bubbling in Europe.
Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ