White House Responds To SOPA, PIPA, and OPEN

eefsee writes "The White House today responded to two petitions with a statement titled 'Combating Online Piracy while Protecting an Open and Innovative Internet.' They note that 'We must avoid creating new cybersecurity risks or disrupting the underlying architecture of the Internet.' In particular, they cite manipulation of DNS as problematic. But overall the statement is clearly supportive of anti-piracy efforts and lays down this challenge: 'So, rather than just look at how legislation can be stopped, ask yourself: Where do we go from here? Don't limit your opinion to what's the wrong thing to do, ask yourself what's right.' So, what's right?"

Comments

Protecting rights

[bonch]

But overall the statement is clearly supportive of anti-piracy efforts...

There's nothing wrong with being supportive of anti-piracy efforts. People deserve to get paid for their work. Those efforts, however, shouldn't undermine technological infrastructure. The White House's statement is overall a condemnation of the legislation, but it does allow leeway for Obama to sign an amended bill that addresses the most pressing concerns.

Given past positions, it will be interesting to see how Slashdotters respond to the question in the submission. Allow me to quote from a recent comment in a GPL discussion:

It annoys the minority of businesses who feel entitled to the free labor of strangers and don't want to give anything back. You see, some people are childish and the most visible mark of childishness is a sense of entitlement. This causes them to feel somehow cheated if you place a few conditions on code that is otherwise free, that no one is forcing them to use if the conditions don't suit them.

The comment was modded up. When it's a case of a GPL violation, the violators who feel entitled to the free labor of strangers are childish and entitled. But in an article on the Pirate Bay, suddenly it's all about demonizing the evil RIAA and MPAA, and piracy is just a cultural revolution that sticks it to the evil corporations--the artists who aren't getting paid don't even enter into the discussion, probably because of the guilty feelings it would inspire to be reminded of the reality of the situation.

The point being that there probably should be an attempt made to hinder online piracy in some way. We can't just let it spiral completely out of control, to the point where it's no longer lucrative to produce anything. Part of the reason the console platform became so appealing to game developers is the reduced amount of piracy compared to the PC platform. In other words, they can actually make money from their work, money that is used to make more games. You can't have a functioning long-term economy in which people never get compensated for anything; people are trying to make a living, and they use the income to produce more contributions to society. If your boss withheld your paycheck and told you that the code you wrote is now theirs free of charge because "information wants to be free," you'd sue for the wages and win. But if the code you wrote is included in a game, and the game appears on Pirate Bay, downloaders will happily pirate it and never even dream of spending a time, and they'll justify it until they're red in the face.

The most common one they use is that it's "free advertising"--that pirating games leads them to purchase games. Correlation doesn't equal causation, however, and the fact they buy games as well as pirate them simply suggests that they like games so much that they acquire them by any means possible, and when they can't pirate, they buy. Either that, or they buy to resolve their feelings of guilt. When Louis CK offered his video for download, he made an interesting comment in an NPR interview:

"And a friend of mine who does torrent stuff a lot says that when torrent users do buy something, they act like they're doing the greatest thing ever. ... They're saying, 'I bought something today. I paid for it. And I didn't steal it. I'm the greatest person alive.' "

I've noticed this attitude as well. It's very, very annoying.

I'm probably risking a lot of downmods here--if there's anything Slashdot seems to dislike more than comments about Slashdot, it's comments that are anti-piracy. But I have karma to burn, and I felt like starting the conversation anyway.

Re:Protecting rights

[rtfa-troll]

When it's a case of a GPL violation, the violators who feel entitled to the free labor of strangers are childish and entitled.

The reason for the existence of copyright owners is to increase the pool of work available to the public (see; e.g. the US constitution). Copyright exists because it is believed that without it people would create fewer works and that would limit the benefit to the public. GPL authors are directly, though their license, putting out works which the public can use for free and with no usage restriction and copying and distribution restrictions limited only to a lack of restriction. You cannot make a direct comparison.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

You are not comparing like transgressions. Many of the anti-RIAA/MPAA posters that you cite would also agree that selling copies of illegal software, or using them in a business environment, is not okay (which would be the equivalent of a business using GPL code). It's only mildly less dishonest than calling piracy "theft", and it will continue getting you in arguments with people with whom you might otherwise find common ground.

Re:Protecting rights

[darpified]

Part of the reason the console platform became so appealing to game developers is the reduced amount of piracy compared to the PC platform. In other words, they can actually make money from their work, money that is used to make more games

So EA, Activision, Ubisoft, etc... Never made any money off of PC games so far? Not that I condone or give a shit either way as far as piracy is concerned, I do give a shit when half-cocked laws created by corporations and their pet politicians are enacted that are to the detriment of the nation. Sure online piracy is bad and could possibly hurt the profit margins of these companies, but this law is so far on the other side of sanity that it's obscene. The middle ground is where it needs to be, but that point was crossed long ago, back before Mickey Mouse (and the associated copyrights,trademarks, yada-yada) became effectively permanent.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

-the artists who aren't getting paid don't even enter into the discussion

You're right, they should be a part of the discussion, but not in the way you imply. Artists get paid next to nothing by those greedy bastards and piracy does next to nothing to hurt their non-existent paycheck.

The real question here is not how to stop piracy, but how to make the payed-for product more desirable. The game has changed and so must the strategies involved.

Re:Protecting rights

[metrix007]

There is overwhelming evidence to show that piracy leads to an increase in sales. It doesn't make sense to dispute that anymore.

Given that taking copies doesn't cost anyone anything nor deprive anything from anyone, yet can lead to further contributions to society, it only makes sense.

Instead of being greedy and focusing on piracy which is ultimately a good thing which is also inevitable, why not focus on healthcare or something useful?

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

But in an article on the Pirate Bay, suddenly it's all about demonizing the evil RIAA and MPAA, and piracy is just a cultural revolution that sticks it to the evil corporations--the artists who aren't getting paid don't even enter into the discussion, probably because of the guilty feelings it would inspire to be reminded of the reality of the situation.

I think you will find that if the artists were getting paid properly for their efforts and so much of the money wasn't going to line the pockets of middlemen, there wouldn't be nearly as much "demonizing".

It also doesn't help that those middlemen are stretching the law to its limits in an attempt to extort even more money from people (private copying levy, law suits, threats, paying off governments for new laws, etc).

The media world is changing and a lot of new artists are now finding that having their work copied is actually helping them in the long run. The artists get better and cheaper publicity (word of mouth) and more money (by bypassing the media companies that try and dictate what the customers should buy) and we all get a richer experience and greater variety in entertainment.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

You typed all of that in one minute?

IMHO it's a generation thing. There are people, like me, who will never ever pay for recorded entertainment again. We're jaded. From more than a decade of seeing what is technically possible and still having to jump through hoops to get everything working, only to be told that format shifting is illegal, we've learned that the music and movie industries as they are must die to make way for the future. Younger people, who've grown up with music readily and legally available online, are much more open to paying for recorded entertainment. If the industry doesn't screw up their game with them, they're all set. Us oldtimers will be just another bump in the road. It's not like the RIAA is inexperienced: They've seen the sky fall many times, and they've always survived the copying bastards who were about to kill music. They never needed draconian laws or unbreakable copy protection in order to survive, and they don't need them now. So that's my answer: Stop focusing on the people who copy. They are, we are, a lost cause. You've thoroughly driven us away. Instead focus on the people who will pay you for the convenience. Leave the law alone. If you focus on the wrong people and on stopping them from doing what we'll do anyway, you'll lose customers (not us; the paying people) and breed enemies, even among the paying people.

I for one have found enough ways to get my fix legally, and I'm still not paying. Block the Pirate Bay, make the Internet a legal minefield, turn your customers against you: I STILL won't pay you, but you're salting the earth where you should be sowing instead.

Re:Protecting rights

[trout007]

The problem is that "intellectual property" is not property and should not be afforded any property rights protections. It seems this government is much more interesting in protecting IP rights than real property rights. They don't have a problem going all over the world punishing people for violating drug patent rights but at the same time violating the real property rights of the people in New London to steal their real property and transfer it to Pfizer.

The basic reason there are property rights is because property is scarce. If you take my car I don't have a car. Simple. The concept of IP is so confusing for so many people is because IP is not scarce. I can have an idea and share it and yet I don't lose the idea. Also the enforcement of IP rights always violates people's real property rights. The laws punishes me for using my computer (real property) for copying someones IP. So to enforce this it means the person with the IP owns some part of me and my computer to prevent me from using it.

The IP laws have to go the way of slavery. Companies and people have to compete in the marketplace with real products not imaginary ones.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

There's nothing wrong with being supportive of anti-piracy efforts. People deserve to get paid for their work.

No they don't. Not without an agreement/contract.

Re:Protecting rights

[tepples]

Part of the reason the console platform became so appealing to game developers is the reduced amount of piracy compared to the PC platform.

And the other part is that consoles are generally plugged into much bigger monitors than PCs. The general public, composed of people who aren't geeks, is thought to be unwilling to plug a PC into a television even if it means they'll get Hulu for free and a bigger selection of games from indie developers.

Re:Protecting rights

[bky1701]

"The comment was modded up. When it's a case of a GPL violation, the violators who feel entitled to the free labor of strangers are childish and entitled."

What is good for the goose is good for the gander. If Apple (used as an example only) rips off some piece of Linux and then slaps DRM on it and sells it as part of their mono-culture protected by lawsuits and patent trolling, then they ARE "childish and entitled," even if you oppose copyright. They are childish and entitled by their own standards, if not by some higher concept of consistency. What you'll never see on slashdot is a story about GPL-using developers suing BSD developers for copying parts of code over in a way that is maybe not 100% kosher, which is a much more comparable situation to what the copyright industry engages in daily.

Re:Protecting rights

[iluvcapra]

People deserve to get paid for their work. Those efforts, however, shouldn't undermine technological infrastructure.

Why is the technological infrastructure, or rather, a particular group of people's vision for how the infrastructure should work, more important than people getting paid for their work? The important point is that you have a right to stop people making a copy of your work, at least the law the way it is now, but you don't have a right to expect the Internet to work a particular way. Your assertion basically is that an enumerated, Article 1 power of the United States Congress should be enforceable as long as it doesn't conflict with RFC 1034. Where does that rule come from exactly?

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

I never thought about it in these terms, thanks.

Re:Protecting rights

[Pieroxy]

The point being that there probably should be an attempt made to hinder online piracy in some way. We can't just let it spiral completely out of control, to the point where it's no longer lucrative to produce anything.

You see, the problem with copyright supporters is that they believe this to be true. I don't think it will. I know plenty of people buying their music from Amazon or iTunes. And they are tecchies. It's just more convenient. It took them 10 years, but they made something easier that pirating.

And this is the key point. Because nobody is going to stop piracy. It is crazy to think so. Because stopping piracy means stopping privacy. Because pirating is just communicating.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

Enjoy your downmod. Not because I agree or disagree or care but because you have karma to burn.

Re:Protecting rights

[Trails]

The problem with the RIAA and MPAA is that their terms aren't reasonable. These two organizations and their member orgs have been dragged kicking and screaming into the new millennium. Their failure to offer reasonably priced compelling legitimate options is what makes the piracy faction so large and so gleeful.

You know what kills piracy? Netflix and Spotify, not SOPA.

Re:Protecting rights

[betterunixthanunix]

There's nothing wrong with being supportive of anti-piracy efforts

I'll bite. I see the following issues:

1. "Piracy" is not limited to any single activity. An industrial operation that pumps out trademark or copyright infringing goods is very much different from a peer to peer network. Trademark, patent, and copyright laws were only ever meant to be regulations on industry, and we should continue to treat them as regulations on industry.
2. The Internet makes it hard to define an international border. In some countries, software patents are not recognized; what if I happen to run a server in such a country, ssh to the server and use the patent-infringing software remotely? Other countries might not recognize trademarks, copyrights, etc.; if we are talking about things that are not physical goods, can we really claim that someone is "importing" infringing goods by downloading those goods over the Internet?
3. Propping up a dead industry is not a good thing. Does the recording industry really make sense anymore? Should we be expending law enforcement resources to keep the RIAA afloat?
4. No business should be shut down, and no property should be seized, without some judicial process -- this is fundamental to American rights, and outweighs any copyright, trademark, patent or trade secrets rights. Yet the rate with which things can change on the Internet would overwhelm the judicial system.

Just my 2Â.

Re:Protecting rights

[wonkavader]

Given past positions, it will be interesting to see how Slashdotters respond to the question in the submission.

How about "stop making excuses and lead you do-nothing poser?" He could trivially bring in tech leaders and ask them. He could guide some legislation. He could take a stronger hand in the FCC. He could denounce this for what it is, as a massive example of corruption in politics. He could take the advice of any number of well-regarded pundits on the topic and do something, and instead his staff says, "Golly, what should we do? You tell us! Send us 100,000 emails, and we'll read EACH ONE!"

Instead of bread and circuses, we just get circuses.

Re:Protecting rights

[Asic Eng]

Trying to fix this via piracy prevention seems just hopeless as well as ethically dubious. We now have the technology for everyone in the world with an internet connection to access basically the entire wealth of human culture. I don't think there is ethical case to be made that this should be artificially restricted. The question we need to solve is not how we can maintain outdated business models under these circumstances, but how we can make that happen and still enable content creators to make a living.

One way might be to simply collect tips - people put money in the jar if they enjoyed the work. If that on it's own doesn't bring in sufficient funds, then the tip jar could be augmented with a culture flat rate. E.g. you pay a fixed amount every month for media consumption and the content producer additionally receives the tip jar multiplied by a certain factor. That would help to ensure that they get payed for stuff people actually want to see, not just for the pure amount of stuff produced. Also a nice side effect would be that it's not enough to trick people to see your content, they'd have to appreciate it, too. (Maybe that would put a stop to George Lucas? We can only hope.)

I'd also be fine with replacing the flat rate with an internet traffic tax - a kind of sales tax on the downstream data and funding content creation this way.

Anyway just some random thoughts on the topic, but certainly better thought out than SOPA.

Re:Protecting rights

[FlyingGuy]

Your missing the point and failing to understand why "punishment" exists int he first place. First of all lets all take the mindset the piracy of copyrighted work is "bad" so:

If I pirate on single copy of some work then would should be the consequence?

• Being made to pay the face value of the work?
• Being made to pay the face value of the work and some additional fine?

If I place a "pirated" copy of a copyrighted work on a publicly reachable server and then seed a torent site with pointers to said work then what should be the consequence?

• Being made to pay the face value of the work?
• Being made to pay the face value of the work and some additional fine?
• Since the work can be obtained by anyone and I don;t keep records of just how many time the work was downloaded should I be made to pay the face value of n copies of the work? Just how would you go about estimating n?
• Should the "punishment" be formulated to attempt to convince me from doing it again?

In the GPL world in which I am a contributor, I say you may freely use and distribute my work providing that:

• You do not remove my attribution ( my copyright notice under the general terms of GPL).
• You do not sell my work without my expressed written permission.
• You MUST return to me, the copyright holder, all code that changes my code so that I may decide to whether or not to include it in my original code.

If someone violates those conditions what should the consequences be?

Throughout time we have made agreements that dictate the norms of social behavior and we as a society have enforced those agreements with forms of, punishment, retribution, etc. Everything from the scarlet "A" to getting you right hand "removed" to killing the person. I think that for the most part in our modernity we have strove to use the threat of punishment as a deterrent to keep people from breaking those social contracts.

So the question is how do we as a society deter these sorts of violations and what kind of threat is sufficient enough to prevent anyone from doing it? Simply saying he "pirating" of copyrighted works is not against social norms will be rejected out of hand because in point of fact it is because someone worked hard to produce that work or funded its creating as an investment ad deserves the opportunity to realize a return for their investment and labor, if they so choose, without that opportunity being taken from them before the term of the protection from such taking has expired.

Re:Protecting rights

[iluvcapra]

It's important to distinguish between the two claims:

1. 1. Sustaining creative work by getting people to pay for electronic copies of things, without coercion, is a solvable engineering problem.
2. 2. People have a right to copy any and everything they please, to transmit those to whomever they please, without any kind of sanction, and this right has either no effect or a positive effect on the availability of new creative work.

Most people tend to agree with the first one at this point. People who make positive arguments against DMCA and SOPA tend to make them on the basis of the second point.

Re:Protecting rights

[TheRaven64]

People deserve to get paid for their work

No they don't. At least, not automatically. I've written a big chunk of open source software. Some of it I got paid for, because people found it valuable and paid me to write it. Some of it I did with no expectation of payment, and was not paid for. The work I was not paid for was often harder than the work that I did get paid for, but I don't intrinsically deserve to be paid for it just because it was work. If I dig a hole and then fill it in again, I don't deserve to be compensated, even though I've just done a big chunk of work, but if someone wants to burry something at the bottom of the hole then they would have an incentive to pay me to ensure that the hole is dug.

People who create things that other people consider valuable should be fairly compensated. That is not quite the same thing.

Re:Protecting rights

[Baloroth]

Part of the reason the console platform became so appealing to game developers is the reduced amount of piracy compared to the PC platform. In other words, they can actually make money from their work, money that is used to make more games. You can't have a functioning long-term economy in which people never get compensated for anything; people are trying to make a living, and they use the income to produce more contributions to society.If your boss withheld your paycheck and told you that the code you wrote is now theirs free of charge because "information wants to be free," you'd sue for the wages and win. But if the code you wrote is included in a game, and the game appears on Pirate Bay, downloaders will happily pirate it and never even dream of spending a time, and they'll justify it until they're red in the face.

And if I go out and pay $50-60 for a video game which crashes every 20-30 minutes, runs like shit on a PC that should be able to handle it easily, takes 2-3 minutes to boot up because it uses highly intrusive DRM that for some reason tries to phone home every single time it runs, and can't be installed more than three times even if the installer fucks up (which of course it often did), can I return it as defective product and get a full refund?

Hell no. BTW this isn't a theoretical example: that was almost my exact experience with Mass Effect (I didn't have installer issues, but many people did. It was also only $50, but many new games are $60). But the rest of it happened to me. I swore then that that would be the last game I bought without looking at the DRM system it used, and I have skipped several games entirely because they used Tages or some other crap. I didn't even consider buying Starcraft 2 (although I also wasn't particularly excited for it), much less any of the new Assassin's Creed games (actually, I won't touch any Ubisoft games anymore and rejoiced when they said they would stop making PC games). I also might not buy Diablo 3 (although that is still in the air). PC gamers got sick of that shit, so they turned to piracy which gave far, far better experiences. The result was idiot game developers turning to ever more restrictive DRM until PC gamers simply stopped buying their games (again, Ubisoft).

Game makers that don't do that make still make tons of money: hell, Oblivion had zero copy protection: literally, you could make an ISO of the disc, burn it, and it would work fine. Fallout 3 technically had Securom, but only on the installer: the executable didn't require it. And Skyrim just has Steamworks, which it is pretty easy to pirate, but the game still sold like crazy on Steam (still has 94,000 players ATM despite being released 2 months ago), and despite costing $60 dollars (which I would balk at if it was almost any other game). Why? Because they made a damn good game which was worth buying.

Indie game makes often have zero copy protection. Hell, any Humble Bundle game can be downloaded directly from their site with the tiniest effort. Yet they make money. How? Because they make good games and price them properly and don't put shitty DRM on it. Any game maker could do this: instead, they keep shoveling out bucketloads of expensive shit (like Call of Duty) and then wonder why PC gamers keep pirating it instead of paying for it.

And yes, I do pay for my games now that I have a job: bought tons during the Christmas Steam sale.

This is also why I don't buy almost any modern music: it just isn't worth it. Wouldn't even be worth the bandwidth to torrent. I will still buy albums I like, but that is incredibly rare.

Re:Protecting rights

[Lumpy]

We have plenty of already effective laws on the books, anyone supporting MORE laws are plain old nuts.

Sorry, I will NOT support more draconian zero effort laws to protect I.P.

Re:Protecting rights

[Hatta]

There's nothing wrong with being supportive of anti-piracy efforts. People deserve to get paid for their work.

This is a non-sequitur. People deserve to get paid for their work, but anti-piracy efforts do nothing to help people get paid. People who pirate spend more on media than people who don't. Cracking down on pirates isn't going to give them any more expendable income to spend on media. Piracy and entertainment industry profits are both at all time highs. Your entire post is based on fiction.

Re:Protecting rights

[khallow]

When Louis CK offered his video for download, he made an interesting comment in an NPR interview:

"And a friend of mine who does torrent stuff a lot says that when torrent users do buy something, they act like they're doing the greatest thing ever. ... They're saying, 'I bought something today. I paid for it. And I didn't steal it. I'm the greatest person alive.' "

I've noticed this attitude as well. It's very, very annoying.

Not for the torrent user, it isn't. And it is worth noting that the torrent user is doing the greatest thing for the content provider, he is buying that person's stuff.

Re:Protecting rights

[StripedCow]

We can't just let it spiral completely out of control, to the point where it's no longer lucrative to produce anything.

True. But we should, imho, focus on protecting intelligent work, not casual entertainment.

It happens to be the case that intelligent work, such as software, is much easier to protect than movies and music, simply because the latter two you can record and replay. (Yes, I'm aware of software piracy, but there is still a lot that can be done about that if you really want to).

Now you're saying: but what if I write an educational book? Well, it can be argued that educational work should be free (there are many free initiatives), OR you could make your work interactive (hence not easy to copy). Or put it behind a paywall, with additional benefits for paying customers, like commenting and updates.

Another way would be the crowdsourcing model: you bring your new music/movie/book/whatever into the open ONLY after a sufficient amount of money has been raised.

These are just a few options. Let us not limit our views too easily.

Re:Protecting rights

[vux984]

the artists who aren't getting paid don't even enter into the discussion, probably because of the guilty feelings it would inspire to be reminded of the reality of the situation.

No, the artists aren't entering the discussion about getting paid because they aren't getting paid either way. Go ahead, buy the CD... the artist still doesn't get paid.

If your boss withheld your paycheck and told you that the code you wrote is now theirs free of charge because "information wants to be free," you'd sue for the wages and win. But if the code you wrote is included in a game, and the game appears on Pirate Bay, downloaders will happily pirate it and never even dream of spending a time, and they'll justify it until they're red in the face.

That's because my boss and i have this employment contract. They stop paying me, i stop writing code, its that simple.

If that code is included on something on the pirate bay, i don't really care, because I was smart enough to get paid. My business model is to get paid for writing the code, not paid for copies of it.

The business model of selling "copies" is stupid in the digital era. Find another business model. Live performances... sponsors... whatever. Make movies that can break even in theatres...put them on netflix... hell... run a free legit torrent site, and then charge for premium memberships ... people will pay if there is a real value add. But its got to be a value add and not simply "less crippled". They might not pay as much as they used to for DVDs but so what... online streaming doesn't cost as much as manufacturing, transporting, warehousing, and retailing DVDs either... so it shouldn't need to.

Re:Protecting rights

[cheekyjohnson]

The comment was modded up. When it's a case of a GPL violation, the violators who feel entitled to the free labor of strangers are childish and entitled. But in an article on the Pirate Bay, suddenly it's all about demonizing the evil RIAA and MPAA, and piracy is just a cultural revolution that sticks it to the evil corporations--the artists who aren't getting paid don't even enter into the discussion, probably because of the guilty feelings it would inspire to be reminded of the reality of the situation.

Maybe it isn't the same people?

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

What's astonishing to me is that you are equating the rights of original GPL authors to the rights of middlemen corporate organizations who not only didn't create the material that is most being pirated, but who work their tails off to be sure that they get the profits rather than the original authors.

Let's be very clear about one thing with regards to all legislation in the past 15 years regarding copyrights stuff: It's all about protecting corporate profits and not at all about protecting individuals, so don't go talking about them as if they're the same thing.

Re:Protecting rights

[teg]

There is overwhelming evidence to show that piracy leads to an increase in sales. It doesn't make sense to dispute that anymore.

Given that taking copies doesn't cost anyone anything nor deprive anything from anyone, yet can lead to further contributions to society, it only makes sense.

Actually, if you look at the trends in music sales since mp3/napster arrived I'd say that on a macro level you have a very good case that piracy decreases sales. Also, if you look at the sales of top albums now vs. 10-20 years ago they have decreased significantly.

Sure, you could argue that this is because Britney and the gangsta rap-act of the week aren't as compelling as the high quality music made in earlier decades - but most of the content then was junk as well. We just happen to remember the good ones.

This doesn't mean that the music industry has acted sanely - their legal tactics are dubious, some of the suggested cures (like SOPA, and others before it) are much worse than disease and their "damages" are insane. And it has taken them a decade to go kicking and screaming into the future, with streaming music like spotify. But none of this means that piracy is good, and that a lot of people have downloaded music they would have paid for otherwise - alongside at lot of music they wouldn't have given second look, much less their cash.

It also doesn't mean that there aren't many artists who have used to their advantage - e.g. to get publicity - but overall it looks like a net loss. A big one.

Re:Protecting rights

[symbolset]

Bonch is, like me, a slashdot subscriber. You can tell this by the little * next to our UIDs. In return for paying (ridiculously cheap) membership fees to slashdot we get a few bonus features. Among these are the ability to read back any poster's entire comment history, to turn off advertisements, and to see articles a few minutes before they're posted without scanning the Firehose for them.

For me to agree with something Bonch has to say is exceedingly rare. But in this specific case he's got plenty of time to prepare any comment he likes and get it posted first, as do I. I'm guilty of calling copypasta now and then too on AC and new accounts, though I'm trying to get away from that as it doesn't add to the discussion more than it takes away. But the * makes calling copypasta totally inappropriate.

I've not been a fan of stealing content, but I'm coming around to that point of view. Copyright is a social contract where creators get something (a monopoly) in return for something (the improvement of the public domain when the monopoly expires). They're using the corruption of law to get their something without paying the something by preventing the expiration of the monopoly. Complying with this encourages corruption of law. So in the interest of good citizenship until they restore the balance of getting something in return for something, violating copyright isn't a sin: it's your civic duty.

The President is a Constitutional scholar, and it doesn't surprise me that he would come out against these bills that violate our freedoms of speech and due process. I wish I wasn't so cynical that I thought the popular uprising had more to do with it than his skills and experience, his good citizenship.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

People deserve to get paid for their work.

See, it's this kind of unqualified stupidity that poses as reason that is responsible for a lot of the silliness in the debate. I am typing this response, and a handful of people are going to read it, so I deserve to get paid for my work. In a moment, I am going to sit on the toilet, and squeeze my bowels to produce a turd, so I deserve to get paid for my work. And on, and on, and on. You need to be clear and precise in your language ... otherwise, you come off sounding like a child yourself.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

Article 1 enables congress to secure existing rights of artists and inventors, not to create new ones. It means nobody is obligated to publish schematics for their inventions or copies of their writings. It doesn't mean that people are entitled to control information that they have already willfully disclosed. So-called intellectual property is nothing but a fabrication of guild politics, a relic from another age that needs to be put to rest.

People should get paid for their work. The emphasis there is on work. Copying and distributing information is not their work. Creating that information is. It does not do to place a restriction on the former in order to substitute for a lack of compensation for the latter. It does not do to violate many people's actual property rights in the name of preserving a few people's imaginary property rights. People are too obsessed with the direct, tit-for-tat exchange of valuable articles. Information doesn't work that way.

Re:Protecting rights

[anagama]

Obama, if he really is a conlaw scholsr, is extremely cynical, what with the due process free detention and execution policies.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

"When it's a case of a GPL violation, the violators who feel entitled to the free labor of strangers are childish and entitled. But in an article on the Pirate Bay, suddenly it's all about demonizing the evil RIAA and MPAA"

Um, because it is evil to give (sometimes even obviously so) innocent people a force between paying a large sum of money to make them go away or incur huge legal fees? Now that we've once again reminded some of our less bright elements why RIAA is often equaled to the mafia, we can go on to "childish" argument. Pirates are childish. People who give code away for free also get petulant when they percieve that they are or might get taken advantege off. So what? What is your bloody point? That are two vastly different groups that you try to clump togheter, and some of them are even somewhat justified! That there are some childish persons, some even in my IP block, does not mean that it is ok to make a resonse so out of proportion that the only ones who can safely put something on youtube etc. are multinational corporations who got their own army of lawyers to protect them.

You simply do not get to quitely implement a fascist state only because it is *convenient* for you and your overlords. If piracy is such a problem then I suggest they spend money on finding out how to reduce it (like Valve did for Russia). However, that is your problem as it is a problem between you and your potential customers, and once again - you do not get to assume that everyone would pay one fantacillion dollars for your product and that the only reason why your product is failing to meet your goals is because of evil pirates.

Now you're probably going to accuse me of not being constructive. So, I'm going to be constructive: Whenever a new movie is about to be published on DVD's - invest in physical security to make sure no unauthorised exemplars leaves the premises. Then market the movie in world-wide simoultaneusly. What? that doesn't fit your profit maximising theory? It would cost you money? Not our fucking problem. Our problem, as citizens, are corporations fucking with our laws and rights in order to maximize their profits because it's cheaper to buy laws than either sorting our their distribution chain, busniess model or public perception.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

>> Copyright exists because it is believed that without it people would create fewer works and that would limit the benefit to the public.

What about William Shakespeare? William Shakespeare did not make money from selling books and relying on intellectual copyright laws to save him. The reason Shakespeare was able to make money is because people bought tickets to go see his plays performed! A theater needs plays/movies and without them they wouldn't exist. Real scarcities are great for business, and the selling is real -- not artificial -- scarcities is still a damn good business model today. Shakespeare could still make a killing on Broadway. Or he could go into the movie business and sell tickets to seats in theaters. There are plenty of real scarcities he could have focused on, but failing business models is not one of them.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

There's nothing wrong with being supportive of anti-piracy efforts. People deserve to get paid for their work.

People don't deserve to get paid for their work if their business model is a failure in the marketplace. Anti-piracy efforts are an illegitimate attempt to shape the marketplace instead of changing the business model, and there's definitely something wrong with that.

When it's a case of a GPL violation, the violators who feel entitled to the free labor of strangers are childish and entitled. But in an article on the Pirate Bay, suddenly it's all about demonizing the evil RIAA and MPAA

Firstly, can you not see Slashdot's general clear bias towards OPENNESS? The GPL opens things up, GPL violators close things up. Piracy opens things up, copyright closes things up.

That aside, you must be referring to this comment by user "causality", which you failed to link to. It is currently modded as only (Score:2, Insightful), with significant downmodding as flamebait/troll and a barrage of disagreeing comments after it. Hardly representative of Slashdot's consensus on this subject, don't you think?

The point being that there probably should be an attempt made to hinder online piracy in some way. We can't just let it spiral completely out of control, to the point where it's no longer lucrative to produce anything.

Citation needed. Show evidence that piracy is a problem and internet regulation by the legacy copyright industry would help artists in any way.

Part of the reason the console platform became so appealing to game developers is the reduced amount of piracy compared to the PC platform

Part of the reason. Perhaps an unjustified part of the reason.

and the fact they buy games as well as pirate them simply suggests that they like games so much that they acquire them by any means possible, and when they can't pirate, they buy

How did you arrive to that conclusion?

I've noticed this attitude as well. It's very, very annoying.

Yeah, people who buy to support artists should mourn the occasion. They shouldn't be glad they're supporting creativity (god forbid), they should cuss at the copyright lords and grit their teeth as they click the "Buy" button.

I'm probably risking a lot of downmods here--if there's anything Slashdot seems to dislike more than comments about Slashdot, it's comments that are anti-piracy. But I have karma to burn, and I felt like starting the conversation anyway.

You deserve all the downmods you get because you are obviously a troll.

Re:Protecting rights

[alexgieg]

People deserve to get paid for their work.

An anti-copyright activist will agree with this, while disagreeing with copyright itself, on the basis that, yes, people deserve do get paid for their work while they're working. Being paid for work they did, but aren't doing anymore, on the other hand, is by no means deserved, no. Hence, a programmer deserves to be paid while programming, not for previous programming; a singer while singing, not for previous singing; a painter while painting, not for previous paintings; a writer while writing, not for previous writings; and so on and so forth.

The counter argument to this is that under such a social arrangement much creative work that depends on consumers paying for it after it's been done wouldn't be done at all. To which an anti-copyright activist would answer thus: "So what?" After all, where's the ethics in getting paid for non-work? Unless one's disabled or otherwise unfit for work, nowhere.

Note that this reasoning can be extended to all kinds of payments for non-work: financial speculation; earning interest on loans; investing, unless you're there, actually doing something useful at the company you invested in; and so on and so forth. Which looks kinda socialistic, but isn't, as actual property, of the physical kind, remains fully private, and operating as expected.

Re:Protecting rights

[symbolset]

That he's a conlaw scholar really isn't open to question. He taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago law school, and was editor and president of the Harvard Law Review. I suppose this does eliminate the ability to plead ignorance. But the facts are what they are. The President is a Constitutional scholar.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

They wonder why consoles make more money when they release garbage ports of console games...

I mean, even a blockbuster hit like Borderlands has a very console-esque feel to it. Most of the gameplay is there, but why can I click sell with my mouse and press enter to confirm? (Being right-handed, my mouse is right next to the keypad enter, so it's easier and faster - especially when selling multiple items) just to reach over and hit it than targetting the "yes" and clicking)

Thank god I only paid $5 for it on a Steam sale.

Re:Protecting rights

[blahplusplus]

"There's nothing wrong with being supportive of anti-piracy efforts."

Actually there is, copyright is a monopoly, it's not a law of nature. The fact that you all accept it is proof that piracy is a valid response. You are all proof brainwashing works. There is nothing natural about copyright at all and the whole idea that we need it or else people can't make money is a bunch of nonsense. It prevents us from discovering how to make money without it and people DID make money without it for thousands of years before it was invented.

Re:Protecting rights

[next_ghost]

Why is the technological infrastructure, or rather, a particular group of people's vision for how the infrastructure should work, more important than people getting paid for their work?

You're missing the minor detail that the work for which somebody should be paid is creating the work in question. Current technology makes copying so cheap that it's almost free, thus obsoleting an ancient business model. Why should we keep paying for some expensive obsolete related service done by obsolete middlemen instead of paying those who do the real still valuable work? That's what upholding copyright monopoly (that's right, it's not a property right, it's a special purpose monopoly!) is all about - paying for obsolete related service instead of the actual valuable work.

The important point is that you have a right to stop people making a copy of your work, at least the law the way it is now, but you don't have a right to expect the Internet to work a particular way.

And does that "right" to stop people from copying something overrule others' right to privacy? Does that "right" overrule the freedom of speech? Does that "right" overrule others' rights to physical property? There's no differentiating between "real" and "on the Internet" anymore. The Internet IS real.

Re:Protecting rights

[Curunir_wolf]

The reason Shakespeare was able to make money is because people bought tickets to go see his plays performed!

It was also because the majority of those people couldn't read anyway, AND there was no way to mass produce books. So copyright laws were completely unnecessary.

Re:Protecting rights

[lexsird]

For the children.

Re:Protecting rights

[FiloEleven]

This is a hairy issue, at least if you believe that the arts have merit for entertainment and deeper purposes as I do.

Music, movies, software and books are all things that fall under IP. They take significant amounts of time and money and effort to create, but once created they are trivially reproduced. Without something in place to encourage a (potential) return on that investment there will be a lot less of them created. Some people say, "Well you should be creating it out of a love of creating it, not for monetary compensation." That is true to an extent but the fact is that without some possibility of a return, lots of people who love making art will be unable to devote the resources to it in order to make things worth making. There aren't enough hours in the day to keep a day job, handle adult responsibilities and family or social obligations, and also take the time needed to work on a game or an album or a book or (especially) a film.

There is room for a new model: self-publishing and pay-what-you-want purchases of things have in many instances proven to be viable. The trick then is getting exposure without the backing of a big studio. As this model becomes more prevalent I expect some sort of promotion-only services to become popular places to find new stuff worth checking out. It might work and it might not, and there may be other, better models yet to be created. The central issue that must be dealt with is providing incentive for people to continue to create stuff we like, and part of that is inevitably that we must take responsibility for rewarding the creators.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

Right thing 1: Reasonable punishments for illegally downloading copyrighted material (2x, 5x, 10x, not 50,000x)
Right thing 2: Leave the core infrastructure of the internet out of your enforcement strategy. We don't re-route roads to prevent pirate cigarettes and alcohol, and we don't allow mass unfettered searching of vehicles on the road (yet, another discussion I suppose there).
Right thing 3: Let the party that is harmed report a crime just like everyone else. Just because the entertainment industry can and will give lots of money to politicians doesn't mean they should be able to get the government to track down people who have "stolen" from them without even reporting a crime. I can't ask the government to search the home of every person I was in high school with to get my favorite jacket back. If Disney thinks someone has stolen something they can report it to the local police just like everyone else. The feds don't get involved when kids steal DVDs, but they do if they steal mp3s?

Re:Protecting rights

[b4dc0d3r]

I think you're stretching this too much. If I take your car, you don't have it, that is stealing. If I take your exclusive right to copy a book you just wrote, you also don't have that right. It's not stealing, it is an infringement of rights.

When you have a society, you agree to give up certain things for the greater good. Known as a social contract, this establishes what you can and cannot do. You have not really made a case for removing this from the social contract.

If you have an idea and I copy it, no one has lost anything. When you try to implement it by writing a book, painting a picture, making a physical invention, or a movie, you have expended effort and time. If you create a beloved character like Winnie the Pooh, the question of control over the character might come up, whether I can make my own stories with the character (fan fiction). A separate question is whether I can take your book and copy it.

As for the part about controlling your computer, you went right off the deep end on that one. You could use a public library's computer instead, or an open wi-fi setup. Is that controlling your property? No, is it right to say that it is only control when your property is involved? No.

The only thing I agree with is that patenting things like human genomes and natural compounds is taking knowledge out of the public domain.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

Instead of bread and circuses, we just get circuses.

And not the fun kind of circuses with clowns and acrobats and lions and tigers and bears, either. We get the boring kind where people in black turtlenecks try to make you feel bad about yourself.

Re:Protecting rights

[Hentes]

You are oversimplifying it. There are very few radical pirates who don't believe in copyright at all. The problem is not with the idea of copyright, it's how it is implemented. Also, you seem to only view the problem from an ethical/emotional point while mostly disregarding the practical side of it which in an issue as complex as copyright legislation simply doesn't work, this topic is not black and white.

Also, what "attempt" are you speaking of? There are already tons of laws against piracy in America. The fines for copyright infringement are already irrealistically high. DMCA and ACTA are already overly broad. And you say you want even more laws, even worse than them?

It seems to me that you have fallen for the apocalyptic crap of the Big Media. They have been predicting the end of music end movies for ages. The fact is, there isn't much proof of that decline. I'm not saying that piracy doesn't exist, but it is, despite the propaganda, a contained problem. And since you like to draw analogies with theft so much, let me illustrate it to you with the example of theft. Theft is illegal, but that doesn't mean it never happens. You can't prevent crime completely, but you can contain it. Shop owners calculate shoplifting in as a necessary loss, and can still manage. It's the same with piracy: you can't eradicate the problem completely, and you can't hold the whole Internet responsible because of a few pirates. But claiming that the existence of piracy is the end of the world is a huge exaggeration. In fact, in places when there are affordable digital alternative sources, piracy actually decreases. I know that in capitalist America it's standard to view individuals as selfish money-oriented machines, but most people are better than that.

You say that "anti-piracy efforts" are really against piracy? That's what they want you to think! But, as with all similar laws, pirates are just the strawmen here, like terrorists or pedophiles were in the past. The real purpose is to stop all user-generated content. Blogs and social networks created news sources that aren't controlled by parties like TV or papers are, users of sites like Youtube have created content that isn't controlled by the Big Media cartel. Just think about it, there are independent artists sharing their music through torrent sites/netradios/digital stores making a living whithout any publisher ever seeing a dime of it. This is what they really want to stop.

Re:Protecting rights

[wonkavader]

Exactly! This is why the tea party does so well! Better clowns!

Re:Protecting rights

[Yvanhoe]

There's nothing wrong with being supportive of anti-piracy efforts.

I agree, attacking ships is pretty bad. If you talk about copyright infrigement, it is about DAMN TIME that we, as a society open a debate about how we use internet to share culture, retribute artists and how we change a model that was designed when copying a work could not be done freely and reliably at large scale.

There is imbalance, there is a system that is not working. Artists deserve money for creation, but who will pretend that Mickael Jackson being a billionaire was preferable than one thousand musicians (including him) being "simple" millionaires ? Who will pretend that it is more important to protect Britney Spears' interests rather than free speech ?

The ease of copying music and videos and transmitting them is a fact that is still denyied today by **AA groups. The very people that are paid by artists to defend their interests and help them make money. They are the people who should be proposing a system. They have the data, they know how the industry work, they understand trends, they have knowledge about how one runs a studio. It is their work, not ours. If it becomes our job to find a business system that works, it seems obvious that the first step is to remove these parasites that feed on artists money and are actually counter productive.

Several models have been proposed, but we (IT specialists, music lovers, even amateur artists) lack the insights that **AA denies us. Some models won't work, but we don't have enough data to know which ones. We are fed provably fraudulous data by these groups, it makes it harder to know if an artist can earn enough with touring, merchandising, mecenat, sponsoring, "ransom" financing, schemes likes flattr, websites' advertisements or even (but it won't happen in America) a global tax redistributed by a public organism (why not the very same **AA that refuse to change their system).

Models exist, are numerous, and did not receive objective criticism. Saying "We are the only model and internet should just stop sharing files" is simply denial, that is lasting for so long that it really is pathological.

Re:Protecting rights

[Dunbal]

Also, if you look at the sales of top albums now vs. 10-20 years ago they have decreased significantly.

Surely this is 100% due to piracy and not due to a completely different phenomenon called "the internet" giving people a choice of something else to do with their time other than a) watch TV or b) listen to music or c) hang out with friends.

Re:Protecting rights

[Son of Byrne]

Let me say that I agree with you. I think that reasonable compensation is justified when work is completed. Let's see your quote:

If your boss withheld your paycheck and told you that the code you wrote is now theirs free of charge because "information wants to be free," you'd sue for the wages and win.

Quite right and for a reason: the contract that exists between employer and employee. That contract is usually implied (in the US anyway) and is one that is backed up by a few labor laws. If I agree to exchange my time for your money, then I expect to be paid when I give up that time and I have the law on my side if you decide not to pay.

So, explain to me, if you would, the nature of the implicit contract between an artist (content creator) and me (the consumer)?

I'll take a stab at it, to satisfy my curiosity. If you record a few songs and spend 200 hours doing it, then what is your motivation? You have never met me. You don't know if I'll even be interested in what you recorded. You (the content creator) are a speculator. You're putting time and money into some work that you reckon will net you a return over time.

Let's look at another example of a speculator: a used car dealer. In the case of a used car dealer, the dealer spends her time and money on a vehicle that might have been acquired at auction. She buys it for a price presumably below retail market value, spends time and/or money repairing it and shining it up and displays it on her lot for sale. She is counting on me (the consumer) to come along and want to exchange my money for that car.

That example is nicely formulated and makes perfect sense to anyone with business experience. Now lets change the scenario to spice it up a bit.

Let's assume that the car dealer buys that car at auction as before and puts all that time and money into prepping that car for sale. Now, enter the new car manufacturers. The manufacturer of that line of cars has decided that they'd like to liquidate their business. They cut their prices. So much so, that now, it is cheaper to just buy a new car directly from this manufacturer rather than buy from the used car dealer. What's to be done about that poor used car dealer who spent her valuable time and money speculating on that used car? She's a victim of the market. Does she sue the car manufacturer? She might, but how will that ever restore her now antiquated business model? Maybe she should sue the buyers that are now buying new cars instead of her used one?

The point of all this is, markets change, consumers change, technology changes and every last one of those factors can wipe out my precious business model. What I don't have the right to do though, is blame anyone else. If I'm a speculator and my speculation goes bust, then its time for me to pack up and move on. Maybe even try again with a new approach.

I don't dislike content creators, but I'm not willing to stand by and allow *any* laws to be created to protect content creators' business model propped up on artificial scarcity. It is time for content creators to pack up and move on. Move on to another way to pay the bills. That doesn't mean stop creating, it means get your money first. If I get burned by employers who agree to pay me for my time and I give them my time and they back out and don't pay me, then I'll probably start demanding pay in advance and I'd be justified in doing it. I see no reason why content creators cannot do the same thing.

Re:Protecting rights

[Sir Homer]

You are seriously using the GPL in an argument on why copyright is a good idea? The GPL is designed to use to use copyright to subvert its fundamental purpose! Instead of saying "you can not sure", GPL says "you MUST share". It goes against every argument the copyright minimalists make the purpose for copyright is. That's why it's called a "copyleft license", it turns copyright on its head.

Re:Protecting rights

[Sique]

No. When Napster shut down, the decrease got only stronger. At the end of Napster in Jan 01, it was still about US$ 14 billions, then it sunk down pretty fast to $12 billions 2003, where it stayed for the next three years till 2006. Then the free exchange via KaZaA was shut down, and sales are going down very fast since then - 10.5 billions in 2007, 8.5 billions in 2008 and 6.3 in 2009.

So whenever a big exchange network gets shut down, sales break down, and whenever an alternative exchange network grows large enough and stays relatively unharmed, the sales remain stable.

Re:Protecting rights

[lexman098]

Wish I had mod points. This is the correct response. Software engineers get paid because they can come up with the necessary code on the fly more or less. Their value is much more in that than in the code they've written, and after they write a program they're kept around (and paid) because of the next program that will be needed.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

So EA, Activision, Ubisoft, etc... Never made any money off of PC games so far?

So, as long as a publisher makes one thin dime, pirates can continue to leech off of the system? And then bitch about the increase in the cost of the games (which they don't pay for the in the first place), and then use that as an excuse to continue to pirate?

Re:Protecting rights

[EuclideanSilence]

...People deserve to get paid for their work.

I just did 50 pushups. Do you use paypal? Would you prefer to setup a regular payment plan for when I do work?

Perhaps people only deserve to get what's agreed upon voluntarily.

Re:Protecting rights

[lennier1]

Don't forget options like Hulu, which let you watch shows when you want, where you want and in the form you want (e.g., in case you don't give a shit about dubs and want the original).

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

You know what kills piracy? Netflix and Spotify, not SOPA.

Well spoken.

Re:Protecting rights

[kurzweilfreak]

The scarcity inherent in IP is time. People invest time to formulate an idea, do research, code a program, type out a book, write and record a song, whatever the intellectual pursuit is and put it into a communicable media. Time is something that people can literally never get back. Not only that, but it's even more than just the physical labor of creating the media, it's the time to get the education to code that program, the practice hours to learn to play that instrument and write that song, the education to learn how to use Pro Tools or Logic or Sonar and use EQ and mastering tools.

Think about what your time is worth to you, what your time should be worth to someone else, and what someone else's time is worth to you, too.

Maybe intellectual property should be renamed to reflect its real value. Perhaps intellectual work or intellectual investment. It won't stop jackholes who just want shit for free no matter what, that cat is out of the bag. What's missing is a respect for the work that other people do and what they've invested into it. [rant over] That's just my opinion, YMMV.

Re:Protecting rights

[gnapster]

People deserve to get paid for their work.

An anti-copyright activist will agree with this, while disagreeing with copyright itself, on the basis that, yes, people deserve do get paid for their work while they're working. Being paid for work they did, but aren't doing anymore, on the other hand, is by no means deserved, no.

Artists and others are very often paid by commission, where they are not paid for the time spent, but for the completed work which was done in the past.

If I can get someone to agree to pay me under any terms, then I do deserve to get paid according to our agreement.

Re:Protecting rights

[Dhalka226]

Your statements are extremely loaded ones. They are like a slippery slope argument, except that you have skipped over the slippery slope entirely and simply found yourself at the bottom of the hill going "shit, that happened fast."

The point being that there probably should be an attempt made to hinder online piracy in some way.

I might agree with you.

We can't just let it spiral completely out of control, to the point where it's no longer lucrative to produce anything.

But then you lost me. For starters, can you provide some evidence that piracy is spiraling completely out of control? To be sure, the widespread adoption of the Internet and the increasingly quick download speeds were a boon to piracy, but I see no evidence that things are "spiraling out of control." If anything I think we're close to an equalibrium point.

Second, the idea that it is not lucrative to produce anything, or even that we may one day arrive at such a point, is so far-fetched that it is really not even worth addressing. Crap like Farmville and Maffia Wars are making a mint. Good, independent games like Magicka are too -- even when they are on nearly perpetual sale through avenues like Steam (which, by the way, the wider adoption of high-speed Internet also made possible). Modern Warfare 3 made over a billion dollars in two weeks. Battlefield 3 has sold eight million copies in its first month. Games like World of Warcraft keep on chugging, bringing in millions of dollars in subscription fees alone. If you want to claim people are only buying them because of the heavy multiplayer value, look no further than a game like Batman: Arkham City bringing in 1.5 million units in sales in its first month. There is no shortage of money to be made with decent games that people want, and if you think that is going to magically change then the onus is on you to prove it.

the fact they buy games as well as pirate them simply suggests that they like games so much that they acquire them by any means possible

Actually, I agree completely with you. A lot of piracy is a collector mentality. What I can't understand is why you start there and leap to some sort of need for technological means to censor the Internet. If these collector-types had to pay for every game they had, do you really think they would do so? I don't. They're going to pay for roughly the same amount of games as they did before, since that is obviously the point at which they have decided they can afford to purchase. The rest they will simply do without. You may consider that a win; "if you don't want to pay for it, you don't deserve it." In its own way, that's certainly fair enough. But when we have to enact legislation to protect that model, where nobody is being harmed to begin with and suddenly we have Internet censorship and life-destroying lawsuits flying around--not to mention the incredible costs of doing so, both to the publishers, the pirates, society as a whole and the opportunity costs of everything we're doing (Congress really has nothing better to debate for months? I thought our economy might be sucking, but I guess I'm wrong), I do not consider it to be a very good idea at all. Getting over the indignation and realizing they were never going to pay you for those games to begin with, now that is a good idea.

If the RIAA, MPAA et al wanted to increase their profits, that's easy: Reduce the prices. No, it will not eliminate piracy; nothing will, including these proposed laws (Piracy up in France despite three strikes law"). It will bring them more buyers. Piracy is, like almost everything else, at least partially a supply and demand issue, but publishers are unwilling to consider the idea that gambling on getting a huge chunk of an entertainment budget rather than virtually guaranteeing a s

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

I take CARE of MY kids!

Cookies for everyone.

Re:Protecting rights

[Sir_Sri]

Never made any money is sort of the wrong way to look at it. Sure, 10 years ago the market.. oh wait who gives a shit about 10 years ago? What matters isn't what happened 5 years ago, it's what is happening this year. That's a much murkier question. There's a shift back into PC games as the technology to make sure you get paid for the game has changed. Even a pirated copy you can still sell DLC packs these days.

Sure, 3 or 4 years ago a few big studios surmised that there wasn't enough money in PC versions, and so didn't make any (think fable 2). But for a lot of reasons that market has shifted - and what matters is what the market will look like in 2012, which is that shift continuing. Steam, which is a giant DRM platform, makes the PC appealing, if you're a small indie outfit there's no 30k developer kit (see the Wii....), and no competition from first party or big studios (seriously, who wants to compete with Uncharted 3, or Skyrim?), and now with the way Steam works your game can get front page attention in between major releases at least. That's actually the new 'big thing' in our business is that piracy matters a lot less than when all these really good games are coming out, and trying to find when to squeeze yourself into their release cycles. We're competing on time, not money. Money is not completely solved, but mostly. We've cut retailers out of the process, and sure, digital takes 30%, but before it was more like 60, so you make more money per copy, your game has a longer tail, you're locking them to steam. Sure, steam *can* be cracked, but most people don't want to risk their steam account for one game they could buy for 5 dollars. They'll take that risk for portal2 for 60 bucks, but not for a game you're selling for 5 or 10.

Because piracy wasn't ever really dealt with, the market changed. We now have 'free' games, where you basically buy anything worth having in the game online. We have online games, or DLC or a little bit of both, which means now the thing that can be pirated is not the real value, the real value is in 12 dollars in DLC you're going to sell someone, or the 15 dollars a month and that's all going into your coffers, not to Gamestop or Walmart. It's meant there's a lot less room for innovation in the market. Basically the innovation happens at the top (kinect), you get crazy lucky with a product like minecraft or magicka, or you live on government handouts and hope that works for you. Most small developers are fleeing consoles and PC, because the risk is too high, for all of the help steam provides. You make 20 facebook/android/ios games in the time it takes to make one decent game, and odds are, collecting a 50% government subsidy that you can crawl along breaking even, and you hope for your farmville.

As a practical matter legislation isn't going to stop piracy. It's too easy. The market had to change. But the market is now split between people who make experiences like Skyrim, Mass effect etc... and basically gambling, and hoping enough suckers will spend 300 bucks on your game to keep you afloat (Star Trek Online). I'm not sure that's made it better for consumers. Steam made things better (as did their competitors, the Xbox market, PSN etc.) but the only way to survive making traditional games is if you can be big enough to absorb the losses due to piracy. That's not really a great model, and my nagging (but uninformed) suspicion is that the Xbox 3 and PS4 will be looking a lot more like a software as a service model, where everything important is done over the internet, and any disks you do get will only serve to limit the amount of downloading you need to do, but for it to work, you'll need to constantly authenticate with them.

Re:Protecting rights

[poetmatt]

There is tons wrong with anti-piracy efforts, starting with "how congress defines antipiracy is flat out dishonest".

If I call antipiracy "you making more money than me", then no matter how you try to explain it away, the entire situation is both intellectually and factually dishonest. Considering that's not a stretch from what the RIAA is doing (they see it as their $$ streams are simply not going to them which they feel entitled to).

The RIAA and MPAA have been proven to be the cancer of our society's success - numerous studies by their own sources prove this. They can't even make sure they don't break the laws they push for, and instead

There should not be an attempt to "hinder piracy" in any way, because doing so will contradict your very second sentence:

Those efforts, however, shouldn't undermine technological infrastructure

.
There is no way around that, and thus your entire point is not only misleading and contradictory, but entirely moot. In fact, acting like piracy is something you can fight, treating piracy like a zero sum game is the exact definition of not understanding anything technology, piracy, copyright, or freedom of speech. Please go away.

Re:Protecting rights

[webdog314]

Or, it could just be that WAY fewer people are buying "albums" anymore. Why should we when most of the crap they pass for music these days has one, maybe two songs of any worth per album? The industry used to make huge profits off of the one-hit-wonder, basically selling a single good song for the cost of an entire album. But now that we can get just the single on the cheap, they have lost their scam.

Re:Protecting rights

[alexgieg]

If I can get someone to agree to pay me under any terms, then I do deserve to get paid according to our agreement.

True, because then it's a matter of a contractual agreement, as two parties deciding on how to do things among themselves is perfectly fine. My answer was in regards to non-contractual relationships. In this case, a 3rd party C copying a work made by A for B, with no contractual relationship with either A or B, has no obligation to them. A got paid; B got the work. Whatever C does afterwards is of no concern to them, as C is neither depriving A from B's payment, nor B from A's work.

Re:Protecting rights

[johnlein]

Personally I don't pirate games or music because thanks to Steam, Amazon, iTunes and the like I can get my hands on them immediate for a price. Now with software, books and movies/series things get more complicated.

Software is simple for me, I own two Windows and two Linux machines. My Windows copies are legal and so are the games running on them. All the other software I use is open source. It's not like I wouldn't pay lots of money to get the Photoshop or Illustrator (even though I think they are way overpriced) but I have 4 machines and two of them are NOT supported by Adobe at all. For me open source is the better choice since I like to use the same software on all of my machines. As long as there isn't a Service like Steam for software like Photoshop that takes small businesses, home users, cross platform requirements and bulk licensing into account, software piracy will stay a big issue.

Movies and series will also continue being pirated until until there is a better way for us to get at the content. If I like to watch some series as soon as it's out I am almost forced to pirate it. There are websites for a lot of shows but you can only watch them IF you are in the US. This sucks for me since I am American but live in Germany. If I want to watch anything in English when it's still new I am screed. I thought about buying the seasons of my favorite series ahead of time on iTunes so I get to watch them once they come out BUT I can't because I can't buy them ahead of time in Germany IF they are listed at all and I can't just switch to the American market and buy them there. I haven't found a good solution to my problem yet but at least South Park serves me well with THE BEST SOLUTION of all content providers I have seen so far.

Books are another issue (that most people totally forget by the way). If I want my own shiny edition of Compilers: Principles, Techniques, & Tools I have the problem that it is out of print (again, well at least in I can't buy it anymore in Germany) and I can only get used copies if at all. After all I would like to get an English version and I am currently not living in an English speaking country. But hey, I have a Kindle, maybe I can get it for that? Hell no, I CAN'T get a digital version either. So I am screwed again.

The thing is I have money, and I would LIKE to spend it. I sure as hell am not working to sit on my money till I die and I DON'T WANT PIRATE ANYTHING. It's a fucking hassle trying to find something online to watch. I don't like file sharing and I flat out refuse to use it. I am to old for that crap, you just waste to much time finding what you want, if you find it at all, get a crappy version and if you are lucky it comes with a virus or a root kit. And all that because I have to wait half a year or longer to get my fingers on the damn DVD. I am inpatient, I want stuff now. I have no problems paying 5 bucks more for DVD if I get a download version immediately (hear that amazon?). I would love to be able to watch a movie online for 10 bucks after it stopped playing in the theater BUT before it's out on DVD or Blu-ray.

As far as I am concerned piracy would go down a hell of a lot if the RIAA and MPAA would spend the money they are spending lobbying on new distribution channels to get their content to me faster, regardless where I am and what language I want.

Sorry for ranting, but I and my family spend a lot of money on movies, books, games and music but I still get labeled as criminal or pirate if I just want to watch an episode of The Big Bang Theory in English.

Re:Protecting rights

[jamstar7]

Trying to fix this via piracy prevention seems just hopeless as well as ethically dubious.

But it will create jobs, just like the War on X's did. Granted, not nice jobs, but jobs nonetheless.

One way might be to simply collect tips - people put money in the jar if they enjoyed the work. If that on it's own doesn't bring in sufficient funds, then the tip jar could be augmented with a culture flat rate. E.g. you pay a fixed amount every month for media consumption and the content producer additionally receives the tip jar multiplied by a certain factor.

EVERYBODY pays this??? Why should I subsidise, oh, I dunno, rap yodelling? You wanna listen to rap yodelling, no problem, but let it be on YOUR dime.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

Some of your arguement is correct. People should be paid for their work. It's this that I have a problem with "downloaders will happily pirate it and never even dream of spending a time, and they'll justify it until they're red in the face."

Fuck off, I pirate. And I get a fuzzy warm feeling for paying for the stuff that I like. There's so many games and apps that I'm glad I tried before I accidently spending money on a piece of shit. Money that I work and spend 8 hours a day of my life making.

Re:Protecting rights

[Hentes]

Actually, if you look at the trends in music sales [cnn.com] since mp3/napster arrived I'd say that on a macro level you have a very good case that piracy decreases sales.

These are only the revenues of the RIAA, as reported by them. Not a trustworthy source, and far from being the full picture. Independent artists are not included, and neither are concert revenues which make up the majority of income for most musicians.

Re:Protecting rights

[shutdown -p now]

They're using the corruption of law to get their something without paying the something by preventing the expiration of the monopoly. Complying with this encourages corruption of law. So in the interest of good citizenship until they restore the balance of getting something in return for something, violating copyright isn't a sin: it's your civic duty.

The only problem with this is that "they" who define the law (RIAA etc) are different from "them" who are financially hurt by not getting paid for their works because people ignore copyright.

Re:Protecting rights

[shutdown -p now]

The basic reason there are property rights is because property is scarce.

The basic reason why there are property rights is because the people making up our society have decided that property rights are worth having. You can own a parcel of land that you've never even set foot onto in your life, and charge people for living on it and using it. That kind of arrangement is no more "natural" and no less virtual than the monopoly that is copyright.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

DavidSell, ByOhTek, antitithenai, Bonch, Dtech and others are psuedonyms/sockpuppets used by the Waggener Edstrom rapid response team employed by MS to astroturf discussions in favour of MS and to attack any point of view which isn't favourable to MS and supportive of their interests.

http://waggeneredstrom.com/about/approach

Mod accordingly

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm probably risking a lot of downmods here--if there's anything Slashdot seems to dislike more than comments about Slashdot, it's comments that are anti-piracy

Well, you have that against you, but in your favor you acknowledged a risk of down mod which almost guarentees an upmod.

Additionally, you get the +1 wall of text modifier in addition to the insightful nature of your comments.

Btw, I upmodded you, for all 3 of the reasons above :) Well written WoT, sir.

Re:Protecting rights

[metrix007]

No, it doesn't. There is study after study showing that piracy leads to an increase in sales. You can't look at sales today and a decade ago and blame the increase on piracy, given all the other factors that have happened, i.e. the economy. Correlation is not causation my friend.

Re:Protecting rights

[metrix007]

For fucks sake. Piracy is not stealing. It's piracy. It's not just semantics either. If there is no deprivation then it isn't fucking theft.

Re:Protecting rights

[frnic]

How about if you only got paid for 50% of the hours you worked. Whats the big deal! Didn't you ever make any money for your work?

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

hell, Oblivion had zero copy protection

That was true of the original release, but the GOTY edition and the 5th Anniversary Edition both use SecuROM.

Re:Protecting rights

[bob')DROP TABLE user]

There is overwhelming evidence to show that piracy leads to an increase in sales. It doesn't make sense to dispute that anymore. Given that taking copies doesn't cost anyone anything nor deprive anything from anyone, yet can lead to further contributions to society, it only makes sense.

Citation needed

Re:Protecting rights

[trout007]

Where you are getting confused is that government has granted monopoly to these industries which is one of the reasons they are so profitable. Why should those things make so much money to begin with? Did you ever wonder why movies are made in California when at the time most of the entertainment industry was in NYC? Because Edison held the patent on the motion picture and held tight control over the content. But some people wanted to make more exciting pictures that Edison wouldn't allow. So they moved to California where they were pretty much outside of the law. So Hollywood exists where it does in order to defeat Edison patents. All of the big studios you know to day were apart of that.

There is opportunity to make money without IP but you have to control your product. Musicians would get paid to perform live. TV shows still make money. Movies would have to make their money in the Box Office where they have control over the product. If they wanted to release it outside of theaters they would have to charge a low enough fee so people would pay for it like iTunes.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

The general decline in music sales could also be due to the greater availability of other forms of entertainment.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, you should be paid for all your work. But digging a hole and then filling it back up with the same dirt won't involve any work.
I always move everything in one direction, that's why I should be a billionaire.

Re:Protecting rights

[symbolset]

That is partly true, and it's a shame. But "we" are definitely the ones harmed by this attempt to steal our rights of due process and free speech. It's time to send the message that if you kick that particular dog the response will be asymmetrical.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

the artists who aren't getting paid don't even enter into the discussion

That's interesting. Because in all the posts demonizing the RIAA/MPAA that I see, that always comes up. The RIAA/MPAA are groups that feel entitled to the free labor of the artists, by not paying them.

Obvious shill is obvious.

Re:Protecting rights

[Alsee]

When it's a case of a GPL violation, the violators who feel entitled to the free labor of strangers are childish and entitled. But in an article on the Pirate Bay, suddenly it's all about demonizing the evil RIAA and MPAA, and piracy is just a cultural revolution that sticks it to the evil corporations--the artists who aren't getting paid don't even enter into the discussion, probably because of the guilty feelings it would inspire to be reminded of the reality of the situation.

First lets note that I myself am a programmer, and in fact I am a copyright holder on GPL code.

I have no "guilty feelings" stating that my GPL code has no need of a 20 year retroactive copyright extension. So how about we start with some reasonable copyright law repealing the Sonny Bono copyright extensions act.

I have no "guilty feelings" suggesting reasonable copyright law to repeal some or all of the other copyright extensions, potentially all the way back to the original 14+14 year US copyright term. I am more than happy to have my copyrighted GPL code, and all GPL code, return to the public domain after no more than 28 years.

I have no "guilty feelings" suggesting that non-commercial infringement of my GPL code should be a civil offense with fines, not a criminal offense, and therefore propose reasonable copyright law to repeal the No Electronic Theft Act which criminalized non-commercial infringement.

Hell, I'm not even certain that commercial infringement should go beyond a civil case with cash damages, so I suggest a review to consider reducing or eliminating the criminal infringement sections 506/2319.

I most certainly do not feel any "guilty feelings" stating that people should not be imprisoned for decrypting my copyrighted code, most especially when they have not committed any infringement of my code. So I suggest reasonable copyright law to either eliminate DMCA anti-circumvention section 1201, or at a minimum amending it to state that there is no criminal offense if the person is cot committing infringement, and amending it to clarify that the trafficking provisions do not apply to legitimate products which satisfying the Sony-Betamax standard of non-infringing purpose.

I'm sure with a little thought I could continue with additional copyright law changes that should be made to properly and reasonably defend MY copyright on my GPL code, but that list should constitute a pretty good start.

The point being that there probably should be an attempt made to hinder online piracy in some way.

Once we start passing some copyright law that has at least some remote resemblance of sanity, I will be more than happy to consider and cooperate on additional reasonable modifications of copyright law.

I'm probably risking a lot of downmods here--if there's anything Slashdot seems to dislike more than comments about Slashdot, it's comments that are anti-piracy.

No, not many people object to anti-piracy comments. But what a great many of us object to are people who defend butt-fuck insane draconian expansions of copyright law on a threadbare excuse that the Noble Ends justify Any and All Means. No, having the US government go on a crusade of international censorship, and doing so with total disregard for the question of whether any infringement exists at all, is Not A Good Idea.

SOPA and PIPA are absurdly BAD laws. Just because the motivation for them is to reduce infringement does not justify passing bad and destructive laws.

-

Re:Protecting rights

[mpoulton]

Note that this reasoning can be extended to all kinds of payments for non-work: financial speculation; earning interest on loans; investing, unless you're there, actually doing something useful at the company you invested in; and so on and so forth. Which looks kinda socialistic, but isn't, as actual property, of the physical kind, remains fully private, and operating as expected.

That's not really extensible to most of those examples. When you loan money or invest in something, you're actively "working" the entire time that your money is out of your hands. If I loan you $1000, I'm "loaning" for the entire period of time that I don't have my $1000.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

"The point being that there probably should be an attempt made to hinder online piracy in some way. We can't just let it spiral completely out of control, to the point where it's no longer lucrative to produce anything. "

That will never happen.

Also: Movies and music made for the sole purpose of making money isn't worth paying for. It's no longer "art" at that point, and the producers are no longer "artists."

For thousands of years art hasn't been profitable. The vast majority of people believe we as a society should go back to that. The only ones who don't, seem to be the record and movie companies and their shill lawyers.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

How about some facts? Wii SDKs don't cost 30K. They cost US$2K to US$10K.

"Development Kits: Approximate development costs range from $2,000 to $10,000, depending on the size of your team. Financial stability is expected by Authorized Developers in order to purchase the necessary development equipment for your project. "

http://www.warioworld.com/apply/ section 4.

Re:Protecting rights

[darpified]

Where did I approve of stealing someone's software (or music, or whatthefuckever in digital format?). What I said was that the companies are coming off as money grubbing douchebags and getting shitty laws passed that will not be effective. The SOPA law (and similar laws, such as the DMCA) will be primarily used in an offensive manner with little to no accountability What this has to do with me getting paid for the hours I work I don't understand. I am not a content producer, which I presumed was obvious when I said "Not that I condone or give a shit either way as far as piracy is concerned." If I were, I would probably give more of a shit, but getting BS laws passed such as this, bankrupting individuals with enormous legal fees, and screwing society over is not how I would proceed. And another note, that's the difference between the "general outrage" on Slashdot when a GPL project is being taken advantage of, compared to the overall approval when it's the RIAA/MPAA who is the target. The RIAA and MPAA are not even remotely altruistic organizations. Most open source projects can be seen as contributing something towards the betterment of humans, and not just screwing over the consumers. Bah.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

IP is a misleading phrase for a couple of reasons. First, it conflates copyright (utilitarian incentive), patents (utilitarian incentive), and trademarks (originally intended to prevent fraud-by-intentional-confusion). Even "IP" lawyers know that there is a great deal of difference in the way that the laws work for these three types of things.

Second, copyrights and patents are not based on the idea that there is any natural property right to works or to ideas. That much we know, e.g., from Thomas Jefferson's letter to Isaac McPherson, and from the fact that the Constitution says they MUST expire after "limited Times".

What copyrights and patents are is an attempt to solve a free market failure. Theoretically, an author or studio should sell their services in creating a work on the free market to whomever is interested; once the work has been published, it should immediately belong to the public domain. But it is hard to get people to buy this way, especially from unknown authors; they would prefer to wait until shiny copies are on the shelves. Enter copyright. It interferes with the free market, giving the copyright holder a limited Government-granted monopoly on the sale of copies, and therefore a way to collect payment for creation of the work at the "shiny copies are on the shelves" stage.

So far, so good. If the copyright length and terms are set appropriately (where "appropriately" is something that may change based on advances in technology), then it may make sense for the public to temporarily restrict some of its inherent rights, in order to offer a "patch" for this market failure.

But as we all know, some copyright recipients are not satisfied with being offered a reasonable incentive to create and release new works. They want us to believe that the purpose of copyright law is to maximize their income at our expense - in money, in loss of works for the public domain, in being treated like criminals (DRM, copy protection, etc.), and even in terms of civil liberties.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

No long lucrative to produce anything? I have no sympathy at all for that. One of my favorite trance artists (Airbase) barely makes money off of his production work, but makes a decent chunk of change going out on tour. But guess what, he doesn't even make enough money to support himself doing that - he works his day job as a graphic designer. I'm actually going the same route, where I'm giving away most of my production work away, hoping that it will get me shows later on down the road

On a completely different note, the 4 admins of a private tracker I'm on for games have Steam account values of over $8000, and I my steam account is somewhere over $2000 right now. Now while I cant speak for most of the people on the tracker, I know for a fact that our top downloaders/seeders have huge steam accounts. Sure, correlation isn't causation, but it must have some merit due to how often I see this.

Re:Protecting rights

[jjoelc]

I'm late to the party, but here's my two cents worth anyway...

I LOVE the idea of content creators getting paid for their creations (assuming they want monetary compensation, of course. Money isn't the only way a person can feel properly compensated for their efforts. But given what this discussion is about, I'll set that aside for now...) I can even agree that distributors and marketers ave a right to be paid for their efforts as well... Distributors should absolutely not be able to require the signing over of the creator's copyright for the privilege of having it distributed. Corporations should not be allowed to "own" copyright. The individuals working for the corporation can, but not "the Company".

At the simplest level, it is humans who are doing the creating. Copyright should be specifically tied to those humans doing the creating. In other words, copyright is a HUMAN RIGHT, and it should not be made available for sale to the highest bidder. Even if I wanted to sell myself into slavery, it is illegal for me to do so, and illegal for anyone to "buy" me also. Copyright should be absolutely non-transferrable.

I would be willing to bend so far as granting copyright for the lifetime of the creator, with some minimum time frame also. So for example, copyright would last 5 years, or the lifetime of the artist, whichever is longer. (If I publish a book on Tuesday, and die on Friday, certainly my direct heirs deserve some chance to "inherit" the returns from my work. Not forever, but certainly for some reasonable amount of time...)

This all works out wonderfully for those things that are produced by individuals or small groups (books, music...) and fall apart pretty quickly with e.g. movies, where there are hundreds of people actively involved in the creation process. The simplest way to work this out is to grant each person involved a percentage of the copyright. Does the carpenter really deserve a piece of the copyright fro a movie set he helped build? Well, sure... Why wouldn't he? Does he deserve the same percentage as the screenwriter, or the director? I don't think anyone would argue he does, no. Individuals of course can still decide to offer their services for a flat fee or form of compensation other than a percentage of the copyright, but the default should be $X per hour PLUS X% of copyright... And since copyright is not transferable, the collective work becomes public domain when the last person owning a piece of the copyright dies.

So lets take movie as an example. And to make the numbers really simple, lets say that there are 100 people, each with equal shares... (I know, it would never happen that way in the real world, but this isn't it!) Copyright is not transferable, remember, so 20 years later, when all but one of the owners have died, it does NOT mean that one person owns 100% of the movie, or is entitled to all of any profits still coming in. They still only own 1%, and only get revenues from that 1%. What happens to the other revenues? I'd suggest placing those revenues into "the public domain", or as close to it as we can. Those proceeds could for example be used to fund education, or public libraries, or community theater, or any one of hundreds of other places that promote and foster the creative process.

A system like this would allow the real creators of a work to be fairly compensated for those efforts, would set a limit on copyright that I think most people would find reasonable, and would foster the continued expansion of the creative arts.

Not quite ready for the lawbooks, I know.. but that's where MY head is, at least.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

As a general rule, if what you do for money is done by literally millions of others for free, your "job" is not a job, it is in fact just a hobby.

That includes: playing a musical instrument, drawing a picture of something you're looking at, pretending to be another person in a movie.
Writing a novel, however, isn't something a reasonable number of people do for fun. Same with taking a snapshot (that cannot be captured again) of an important moment in time on a camera. Things like that should be defended.

Music and movies? Pffffft. It's the "personality" (lead singer, A-list movie star) that's being defended, not the creations themselves.
People are going to go see whatever the fuck you put Brad Pitt in. Look at his IMDB for a long list of shit. The studios, though, will keep putting him in everything and keep your average Joe Schmoe from getting a part in a movie. Why? Because people know the media personality Brad Pitt. The names sell, not the "works." Look at Gene Simmons for example of the biggest music shitbag that ever walked planet Earth. He's as Jewey as they come about his IP, and hasn't been relevant in music in 4 decades. Does he really still deserve to keep getting payed for the same horse-shit for the rest of his life? What if someone else can come along and do a better job of singing and playing? At that point, when someone can do better, and is legally barred from doing so, you're doing more harm to the market than good. This is why IP laws are terrible at best.

The terms "Work" / "Works" of art should be abolished from the language entirely. How the figure of speech "work of art" came to be written law to defend the "work" you put into making somethign artful, is baffling to me. Todays "artists" aren't creating anything physical. No supply is being used up by the end user. I have a hard time taking any laws seriously that aims to limit the supply of something that exists infinitely. The current **AA models of artificial scarcity is laughable at best. I'll continue to "Steal" everything until they collapse.

The justification behind the exorbitant costs for movies/music for the last 40 years was that you had to pay for the media it came on. The Industries used to have people over a barrel and they claimed it was because of distribution. Now, distribution is free. Sooo... unless they come up with a new excuse for justifying that money (which never makes it to the actual "artist"), they can suck a long thick dick.

TLDR: Copyright should not be the preferred retirement plan for "artists." If you can't manage with the money you made initially, then your "work" wasn't worth what you feel it was.

Re:Protecting rights

[alexgieg]

That's not really extensible to most of those examples. When you loan money or invest in something, you're actively "working" the entire time that your money is out of your hands. If I loan you $1000, I'm "loaning" for the entire period of time that I don't have my $1000.

The problem with loaning and investing, as it's usually done, is that one's shielded from the consequences. At most one'd fear losing the amount invested/loaned, but that'd be it. Where one actually fully responsible, as a co-participant, in whatever that amount was being used for, then I'd agree with you. Alas, one can dump money somewhere based solely on a monetary-related values, remain blissfully ignorant about other concerns, and not care about anything other than the return on investment. Evident then the end result couldn't be other than, with rare exceptions, the amoral or even immoral mega-corporations of today. Things would be radically different if anyone, by merely investing $100 in a company, were held as liable for, let's say, deaths it caused while caring enough for environmental damages in a remote operation in Africa, as the person directly responsible, including jail time. Until things change, it's more ethical for one to use the money by directly becoming a partner in an actual business where one'll have actual responsibilities.

Re:Protecting rights

[stanlyb]

Aristotel: The best way to win a dialogue is to start with false statement, and then using it to justify an the unjustice....
The "inventors" got NOTHING. They "created" whatever it is, but after it is the big corporation that is using their invetion for 5,10,15,50 and 75 years??? I repeat, 75 years after the invention!!!! WHAT THE ^%#^%#^% How could you invent anything new, if you have to wait what, 75 YEARS!!!
I will give one very good example why copyright, IP, whatever should last at most 2-5 years. INTERNET. It was invented by US military, and then given for "free" to the public. I say "free" because at the end of the day, who pays the military? The people. So who actually own the internet? You are correct, THE PEOPLE. Anyway, after it was made free, in a matter of very short period of time, you could see a progress unheard of, and unseen of in our whole history as a civilization. So, the correct response to every one who wants to restrict THE INTERNET, is to remind them, that we all already paid for it, and it is ours, for FREE. And any attempt to use some twisted logic justifying any unjust restriction over OUR INTERNET is &$&^%$^%&^$&^%$&$&&

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

No. When Napster shut down, the decrease got only stronger. At the end of Napster in Jan 01, it was still about US$ 14 billions, then it sunk down pretty fast to $12 billions 2003, where it stayed for the next three years till 2006. Then the free exchange via KaZaA was shut down, and sales are going down very fast since then - 10.5 billions in 2007, 8.5 billions in 2008 and 6.3 in 2009.

So whenever a big exchange network gets shut down, sales break down, and whenever an alternative exchange network grows large enough and stays relatively unharmed, the sales remain stable.

Could it also be that people don't want to pay $20+ for a 15 track album when they only want the one listenable track on it? Why pay $20 when you only want the $1 song that you can get from itunes?

The reason those other 14 sound the same as the one you want... only worse... is because the band/group/artist was forced to put it out by the record company. It wasn't something they felt, so much as something they had to do contractually. We all know that contracts make everyone so creative and artistic. *roll eyes*

Re:Protecting rights

[bryonak]

You're making a good argument, but first let me point out that this is quite a flawed interpretation of the GPL...

In the GPL world in which I am a contributor, I say you may freely use and distribute my work providing that:

• You do not remove my attribution ( my copyright notice under the general terms of GPL).
• You do not sell my work without my expressed written permission.

I'm allowed to take any GPL'd program and sell it for any price I wish. This is explicitly allowed and endorsed by the GPL, which is a commercial but non-proprietary (aka Free) license.
I do have to respect the four freedoms and pass them on to the receiver, but price is not a criterion here.

• You MUST return to me, the copyright holder, all code that changes my code so that I may decide to whether or not to include it in my original code.

I can take any GPL'd project and make as many changes as I want, then use the program in any way I want, all while not sending a single byte of my changes back to the original author. The license is activated when I distribute the software. Anectodally, I know of a company who uses modified GPL code internally without contributing back, figuring that they don't need upstream sync.

By the way, your first point, while not incorrect, is not something from the GPL itself, but an inherent mechanism of most countries' copyright system.

If someone violates those conditions what should the consequences be?

In handling GPL transgressions, it has been the SFLC's and FSF's policy to not "harm" and "punish" the perpetrator, but show them the way to compliance (i.e. put your changes on a public server) and be done with it. I do agree that this is what the consequences should be.

Throughout time we have made agreements that dictate the norms of social behavior and we as a society have enforced those agreements with forms of, punishment, retribution, etc. Everything from the scarlet "A" to getting you right hand "removed" to killing the person. I think that for the most part in our modernity we have strove to use the threat of punishment as a deterrent to keep people from breaking those social contracts.

This is the obvious and traditional way. It has been well tried and proven, so it's hard to attack a model working so well with regard to human psychology...

So the question is how do we as a society deter these sorts of violations and what kind of threat is sufficient enough to prevent anyone from doing it? Simply saying he "pirating" of copyrighted works is not against social norms will be rejected out of hand because in point of fact it is because someone worked hard to produce that work or funded its creating as an investment ad deserves the opportunity to realize a return for their investment and labor, if they so choose, without that opportunity being taken from them before the term of the protection from such taking has expired.

1. Maybe we should ask ourselves the underlying question: is it moral to create an artificial scarcity on something that can be copied and distributed with negligible time, effort and cost?
Most people probably agree that it actually is, but they are highly influenced by the physical, tangible world and don't think in digital/virtual terms. But afaict the complementary group is growing, especially among young people. (here, just keep in mind that law roughly follows the majority opinion/morals)

2. Is it moral to forbid, for example, a group of people singing happy birthday for a friend at a restaurant?
I think most people will agree that the current copyright system especially in the USA is out of bounds and the punishments are way overblown. This is a completely different issue than the previously mentioned, but they're often mixed and lead to stupid arguments when the free thinkers from the previous point meet with "material

Re:Protecting rights

[NoOneInParticular]

That's funny. So you expect, when you fire up a word-processor, that a programmer will come to your house to 'perform' the program for you? Because in your system there's no incentive whatsoever to put any piece of software on the market as nobody would pay for it.

Re:Protecting rights

[shutdown -p now]

Asymmetrical response only really works if one side cares about the other. So long as large studios keep shoveling money even while piracy rates are through the roof, they don't really have any incentive to change, and don't care much about what happens to indies and other small fish - in fact, if anything, hurting those latter lets them paint a bleak picture for the Congress and the public whilst demanding more shit like SOPA.

If you really want to send the message, then boycott their products altogether, and bring that money to creators who want change in a different direction - people releasing their stuff under CC licenses, open source etc.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

The point is that unlike physical property, intellectual property is not scarce and should not be covered by laws to make it so.

Re:Protecting rights

[metrix007]

So Google away.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

In the GPL world in which I am a contributor, I say you may freely use and distribute my work providing that:

• You do not remove my attribution ( my copyright notice under the general terms of GPL).
• You do not sell my work without my expressed written permission.
• You MUST return to me, the copyright holder, all code that changes my code so that I may decide to whether or not to include it in my original code.

What license are you using? The GPL only requires that source code be provided for minimal cost (postage and handling). You can burn any GPL program binaries to a CD, stick it in a box and label it $100. As long as you include an offer for the source code at minimal cost, that's perfectly kosher.

I didn't think Creative Commons' licenses work properly with software, do they?

Re:Protecting rights

[Sique]

As a typical non-listener to music, I don't speculate about the motivations of people downloading music. It would like being blind and philosophing about colors.

Re:Protecting rights

[symbolset]

No, that's not enough. They propose to take away by force of law all citizens' to freedom of speech and due process of law whether they consume their products or not, to preserve their business model. That's not a boycott level "deprive you of the profits you got from me" thing. That's a "take away your ability to do business entirely" thing. That's war. That's a "destroy your entire reason for being" thing.

The completion of the meme I was driving at is a US military theme (Marines, I think) that I was avoiding completing because it encourages personal violence that I'm not in favor of. But to be completely factual it goes something like "kick my dog and I burn down your house."

Re:Protecting rights

[JasonRabbit75]

You're attacking a strawman here--I really don't think that the parent meant "People deserve to get paid for any work regardless of its value."

Re:Protecting rights

[dmbasso]

You forgot to say Thomas Edison copied "Voyage Dans La Lune" and distributed it in the US without giving any penny to its author, George Melies.

Re:Protecting rights

[symbolset]

In my mind stealing is subtly different from theft. In theft, you unfairly deprive someone of something they had, enriching yourself thereby. In stealing you enrich yourself with something you're not entitled to by law and whether or not someone else was deprived thereby is irrelevant. It's splitting hairs exceedingly fine I admit, and what do I know? - but that's my take on the theft/stealing thing.

Re:Protecting rights

[metrix007]

That sounds like a personal definition, which is fine. But when talking about the problem and potential solutions we need to use agreed upon definitions. Most dictionary definitions tend to say something about deprivation or the act of stealing having some negative affect on the owner. This isn't true with piracy.

It should also be noted that piracy is a specific word dealing with infringing copyright. The definition of piracy does not make use of the words steal or theft or even imply the idea of such. Because the two are unrelated.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

1. If the starving artists got the royalties, nice and fine, but what if not? http://www.salon.com/2000/06/14/love_7/
2. If I can get it in the shop, I'll buy it. But what if I'm PREPARED to buy it, have the money in my hand, but.... the CD is nowhere to be found?
3. Dude, once they have broadcast it on free-to-air radio / TV, it is in the public domain, regardless of the law.

Re:Protecting rights

[Altrag]

If apples an oranges were more similar, you might have a point.

Apples: Solo developer, makes a tool for himself. Decides its useful enough that other people might like it and releases it under the GPL, making not a dime for his work. And then a big company with a pocketbook the size of the guy's house decides that they're somehow entitled to use it /for profit/ simply because it exists and get pissy when they're caught at it.

Oranges: Large companies of middlemen charging you 2-3 times what most works are worth and feeding bare peanuts back to the actual producers. And then some kid in his parent's basement decides to enjoy the work by himself and his life is essentially destroyed because he's now a full-fledged criminal in league with murderers under laws purchased (and often even written) by the same large companies.

Yes both are cases of copyright infringement, but its a lot easier to side with the guy who's just trying to get by than the faceless company who's out for blood, regardless of which one has the law on their side (especially when the law itself is unfairly weighted in favor of the large faceless companies and often simultaneously destroying personal freedoms).

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

Or maybe the quality has decreased significantly?

Re:Protecting rights

[symbolset]

The meaning of words is to a limited extent fungible. In a certain sense if you can take control of the meaning of the words, you win the discussion. There's a reason I "stole" the handle "symbolset" back in the day, as the symbolset is the nexus between expression and understanding. I'm not trying to manipulate the meaning of the words here: I'm just trying to use them effectively to convey a critical idea. Putting across fine discriminations can be a difficult thing when we're still arguing about what the meaning of "is" is. English is, at best, a difficult language. It's no wonder people have difficulty learning it.

I don't find any fault with your argument that by taking a copy of content the owner is in no way diminished. He still has his copy, he can still sell it. You can still buy copies of "The History of England" published in the 1800's and well into the public domain - if you have a few hundred dollars to spare. Fully public domain copies of "Grimm's Fairy Tales" and other classic works also.

Theft is a civil order matter, governed by laws to the extent that they can be applied. Stealing is a personal moral matter, subject to exigencies and necessities of the day but governed overall by what is "right". Often, but not always, they are the same thing.

I argue with your objection, but not your intent. You have a good point, as do I.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

The real question here is not how to stop piracy, but how to make the payed-for product more desirable. The game has changed and so must the strategies involved.

I don't think the problem is the desirability of the product at all.

To say "you need to make it more desirable in order for me to pay for it" is a garbage argument. If you choose to consume the media, it has worth to you. You don't get to set the price. If you don't like the product at the price offered, don't buy it. That sends a message about its worth.

Pirating it doesn't send a message beyond "this has worth to me, as I chose to consume it".

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

What about Liza?

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

One way might be to simply collect tips - people put money in the jar if they enjoyed the work.

That only REALLY works for sites like Wikipedia and VideoLan -- you produce content/products SO VALUABLE and you give it away for 'tipware' that ENOUGH people appreciate your hard work that they ARE COMPELLED TO ACTUALLY TIP YOU IN CA$H!

For everybody else, you have to offer a small sample for free and a paid link to the full content or use the ransomware model: pay the ransom and release the content/product for free from then on....

CAPTCHA: surplus [ What the internet created with 'digital goods'.... :D ]

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

So what? You don't have an automatic right to be paid for work you do. Especially not for the rest of your life.

Intellectual property is theft from the public domain.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

You wrote that software without any kind of contract (or even reasonable expectation) regarding your payment.

If someone creates software on contract, they should be paid according to the contract.

And the same also applies for contracts with distributors, retailers, etc.

Randomly leaked 0-day warez, however, are not open source software

Re:Protecting rights

[flibby]

You seem to have bought into the industries demonization of us; that we're the reason that the industry is suffering, because we steal everything we want and rob them of their livelihood. That simply isn't true. They just want to squeeze out more profits from us lowly peasants.

Sure, there are some asshole "pirates" who never buy anything, but I believe that most people buy things that they think are worth their money. People like buying things, but they don't like wasting their money. One way to avoid wasting money is to make sure that you like something before you invest in it.

As the Valve philosophy states: "piracy is a service problem." Inconveniencing the people who buy a product with restrictive and intrusive DRM is a service problem. They don't want to deal with it, and they want to discourage those practices by telling them in the only language they understand. (money)

DRM never stops piracy and never will. Piracy is an inescapable fact of business and no amount of DRM will ever stop it. The sooner the industry wakes up and realizes that intrusive DRM is a waste of time and money, the sooner everyone can be happy.

Re:Protecting rights

[Jimekai]

People don't deserve to be paid for their work. Being paid with money is a Judaic Capitalist concept whereby double-entry bookkeeping has created a usury system which flows ultimately only to the 1%. That in turn has conjured up all sorts of useless trite terms to enslave us. Instead of money, a reason-based economy driven by a people's A.I., which isn't a zero sum banker's game, but one that uses quantum information to conduct transactions, is just around the corner. It is similar to the way in which enzymes and proteins interact. IBM is one company that sees the future economy being based on authenticated rights. They maybe afraid to actually come out and say that the adding and subtracting concepts of money are useless in a world of nanotechnology replicators, but they are certainly going full steam ahead to make the world run on a much sweeter mathematical framework than usury.

Re:Protecting rights

[Internetuser1248]

You can't have a functioning long-term economy in which people never get compensated for anything; people are trying to make a living, and they use the income to produce more contributions to society.

The point being that there probably should be an attempt made to hinder online piracy in some way. We can't just let it spiral completely out of control, to the point where it's no longer lucrative to produce anything.

While I agree with much of what you say, I must take issue with current modern views on money and art, which I find to be flawed. I myself produce art, mostly I am not paid for that. Sometimes I get paid, but then it is an hourly rate, not far above minimum wage. I am not complaining about this, it seems fair to me. I would of course prefer a higher hourly rate. My point is that you don't need copyright law to get compensated for things, copyright compensates you for doing nothing, it is only for what you have done in the past, or what your parents did in the past, or what the person who you bought the rights off did in the past. Piracy could never spiral to the point that it is not lucrative to produce anything. Assuming you meant information (copyright is unlikely to infringe on food production for example) the majority of great works of art were produced by people who did so for the love of their art. Some of them got paid and some of them didn't. But to suggest that we wouldn't have art if there were no copyright law is an insult to the millions of artists throughout history who have worked menial jobs to support their art, and never saw a penny. Vincent van Gogh sold one painting his entire life - to his brother, Bach worked mostly on commission and wasn't paid royalties, which is true for most of the classical composers of his day, and the painters, the architects, etc. I believe artists should get paid for their work, like every other kind of worker. Commission, wage, salary or sale of goods are all viable. Those that create art that no one will pay for (like van Gogh), also highly valuable work in many cases, should get social welfare. Name ten artists who don't get paid, and have their work heavily pirated - I bet you can't. Metallica? Oh wait, millionaires. Ubisoft 3d artists? Fairly well paid. My wife's brother? No one pirates his work. Total lack of correlation often suggest lack of causation.

Art is not business, if you want to make money go found a company or get a law degree. Every person that gives up on art because it won't make them rich, increases the average quality of art in the world.

Re:Protecting rights

[metrix007]

With all due respect, I feel you are missing my point, or perhaps I am misunderstanding yours. I feel that you are linking piracy to stealing as you have defined it. I am making the point that piracy is a separate thing from theft and stealing altogether.

Re:Protecting rights

[symbolset]

I am missing your point - or perhaps you're missing mine. Stealing is not quite exactly theft. In this particular case I'm quite OK with stealing, but I'm not OK with trying to pretend it's not stealing. We need to own up and admit that we're taking without permit of law, and that it's not legal, and that it's still OK. Otherwise it's just being a cheap-ass and not a social statement.

Re:Protecting rights

[metrix007]

My point is that both stealing and theft are irrelevant to a discussion concerning piracy. The word piracy was created to describe copyright infringement, distinct from stealing and/or theft. While you may feel bad about copying something you didn't pay for that doesn't mean it is stealing.

FWIW, downloading a movie is perfectly fine in many countries, so in those countries do you still consider it stealing?

Re:Protecting rights

[metrix007]

My point is that both stealing and theft are irrelevant to a discussion concerning piracy. The word piracy was created to describe copyright infringement, distinct from stealing and/or theft. While you may feel bad about copying something you didn't pay for that doesn't mean it is stealing.

BTW, downloading a movie is perfectly fine in many countries, so in those countries do you still consider it stealing?

Let's forget about the lines you have drawn between theft and piracy and realize that they are both separate categories, unrelated to the distinct category of piracy. I would recommend reading about the history of piracy in the context of copyright to get a clearer sense of this. It's only in the last decade that they conflated a word that had existed for about 500 years with stealing and/or theft, when previously it was unrelated.

Re:Protecting rights

[Sir_Sri]

Well ya, now that the price has come down. I'm not sure what was included in the 30k figure I got at the last place I was, whether that was just a box, or software, support and training etc. The 'kits' themselves are under 2k today, but today you're looking at what the Wii U will do, not the Wii. You also need to get into their development programme.

(Note; You can buy emulator kits which are nearly as good, if not better, from sketchy hong kong sites for a lot less than the official kits).

Re:Protecting rights

[symbolset]

I've had enough of this. Fuck off.

Re:Protecting rights

[Asic Eng]

That would only happen if you are a lousy tipper. Otherwise the money goes to the content you are interested in.

Re:Protecting rights

[alexgieg]

in your system there's no incentive whatsoever to put any piece of software on the market as nobody would pay for it.

How can you be on ./ with such a low user number and don't know Linux etc.? Existing software is free while implementation, support, customization etc. are all paid work. What's true is that in my system huge software houses wouldn't exist, but there would be a lot more of the small ones, professional programming becoming basically a craft. And gaming, much like filming, would be a much smaller field, as there wouldn't be blockbuster-level budgets in it anymore.

Re:Protecting rights

[Pieroxy]

In my view, you're missing the point entirely.

1 is not an engineering problem. But 1 is irrelevant, because of 2.

2 can be summarized into "Do people have the right to communicate freely and with an expectation of privacy in said communication". So, if you want to stop the piracy over the internet, the only way is to forbid people to communicate over the internet, or to track whatever they do, in other words, to shut down the internet or monitor it. Shut down is not going to happen, as the internet is now a sizeable part of every developed country economy. And moniroting ain't going to happen either, because the basis for e-commerce is that you can get your VISA card number through secretly. And if you want to stop piracy at all, you need to forbid people to communicate. Not going to happen either.

Note that at any point I never claimed that "People have a right to copy any and everything they please". What I'm claiming is that in order to remove this right, you also need to remove the right to communicate. Which ain't going to happen, no matter how hard you want to.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

The flat rate tax will just as well keep a dying business model alive; it will actually hurt the producers of content. The reward should be quality/appreciation based, no cheating.

Otherwise, thank you; very well spoken.

Re:Protecting rights

[TheRaven64]

It's not a straw man. A lot of people in the copyright debate claim that artist deserve to be paid for their art, simply because they created it, and claim that poor artists are evidence that current copyright enforcement is too weak. Artists do not deserve to be paid if they create art that no one likes. I agree that, if lots of people are downloading someone's work then this implies that lots of people do like it, and in that case they deserve to be paid (although the amount is still debatable), but this needs to be stated. The act of producing some creative work is not intrinsically valuable, it is only valuable if people want what is produced, and this often gets overlooked.

Re:Protecting rights

[master_p]

While you recognize the right of man to access the human culture, you fail to recognize the right of a man to be compensated according to his abilities.

Our society is based on the principle that the higher more able or more clever one is, the more is entitled to be compensated.

By giving everyone a free pass to everything created, we effectively destroy that principle, which is really unfair to both the more able (because they get to be compensated less than they deserve to) and to the less able (who think they are entitled to everything without even working to have access to it).

Not having to work for something is completely unethical, in my opinion. I thought America valued hard work above all.

Re:Protecting rights

[master_p]

One is not being paid for the effort to do the work, he is being paid for the value his work creates, which may extend beyond the actual effort.

For example, you pay for food that someone else has prepared for you. At the time you eat it, no one was working on it, yet you happily paid for it.

Re:Protecting rights

[alexgieg]

One is not being paid for the effort to do the work, he is being paid for the value his work creates, which may extend beyond the actual effort.

Actually it's neither. One's paid what the other thinks the work is worth at the exact moment of the exchange. There's some background calculation going on on both sides based on previous valuations, but it's still all a subjective game of figuring out some middle ground between the maximum one's willing to pay and the minimum the other's willing to work for, effective at that very instant. Afterwards things can change, usually little, sometimes a lot.

Anyway, this isn't really related to what I was saying. In your food example, it's certainly proper for a meal to be paid for. Whether before or after or in installments is irrelevant, provided it's a price for an actual service. What isn't proper is for the lunch maker to be paid in again and again and again and again, for a single meal he prepared way back. Copyright is the literal equivalent of, using another example, a janitor charging a "passright" for every person who ever walk through a corridor he (once) cleaned, plus having the right to sue anyone who were to clean another corridor as much as he (once) cleaned his as well as anyone who merely looked at either of those corridors.

Re:Protecting rights

[thunderclap]

I am one of those artists. And you know what amuses me? The argument that artists don't get paid when piracy happens. It is more likely that one of the big 5 record companies or the movie studios will reduce the amount of royalties than is fair than piracy (copyright infringement) denies them. Stuff not bought will never provide money. The argument is as much a straw man as the one that only half of America pays taxes. (we all pay taxes, half just get a refund check. Everyone pays sales tax.)
So get off your stolen high horse. If you are arguing that piracy reduces royalties, you are wrong. The problem is the industry as it stands has to change again like it did in the 1930s and 1970's and it doesn't want to. Piracy will never go away. If it did, there would be a cure for shoplifting or bank fraud. So the solution is enforcement of current laws, and the fact that you need to end this staggered release of movies and staggered distribution. This is, and always has been a business problem. None of us want to let that guy in china making fake Louis Volutton purses to get away with it. So be honest and not ignorant and blind, artifical scarcity is dead.

Re:Protecting rights

[lightknight]

You are correct that people deserve to profit from their work.

However, and this is just one of two hundred reasons we are were we are, the bill in mind would have use protect someone's work at the expense of their freedoms. I know it's not popular to point out that we have certain guaranteed rights which are constantly, and conveniently, being forgotten, reinterpreted, or trampled over, but someone needs to be the canary in the coal mine, and shout that we are in dangerous territory. Those rights, given to us in a Bill of Rights, cannot be impinged upon, not even in the event of a copyright or patent violation. I leave it as an exercise to the reader to determine which amendments, and what rights I am speaking of here, and how they run the risk of being violated. I do not expect a reply with the correct information.

"RIAA and MPAA" -> they are evil. Even the artists they claim to represent have come out and said (paraphrasing): "Free us of these evil bastards. Buy our music directly from our website, at a discount, and know that we despise these middlemen as much as you do!"

"We can't just let it spiral completely out of control, to the point where it's no longer lucrative to produce anything." -> I'd love to know how you believe you can stop, or even slow piracy. I am a Computer Scientist, on a website where there are thousands of CS / SE / programmers / intelligent people of all sorts who visit daily, and we haven't found a solution that would work would stop, or even slow piracy. In effect, you're perpetuating fraud, asking us to pay good money (taxpayer money) for a product that will NEVER deliver on its promises.

What more, companies like Steam are doing just fine. They continue to grow, +100% per year is what I've heard quoted, for the past several years. They use DRM, and yet many of their customers couldn't be happier. Perhaps the reason for the lack of sales the various interests behind this legislation are experiencing is not because of an increase in piracy, but because they've been pissing on the customer's leg for the past two decades, all while telling the customer how awesome it feels to be giving him / her a golden shower. Perhaps piracy is a symptom of the larger problem, not the cause.

"And a friend of mine who does torrent stuff a lot says that when torrent users do buy something, they act like they're doing the greatest thing ever. ... They're saying, 'I bought something today. I paid for it. And I didn't steal it. I'm the greatest person alive.' " -> Indeed, but it's more along the lines of all the sh*t people hock to customers these days, they've found something that is actually worth buying, and recommending to friends. And let's be honest, the customer is being screwed fairly badly these days. Anything from BofA debit fees, to the music industry's desire for you acquiring a new license to transfer a music file onto your iPod (from your ripped CD), these people deserve the bad-will they've been earning.

Interesting to note, I was looking at Louis C.K.'s video download offer the other day, and was happy to find that he was offering a DRM-free version (so I can watch it on my computer, or burn it to DVD to watch it on the big TV in the living room, etc.). Hell, even the ability to make a copy of it, when the first copy becomes so scuffed (DVDs rarely make it back into their cases unharmed, I lost a FF7: Advent Children disc to this) was particularly appealing.

The conclusion that I, and most people have come to, is that technology can't solve this problem. It's a business method problem. Stop the propaganda, stop wasting money on methods which will fail, and start spending money on a music-delivery system that doesn't piss off the end-user. Were I Sony, I'd pull a Steam, offer people a permanent service, where they could re-download their music as much as they wanted, and offer up entire discographies for bargain prices around the holidays. Let the customer do what they want with the end-product, but make it so that when they wa

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

"And a friend of mine who does torrent stuff a lot says that when torrent users do buy something, they act like they're doing the greatest thing ever. ... They're saying, 'I bought something today. I paid for it. And I didn't steal it. I'm the greatest person alive.' "

I've noticed this attitude as well. It's very, very annoying.

This just means that this something is really worth their money in their opinion, unlike most of the bs they are fed by the industry.

Re:Protecting rights

[danomac]

Maybe they think the PC will infect the TV with viruses. TVs are getting "smarter" now, so the scary part is it could actually be a possibility. You never know...

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

Not a very good one unfortunately. He's either dumb or evil.

Re:Protecting rights

[jamstar7]

Oh, ok. So if I vote with my wallet and don't support rap yodelling, they'll come pick my pocket anyway and make me support rap yodelling?

What's the criteria on this? Do I need to just own a tv, computer, or a radio? Or would a current account with my local power monopoly do?

When I was a kid back in the Stone Age, back when we still hunted dinosaurs from the backs of our '57 Chevys, we tipped for good service. Tips were optional, not manditory. If the person gave shitty service, no tip. This was understood by everybody, nobody fored tips from you.

Re:Protecting rights

[metrix007]

Wow. I really wasn't expecting that as a reply, as I thought we were having a civilized conversation. I was fine with you arbitrarily separating theft and stealing, because I was pointing out that piracy is separate from both of those. Which is fact. Now you have resorted to insults, which shows that you are happy to be willfully ignorant. A shame.

Re:Protecting rights

[Anonymous Coward]

That and people no longer buy albums, they buy only the tracks they want decreasing sales. Oh yeah and the economy took a massive dump and we have +8% unemployment.

Re:Protecting rights

[Lord_Jeremy]

Sure, steam *can* be cracked, but most people don't want to risk their steam account for one game they could buy for 5 dollars. They'll take that risk for portal2 for 60 bucks, but not for a game you're selling for 5 or 10.

In no way is there any evidence that you will be Steam banned for playing games cracked with a Steam emulator. If you're actually running some modified version of the Steam client, that is a totally different matter since that probably involves fraud with the Steam system itself. Also, Portal 2's launch price was $50 and I preordered it for $45. In October I gifted a copy to someone for $15.

Re:Protecting rights

[HiThere]

As this model becomes more common, *I* expect that the laws will be slanted even more to suppress it. They already allow anyone who can hire a lawyer to get your files removed from your ISP with no repercussions for fraudulent takedown. This next step allows your entire site to be taken down without even notice to you. And again, no repercussions for fraudulent complaints.

I'm not really sure just how far they'll go. Two years ago I would have guessed they couldn't get this thing even up to a vote, much less just about guaranteed passage.

If you definedthe central issue as "preventing copyright", then you are already accepting the arguement that they should be allowed to suppress works that they claim as copyrighted without any repercussions for fraudulent claims. This is something that I cannot accept as just.

P.S.: The current law allows anyone to request any file to be removed if they have a "good faith belief" that it violates the copyright. And it allow them to get that belief by trusting someone else. And the someone else is under no penalties if they make a false claim. (Caution: IANAL, but that's the way I've heard it explained.)

Re:Protecting rights

[marnues]

Music, movies, software and books are all things that fall under IP. They take significant amounts of time and money and effort to create, but once created they are trivially reproduced.

False. It takes great expense and effort to recreate some of the concerts I've enjoyed. It is near impossible to duplicate the emotional involvement of a crowd in a theater (live actors or big screen). It is next to impossible to replicate WoW's servers. Just because it has become trivial to reproduce those areas where industries previously profited does not mean that it is trivial to reproduce the artistic work and status of enjoying said work. If industry would discontinue profits from distribution, we could all come out ahead.

Re:Protecting rights

[tepples]

That or they already have a PC and aren't willing to buy a second one to put next to the TV.

Re:Protecting rights

[Asic Eng]

I don't know, maybe I didn't explain this very well. The money the artist gets is the amount he gets from tips, plus his share from the flat rate. However his share depends on the tips he's getting. So his income is: money_from_tips + money_from_tips * flat_rate_share_factor. Let's say the factor is 50%, than his total income is 1.5 times the money he gets from tips. The factor is the same for everybody, the contribution for the flat rate is the same for everybody.

Let's the say the average amount of tips people give out is $5/month, the amount distributed via flat rate contributions is $2.5 per month and person (has to be because flat rate factor is 50%). So if you give your favorite artist $5/month, they will receive 1.5*$5 = $7.50 from you as combined income. Since you are an average tipper, all the money you pay in the flat rate is distributed to artists you like.

Now if you were a below-average tipper, you might only tip $2/month. Your artists receive only 1.5 times that - i.e. $3/month from you. That means the remaining flat-rate funds of $1.50 are used to fund rap yodelling (or other stuff you don't like).

If you are a good tipper you might tip $20/month - your favorite artists receive $30/month - $7.50 more than would normally come out of your flat-rate share. The rest comes from people who love rap yodelling but are lousy tippers.

So good tippers are shaping the direction in which content creators develop. They also help keep the flat-rate down, because they contribute more to the total. Extremely lousy tippers don't have to spend anything other than the flat rate, but they also exercise no control.

Note: I didn't pick realistic amounts here, just wanted a simple example for the numerical side of things.

Re:Protecting rights

[jamstar7]

Oh, I got that, alright. My problem is with the flat rate portion of it. Basically, what you're saying is, tax everybody for the benefit of the MAFIAA. They're working on that. And that's the part I don't like.

Re:Protecting rights

[Warmlight]

Data is not the plural of anecdote.

Re:Protecting rights

[iluvcapra]

(1) is sortof an engineering problem, more of a social engineering problem, making paying just easy enough and copying just annoying enough.

Note that at any point I never claimed that "People have a right to copy any and everything they please". What I'm claiming is that in order to remove this right, you also need to remove the right to communicate.

I don't see the distinction you're making here, you're just making the negative argument for the positive alternative. Also, I wouldn't necessarily agree that people are entitled to a mandatory government protection to communicate on the Internet -- if the state doesn't cut the lines, Time Warner and Comcast are well within their rights to build whatever computer network suits their business objectives. They're the last mile in most of the United States, they get final cut.

It isn't all "just" communication. The Internet is at its best when people are expressing original ideas, about the way they see the world; using it as a pipe to ship other people's ideas because you want to save $3 on video rental is really a bastardization. It's a fallacy to claim both acts have equivalent moral or social value.

Re:Protecting rights

[Asic Eng]

Well *your* part of the money goes only to the content creators *you* like. The MAFIAA only gets money if people are willing to tip for their content. If they do that with their money, you'll just have to live with that.

Re:Protecting rights

[jamstar7]

Well *your* part of the money goes only to the content creators *you* like. The MAFIAA only gets money if people are willing to tip for their content. If they do that with their money, you'll just have to live with that.

You're not getting it. You talk about a flat rate. Everybody pays this. This flat rate is a tax on everybody unless they can prove they're, I dunno, Amish or something. Plus, we get the opportunity to 'tip'.

What happens if 'not enough people' tip? They raise the flat rate tax?

Re:Protecting rights

[FiloEleven]

Perhaps I wasn't clear. I'm not talking about giant studio works, I am talking about more independent artists. I'll focus on musicians since that's what I have the most experience with.

The argument that musicians would (only) get paid to perform live works for conventional rock bands. It doesn't necessarily work for people who fall more on the composition side over the performance side. There are things you can do in a studio that cannot be recreated faithfully live, and there are entire genres of music where a live show would consist of playing a bit of guitar or keyboard over a tape of the vast majority of the performance. As the gear continues to improve and people become more comfortable with it this is not always the case, but the failure to recognize craft as a worthy thing that is separate from performance is a real problem. Is a stunning musical piece's beauty diminished because it can't be performed live? The model which says, "play shows to get paid" leaves no room for that kind of music.

Re:Protecting rights

[FiloEleven]

But WoW's servers are exactly what the industry wants to move towards--you pay a subscription to access the content, and when you stop paying you stop playing. Distribution is still very controlled, except now it's not even something that you pay for and get--it's something you have to keep paying for and you lose it when you stop.

I responded to another post above regarding concerts, so I'll only restate that not all music can be played or even belongs in a live setting.

Re:Protecting rights

[Pieroxy]

At the core, the Internet is a bunch of pipes allowing information to flow. In other words, allowing people to communicate. Nothing less and nothing more.

This information can be novel ideas, a credit card number or HD movies, but in the end it becomes a stream of bits that goes through said pipes.

People are not entitled to communication over the internet, at least not yet. But if this goes down the drain, as the copyright supporters want it to, it will be the end of the internet. But this cannot be done from a technical standpoint - there is such a thing as unbreakable cryptography. It also cannot be done through law enforcement - there is such a thing as unbreakable cryptography, again, and I don't see a country putting a sizeable part of their population in jail for communicating through encrypted means. Moreover, there are plenty of ways to communicate an undetectable message, although pretty much all of them involve a huge overhead in terms of the message size vs the number of bytes transmitted.

Again. Progress is here, right in front of us. I don't think any party has the means to stop it. But as always, some parties have the stupidity to try, and have the means to slow it down, with huge collateral damage in the process. But they couldn't care less.

All in all, I'm not claiming it is a good or a bad thing. I'm claiming it's the way it is and the majors have better get prepared to live with it instead of trying to fight it. It will be a much more productive endeavor for everyone.

Re:Protecting rights

[Asic Eng]

Yes, correct I wasn't proposing magical unicorns. Everybody pays. However you also direct where your money goes. It's not true that your share goes to stuff you don't like. That only applies if you want to pay less then your fair share, then that control goes away.

Re:Protecting rights

[jamstar7]

That's what I was thinking you were saying. Nice to know my brain still works after all that exposure to 'reality tv'.

So, basically, you're proposing a subsidy. Reminds me of subsidising buggy whip makers after the development of the auto assembly line and the car loan. Not my problem if the MAFIAA's business plan is on life support. They need a new business plan. Again, not my problem to come up with one for them unless they wanna throw me a paycheck. They need to learn how to use the new technologies. Again, not my job to teach them til they throw me a check.

Re:Protecting rights

[Asic Eng]

I'm proposing a way to get money to content creators. It's not a subsidy it's payment. MAFIAA is involved only if people want to see their content. If content creators don't offer their content via the MAFIAA, then the latter is out of business.

The business plan of the MAFIAA is very much your problem, because it means subordinating your freedom to their profit, and they won't pay you they'll pay your representatives instead. You are essentially proposing a "wait and see" approach, hoping that they'll adjust to the internet or be replaced by others. I'm not too hopeful on that.

If you want to compare that to buggy whips ... They'll ban car manufacturing, label anyone traveling over 35mph a pirate and are asking government to destroy roads whenever pirates are sighted on them.

Re:Protecting rights

[bugger41]

I don't care what anybody says about the subject if Joe blow as They are trying to Betray here Was getting bent over the barrel by some hack publishing his work I would be all for him but it's not Joe blow is it ? for the most part it's corporations who are trying to make this our problem with it should be settled at best in the lower courts were Joe blow would have to If this happened to him but because of corporations .if he had to take one of them on the wood handedly lose the case in no time flat Because he doesn't have a war chest full of corporate money .so as far as I'm concerned the corporations Can settle it in court just as Joe blow would have to and if it somehow turned out that Kim Jong was the culprit somewhere in China and China didn't recognize American views on the subject too damn bad .those are the breaks. I could care less just as long as we put Joe blow first let's see America as a system. get behind Joe blow. If Kim Jong bends Joe of over the barrel 6000 miles away And America calls for Kim Jong's head on a stick. when we see that. I might be Interested in some damn Corporations views but until then I'll take the position of telling that the de Rothchild and the Rockefellers of this world to stick it where the sun don't shine .we know that they are not interested in fair play and anyway . They only need to legislate anything at all as to manufacture America's dependency on them anytime any corporation starts whining about anything at all you can bet it's not to be trusted it's about time America shuts them up permanently.if it wasn't for Joe blow corporate America-- global banks-- and global Corporate America wouldn't even exist they exist by the sweat blood and bones of the hard-working people and America around the world Let them solve their own problems and quit crying like The bunch overgrown babies they are. This sickens me to see that they're trying to make this about Joe blow but it never has been Has it?

They are right and we need a clear answer

[rtfa-troll]

This is absolutely right. It's not enough to be negative. We have to clearly state a future in which the rights of copyright owners are much more limited and are determined by their duty to increase the public domain.

Re:They are right and we need a clear answer

[Anonymous Coward]

Cool. The future is the past. We enforce the laws we already have against things like look-a-likes (through copyright infringement suits, seizure of product, etc).
We enforce the laws against piracy (physical theft of physical objects that once you take them, they are gone) Digital copying is not piracy, it is only copying - like taking a photograph of a painting, it's not stealing the painting.

*Rant mode enabled*
While we're at it, why don't we protect the artists and creators of said content. Let's make cartels like the MPAA and RIAA illegal. They have been the bane of artists and their customers alike since shortly after their inception. If you truly want to look out for artists and media content creators, these illegal organizations have to be dealt with. My suggestion, line up everyone who's party to them (ie board members, ceos of member corporations, anyone getting a pay-check from them who isn't a content creator), and ship them off to gitmo, forcing them to labor to pay for their meals until dead, then bury them in a mass grave somewhere sealed in concrete 30 feet thick. It's either that or nuke em from orbit. They're like cock-roaches, have to be sure.

Re:They are right and we need a clear answer

[rtfa-troll]

[..] We enforce the laws against piracy (physical theft of physical objects that once you take them, they are gone) Digital copying is not piracy, it is only copying - like taking a photograph of a painting, it's not stealing the painting.

Piracy is an old term which has existed for hundreds of years; I prefer "unlicensed copying", but I really don't see the difference between a photocopy and a digital copy from the point of view of the law. The laws that are being enforced are copyright related and pretty clearly apply here. What's wrong is that they have gone far beyond their original aims.

My suggestion, line up everyone who's party to them (ie board members, ceos of member corporations, anyone getting a pay-check from them who isn't a content creator), and ship them off to gitmo, forcing them to labor to pay for their meals until dead, then bury them in a mass grave somewhere sealed in concrete 30 feet thick. It's either that or nuke em from orbit. They're like cock-roaches, have to be sure.

Now that's what I call a positive suggestion. Furthermore, I believe that, as long as he first accuses them of "terroristic copyright protection" then congress has just given him full authorisation to do this with no need for new legislation (though he might need to trick them into going abroad first for things to go fully smoothly). You should post it up on a web site and then send it off; do remember to put up President Obama's reaction in full. :-)

Not enough.

[pclinger]

This simply is not enough. From what it sounds like, they'll sign the bill as long as the DNS portion is removed. This will still kill many user-generated content websites on the Internet.

Re:Not enough.

[wonkavader]

No, you're misunderstanding the statement. It's saying, we'll sign anything with the DNS portion removed BECAUSE NOW WE SEE CONGRESS IS ALREADY REMOVING IT. This statement would have been even blander had it been issued just a few days ago. Obama will sign anything he's handed. He does little, changes nothing. His people will try to put a good spin on whatever trash happens under this continuation of the Bush presidency. This document is another example of that.

I'm not sure whether at heart he's a Republican who knows he can only get elected as a Democrat, or whether he read the constitution and decided to only what is expected of a president in that document, as opposed to a modern presidency. Either way, I really feel for his staffers and especially the people fighting to get him re-elected. They know he's crap. They can see, very clearly, that the man is the worst failure as a president we've had in modern times. But we've got to re-elect him, because a Republican might be even worse. Besides, the situation makes them look like fools. So they defend his actions with vigour, when his actions (or really, his inaction) has given us 4 more years of Bush policies domestically (with, bizarrely, LESS restraint from above) and just about everything the Republicans in congress want.

Have you read the rest of the responses to the petitions on this site? One after another, they say (essentially) "Thanks for sending us your petition. We're ignoring it."

Every single response. Without exception. Not one response hints at any willingness to change or reconsider based on the petition. Zero.

They really should say, "Thanks for your petition. You're asking us to do something. We don't do that. We let congress do whatever it does, we let the agencies do whatever they do, we back down whenever there's pressure, we make promises, break then, then shift our language to pretend we delivered rather than admit we failed. We are a sorry excuse for a presidency."

The one thing they seem to have effective at (at least according to Nader, who sometimes is on the money and sometimes seems completely off) is strong-arm the whole party into not challenging him in a primary. They do machine politics well. They just don't seem to know how to govern.

Re:Not enough.

[shentino]

Remember, Obama is in the MAFIAA's pockets.

How do you think so many of their attorneys got jobs in the DOJ?

Re:Not enough.

[Anonymous Coward]

This simply is not enough. From what it sounds like, they'll sign the bill as long as the DNS portion is removed. This will still kill many user-generated content websites on the Internet.

I know, I know, it's too much to ask to RTFA. I suppose you should be commended for at least reading the summary.

Across the globe, the openness of the Internet is increasingly central to innovation in business, government, and society and it must be protected. To minimize this risk, new legislation must be narrowly targeted only at sites beyond the reach of current U.S. law, cover activity clearly prohibited under existing U.S. laws, and be effectively tailored, with strong due process and focused on criminal activity. Any provision covering Internet intermediaries such as online advertising networks, payment processors, or search engines must be transparent and designed to prevent overly broad private rights of action that could encourage unjustified litigation that could discourage startup businesses and innovative firms from growing.

Of course, SOPA already does most of those things, and nobody is at risk of being shut down via SOPA because of third-party content anyway, but it'd be clearly crazy to ask people to actually read the SOPA bill and not just summaries of articles about it.

(Disclaimer: I am 110% against SOPA. But I think people should oppose it for the right reasons and based upon the actual content of the bill, not because of hysterical reddit-based tirades about how it's going to shut down YouTube.)

Re:Not enough.

[Black Parrot]

They can see, very clearly, that the man is the worst failure as a president we've had in modern times.

Iff "modern times" started in January 2009.

I despise the man, but let's maintain a bit of objectivity.

Re:Not enough.

[wonkavader]

You're off topic. Your response is like saying "This stone hurts my foot because it's blue." His "MAFIAA" connections, if they existed, would be only relevant if he'd DO SOMETHING to help them. He does nothing. He just signs whatever congress gives him. He talks a good games, but in action, he's totally passive.

You are correct, certainly, that Congress is in "the MAFIAA's" pocket. The problem is that if Congress were in the spaghetti-at-every-meal lobby's pocket or the pickle-prohibition lobby's pocket, he'd sign whatever they passed, and his staffers would make excuses.

Re:Not enough.

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow. Trying to spin him into being a Republican for protecting Hollywood? That's a neat trick.
 
  So they defend his actions with vigour, when his actions (or really, his inaction) has given us 4 more years of Bush policies domestically (with, bizarrely, LESS restraint from above) and just about everything the Republicans in congress want.
 
LOLz!!! Again, trying to spin him into a Republican? Wow. Just wow. If that's the way you really feel then I hate to break it to you but the majority of those in The House and The Senate are now DINOs too. Many of Bush's policies passed with a Democratic majority in the legislature, same for Obama. If there is this magic power of filibuster that can trump any administrations wants at the drop of a hat, why didn't the Democrats do this when Bush was pushing the same policies? Because they wanted it just as much.
 
Please stop with this naive pandering that the Democrats are the soldiers of American way and the Republicans are the incarnation of the orcs of Sauron. It's gotten old and frankly the double speak coming from your camp just doesn't work anymore. The Democrats have and had the numbers and the power to stop "Republican" dirty tricks. Stop acting like they even attempted to. The Democrats are doing a fine job of pointing the finger but they're just as involved and buying into their lie empowers them even more. They're just as rich and they have just as much to lose as any Republican. Open your eyes!
 
I'm sick of stooges standing up for their favorite high school football team even if they do the same thing as the other guys, all the while screaming "foul" from the bleachers when the other side gets caught. You fuckers are part of the problem AFAIC. Go fuck yourself.

Re:Not enough.

[Nite_Hawk]

Here's a question for you: Which is the worse failure? The D student getting an F or the A student getting a D?

Re:Not enough.

[Anonymous Coward]

Bad analogy.

I really don't care whether or not the President is living up to their full potential as a human being, all that matters is the real-world results of their actions. In this case a D is simply better than an F, end of discussion.

Re:Not enough.

[shentino]

It's quite relevant because the MAFIAA is also the one that sponsored SOPA and PIPA in the first place.

Re:Not enough.

[Black Parrot]

Here's a question for you: Which is the worse failure? The D student getting an F or the A student getting a D?

Not sure why you ask... it's been a while since we had a prez that I would call an A student.

Re:Not enough.

[NoOneInParticular]

The worst failure? The class electing the D student as class representative. And for a second time when he scored an F.

The POTUS and Congress will do

[hsmith]

Whatever their lobbyists tell them to do. Nothing more.

They site

[Anonymous Coward]

"they site manipulation of DNS as problematic"

Good god, who is reviewing these things?

Re:They site

[Anonymous Coward]

I just kinda assumed it was a poor attempt at being punny

Typo

[Anonymous Coward]

I believe it's 'cite', rather than 'site', in this case.

Next step

[Anonymous Coward]

Let's ban 192.168.*.* and 10.*.*.*

Re:Next step

[a_nonamiss]

Hahaha.... I'll just set up my network on 172.16.1.x. Muahahahahaha!!

Re:Next step

[KiloByte]

I fully agree! Hint: my address starts with 2001:

Re:Next step

[Skapare]

I has fc00::/7 ... triple Muahahahahahaha!!!

Two internets

[Anonymous Coward]

1 for low bandwidth and full freedom communications
1 for high bandwidth and silly piracy prevention stuff in there to download big software / media

Re:Two internets

[Lanteran]

Die.

It isn't that complicated

[Brain-Fu]

If the economy depends on the imposition of artificial scarcity on an abundant good, then the terms have to be reasonable.

20 year copyright term limits are very reasonable. The current term limits + options to extend are absolutely unreasonable, and they drive people to rebellion.

Also, while it is true that a punishment should be a deterrent to crime, the punishment must also be within the order-of-magnitude of actual damages in order to be just. The current punishments are outright ridiculous, and they also drive people to rebellion.

Make fair laws and enforce them fairly, and watch the people happily fall in line.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[shentino]

I think expecting collateral damage to be minimized is reasonable.

I hate DRM because of the inconvenience it causes people who aren't actually pirates.

If you want to nuke a castle you don't lob a stink bomb at it.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Hatta]

20 year copyright term limits won't stop a bit of piracy. Copyright itself is simply untenable in the digital era.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[iluvcapra]

The current term limits + options to extend are absolutely unreasonable, and they drive people to rebellion.

Yeah, the kids are running their BT peers ragged downloading 20 year old movies and TV shows. Or maybe the fact that the terms are so long somehow breeds this sort of amorphous, diffuse resentment that causes them to copy movies for free when they know they'd rather pay for them. Yeah that's what it is, it's really an elaborate social protest movement.

Either that, or they just do it because they can. One of those.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[TubeSteak]

Also, while it is true that a punishment should be a deterrent to crime, the punishment must also be within the order-of-magnitude of actual damages in order to be just. The current punishments are outright ridiculous, and they also drive people to rebellion.

Are the punishments that rediculous?
When copyright is 120 years or life + 70 years, maybe $XY,000 per infringement is proportional.

/That said, life+70 & 120 years roughly translates to "fuck you and your kids"

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Elbows]

20 year copyright term limits are very reasonable. The current term limits + options to extend are absolutely unreasonable, and they drive people to rebellion.

I mostly agree with you, and I definitely favor shorter copyright terms. But I doubt that 20+ year-old works make up a significant chunk of online piracy. People are largely downloading recent movies, games, and music, and limiting copyright to 20 years probably won't put much of a dent in it.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[shentino]

This isn't just law and order.

It's a war against piracy.

Let's call a spade a spade here and see it for what it really is.

And after doing that, we can see DRM for what it is, as an ugly weapon that causes craploads of collateral damage.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Anonymous Coward]

People are seeing penalties of millions of dollars for sharing a few MP3's online.

Permanent impoverishment does not fit this civil infraction.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Anonymous Coward]

"20 year copyright term limits are very reasonable."

Bullshit is that reasonable. People shouldn't be barred from sharing in the first place, that is reasonable. If an economy is built on making sure people can't freely share things originating sooner than 20 years ago then that economy is broken.

Find another way. Authors might register to promote their works in systems that divide reasonable subscriptions for otherwise free access to all works, or concentrate on systems that encourage one time reasonable payment for good ideas that become free, or partially tax subsidize informational works by merit and by vote. But never proceed by limiting useful and dead simple actions like copying and sending information.

Down that path invariably lies this same dark future we're facing now, because since it is so incredibly easy to share information, essential things like the Internet cannot exist in any semblance of a free form while still enforcing those laws.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[maxwell demon]

Indeed, when the anti-piracy measures leave the pirates in a more comfortable situation than the non-pirates, something is wrong.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Anonymous Coward]

If the economy depends on the imposition of artificial scarcity on an abundant good, then the terms have to be reasonable.

Aboslutely agree.

20 year copyright term limits are very reasonable. The current term limits + options to extend are absolutely unreasonable, and they drive people to rebellion.

I agree that the terms are ridiculous, but often the most pirated items (certainly the ones the content companies get most panty-bunched about) are brand new songs or brand new movies... the ones on which they expect to make the majority of their bank. Sure, they're not *happy* about 30-year-old music getting downloaded, but it's not what they're really upset about.

Also, while it is true that a punishment should be a deterrent to crime, the punishment must also be within the order-of-magnitude of actual damages in order to be just. The current punishments are outright ridiculous, and they also drive people to rebellion.

So you're saying that the ridiculous punishments encourage people to pirate? Maybe in fringe cases (I was in that fringe, at one point in my life), but I doubt most people think "wow, the penalty for downloading this song is too high to be just, therefore I should download it to make a statement about how unjust it is."

Make fair laws and enforce them fairly, and watch the people happily fall in line.

Absolutely agree.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Anonymous Coward]

Copyright is very complicated. 20 years WAS reasonable, as is 20 years on Patents. For non-artistic works, anything more than 20 years is too long. Software patents should be even shorter (like 2 years) since it hinders standardization efforts.

Artistic works... copyright needs to be have some kind of publication and availability measure. Like Copyright expires 20 years from first date of publication, but only applies to -THAT- version of the work. So for Films, someone could make unlimited copies of the VHS version of Beauty and the Beast later this year, but not the Blueray or new 3D theater version. This gives incentive for the original publisher to keep availability or lose the copyright and thus let/rely on the public domain to preserve important works.

Music is a bit trickier, since music often has to be re-licensed in the works they are used in if the media shifts. It should still be 20 years, but applied separately to the lyrics, melody, and the actual recording. So for example something released on CD in 1992 would be out of copyright, but if they publish on iTunes, they can't copy the DRM-free iTunes version endlessly. Other artists would be free to make covers of the music as of 2012.

Games and software would benefit the most from short copyright, 10 years would be sufficient (Console lifetime is about 6 years) , again, from the publish date.

Some specific exceptions need to apply to software as well:
- Software marked as Preview/Alpha/Beta test have a "Build Burn Bag", in that after that Build expires, the software is to be destroyed and keeping any copies is infringement. Software that is Release must NOT expire.
- Software that is incomplete (think MMO games) by merely having the client installable software, the copyright applies only to the assets, and game engine. Should someone decide to make their own "private server" using version 2002 of the client in 2012, that would be OK. Writing your own client would be OK. The company can still require, via service agreement, that you use only the newest unmodified version of of their software.
- Translation of software and providing a patch against a specific version is not infringement. This also applies to all digital files, including digital comics, music, and video. Right now this doesn't happen because there is no legal way to buy foreign software, music, movies and games digitally since many online stores do not allow downloading by foreigners, even if the purchase is legit, blame credit card fraud for this.

The republishing requirement would probably have prevented the kind of code rot that happened with Vivendi Universal when they had acquired Sierra's licences. The current versions of the Sierra games on Steam and Gog.com, some of them don't work whatsoever, but could have, had the source code been available to the interpreter that was used with ALL the games made. It may still be another 10 years before SCUMMVM manages to work out how to play Kings Quest 7 and Quest for Glory 4. (The KQ7 in the Steam download only works on 16bit windows as it's a Win32s(win3.1) application, it will work on 32 bit versions of NT apparently.)

Re:It isn't that complicated

[StripedCow]

Also, while it is true that a punishment should be a deterrent to crime, the punishment must also be within the order-of-magnitude of actual damages in order to be just.

That's the problem right there: no punishment exists that satisfies both conditions.

The probability of getting caught (owning pirated material) is so extremely small that the punishment MUST be large to be a deterrent.
Increasing the probability is not really an option because that would mean an invasion of privacy.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Forty Two Tenfold]

People are largely downloading recent movies, games, and music

BluRIAA version of Star Trek, Pink Floyd Remastered in FLAC. Digger PS3 Online edition.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[MrHanky]

Without copyright, the only way to get paid in the digital age is through draconian DRM and black box playback devices.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Anonymous Coward]

Thank god someone is still sane!

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Anonymous Coward]

Reality check. Downloading a 20 year old movie or game that is almost impossible to buy is just as illegal as downloading this years blockbuster. And for doing so i should be forced to pay 3 years worth of gross wages. Seems fair.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[MrHanky]

20 year copyright term limits are very reasonable. The current term limits + options to extend are absolutely unreasonable, and they drive people to rebellion.

Excuse me, but if that were true, people would mainly be pirating older things. And although lifetime + 70 years is absurd, it may take an artist/writer/musician/coder/whatever more than 20 years to build a career. Why should they all have to write off their initial investment?

Re:It isn't that complicated

[gweihir]

Without copyright, the only way to get paid in the digital age is through draconian DRM and black box playback devices.

Wrong. Look for example at Baen books. Quite a few people are wiling to pay for non-protected content, provided the quality is good. Your problem is that you think any creator of a work deserves to be paid under all circumstances. Not so. Unless the work is of good quality, the creator does not deserve anything. Even if it is good, the creator does only deserve what people think he deserves. This model does work as soon as anybody can get global exposure, i.e. today. Trapping people by forcing them to pay before they can assess quality is just a scam and more and more people are waking up to that.

Commercial copyright infringement (i.e. selling works you have no right to) is something else. But for that no new laws are needed.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Anonymous Coward]

"Make fair laws and enforce them fairly, and watch the people happily fall in line."

There is the clue.
Why have 20 laws covering piracy then decide to yet another one?
RIAA was using the laws as they should have been used. Find the person responsible and sue them for damages.
Now the law allowing mega millions in damages for a couple dozen downloads is ridiculous.
$1 per download, $1 per upload and maybe a fine of $10 per each for punishment would be better.
Allowing companies to fish for people to sue is wrong, they need to spend the time and find them and then sue them, not fish entire campuses looking for them.

By allowing a Hodge-Podge of laws that even attorneys have problems with does make the average consumer throw up their hands and violate the laws.
Throw out the laws and rewrite it one time with specific fines, damages,etc. and let it go at that.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[MrHanky]

Baen books are copyrighted.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Dunbal]

Without copyright, the only way to get paid in the digital age is through draconian DRM and black box playback devices.

No, that doesn't stop piracy either. Perhaps the only way to get paid is by actually doing something worth getting paid for, like giving me a physical copy of a book, or a concert I can go to, etc. But throwing me in jail for downloading the movie that I missed last night when it was on my cable channel - well go to hell, you don't deserve to get paid, YOU are the one who deserves to get locked up.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Anonymous Coward]

Honestly a 3-5 year copyright term would be perfectly reasonable in most cases.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[MrHanky]

I didn't say it would stop piracy. Without copyright, there would be no piracy, of course.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Anonymous Coward]

Software patents need to be banned.

You can patent a mathematical algorithm and that is all software patents are.

I would love to see a software patent that is novel, non-obvious and not based in prior art.

Care to show me one?

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Anonymous Coward]

> The current term limits + options to extend are absolutely unreasonable, and they drive people to rebellion.

Really? REALLY??? The people who download the latest call of duty the day of release are rebelling because of the >20 year copyright terms?

People pirate stuff primarily because they're cheap.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Anonymous Coward]

Not true. If you use someone else's work to make money (movie adapatation of a book for example) without paying them... you can be sued. You just can't/shouldn't use copyright to enforce ridiculous access restrictions for everyone in the digital age - it's a hell's merry go round.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[DurnikBob]

I feel that you have your supplier/purchaser interaction backwards here. If supplier produces something that they consider worthwhile and then offer it for purchase. It's your right to agree or disagree on the price/terms and walk-away if you feel my product does not merit the price. Just because 'you' deem the product bad/overpriced does not give you the right to steal or violate the contract. Now, I freely admit that the current copyright extensions, patents, etc. have almost no basis in reality and should be returned to their original intent. They frustrate me to no end and are part and parcel of a large number of all our frustrations. However, the point is still the same. Your assessment of a product does not entitle you to freely take what someone else has produced (let's not go down the argument of digital theft is only copyright violation. Correct in legal terms, but someone is still losing something).

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Lando]

As it stands, to me the copyright terms are so far out of proportion that I just chose to ignore the law altogether. If I get caught, I'll tell them to shove it up their ass and deal with it. Since the law offers me nothing in return, I chose to ignore it. If copyright law was sane, then I might actually accept the law as valid and proceed from there, but currently all the law does is take from the public domain and offers nothing in return.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[bieber]

Copyright as an imposition on private communications is untenable in the digital era. There's no reason we can't have a limited copyright that applies only to commercial entities, as copyright effectively did when it was originally instated.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[AlXtreme]

concentrate on systems that encourage one time reasonable payment for good ideas that become free, or partially tax subsidize informational works by merit and by vote

I think that such positive (dare I say it) government-rewarded incentives are the only way forward when it comes to rewarding authors for their efforts.

Instead of subsidizing the poor and instead of harming ordinary people who simply share information freely, the government should encourage this sharing and reward the efforts by providing benefits to authors who have made works that all can enjoy. Of course, the question then becomes which authors may benefit from the tax-payers money, but this is a much more positive forward-thinking approach than using said tax-payers money to seek out and penalize individuals.

Marx would be proud, his vision of communism would only work an enlightened society where such a construction would be possible. A society without scarcity.

Not holding my breath...

Re:It isn't that complicated

[gweihir]

Yes, but DRM free.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Tom]

Correct.

Copyright laws originated when the only copyrighted material that mattered was books. The lifetime of a good book is easily 20 years, but the lifetime of even a good computer game is maybe 5 years. And most blockbuster movies are forgotten before their first anniversary.

Understanding your subject matter is the first step towards finding a good solution. I fear very few people really understand both copyright law and the subjects of it, i.e. copyrighted works in all their various forms and shapes.

What I know is that the solution won't be simple. We need differentiation.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[gweihir]

I do not think I do: Here, you cannot access product quality without using it. And for using it you already have to pay in full. So not I have it backwards, but the relationship actually is backwards. The entertainment industry however invests quite a lot of money to obscure that fact.

As to someone still losing something, that is not true, things are more complicated. Although the industry would have you believe this in order to enforce the analogy with physical goods. Which is wrong. The reality is murky. Some people have observed actually gaining from compensationless copying, and at least for more obscure musicians it has been demonstrated it is a boon, as it gets people to their concerts and donate without huge advertisement budgets being necessary. No, no, it is not clear what the economics are and they are provable not that simple.

Also remember that music, writing, poetry, sciences, etc. developed before copyright. The financing models there were donation, patronage and being wealthy. For example, in classical British theater, the troupe was financed by donations after the performance. So do not give me than nonsense.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Anonymous Coward]

That sounds like the only way to get paid what you think you deserve. Make something worth throwing money at, and you'll get what your consumers think it's worth.
I mean, hey, we all wanna be oversexed, bonged-out multi-millionaire rock stars, living in perpetuity on the royalties from a single disc of mediocrity, but those days are long gone. Prolific creation is the modus operendii in the brave new digital world. Start putting out like the rest of us.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[shutdown -p now]

Perhaps the only way to get paid is by actually doing something worth getting paid for

Are you saying that all that software you use daily, that helps you save your time, is not worth paying for?

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Anonymous Coward]

And we'll all use open source, no more off the shelf commercial software. And it will all be designed to promote consultancy, since that would be the only way to make money programming.

I'll let you imagine the implications of that.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[MrHanky]

I'm just pointing out your argument is irrelevant (and the rest of your comment is a strawman).

Re:It isn't that complicated

[semi-extrinsic]

Since I don't pay for Firefox, vim, archlinux, awesome, gimp, latex, gnuplot or gfortran... yes. However, I do make contributions to some of those projects, so I'm not all selfish.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[cas2000]

1. The vast majority of programmers get paid for doing in-house development for the company they work. The next most common kind of employment for programmers is as consultants working on specific projects, either through an agency or self-employed. The number of programmers working for commercial software developers producing COTS software is miniscule - so tiny it's barely worth even counting.

2. Free/Open Source Software hasn't eliminated COTS software yet and is unlikely to do so in future. Some people (and many businesses) prefer to buy a product - in a box, with a manual and support. People even pay for Free Software packaged this way.

2. implications? they're all good as far as i can see.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[hairyfeet]

I'll give an even better example...Steam. Steam DRM is trivial to bypass for anyone but the simplest Billy Joe Bob (which is what the original DRM like CD checks was for, to get rid of casual piracy) and hacked Steam games are all over P2P yet Gabe from Valve is singing "Merry Xmas to me" while swimming in a giant pool full of money like Scrooge McDuck, why? Because he learned the way to turn pirates into customers isn't pile on the DRM and hoop jumps but to make it easy, simple, and cheap. We humans are lazy creatures by nature and if you make something simple enough and cheap enough it becomes more of a PITA to pirate than it does to simply buy it and Valve seems to get that.

Take my own case for example, I probably spent a good $200 this Steam Xmas sale between me and my two boys. Now was there a SINGLE game, even one, that I couldn't have pirated trivially? Nope in fact I could have simply used the listings on Steam and went and downloaded every single one if i desired, so why didn't I? Because Valve has made it as simple as "whip out CC, push button, get game" and their download speeds are insanely fast compared to most P2P, most of the games i bought were bundle packs where I got a pile of games in a series for one low price (such as FEAR 1 & 2 & the DLC extras for $5)or a game with ALL the DLC (which the pirated version never has, such as Just Cause II with all the DLC included for $7) and unlike the pirated version I can enjoy full MP support, I get the game automatically updated to current, I get Valve's excellent long tail game support (Such as their throwing in HL:DM when I bought the complete HL2 series which is STILL highly populated after all these years) and it even keeps my graphics drivers updated without me having to bother.

The way you kill piracy isn't with a stick but with a cookie, and by finding the sweet spot on price that gives you maximum sales. look at how just as an experiment the sold L4D for $2 and ended up making over 1700% PROFIT on the title simply by having everyone buy the thing while not having to pay for advertising or making copies. Even at that ultra low price because of the massive economies of scale they got they not only made such huge profits but now everyone of those people will see the DLC for sale as well as the news of the latest L4D games thus making it easier to sell even more content.

So if companies would just accept the mantra of keep it simple, easy, and cheap, put in the most simple of DRM, just to keep Billy Joe Bob from passing around copies to all his buddies, they could be making mad piles o' cash instead or trying to assrape the entire Internet with SOPA and the like. For an example of a company that didn't "get it" look at MSFT, for about 7 months I saw NOTHING but legit versions of Windows and in a small shop that's unheard of, so why did it happen? At $50 a copy the win 7 HP upgrade made it cheaper and less hassle to buy Windows than it was to pirate and $50 appears to be the sweet spot for Windows Home. Sure enough Ballmer kills the program and not 30 days later I start seeing Win 7 Ultimate everywhere because folks simply weren't willing to pay $100 for home and if they are gonna pirate why not get the biggest SKU? Make it simple, easy, and cheap, find the sweet spot on price and people WILL buy simply because its the easiest route. Throw in a couple of bonuses that pirates don't get like DLC and MP and it becomes a no brainer. I mean when I get both Max Paynes for $2.75, Butcher Bay remade in HD AND Dark Athena for $5, and JC II with over a pages worth of DLC for $7 why would I bother to pirate?

Re:It isn't that complicated

[walkswithwolf]

Baen books are copyrighted, yes, but they also provide free downloads of some of their books online ( http://www.baen.com/library/ ). No DRM, no black box. You can get them in many formats. For example, the Honor harrington series, most of the books are available free online or on a CD that Baen produced and distributed (again, no DRM).

I think this is what gweihir was referring to.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[IICV]

Because Valve has made it as simple as "whip out CC, push button, get game"...

Did you know that Steam will store your CC info if you let it? It becomes literally "push button, check box, get game" then. It requires terrifying amount of willpower to not buy everything that goes on sale at that point.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Solandri]

Perhaps the only way to get paid is by actually doing something worth getting paid for, like giving me a physical copy of a book, or a concert I can go to, etc.

Some industries have already made this transition. Wedding photographers used to shoot weddings for a minimal fee, the charged a large amount for prints and reprints. If you wanted extra copies of your wedding photos for your extended family, you had to pay for the extra prints.

With the advent of scanners and dirt-cheap photo printers, they've transitioned to a model where they charge a lot for shooting the wedding, but charge little for the prints or even give them away for free. Technically they can charge for the prints as they did before, but realistically they know it's so easy to make copies there's no possible way they'd be able to enforce their copyright for every photo the take. So they've just restructured their payment system to reflect reality, rather than copyright laws.

Forget for a moment everything about copyright, publishing, movie/music production, etc. Think of this purely in terms of work vs. compensation. I shoot photos of a wedding and process the photos. That's a lot of work. I print pictures of said wedding. That's very little work. Under the old model, the payment system did not reflect my costs - I charged very little for the part which required a lot of work on my part, but charged a lot for the part which required almost no effort. The new system fixes this. I now charge a lot for the part which requires a lot of work, and charge little for the part which requires little work.

The same thing has got to happen to books, music, and movies. In the old days, musicians and actors were paid for live performances. That is the norm.

In the 20th century there was a bit less than 100 years where technology was good enough to allow mass duplication, but not good enough to lower cost of duplication to the point where individuals could duplicate. This allowed a business model to flourish in which payment did not reflect costs. Musicians and actors were able to work once, then sit back and make money over and over based on that single performance. This is not normal. No other business is like that - you have to constantly work if you want to keep making money.

Now in the 21st century, the cost of mass duplication has fallen far enough that it's now easily within grasp of the individual. No longer does it make sense for people to be charged large amounts of money for what is a nearly free service (duplication). People may be stuck on the morality of it because the 20th century way is all they've ever known. But strictly in terms of work invested vs. compensation, the 20th century way was clearly wrong since the most money was being made for the step which cost the least money.

The transition to a model where content creators are not paid for duplication services is not some new journey into unexplored territory. It is a return to what was the norm for millenia. For most of history, duplication was impossible (performances) or nearly impossible (books), so the only way to get paid was for the actual content creation. During the 20th century, duplication became possible, and content creators leveraged it to get paid multiple times over for the same work. Now in the 21st century duplication has become so cheap that people are starting to question if it's really fair for content creators to be paid multiple times for the same job. That is the true crux of the matter, not who owns the work or whether copying is stealing.

I do believe in copyright - the temporary monopoly does encourage creation. But the terms have to be reasonable. With duplication costs having dropped to almost zero, preventing society from making copies simply because of archaic laws does more harm than good. Something like 10-20 years for copyright seems about right to me. Copyright is fundamentally about encouraging creativity and creation of new content. A copyright term of life + 70 years discourages creativity, and instead encourages trying to figure out how to create something new once and live off it for the rest of your life.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Alsee]

I doubt that 20+ year-old works make up a significant chunk of online piracy.

I'd lay you 10-to-1 odds that the the percentage of 20+ year old works would go up sharply, and the percentage of under 20 year old works would go down sharply, if we were to drop the copyright term to 20 years.

That would include countless albums such as Nirvana's Nevermind and countless movies such as Batman Returns. Click to view a small fraction of other music and movies that people would fileshare massively, legally, and safely.

And not only could all of that be fileshared legally and safely, but all of it would be open for massive commercial revitalization of re-releases and compilations and derivative works. Virtually every Disney movie ever made was based upon an some public domain story. Just imagine all of the new music and movies and books and TV shows and more would flourish based upon unlocking the treasure chest of 20 year old culture.

-

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Alsee]

This isn't just law and order.

Speaking of Law & Order, under a twenty year copyright term the first three seasons would be public domain right now.

1992_in_American_television

-

Re:It isn't that complicated

[aix tom]

Copyright also needs to get the priorities right. The GOAL was to "further the arts", not "make endless money"

I often try to get some older stuff from the 70s / 80s, but a lot of that is unavailable in ANY form due to "unclear copyright situations". Nobody wants to make money with it any more, but they are lost to culture and history.

In a day and age where it is technical trivial to make a copy of an existing work ( even when it's not digital, a copy from a television master at a local TV station here cost $50 per hour from either tape or film ) there should be no reason to DENY a copy, if the person is willing to pay for a copy.

One thing that needs to be fixed it that anybody that wants to be granted a copy*right* to a work, also needs to have a copy*obligation*. Once that is in place, distributors would have a higher incentive:

- to either actually create a efficient and easy to use distribution system for the works they want to keep the copyright to.
OR
- place works they don't want to administer anymore into the public domain.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Anonymous Coward]

Gabe's solution to piracy is to ignore it. Pirates aren't being turned to customers by making the games insanely cheap - all that does is acquire new customers, people who previously had never even thought of buying the game, who may not even know much about the game or even like it, and may not even play it after they buy it; but the game was too much of a bargain not to buy it. It's a perfect example of impulse buying in action.

The pirates, however, already downloaded the game on or before release date, played it, grew tired of it, and have no reason to buy it now. SOME of them may buy it during the sale, in order to clear their conscience, but even for the few who do this you haven't really 'converted' the pirate into a customer, since they still got the enjoyment out of the game when it cost considerably more than $5 or $7 or free.

If you need a carton of milk now, you buy it now even if you don't like the current price of it. You don't shoplift it now, then go back whenever it's convenient for you which just happens to be during a 1-day milk sale, and pay for it then. You don't go back 4 days later and say "this milk is now 4 days old, you would have thrown it out anyway, but here's a token 5 cents, consider my purchase covered".

The Valve model is about making more profit from older works by getting new customers. It's a great model and it obviously works well, but it doesn't do shit to prevent piracy. Ultimately you can't measure "enjoyment" so it's impossible to say how much of a benefit somebody got pirating the game on release day vs buying it from the bargain bin 6 months later but the concept is clearly there otherwise they wouldn't pirate it.

If you consider the sole purpose of copyright is to allow companies to make a profit at its most purest, then yeah the Valve model works. But why bother with it, for the costs involved in creating and enforcing copyright you may as well have a "copyright tax" that pays any company an automatic X times their costs to ensure they profit, and good luck proving which companies deserve to profit once it becomes a government-guaranteed cash cow. Copyright is about more than profit or loss for IP though. It's also about making sure people keep their entitlements in check. It's about making sure people get what they deserve, rather than what they think they deserve. It's about making sure the only people who get enjoyment out of an intangible product are the people who invested their dollars in it. And it's about making sure that people get compensated a fair amount for their work directly in proportion to the number of customers, preferably as a result of quality. (You could argue that it's unfair when companies profit from many customers via hype and over-zealous marketing campaigns rather than actual quality product, but nobody seems to mind Apple doing just that.)

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Lumpy]

No problem. they have have their mega million damages. as long as they are taxed based on their claims.

that one B movie downloaded was worth $20,000,000? We need to tax you at $20,000,00 X 500,000 copies sold.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[DaTrueDave]

Without copyright, the only way to get paid in the digital age is through draconian DRM and black box playback devices.

If that's true, then how do you explain the band Radiohead making more money off the album that they released for "name your own price", then any album previously?

And, similarly, the incredible success of the Humble Indie Bundles, concerning profit both for the game developers AND charities?

I'm sure there is a certain amount of people paying for the novelty and to support the concept, but I don't think that accounts for enough to be able to say that these pricing schemes aren't feasible.

Put out a good product and people will pay you a fair price for it.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[thoughtlover]

I don't mind paying for content. I just want to know that I'm not being tracked every time I read whatever book on my Kindle at any given time of the day or change my TV show or even if I rewatched or skipped over a certain commercial. It's one thing to actually pay for the content... It's another to give the providers every frackin metric you'd never even give your friend, much less some corporate monolith that can't even be trusted to properly secure the personal information you gave them to acquire their service in the first place! Seriously.. if you're gonna track my viewing habits (and maybe my facial expressions and eye movement... someday) then give me the damn content for free... like Nielsen does.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[shutdown -p now]

Note that the question wasn't "are you paying", but rather "do you think it's worth paying for?".

And, of course, contributions are also a form of payment - in fact, GPL makes it clear that it's rather an expected one.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[grahamd0]

Excuse me, but if that were true, people would mainly be pirating older things. And although lifetime + 70 years is absurd, it may take an artist/writer/musician/coder/whatever more than 20 years to build a career. Why should they all have to write off their initial investment?

Because the alternative is the system we have now.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Anonymous Coward]

But throwing me in jail for downloading the movie that I missed last night when it was on my cable channel - well go to hell, you don't deserve to get paid, YOU are the one who deserves to get locked up.

Just because you are lazy and didn't watch the movie when it was on doesn't mean that they owe you another chance. Companies paid advertising money to get that movie shown. If you don't have the energy to tape it, or watch it when it is on the way they wanted to show it to you, then you do not deserve anything.

Going by your logic, anything that has been on broadcast tv or any of the movie channels that I have had in my life I should be able to download/watch/keep for free! Maybe anything that is on Netflix instant streaming too.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[MrHanky]

You know that's untrue, so why say it?

Re:It isn't that complicated

[gweihir]

Very, very true.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[gweihir]

Indeed. And with hardcovers, you often get a CD with the older books in the series. I have one here. Copying would be easy and I am sure people are doing it. But Baen's business runs well. Of course that requires reigning in corporate greed and does require actually wanting to give your customers good service. A thing the media industry seems to have mostly forgotten.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah that's what it is, it's really an elaborate social protest movement.

Either that, or they just do it because they can. One of those.

Or perhaps both of those.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Laughing Dog]

Yes, this. Amazon's DRM-free mp3 store is what stopped me from pirating music. I could use them in exactly the same way as I did pirated mp3s (burn them to CDs for the car, back them up, put them on any portable player I wanted, etc.), and could download a high quality file of the exact song I wanted in all of six seconds. It's just more convenient than searching for people sharing the song at a decent quality and waiting for it to download, especially if it's from an artist that isn't very popular.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Anonymous Coward]

Unless the work is of good quality, the creator does not deserve anything.

Unless the work is an infinitely copyable computer file with a value of essentially $0, the creator does not deserve anything. That is to say, I will ONLY pay for three-dimensional objects I want and value with my hard-earned money (such as 'burnt' movies and music for not much more than the cost of the media containing them).

There, I fixed that for you.

CAPTCHA: systemic [The internet started out as an electronic communications medium--now it is mostly unwanted commercial messages (spam), bandwidth sapping, time consuming advertising sent from overload 3rd party adservers, and essentially unchecked copyright infringement. People wishing to sell computer files with valuable information in them may have to resort to a 'ransomware' model to get paid (people in general HATE 'adware' software for example). The instant it gets released, if it has merit, it WILL be all over the internet and off given enough time.]

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Anonymous Coward]

I am a former pirate. There was a time in my life that EVERYTHING on my machine was pirated. Everything. Tons of games, the better part of a terabyte of movies, and enough music to play for a week with no repeats. Through it all, I kept saying - "Make it a reasonable price, make it convenient, and don't treat me like a criminal, and I'm there". Well, slowly, it's happened. It started with Netflix insta-stream. Once I picked that up, it was just too much bother to download any more from the Pirate Bay, then transfer them to my XBMC (That said, I've since switched to Hulu+, but Netflix got the ball rolling). Then, slowly (VERY slowly), I began buying games on steam. The social networking on Steam was familiar to me from the Xbox, and I REALLY wanted to play Warhammer 40k - DoW multiplayer (I had previously pirated it, enjoyed the single player, but found it wanting). So, I waited for a sale, and picked it up. That game started my love of Steam, a love that now includes over 100 games in my list. Then there's a few more on GoG.com, and about 10 on Onlive.

Finally, there's the music. I tried the iTunes thing, didn't like it, went back to sailing the high digital seas. Not sure why it didn't work for me, but regardless, it didn't. I REALLY wanted to like Amazon, and in fact did plunk down a good chunk of change there, but it just didn't stick for some reason. Finally, I've found Spotify, and haven't had the urge to go back (though I have some inexplicable urge to try Google Music, but that's likely just due to my Google fetish).

So, one more datapoint, I guess. Also, I AM waiting for a sale of Skyrim, I figure it'll be worth my cash at $20. It has now become worth more to me to buy (because I get more value, and the DRM is palateable) then to pirate. It's a simple value proposition to me.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[IAmGarethAdams]

A music CD is as useful to you as a blank CD-R? Then I assume you buy and listen to a lot of blank CDs? If not, it would seem you attribute some kind of value to the music content.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Gr8Apes]

It doesn't matter if they're free, DRM free, or whatever, they are still protected by copyright. Once obtaining your copy, no matter if it's legal, free, and DRM free, you cannot distribute without permission. Doing so is a violation of copyright law.

This is the one thing that's overlooked. Copyright law as written in 1787 is as valid today as it was then. Distribution is the thing that's illegal, not copying itself, no matter what that FBI warning says at the beginning of every movie you see these days.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Gr8Apes]

I do not think I do: Here, you cannot access product quality without using it. And for using it you already have to pay in full. So not I have it backwards, but the relationship actually is backwards..

You still have it backwards. Here's how: I cannot asses the product quality of a chef without eating it. And because I ate it, I have to pay in full.

Or are you arguing that the chef should provide you a free meal and you'll only pay for it if you deem it worthy?

The rest of your argument might be true, but is orthogonal to the above statements. It could merely be stated that handing out free samples draws people into the place of business to buy the entire experience. (i.e., advertising)

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Kalriath]

I could not agree with this more. I think half the problems with copyright would be solved simply by codifying "Abandonware" as an actual legal concept. I get why I can't freely download Commander Keen for example, as iD still sells it. But why can I not download say, Barrage, legally - despite it being impossible to purchase it while both the developer and publisher still exist?

Re:It isn't that complicated

[interkin3tic]

If you want to nuke a castle you don't lob a stink bomb at it.

Kind of an odd choice for comparison. Is a stink bomb an option in the newest Civ or something? Because I can't think of any other situation where one would want to "nuke a castle."

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Anonymous Coward]

> Because he learned the way to turn pirates into customers isn't pile on the DRM and hoop jumps but to make it easy, simple, and cheap.

You forgot "treat them with appreciation instead of suspicion".

Re:It isn't that complicated

[shentino]

The piracy problem is like a castle.

DRM is the stink bomb.

It doesn't cause any damage to the castle at all, all it does is piss off the poor peasant consumers who have to put up with it.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[dgatwood]

You can legally time shift a program from TV. So what's the difference between time shifting it using your own TiVo and time shifting it using a copy recorded by someone else's TiVo? I would argue that the only difference is the extent to which your hardware is tied up. And if your TiVo *was* recording it and failed for some reason, even that distinction goes away. Any argument against piracy at that point is purely pedantry; it's technically a copyright violation, but it is only "wrong" in the most purely bureaucratic sense.

See that's the problem with anti-piracy arguments. They don't ever take into account the "why". If you paint every pirate with a broad brush, rather than analyzing the range of reasons for piracy, you're completely missing your opportunity to combat it in any useful sense. At that point, as far as I'm concerned, the government no longer has any responsibility to give you a second chance to combat it....

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Znork]

Not at all. One way to accomplish, if one truly believes creative arts cannot survive on their own merit, it would be to have a 'creators VAT' on creative materials. Then you can merely account for the number of sold copies of a specific work and reimburse the creator appropriately. As there would no longer be a competitive block preventing anyone from creating copies and selling them prices would fall towards the marginal cost of creating copies, thus making pirate copies less appealing, while it would be possible to assure that the creator got a substantial part of the sales price.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[TheTurtlesMoves]

You know this is not really a new situation. The cost of reproducing books feel dramatically with the invention of the printing press and created copyright concerns back then. Its easier to copy a master piece than create one. etc. We are not really seeing a new thing with copies being much cheaper than the original. Hell even your cell phone cost way more to design than to manufacture... In other words, there are many things where the marginal cost of production is almost insignificant to the final cost of the product. Claiming that it cost nothing to copy is not a good argument that it should cost nothing.

Of course i also agree with copyright... I even feel 20 years is too long. 10-15 feels about right.

For my wedding i refused to use a photographer that didn't give me the copyrights for the photos. It is a work for hire!

Re:It isn't that complicated

[semi-extrinsic]

I noticed that nuance after I answered, but in that case, I don't understand your argument. The people producing this software are not asking me to give them money, so I do not. Your point is then? I'm pretty sure that if Mozilla asked me to pay for Firefox, even if it was a voluntary payment a lá Wikipedia (to whom I already donate), I would give them money. The Wikipedia method of financing is pretty much the perfect counterexample to (what I assume is) your argument, BTW.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[PenquinCoder]

Amazon does this as well. I was surprised and a bit worried about how easy it was for me to buy something on their mobile site/app.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Anonymous Coward]

Why shouldn't they have treated you like a criminal? You WERE a criminal, by your own admission. What did you want, for them to give you a medal for stealing their stuff?
You claim to buy your games now. That's great, welcome to functional society. That doesn't make you special. You're not a hero because you stopped taking stuff that doesn't belong to you. And you're definitely not helping the companies who already died out because of people like you, or who had to change the gaming industry to survive by adding DRM, multiplayer passes, reduced single player experience, lack of dedicated servers, LAN play removed, shitty DLC addons and second other game has "MMO" appended to its genre.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[chrismcb]

So in other words you've found a rationalization for not paying for anything, and just taking it? "the law doesn't offer me anything directly so I'll ignore it." Do you ENJOY the things that you stole? You do know that those things were created BECAUSE copyright exists. It is because of people like you that other people are creating stupid things like SOPA.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[master_p]

The abundance argument is valid for naturally occuring items.

In the world of ideas, value of an item is defined not by its scarcity, but by the benefit it brings to its users.

If we, as a society, say that ideas are not worth anything, then any sort of motivation will be lost. The current progress is based on the principle that the more capable you are, the higher you are compensated for your services. If that is lost, there would be no motivation for progress for the majority of people.

Progress will then be left ot the hands of a few idealists, as it was before the 20th century. Need I remind you that the 20th century growth and progress was many times the growth and progress of all the previous centuries?

Re:It isn't that complicated

[master_p]

That copyright is difficult to enforce in the digital era does not make copyright violation legal or ethical.

Your argument is like this: in the era of abundance of lethal weapons, homicide prevention is untenable, so it should be allowed.

Which is all very wrong, obviously.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[master_p]

The economics of piracy are very clear: you can use piracy to spread your creation around, and receive huge benefits from that, if the stock market responds positively to that. Otherwise, piracy screws you easily.

As for the argument that people created things before copyright, think about this: the progress made in the 20th century is many times the progress made in all the previous centuries, simply because people where motivated by profit. Without copyright, this motivation will be lost.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[master_p]

The issue with piracy is not that it prevents you from having a profit.

The issue is that it prevents you from having the profits that you are entitled to, according to the people that are using your creation.

For example, Valve had huge profits from L4D, but the actual number of people that have played this game is ten times more than those who actually bought it.

If there was no piracy, perhaps Valve would have made 17000% more, not simply 1700% more, which is unfair to Valve because they made a game everyone wants to play.

You have to realize that the people who actually buy video games are a tiny minority when compared to the people that actually play those games. I grew up as a gamer, with a huge list of gamer friends, and the number of people who actually bought the games they played was extremely small...perhaps 1 in 100 people.

It is the same with music and movies. The number of people who enjoy the "free" stuff is many times the number of people who buy that stuff.

And these people will never come forward to admit that they do not pay for the material they have downloaded. The internet is filled with forum posts from people that pay for what they illegally download, but the rest of "pirates" will never admit to that fact publically, creating the impression that most people buy what they download, which is not the truth.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[master_p]

What makes you think you have the right to watch a movie you missed by your own means?

You do not have that right.

The TV channel that showed the movie paid some money for the right to show the movie. You did not.

You cannot download a movie and claim you missed it in cinemas either.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[MrHanky]

A VAT on 'creative materials' such as bits transmitted over the internet? Good luck with that. But yeah, it would make sure serious artists make even less money compared to the mass-market hacks who usually can and must sell their works cheaper these days. And fuck them, isn't that your point?

Re:It isn't that complicated

[hairyfeet]

You are falling for what I call "the PPT lie" which is "if the PPT says I made X last year than by our numbers we should get X+Y this year" which is total bullshit. A good example of this lie is Vista. MSFT made it a PITA to pirate Vista, what happened? Did their numbers shoot through the roof? No because at the price point they set nobody bought so stores ended up with shelves full of unsold Vista discs. hell the shelves at my local Walmart are fricking full of 'em.

You think that if you were to magically wipe out piracy ALL of those people, or even a significant portion, would then buy the product but that isn't true. In every. single. case. where they have put in DRM nasty enough to stop piracy you simply had people ignore the product unless the price point was low enough to get them to buy, full stop. Its not like people say "Oh well I can't pirate so I'll hand them $60" instead they go "Oh well its not worth $60 so I'll pass" and with it there goes your modding community, there goes most of those that host servers which help sell your MP, there goes most of the buzz once you quit paying the media to plug it.

As Valve learned with their experiments there is a sweet spot to EVERY product that will make people buy, call it the "WTH I'll take it price". The media corps think they can charge assrape prices by killing piracy but all they will do is have even less people that will touch their product. Again look at Steam, I bet my last dollar ALL of the titles that hit over 100,000 sales were under $20, and ALL of the products that hit the 500,000 mark during the sales were under $12. Hell I bought games I wasn't really interested in because at less than $10 they reached my "WTH I'll take it" price. But if you think because the pirates downloaded X that if you remove piracy you'll get X is simply delusional friend, ask any pirate. They MIGHT buy 5% of what they download MAYBE. The rest? they'd simply walk on by. Just look at how many AAA titles are sitting in piles at your average Walmart because their price point is too high, or how Gamestop makes a killing by allowing trade ins thus dropping the prices by a good $30 a title.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[multimediavt]

I can point to way more examples of non-DRM content making money: Brian Eno, Joss Whedon, hell, Louis C K did something profitable recently. You can make money off non-DRM content, but you have to make more of it inexpensively in order to make *the same* profit you would from DRM content and suing pirates. Making a profit isn't the problem. It's the expectation of getting wealthy off each project that is a product of corporate greed and is a problem.

I am sorry, but the notion that you have to DRM content to make money is just categorically untrue, and is a lie perpetrated on the public by the greedy. The bottom line is copyright (and trademark and patent) law needs to be reformed and business models need to change. All we are seeing now is the old establishment trying to hold onto a failing business model and squeeze as much money out of the system until the ride is over, regardless of the cost to anyone.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[ResidentSourcerer]

In the Bad Old Days microsoft figured that for each legit copy of MS Word there were 3 pirated copies. That destroyed sales to the point that there is little effective competition to Word.

One of the murky areas is that copyright holders can withhold their product. If a book is out of print, you are SOL. At one point if a publisher refused to sell you a copy of a book you could take over the copyright, subject to the same terms with the author.

Copyright gives a monopoly on the sale of a something. Monopolies generally are subject to abuse and need to be regulated.

An earlier post commented on cheering the GPL rights holders, and panning the RIAA.

I object to the music/movie industry's mode of action. Getting these enormous awards for infringement is out of line. Non-commercial infringement should be both simpler to enforce, and should have reasonably small penalties -- e.g. 3 times cover price.

I also object to people getting inordinate awards for small efforts. A book in many ways is a bargain. A print run of 10,000 can pay for the publication, transport, etc at $40. But textbooks are often 5 times that. Why? Becuase they have you by the short and curlies. A huge part of the cost of a book deals with the issues of dealing with dead trees -- paper, printing, binding, transport. So an ebook/digital download/ should be MUCH cheaper than the same material as a DVD with case, book with dustjacket. That it isn't is greed. And yes, I resent it.

Can small penalties be effective? Consider trespass. This is a civil offence and in Alberta common tresspass is subject to a maximum award of $250. Yet "no trespass" signs are pretty well respected.

Regarding pre-copyright material.

My sister is a storyteller, with a niche for aboriginal stories. In the coastal indian cultures it is traditional to ask for permission to tell some one else's story. E.g. a story has an owner. True some stories are 'public domain' but some aren't. Or the way of telling it is unique.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[mark-t]

No... copyright is about the right to copy. Not to distribute. It is merely a point in fact that copying without authorization is not illegal unless it is accompanied by some intent that does not involve keeping the copy for oneself. If any and all copying were illegal, it would be against the law to read a copyrighteed book in the first place, since one is, in a matter of speaking, creating what could loosely be described as a facsimile copy of what one reads inside of their brain. If it were entirely about the right to distribute, book stores would need a copyright holder's permission to distribute the books that they legitmately buy for resale.

Obviously, distribution is what must happen before one can conclusively say that a crime has been committed, but if copying is done with intent to distribute, then it is still that copying itself which is an infringement. The fact that the law cannot determine intent until it actually happens is only relevant to the extent that we have to wait until the intent is carried out before any prosecution can actually commence. But this is not remotely the same thing as simply outlawing distribution.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[ResidentSourcerer]

Standard behavioral psych: It's not the harshness of the penalty, it's te probability of being caught. Draconian punishments have seldom been effective, as long as people had a good chance of getting away with it.

14 years in Australia, and no right to come home? Used to be a British punishment for poaching rabbits. Hanging for stealing a loaf of bread. People still stole bread.

DUA? loss of license. By itself it doesn't work. Checkstops? Works.

10 years for marijuana possession? That's been effective, hasn't it?

Re:It isn't that complicated

[DNS-and-BIND]

Does anyone reading this think that 1700% profit is obscene? What the hell? In which sort of Bizarro World is this sort of thing acceptable? Why is the perpetrator not in prison?

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Lord_Jeremy]

This is the truth. To date I own nearly a hundred games on Steam. I'm still an occasional pirate, primarily of games that are not on Steam. I pirated Gears of War because it's not on Steam. I originally pirated Bioshock and Mass Effect, yet now I own them on Steam because I saw they were on sale one day and I liked them a lot so I figured they deserved money. I bought Dragon Age yet I pirated all the DLC because I didn't feel like dealing with EA's shitty DLC purchasing system. Fuck them and their "Bioware Points" horseshit, that's a great way to get me to not pay for something.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Anonymous Coward]

Generally, it's my understanding that copyright violation is a civil offense, not a criminal one. So no, I should NOT be treated like a criminal. Further, my point was not "Hey, look at me! I'm a really great guy! I bought stuff! That's almost as good as saving orphans, right?". My point was - treat me fairly, I'm more then happy to do the same in return. Gimme a product I WANT to buy, at a price that is FAIR, I'll buy it. If you don't, I'm not paying for it either way, even if I DON'T pirate it. I have no intention of paying more then $20 for Skyrim. Now that I'm not pirating, they're STILL not getting my $60 (which, granted, they weren't when I was either). Frankly, even if I could waltz into Walmart and buy it for $20, I wouldn't, the value wouldn't be sufficient unless I activated it on Steam (I personally find that Steam adds a lot to my experience).

I can't think of any companies who've provably died out due to piracy (please, name one if you can). That's an honest question. I'm truly curious.

As far as adding DRM, DRM's been around in one form or another for EVER, just not always under that name. Remember the old OLD games where you had to enter a random word from a arbitrary page of the manual? THAT to me is FAR more annoying then anything Steam's done. As for multiplayer passes, I won't disagree, as I'm not sure what you're talking about. You may well be right, but it's something I'm not familiar with. A reduced single player experience in many games is to be expected in an increasingly multiplayer industry. And there are STILL some real wowzer single player titles (Deus Ex & Elder Scrolls comes to mind, not to mention a plethora of smaller indie games). I haven't played a game recently that would warrant a dedicated server that didn't have it as an option, but I do remember something about one of the big BF games maybe not having it. But Minecraft, Eye, and Killing Floor (the only games that would benefit from a dedicated server that I've played recently) seem to have the option intact. Ditto for LAN play, though I think what Blizzard is proposing for D3 is trash (I enjoyed LANning with my buddies in D2), but what ever. As for shitty DLC, what about the shitty expansion packs of old? That's not new, it's just trash or treasure in smaller increments. Instead of paying $30 for something that could be good or bad for 15 hours, you pay $10 for something that could be good or bad for 5 hours. And yeah, there's a lotta MMO's. So what? There was a time that there were a lot of puzzle games. And FPS's. The market evolves. You may not like it (I don't - I'm sick of theme park MMO's), but it's just what happens.

And, if you're the same AC I began replying to (if not, forgive me) FYI copyright had nothing to do, per se, with profit of the copywriter. Rather, it was intended to help ensure a steady supply of new creative works (the theory being that without a short term (HA! Like Micky Mouse?) monopoly, creators would have no incentive to create, as everything they printed would be ripped off post haste by bootleggers. Profit is simply the means they chose to ensure the ends.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Anonymous Coward]

That still doesn't address my point. The grandparent post seemed to imply that the harshness of the penalty *encouraged* piracy. I was disagreeing with that.

Your point (if I read it right) is that harshness of penalty neither encourages nor discourages piracy. I think I agree with you, or at least agree with you more than I agree with the grandparent.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[HiThere]

Interesting. I'm not at all sure that 20 year copyrights are justified, while 1 year copyrights almost certainly are. When I look at things, the number that appropriate seems to vary with the work in a way that I haven't been able to determine. But 20 years is the MAXIMUM that I would consider reasonable. And that only if a complete unprotected copy (with all tools necessary to use it) was filed at a library of deposit, which would release it into the public domain (and publish it!) at the expiration of the copyright.

Otherwise I don't think ANY copyright is justifiable. If they aren't going to ensure that the work becomes publicly available at the end of the period of copyright, then they don't deserve ANY copyright protection. And I'm not at all sure that an digital format should be allowed a copyright of more than 10 years. Those things keep becoming unreadable, and the only justification of copyright is that it is a way of ensuring that the work becomes available to the public. The *ONLY* justification.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[gweihir]

Wrong. Physical goods are different. The quality of the chef is actually secondary, you primary pay for nutrition and that you can (roughly) assess before. That today, the nutritional aspect is not that important anymore in parts of the world, does not invalidate the origin of the type of transaction. Also, you can gauge the quality of a dish by a small sample. That does not apply to IP.

Still, there is an artistic component to cooking by some chefs. So the item is a bit murky as well, as this is not a purely physical good. Also keep in mind that typically anything cooked where the quality of the chef matters is cooked to order, i.e. the customer requests a service. And here is the final kicker: If the quality is unsatisfactory, in many higher-quality restaurants that have respectable customers, you get a replacement and the chef apologizes. Or you may not have to pay. So, no, this is not a valid comparison at all.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[gweihir]

If you look at population numbers, you will find that your scientific advancement argument is bogus. If you look at when the basis for many of these advances was created, it turns out to be bogus as well.

But I do not blame you, many (in fact most) people to not have the mental capability to really understand an abstract good.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[marnues]

Distilling all 20th century innovation into an argument for copyright is some kind of logical fallacy. The level of dissonance is massive. First and foremost, few would contribute any of the major innovations (anti-biotics, semi-conductors, computational theory, etc.) to copyright. Second, not quite as few people will completely reject the necessity of the many extensions copyright received in the 20th century. 20th century innovation can be contributed to capital flow towards innovation and increasing the number of potential innovators. The patent system is almost certainly a key factor in the former, but copyright could only play an ancillary role in the latter, and I have yet to see anyone defend that claim.

I'll even come out on the side of copyright hurting innovation. Commercialization of rock 'n roll has gradually lead to the absence of art in pop music. This is a bold claim and I don't have the time or inclination to back it up on Slashdot, but I know I am far from alone in that belief. I'll further the claim by stating my own belief that because innovation stems from being surrounded by new ideas, such a commercialization hinders the next wave of innovators.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[TENTH SHOW JAM]

Performance? That would allow artists who have works that can be performed to be paid.
Patronage? That would allow artists who have works that can be displayed to be paid.
Sales of accompanying merchandise? "Like the painting? Buy the Coffee Cup" There is one for the print people.

I think a lot of the issues that "Artists" have is that all of the above means being beholden to something other than your muse. My art is my code. I sell it to an organization that supplies patronage to me. They get to tell me what the functionality is. I go away and create a beautiful thing that fulfills that functionality. Replace the word code with canvas and oils and the same applies.

Copyright as it stands today is about protecting multimedia empires, not protecting any of the artists.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[marnues]

Do I have that right legally? No.

Do I have that right culturally? Absolutely. My peers and I decided long ago that we were not interested in the legal definition of copyright. Companies like Apple and Steam have gone a long way towards healing the right between what is legally acceptable and what is culturally acceptable. I have not downloaded music or video games in a long time partially because services are available that are easier than copyright infringement, but also because my peers and I no longer consider the cost of such items prohibitive. I leave it to the current college students and indie artists to fight the good fight there.

What my peers and I are still not sold on is the stranglehold of content some distributors have. This is primarily for visual content. NetFlix and Hulu are the solutions here, but as long as companies like HBO prevent me from legally obtaining their works for outrageous DVD prices or a cable subscription, my peers and I will encourage copyright violations. If you, personally, do not like the position my culture has taken, it is worth your time to understand our culture like Apple and Steam have. Proselytizing is, on the other hand, counter-productive and only reinforces our decisions.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[makomk]

Steam DRM is trivial to bypass for anyone but the simplest Billy Joe Bob

Last I heard, they'd ban your account as soon as they detected you using a pirated game with it, taking away any games you had paid for. Hell, they might even ban your account if you used a crack on a game you'd actually paid for. That's a huge deterrent.

(Also, Portal 2 apparently had all kinds of clever DRM checks that rendered the game unplayable if cracked. I looked into this because the DRM is buggy and an obstacle to me playing my legitimately-purchased copy.)

Re:It isn't that complicated

[marnues]

Ideas do continue to be worthless. It is implementations that are useful. 20th century progress was not built on ideas. It was built on real and tangible goods and services that created capital transactions. That such goods and services were based on ideas is immaterial. There are many goods and services (real and otherwise) that are based on ideas that are worthless, even if the idea is solid. I have no money for patent trolls and others who sit on their ass trying to collect on other's hard-work, even if they had a good idea once. I've had many good ideas, but haven't or couldn't implemented them for various reasons. Why give me an incentive to build nothing of value but attempt to capitalize on my idea? How does that advance America?

Re:It isn't that complicated

[MobyDisk]

It looks like you completely misread the MrHanky's post. He isn't advocating DRM, he is arguing that copyright is necessary because if you remove copyright, authors must resort to complex ways to prevent or limit copying. You seem to argue in favor of copyright over DRM, which is exactly his point.

Your problem is that you think any creator of a work deserves to be paid under all circumstances. Not so

No one here said that.

Unless the work is of good quality, the creator does not deserve anything.

True. You seem to be arguing against a system that forces people to pay for things they did not buy. I am unclear where this came from.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Gr8Apes]

No... copyright is about the right to copy. Not to distribute.

You are entirely incorrect. I can make 1000 copies of something - it's not illegal. I can make a single copy of something else and give it to a friend, and it's a violation of copyright.

Go read the law.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Gr8Apes]

Wrong. Physical goods are different.

Why? Given the scenario?

Re:It isn't that complicated

[bsomerville]

One critical difference between the wedding photo example and recorded music, movies, etc. is the size of the audience. Your clients pay your fee because the product is valuable to them uniquely. So who pays the fee for a product that is valuable to millions?

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Lando]

No, when the law doesn't protect equally, the law is unjust. It's called civil disobedience and I'm comfortable with it. SOPA would be going into effect no matter what I do on a personal level. The fact that the majority of people are at the point where they disregard the law is telling. Copyright extentions have stolen materials from me that should have been available. So if you are uncomfortable with that, so be it. Without pushing back these laws will continue to be written.

Re:It isn't that complicated

[Anonymous Coward]

Anyone play Anno 2070? After I bought the game I very much regretted I didn't wait a couple more weeks for a pirated version, since it would probably run smoother ...

Re:It isn't that complicated

[mark-t]

It's called "copyright"... literally speaking, "the right to copy". More specifically, the exclusive right to decide who else may copy the work. Of course, I never said that any and all copying was prohibited.... only copying that is accompanied by any intent to utilize that copy for purposes that would exceed those of fair use. How this intent is objectively measured is entirely based upon how the copy actually *does* get utilized, to the extent that the person who made the copy was a collaborator of that use (for example, if you make personal use copies/backups of your CD's that are stored in your car, and your car gets broken into and your CD collection inside stolen, you would not generally considered party to that sort of distribution, and so that would be be construed to have been your intent when you made the copy). Similarly, it is not intentional distribution itself that is illegal... not even for commercial benefit, as I can legally purchase copyrighted works from a store (which are authorized copies), and give them to a friend as a gift, thereby clearly distributing copies of the works myself, but without any authorization whatsoever.

While I agree that you generally have to actually do some sort of distribution before any ability exists to objectively conclude that you have infringed on copyright, it is, in fact, the copying itself that is illegal... but *ONLY* in conjunction with an intent to distribute said copy. For an (admittedly contrived) example of how distribution would not have to occur, a recently set up pirate shop might have prepared many unauthorized copies for distribution, and if some actual hard evidence should surface that this was their intent, even before they actually manage to distribute any such copies, they could be prosecuted for copyright infringement on the basis of such evidence (as long as it was sufficiently incriminating... such as a recording of a phone conversation or something). Obviously, if the distribution has not yet occurred, the penalties could potentially (but not necessarily) be considerably lower than if distribution had already occurred, sort of like how conspiracy to commit a murder, for example, is against the law, but can have a much lower penalty than actually murdering that person. To that end, actual distribution of unauthorized copies is generally considered to be a crime as well, and if practiced by a person other than the one who made those copies, the person who does so can be held accountable for it entirely separately from any person who voluntarily supplied him with such copies.

If one is really compelled to tie copyright infringement with distribution, I suppose, then that one could reasonably argue that it is intent to distribute any unauthorized copies, and not the copying itself that is illegal, but this is still entirely different from simply shortening it to the actual distribution of any copies being illegal (not the least reason for this being that not all copies of a work are actually unauthorized, and thus perfectly legal for anybody to distribute, whether or not they have received any authorization to do so).

Although IANAL, I have had occasion to become highly acquainted with many of the intricacies of copyright law myself, and the above is, to the best of my experience and knowledge, correct in all of North America (although there are some differences between Canadian and American copyright law, it is my own understanding that they are largely superfluous to the above points).

Re:It isn't that complicated

[ifiwereasculptor]

Steam DRM is trivial to bypass for anyone but the simplest Billy Joe Bob

Last I heard, they'd ban your account as soon as they detected you using a pirated game with it, taking away any games you had paid for. Hell, they might even ban your account if you used a crack on a game you'd actually paid for. That's a huge deterrent.

Why would you add a pirated game to your legitimate Steam account? That'd be all kinds of dumb when your objective is only to run said game. The idea is to add a "pirate Steam" to your Steam-dependant legitimate game.

(Also, Portal 2 apparently had all kinds of clever DRM checks that rendered the game unplayable if cracked. I looked into this because the DRM is buggy and an obstacle to me playing my legitimately-purchased copy.)

It doesn't. I have played it flawlessly, therefore if what you say is true, it's yet another case of DRM hurting only paying customers.

The Swiss have already answered this question

[backwardMechanic]

Keep it legal, and everyone wins.

Re:The Swiss have already answered this question

[Anonymous Coward]

The Swiss do everything right, that's why they have the highest Per Capita in the world.

Re:The Swiss have already answered this question

[IamTheRealMike]

The Swiss have very little in the way of content industry. They have a large drugs industry though, and unsurprisingly, they still believe in patent enforcement.

What's Right.

[Anonymous Coward]

What is right, is the community itself, polices the piracy traffic. Before the government steps in. The purpose of the government is to do the big jobs the little guy can't. So in suggestion to stopping online piracy.

-Sites that offer illegal software, movies, videos, photos, should be reported to the hosting company.
You can usually find out which company is hosting the site, by simply running the ip through WHOIS website.
Than checking the location, and services in that location, and than calling up the providers and reporting.

BETTER YOU MAKE THE EFFORT, than Big Brother

-Making a repository of sites that are considered malicious, and contain malware, wyrms, trojans, keyloggers.
Allowing users to manually add sites to the fire wall for extra security.

It comes down to simple common sense. If we can not police ourselves, someone else will do it for us.

Re:What's Right.

[Anonymous Coward]

Sites that offer illegal software, movies, videos, photos, should be reported to the hosting company.

The problem is that sites that offer content that infringe copyright, also offer a lot of content that does not too, most of which are submitted by users.

Re:What's Right.

[Anonymous Coward]

And are quite possibly legal in the jurisdictions in which their servers are located.

Re:What's Right.

[wonkavader]

There's nothing wrong with what you're proposing, but you're saying it because you think we need to keep things in line to keep government out.

First, you're far too late, and second, acting out of fear will cause us not to use the headroom we have. It will make us repressive in an aim to avoid a hand of government.

This only makes sense because there's a vacuum of sense. The laws are corrupt and insane, the legal system predatory and rigged.

If we had decent laws, we could follow them. We could use all the space allowed us by law. Right now we have little space already, and nowhere and nothing is truly safe.

We need change in government, not a self-censorship regime.

Re:What's Right.

[TheRaven64]

And if those sites are located in China? Do you then start blocking them at the border?

If you want to eliminate piracy, then structure the laws to encourage payment for creation, not copying, of works. The software industry has been 90% like this forever (90% of software developers are paid directly to write bespoke software, not paid in revenue selling copies of software) and open source is gradually encroaching on the remaining 10% (people get paid to add features to open source projects that extend it to meet a user's requirements). The entertainment industry, however, is showing no sign of making this transition, even though there is no long-term future for the pay-for-copies model: it simply will not work as the cost of producing copies drops to zero.

Re:What's Right.

[shutdown -p now]

Well, the remaining 90% of the software industry is stuff that people kinda care about, like games. Even indies didn't find any better model so far - it's same old shrink-wrapped software (or digital download) with a price per copy, just that their price is lower, and there's usually no DRM. What is your suggestion?

Re:What's Right.

[shutdown -p now]

... sorry, that should have been "the remaining 10%", of course.

Re:What's Right.

[TheRaven64]

Here's a simple alternative model: release a (possibly unfinished) demo for free and say that you will release the finished full game as a free download once you have raised a certain amount of capital. Allow people to pay any amount into an escrow account. If it reaches the required amount, then you finish the game and release it.

It's hard for indie developers to start the transition to this model, but imagine if Valve said 'if we raise $10m then we'll release our next game for free.' I bet there are a million gamers who would pay $10 to be able to download the next Valve game for free as soon as it is released. Once you have one game released like this, you can put a 'did you like this game? Why not contribute $10 towards our next one?' button in it and start raising funds. People who got the game for free are likely to want do this, so the second game you release like this is easier. You don't have to worry about piracy for two reasons. The first is that you've covered your costs plus profit before you publicly release the game. The second is that anyone giving a friend a copy of your game is helping to market your next one and release money for it.

Re:What's Right.

[shutdown -p now]

Problem with this (and all alternative schemes, really), is that it's all theoretical until someone actually pulls it up and shows that it can work.

Re:What's Right.

[TheRaven64]

Which is why, in my original post, I said that the government should be structuring laws to encourage innovative business models like this, rather than trying to prop up ones that have no long-term future. Creating software (or art) is difficult. Copying and distributing it is easier than it was and is getting easier all of the time. Any business model that depends on doing the difficult bit for free and then charging for the easy bit is doomed to failure in the long run.

Here's the obligatory car analogy: Imagine if a car company would give you a car for free and charge $20,000 to paint it for you. Now imagine if this was the established business model that all car companies used and there were laws in place saying that unpainted cars could not be used on the road and that only the car manufacturer was allowed to paint the cars that they made. Initially, car painting used expensive paints and required some complex techniques. Now, anyone can do it with a hundred dollars or so of equipment and paint. In a few years, drive-through car painting services are going to be possible costing under $20 for a new coat of paint, but the car industry is refusing to change their business model and insisting that the government impose strict distribution controls on all of the materials that can be used to make car paints.

That's more or less the situation that we're in with copyright. The established players are tied to a doomed business model and they'd rather break the rest of the economy than adapt.

It's not my job to figure out what's right.

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't know what would be right. I'm not a lawmaker, and I'm not really in the business of doing other people's jobs for them. Why should I be bothered with figuring out what's right? The right thing to do should, ideally, hardly impact me at all since I only rarely pirate anything, so I wouldn't really give two fucks about its passage (aside from the times when I can't find an out of print movie/book/album for less than a hundred bucks if at all, at which point I'll just scrunch up my face and go, "Aw, nuts.")

What's Right

[Anonymous Coward]

What's right is to stop passing legislation to bandage up the entertainment industry's ancient, bloated, rotting business model. Make it easy for people to buy music/movies/tv shows inexpensively-- and without DRM-- and the problem will solve itself. As long as pirating a movie is 100x easier than buying a Bluray and sitting through hours of previews and FBI warnings, piracy will continue despite legislation. Give us real digital copies of movies for sale, not DRM-infested WMV files that we can only play on one Windows machine with Internet access. Give the people what they want and they will empty their wallets in your direction.

Citizen Rights or Corporate Rule...

[Anonymous Coward]

First, Do No Harm. Instead of answering and responding to Citizen's, Obama's response was to attack Citizens again, by refusing to hold the bar at a higher level and insisting we are going ahead ... 'So, rather than just look at how legislation can be stopped, ask yourself: Where do we go from here? Don't limit your opinion to what's the wrong thing to do, ask yourself what's right.' So, what's right?" the answer of course, is to hold the bar right here, and in fact raise it to where Citizen's have Rights and Freedoms, and Corporations are limited in their ability to harm Citizens, or infringe upon a Citizen's Rights and Freedoms.

what's right: technology vs politics

[Anonymous Coward]

What's right is to get the lawyers and politicians out of the job of trying to define how the internet should work.

It was made by engineers and scientists, and worked great for decades before the politicians became aware of it and stepped in to "fix" it.

It didn't need fixing. It needs to be driven by technology, not by politics.
 

Re:what's right: technology vs politics

[rtfa-troll]

What's right is to get the lawyers and politicians out of the job of trying to define how the internet should work.

In some sense you are right. Unfortunately that's just not the way the world works, and the people who are spreading the idea that it could work that way are basically tricking you into being passive and being walked over. There's always going to be someone who doesn't like something. That person is always is always going to claim that whatever you want to do is the spawn of the devil and causes cancer (not to mention the risk to the children). There will always be some politician somewhere who either becomes convinced or just sees the issue as a way to be different and/or get publicity.

The only way to handle this; the right way to handle this; is to have multiple sides on the debate and your own politicians in there. Even if their point of view is very similar to the NRA's point of view; there should be no restrictions on the use of internet systems whatsoever; they can be very effective.

It didn't need fixing. It needs to be driven by technology, not by politics.

Politics are simply the way that people deal with the allocation of resources on a large scale. Once the internet becomes worth money then it can no longer exist in a vacuum. The decision to protect internet connectivity centres means the decision to let people get raped and murdered elsewhere since the police officers used for protecting the internet centres aren't available for other work. The decision not to sales tax Amazon whilst taxing local businesses means a transformation of local economies. The decision to let things be driven by technology is politics. It's good politics; probably; but it's still politics. Until we technologists accept that we will always be at the mercy of the "military-industrial" complex which fully 100% understands politics.

Looking grim.

[forkfail]

So, rather than just look at how legislation can be stopped, ask yourself: Where do we go from here?

I really don't understand why further regulation is needed here to protect the rights of the content owners. Are there not copyright laws in effect? Don't they already have the ability to take down sites (with a certain amount of due process), sue for damages, etc?

I often see the use and positive impact of regulation (not dumping raw sewage in the river, etc) - but I still don't follow what exactly the need really is to provide more control to the corporations over the net (I absolutely understand their desire for it, but not any valid reason why there should be any further corporate control allowed).

The timbre of this administration remains the same. It gave away health care by inches to the corporations until they were able to declare "we win!" while trying to look like they were actually fighting. And now they're doing the same with the 'net, as far as I can tell: putting on a dog and pony show, but preparing to hand the show over to those paying the lobbyists.

Re:Looking grim.

[TubeSteak]

I really don't understand why further regulation is needed here to protect the rights of the content owners. Are there not copyright laws in effect? Don't they already have the ability to take down sites (with a certain amount of due process), sue for damages, etc?

The short explanation is that the internet is really really big and using current copyright laws to stop infringement costs enough money that it doesn't scale up well.

Alternatively, the **AA & other copyright holders are just dicks and want to crush any competition to their distribution models, fair use or not.

Re:Looking grim.

[Anonymous Coward]

I really don't understand why further regulation is needed here to protect the rights of the content owners. Are there not copyright laws in effect? Don't they already have the ability to take down sites (with a certain amount of due process), sue for damages, etc?

This. "We," meaning the federal government, should not go anywhere from here. The content-generation industry needs to adapt its business models to a world where content is quickly, easily, and freely disseminated through the public without artificially imposed inefficiencies in the distribution chain or government response to that dissemination. That probably means more live performances where the experience is worth more than the content, more advertising and product placement in recordings, and lower-budget productions that rely less on glitz and hype and the stardom of conspicuous overpayment, and more on cheap features like plot or melody. Very likely, much of the entertainment industry will go bankrupt; that is healthier for the free market than keeping them around on legislative life-support and pretending that they are Too Big To Fail. Constructing a greater mandate for judicial involvement (Jesus, felony downloading?) only introduces artificial inefficiencies and barriers into the market to perpetuate a failed business model: corporate welfare.

Where do we go from here? We stop trying to interfere in the natural death of the entertainment industry as it is now manifested, and we realize that people will get their jollies somewhere, one way or another, without artificially inefficient middlemen backed up by government-sponsored threats of prosecution and bank embargoes. We stop trying to extend our jurisdiction into other sovereign nations for the benefit of a few US corporations. As a result, we reap the rewards of being a friendlier nation abroad, while at home we experience a new wave of grass-roots creativity no longer co-opted and controlled by the culture industry. We create more football teams so more people can attend real games instead of watching a few teams play on TV; we go to theaters to watch plays and hear concerts instead of watching TV or going to the movies; we begin producing a common folk culture with lots of diverse subcultures again instead of consuming centrally-planned and produced content.

Also, the politicians become poorer because they receive fewer bribes, and they have less power because they have fewer offenses with which to charge citizens or interfere in international finances. The social-economic-cultural fabric becomes less centralized and more efficient, to boot.

Time until I'm called a "socialist": 3, 2, 1...

Re:Looking grim.

[Black Parrot]

I really don't understand why further regulation is needed here to protect the rights of the content owners. Are there not copyright laws in effect? Don't they already have the ability to take down sites (with a certain amount of due process), sue for damages, etc?

The problem for the *AA is that it's a game of whack-a-mole against distributors, and too much trouble to sue every downloader for petty theft. Especially if the penalty is limited to reasonable damages.

So, like DRM, they're hoping for a technological solution. Which anyone with a clue will realize isn't going to work any better than DRM does.

Re:Looking grim.

[Shark]

I haven't seen a comment so worthy of my modpoints in years.

namecoins: a DNS controlled by everyone

[Janek Kozicki]

Namecoins should be able to help here: a decentralized DNS with its own currency for registering DNSes (which already proved to be useful as bitcoins). Nobody will be able to block some DNS if you bought it with namecoins, because this DNS is yours, right in your wallet.dat. And everyone who installed a namecoin based DNS client can use it. All DNS names are stored with transaction data within namecoin block chain. This blockchain is copied on thousands of client's PC connected in p2p network. This blockchain is encrypted with 60 PetaFLOPs/sec processing power, which makes them really safe! (namecoin difficulty is now 463897, compare that with PFLOPS used for bitcoin for example on bitcoinwatch).

No government will be able to stop namecoins, just like it's impossible to stop bitcoins. Well it's even better for namecoins. Bitcoins could theoretically be restricted by passing laws prohibiting banks to cooperate with mtgox. Namecoins on the other side do not need exchange with USD for DNS functionality to be working. Such exchange of course will be good, but you can buy namecoins using bitcoins on bitparking exhange, or mine them on slush's pool (the biggest namecoin/bitcoin pool). Domains are really cheap, you should be able to afford one for you just after few days or weeks of mining (depending on your power), or - since you can buy bitcoins now on mtgox without any problems, and because namecoins are really cheap, you can buy your own domain for less than 0.50USD. That is today's prices.

Anyway, I think that namecoins is the wave of the future to save us from any kind of censorship.

http://www.bluishcoder.co.nz/2011/05/12/namecoin-a-dns-alternative-based-on-bitcoin.html
http://mtgox.com/ - get bitcoins BTC here
http://exchange.bitparking.com/ - buy namecoins NMC here
http://bitcoinwatch.com/

sure that's blatant ad. But I think namecoins are really going to help here.

Re:namecoins: a DNS controlled by everyone

[Janek Kozicki]

Forgot two more links:

http://dot-bit.org/Main_Page
https://mining.bitcoin.cz/

War on Drugs^WPiracy

[Anonymous Coward]

I see in our future, another war... the war on piracy. This war will be very similar to the war on drugs... and will be just as much a failure. The companies that benefit the most from the "war on drugs" are the pharmaceutical companies and private corporations that support law enforcement tools and methods (including privatized jails).

The companies that will benefit from the "war on piracy" will be the big content companies and private corporations that support law enforcement tools and methods (including privatized jails).

Hmm...

Re:War on Drugs^WPiracy

[Black Parrot]

I see in our future, another war... the war on piracy. This war will be very similar to the war on drugs... and will be just as much a failure. The companies that benefit the most from the "war on drugs" are the pharmaceutical companies and private corporations that support law enforcement tools and methods (including privatized jails).

The companies that will benefit from the "war on piracy" will be the big content companies and private corporations that support law enforcement tools and methods (including privatized jails).

Hmm...

Mod up.

I suspect well over half the US population has tried pot, but somehow it remains illegal. If well over half the US population downloads illegal MP3s, that won't stop the War On Downloads either.

Re:War on Drugs^WPiracy

[zippthorne]

Ha hah, don't leave out the drug dealers and cartels from your list of beneficiaries. They may be the most significant beneficiaries, in fact. I wonder who's campaigns they donate to....

Re:War on Drugs^WPiracy

[cpghost]

A war on Piracy would be nothing less than a war on Culture. Which culture didn't grow, based on the sharing of knowledge, ideas, memes, music, etc..., including transforming, merging of ideas? Too sad the dimwits in the White House, Congress, and Senate are too blind to see the damage they're inflicting. Or maybe they're just too corrupt and would sell their grandma for a couple of dimes... but that's nothing new.

Abolish IP

[Improv]

Abolishing IP is what's right. Simple as that.

Re:Abolish IP

[gatkinso]

And in one fell swoop you abolish the entertainment industry.

Re:Abolish IP

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually that's not what's right. People who create should be able to profit from their creation. That is both necessary and good for society and for individuals. The problem isn't IP, it's that we have tilted the playing field way too far towards middle men holding IP rights for vast stretches of time, at the expense of society as a whole.

What's right is something much more limited. Such as copyright lasting for 5 years, after which works revert to the public domain. People creating software, music, works of literature, should have that time to make a living from their work, but we shouldn't have the kinds of RIAA/MPAA abuses we see today. Just because the latter extreme is wrong doesn't mean the former extreme is right. The best moral solution is somewhere between the extremes.

Re:Abolish IP

[Anonymous Coward]

Is that so bad? Have you SEEN Jersey Shore?

That said, entertainment will still exist, it will just come from more varied sources with fewer money men sucking up the majority of the profits without providing any actual value.

Re:Abolish IP

[forkfail]

I can't tell if you're trying to be ironic or not, what with your sig....

Re:Abolish IP

[Anonymous Coward]

Wrong.... you mean Hollywood and "Pop" music would disappear.
And considering that its 90% CRAP or recycled old material, thats a good thing!

Re:Abolish IP

[Fusselwurm]

And in one fell swoop you abolish the entertainment industry.

So what. Industries that weren't profitable anymore have been lost in the past, yet somehow the world continued without them. And actually, it wouldnt even been lost; only the part of it that does the content copying (ie distribution) would be lost. Artists would still make music, give concerts, paint pictures and do movies. Budgets will be reduced, but heck... the whole point of the entertainment industry is, well, entertainment, and I for one probably would feel quite entertained on lolcats and self-produced music alone ^^

Re:Abolish IP

[bky1701]

There is an old saying. If there is a will, there is a way. Maybe the current entertainment industry needs to die before the next can be born. Certainly, we've already seen what can happen in software with open source, a model which has slowly made some progress into other areas.

In any case, I do not value entrainment more than free speech and the right to communicate and share ideas. Maybe you should reconsider your stance if you do.

Re:Abolish IP

[Anonymous Coward]

Great!

Re:Abolish IP

[Anonymous Coward]

Down with layer 3!

Re:Abolish IP

[Anonymous Coward]

No, you abolish the obsolete publishing industry. Culture won't grind to a halt, just because you stop putting a toll booth in the middle of a park and hollering ineffectually at the people that simply walk around it. Artists will not stop making art. We will, however, stop throwing tens of billions of dollars at people who are merely piggybacking on the work of artists, and who no longer provide anything remotely valuable while taking 90% of the money. People understand how a "donate" button works. Many webcomic artists count on it to make their living.

Re:Abolish IP

[gweihir]

The entertainment industry, yes. And that would be a good thing. Entertainers, no. Demonstrated by now numerous times. There is absolutely no reason to keep the entertainment industry alive.

Re:Abolish IP

[StripedCow]

the whole point of the entertainment industry is, well, entertainment, and I for one probably would feel quite entertained on lolcats and self-produced music alone ^^

And I, for one, would feel entertained in seeing the entertainment industry going down :)

Re:Abolish IP

[gweihir]

It depends on whether anybody finds what they create enjoyable. As the past (and increasingly the present) shows, forcing the consumers to pay first is not the only model. In fact, the standard situation before the big monopolies was that entertainers were paid after they performed in recognition of the value they provided to the audience. If that value was bad, the entertainer would starve, true enough. But with the possibility of global exposure for everybody, that is less of an issue today.

What you cannot have anymore (and there is no way to continue enforcing it) is that a few people get filthy rich on other people's creativity. But there is no reason why a musician, writer, actor, ... should make massively more than any other craftsman. Several daring people have already shown that the "donate" button is quite enough for that. Others have found that releasing digital goods without any protection does actually increase their profits (some, e.g. Baen books, as early as 10 years ago). The whole argumentation that consumers need to be forced to pay is wrong and ignores reality. On the technological side, this "war" has also been lost more than 10 years ago, when the fundamentals of anonymous file sharing were established.

In short, the entertainment industry cannot stop this development. But it can to untold damage trying to. It is time this parasite dies.

Re:Abolish IP

[Anonymous Coward]

In any case, I do not value entrainment more than free speech and the right to communicate and share ideas. Maybe you should reconsider your stance if you do.

Yes, because not being able to get all of the stuff you want for free leads right into censorship. I see the RIAA are not the only ones spreading the FUD.

Re:Abolish IP

[cpghost]

How would we communicate without IP then? Piggy-backing on ICMP?

Re:Abolish IP

[Improv]

On this I'm serious. I reject the concept of owning ideas or data.

Re:Abolish IP

[bky1701]

Yes. SOPA proves that make information property will lead to censorship inevitably, which I have been repeating for years, and twits like you have ignored. Pull your thumb out of your ass and your head out of the sand, it's time to deal with reality.

Re:Abolish IP

[__aasdno7518]

"And in one fell swoop you abolish the entertainment industry. So what. Industries that weren't profitable anymore have been lost in the past, yet somehow the world continued without them. " ***** I agree. Given a choice between having the entertainment industry running the Internet and controlling all humans who use it with an iron fist,I'd be quite happy if they would just vanish in a puff of smoke...Nothing of value would be lost.

Re:Abolish IP

[ozborn]

Right, because there was no entertainment industry before the digital age?!

I think what you mean is that the profitability of the entertainment industry will be be decreased and you might be right about that, but my guess is there will still be a multi-billion dollar industry before and after the abolition of any digital copyright.

Re:Abolish IP

[master_p]

You would not say that if it was your IP and you survived on selling it.

Ideas have value you know, it is not only physical products that have value.

Re:Abolish IP

[master_p]

Have you seen how many people are involved in one video game or movie?

Do you know how many man workyears are spent on these things:

An individual alone would have to spent his entire lifetime creating just one video game or music.

If that was viable, it would have happened already. But it is not.

Re:Abolish IP

[Fusselwurm]

Have you seen how many people are involved in one video game or movie?

Yah I know. Huge productions like the Lord of the Rings movies most likely wouldnt be possible without IP laws (community financing even by a large fanbase is not likely, me thinks).

I see that that would be a loss (hell I love those movies). But it doesnt mean there wouldnt be any movies or games anymore.
Look at Minecraft: People bought that game in the millions even when Notch was still alone in coding it. There's lots of entertaining movies and games made by small teams or even one person alone.

Re:Abolish IP

[dkf]

How would we communicate without IP then? Piggy-backing on ICMP?

ICMP is defined to sit on top of IP. Eliminating IP itself would require replacing it with something like the old Coloured Book protocols or IPX/SPX. Indeed, I remember using both of those years ago, and I praise the Great Lord Richie and His Prophets, Cerf and Berners-Lee, that IP has won that particular war. It's almost as great as the fact that ASCII beat EBCDIC...

Re:Abolish IP

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, good ol' slashtards modding this +5. Your four digit UID indicates that you've spent too much of your life around here to be sane.

Why should I develop software if nobody will need to pay for it? So I can sell services, display ads? Sorry that doesn't work in my industry, yet people still want our software. Are they SOL?

Why should TV shows or movies be made if theyre all free and commercial free on TPB? You do realize that shits expensive.

What about musicians who don't want to tour? Should they make music for free and beg for food?

IP laws are fucked up, but you morons need a clue.

Re:Abolish IP

[NorthWarden]

Slight problem: ICMP runs on top of IP. See http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc792

Re:Abolish IP

[Spacezilla]

I feel the same way. Any data that can be put in a file can be viewed as a number. No one should be able to own a number, whether small or large.

Moving towards agreement

[Anonymous Coward]

"Washington needs to hear your best ideas about how to clamp down on rogue websites and other criminals who make money off the creative efforts of American artists and rights holders."

So, if we were to collectively respond, what would we suggest instead? Since the message here indicates that opposing the idea completely won't work, what can we suggest that they might actually agree with?

Re:Moving towards agreement

[Black Parrot]

"Washington needs to hear your best ideas about how to clamp down on rogue websites and other criminals who make money off the creative efforts of American artists and rights holders."

So, if we were to collectively respond, what would we suggest instead? Since the message here indicates that opposing the idea completely won't work, what can we suggest that they might actually agree with?

Start by identifying what the might actually agree with.

I'm guessing, "Whatever gives the best odds of getting re-elected", which to a first approximation means "Whatever the richest lobbyists want".

Now... What can we identify that might coincide with what the richest lobbyists want?

Actions vs Words

[fatwilbur]

I'm curious, has any of these petitions resulted in anything besides a form letter response from a head of some department, as obviously the task of writing a response but doing nothing rolled down 4 levels of bureaucracy?

What was the point of this site anyway? What good is a petition of there's no action or even a vote as a result of it?

PAY FOR CULTURE, SWINE

[Anonymous Coward]

If it weren't for pirating children in poor families would never be able to be even one-tenth of cultured as some bratty rich kid who might buy all of his media.

Just because you don't have the money to, or just because you're not willing to blindly throw money at a product which you're not "allowed" to know the actual content of until you purchase it...

I mean, Jesus, I'm so sick of people making the frustratingly mild defense that "Well artists need to get paid, too!" It's an over-saturated market that doesn't require any real cost of production.

I WILL NEVER PAY TO HAVE YOU ON THE COVER OF ROLLING STONE

I WILL NEVER PAY FOR YOUR PRODUCER'S EXECUTIVE RAISES

I WILL NEVER PAY FOR YOUR ADVERTISEMENTS

Make art for the sake of making art, not money, fucking hacks.

This all plays into the open source movement--why don't people try making money off WORKING, rather than ROYALTIES? It's completely FUCKED beyond imagination.

Re:PAY FOR CULTURE, SWINE

[spectro]

This all plays into the open source movement--why don't people try making money off WORKING, rather than ROYALTIES? It's completely FUCKED beyond imagination.

Because royalties are a form of passive income and a key to build wealth. It's the best keep secret of rich people including lawyers and politicians. They all invest in forms of passive income and have a vested interest in protect their way of life.

Re:PAY FOR CULTURE, SWINE

[tepples]

If it weren't for pirating children in poor families would never be able to be even one-tenth of cultured

Then the problem isn't piracy. It's that the popular culture can be made non-free. Ideally it'd be possible to work around this by creating works and distributing them under a license for free cultural works. But the RIAA labels, MPAA studios, major professional and collegiate sport leagues, and other publishers of non-free popular culture collude with the traditional media (largely radio and television) to keep free works off the air. And no, the general public is unlikely to switch to Internet radio because a smartphone capable of receiving Internet radio is much more expensive per month than a dumbphone and an FM radio, nor to Internet TV due to monthly download caps that MPAA-affiliated ISPs such as Comcast have started to impose.

Re:PAY FOR CULTURE, SWINE

[Black Parrot]

If it weren't for pirating children in poor families would never be able to be even one-tenth of cultured as some bratty rich kid who might buy all of his media.

Or *more* cultured, if they turn their attention to the local music scene, local poets and storytellers, etc., like people did before Big Entertainment became the Kraken With A Million Tentacles.

the real problem

[Anonymous Coward]

am i the only one that sees this as censorship, and isnt too worried about the piracy implication? they could shut down say a website bashing politicians and giving news to nerds, just because some people talk about piracy on it...

Re:the real problem

[shentino]

You mean like how UMG took down the megaupload video?

Re:I'll tell you what's right

[Anonymous Coward]

there's building a significant list of USian Presidents who should be impeached ... and put on international trial for Crimes Against Humanity ...

What is right:

[bky1701]

Abolish copyright. We gave it a 200 year trial, and it has not served its purpose of making artists self-sufficient. Instead, it has only further entrenched the patron model by giving the patrons legal teeth, handing our culture over to corporations and the insanely rich. Further, we're seeing more and more that free speech and copyright are completely incompatible. It's time we decide which we care more about: a fictitious emotion-backed economic system, or basic human rights.

Re:What is right:

[Esion Modnar]

What about GPL? That's based on copyright. No copyright, no GPL.

Re:What is right:

[bky1701]

The GPL is a means, not an end. Please see http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2612412&cid=38648850 where I addressed the issue for the nth time already.

Re:What is right:

[Black Parrot]

Abolish copyright. We gave it a 200 year trial, and it has not served its purpose of making artists self-sufficient. Instead, it has only further entrenched the patron model by giving the patrons legal teeth, handing our culture over to corporations and the insanely rich. Further, we're seeing more and more that free speech and copyright are completely incompatible. It's time we decide which we care more about: a fictitious emotion-backed economic system, or basic human rights.

I'd like to see copyright (and patents) made non-transferable, and the licensing of exclusive rights limited to (say) five years. Then Big Entertainment can market a tune for all it's worth for a short time, but after that the creator can switch to a higher bidder if the product has legs.

Also, studios couldn't buy movie rights and then sit on it for decades. If they don't get busy and make the movie, someone else can.

The problem with this scheme is that it would probably result in artists being assassinated to free up high-value IP assets. I don't know if there's a solution to IP that Big Money won't twist around for unintended consequences.

Re:What is right:

[KiloByte]

GPL's aim is to emulate the world without copyright.

That's GPL, not BSD. With freedom of copying, you have no means to render a piece of software proprietary, and you can bet that decompilers would spring up the moment using the result of decompilation stops being illegal in all relevant cases. If we merely banned copyright but didn't enact consumer protection laws, a decompiled binary would in the worst case be identical to obfuscated source.

Re:What is right:

[bky1701]

Further, I think the companies that did produce software would adopt more of a Red Hat sort of model of selling support and specific changes to programs. Software companies would be less about making and marketing a product, and more about providing services for open products. There would no longer be an incentive to make things closed-proprietary, so open-free would likely become standard even without the GPL. There of course are going to be exceptions, but that model certainly can (and does) work. I see no reason we need copyright at all in the software sphere.

Re:What is right:

[Tom]

Sorry, but you are misguided.

Without copyright laws, the huge corporations that currently profit from it would certainly find some new ways to profit - but the authors and artists would lose their last shot at getting at least a little bit of pay for their work.

The movie companies would go on selling movies, the music industry would go on selling music. But they would use the abolishment of copyright law as a means of screwing the artists out of their shares within 60 seconds of the law being passed.

We need copyright law, and it still serves a purpose. But we need to make that purpose protection of the artists again, not protection of the distributors.

Exempt private non-profit sharing from copyright law. Put the harsh penalties that are used to bludgeon down individuals against the corporations instead. Don't expect a blogger to 100% correctly attribute every image on his website - he's one guy, give him some slack, make the penalties fit the crime, have him pay a couple bucks and be done with it. But a major politician running a multi-million dollar election campaign, or an international corporation - those entities can be expected to dot their i's and cross their t's and if they take a photo from a starving photographer and use it without permission, they should be made to pay up big time - they have the staff, the time and resources to make sure things like that don't happen and if they don't it's because they are lazy, cheap or both.

Re:What is right:

[bky1701]

How exactly are they going to sell something which is, essentially, free? Isn't that the complaint about piracy? What you describe might be a temporary state of affairs, but it is unlikely to last. The RIAA/MPAA need copyright to keep a hold of the market. Without it, people will discover the alternatives. They are as we speak, with or without abolition.

Re:What is right:

[tqk]

What about GPL? That's based on copyright. No copyright, no GPL.

The GPL is a means, not an end. Please see http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2612412&cid=38648850 ...

fwiw, I tend to agree with your point of view, but that screed is not what you should be pointing people at. It may describe your point of view, but it doesn't enlighten.

IMO, the GPL is a reaction to a bad situation. Absent the bad situation, the GPL would be unnecessary.

Re:What is right:

[Tom]

How exactly are they going to sell something which is, essentially, free?

The keyword is "essentially". There are transaction costs and there's doing the right thing. I buy music I could download for free if it's worth it.

But yes, maybe the times of the multi-million-dollar album sales and the rockstars who don't know how to snort away their fortune are over. That's fine with me, they were abnormalities anyways, most musicians and actors don't really make more than you or me and often less.

What's Right? Abolition of copyright!

[Anonymous Coward]

Nothing less is satisfactory. Copyright and patent monopolies are a cancer growing in western civilisation. We need to excise them before it's too late.

• http://www.dklevine.com/general/intellectual/againstfinal.htm
• http://mises.org/against.pdf
• http://piratpartiet.se/international

oh ok.

[australopithecus]

>ask yourself, what's right.

... what is right is to think about how technology has given people NEW rights that could be considered inalienable under many definitions, and that existing methods of revenue generation for media companies might have to change to accommodate these new paradigms.

Re:oh ok.

[Black Parrot]

ask yourself, what's right.

...
what is right is to think about how technology has given people NEW rights that could be considered inalienable under many definitions, and that existing methods of revenue generation for media companies might have to change to accommodate these new paradigms.

Bah. Your right to ride one of those newfangled automobillies shouldn't be allowed to undercut *my* right to get rich selling buggie whips.

Victim card

[Anonymous Coward]

The victim card is worn out. It can't be used any longer.

The right thing to do is to stop SOPA, PIPA and other nonsense laws.
Patents should live for 10 years only.
Copyrights should live for 10 years also. The copyright reform should be retroactive, too.

A bricklayer gets paid once for the house he builds. Why does a musician get paid many times? Why doesn't the man who is helping build motorways get paid for every car which drives there?

Re:Victim card

[Anonymous Coward]

Can you infinitely replicate a house?

Re:Victim card

[bky1701]

No. But if you could, house builders would try to pass legislation to make sure you couldn't. If replicators were invented tomorrow, the current train of thought would make them illegal.

Re:Victim card

[PPH]

Looking around my suburban neighborhood, it would seem so.

Re:Victim card

[Anonymous Coward]

What does that have to do with anything?

The musician worked only once.

Why should every new song instance be paid for separately?

How to fix the bill

[Anonymous Coward]

1. Add a provision where evidence MUST be provided & stored, and made retrievable by the accused -- in a manner that cannot be forged (or is too expensive to forge.) The accused must be notified via email after evidence is collected but at least 24 hours before the site is shutdown.

2. If a non-political site is taken down without sufficient evidence, the accuser must pay the site owner no less than $10,000 per hour of downtime within 30 days of the shutdown, and interest should be at the same rate as the average VISA & Mastercard rate (excluding credit unions) charged to consumers in the country of the operator. There should be no barrier for Joe Sixpack to collect (he should have to spend thousands in legal fees to collect.)

3. If a political site is taken down without sufficient evidence, the accuser must be criminally charged with "harming freedom of speech" which should be a felony with a minimum sentence of 6 months in prison.... in addition to paying the fine stated in #2.

You get the idea...Give them a way to legitimately take down pirates, without turning USA into China or North Korea.

Re:How to fix the bill

[shentino]

On number 3, what about simply charging them with perjury if they submit a false complaint?

You know, the same kind of perjury you swear under when you make a counter-notice under the dmca?

Funny fact: Testify got its name from the original penalty for perjury. If you got caught you got castrated.

Re:How to fix the bill

[Anonymous Coward]

#3 is Domestic Terrorism ;o(

#1 has an even worse problem than electronic voting. You can not validate digital data that it has not been tampered with.
I can fuck you up at the manufacturer's level, while doping the chips you buy and solder into your fucking box! Did you watch me make these chips? Generally speaking between you and me at a System Administrator's level, the log files are generally to be trusted, we all do it every day, right? I mean see a problem, fire up mc, hit the exim /var/cache (or where ever) and delete that bitch, but if you asked me to swear in court that the logs were not tampered with, I would have to nullify the case. Even if you could get, extract, and inspect every mile of wire, vaults, switching, nsa fios splitting, from the classified telco vaults, and isp nda's, and destructively reverse engineer every piece of silicon under an electron microscope for every chip in every machine, router, switch, etc down that same line, you still might not find the backdoor, and if you did, that leads to even more problems. I would have to nullify both the law and the case against the person being prosecuted.

Bottom line is if you are nsa, you could setup and do anything to anyone via these wires, if you are chip manufacturer same, if you are isp with government funded deep packet snoop box same, there's no oversight of the people who are shoving all this shit down everyone's throat. So at some point, when enough examples are made, everyone honest people will simply go dark to combat the problem. This will further consolidate isp choices, webhosting, domains, etc all that shit. For whoever might still have a job and money.

#2 You had said, "the accuser must pay the site owner no less than $10,000 per hour of downtime within 30 days of the shutdown, " (and yes I cut that for brevity and am slightly taking it out of context)

How about, restore the us constitution "before" the first time this get's abused.
How about that "restoring the us constitution" in a fuckin written binding, and witnessed, and overseen contract?
That way if you are an official and vote for psychopathic unconstitutional bs you just committed treason as a domestic terrorist and are expelled only (since no death occurred.) and your nonsense nullified or reversed or rolled back or made right. This gives you psychopathic fucking tyrants the incentive to do the right thing, by undoing the bullshit you've done. It protects the public interest, and forces corporations to care about the public interest.

These bills need all need to be burned.
Get the banksters, restore the us constitution, regulate the monetary system, and toss all these oath breakers out while setting up a way they can never get back in.

I don't give a shit how secret some agency for the US government is, they WORK FOR ME GOD DAMN IT!

Infinity minus one day

[Anonymous Coward]

The length of copyright must be changed.

--
Anonymous

A (slightly) more sane approach to enforcement

[michaelmalak]

I support copyrights as originally described in the Copyright Act of 1790, of 14 years plus 14 years. With that in mind, if we were really interested in strengthening copyright provisions, below is a much more reasonable approach than SOPA.

The DMCA, despite all its faults restricting fair use, also provides a loophole for copyright violators. Remember when Google was going to buy YouTube, everyone was saying that Google was opening up itself to untold copyright liability? What the public didn't realize is that Google had read the DMCA and determined they could leave copyrighted videos up on YouTube as long as -- until -- the copyright owner complained.

To fix this loophole, the proper solution is not domain seizure, but rather civil penalties. Google/YouTube should pay a copyright clearing house for video downloads between the time of original posting and the time of DMCA takedown. Then Google/YouTube can decide whether it's more cost effective to have turks screen videos before posting or to risk the copyright fees.

Re:A (slightly) more sane approach to enforcement

[shentino]

Youtube should only be liable if they obstruct copyright holders.

Damages are on whoever uploads the damn thing.

A happy middle ground might be to require Youtube to fork over any ad revenue they collect on the video.

Pricing is too high?

[gatkinso]

It would be a lot easier to address piracy if the entertainment industry wasn't making money hand over fist.

Nobody has a problem with them making a profit... even a big profit.... but when they pay an A-list star $25 million to act in a movie and still make enough money to fund private jets and private islands... well let's just say maybe the price should come down.

Clearly technology has put a whole new aspect into capitalism with respect to entertainment... after all even with piracy Hollywood is raking in huge bucks.... but it is also cutting off a revenue stream by forcing some into piracy. But not all: some folks pirate just because they can.

Re:Pricing is too high?

[Anonymous Coward]

Indeed - piracy seems to be the token "witch" in this witch-hunt trying to figure out why sales are decreasing (even while profits are increasing).

One might say that society in general is responding to big content with market-pressure to reduce prices and even out the market for content. Content is easier to obtain now than it ever has been. It's amazingly easy for an independent artist to produce and distribute his/her content. This is what the big content guys are missing - their business model is bursting, and they are looking to pass laws to prevent it from happening. The fact that their shitty content has been trivialized down to "eh, I'm not paying that much for that crap" irritates them to no end.

Re:Pricing is too high?

[Anonymous Coward]

I do not hardly consume; in their view I do not exist has nothing to do with me being a voter. I will consume nothing when I stop violating copyright. It is not piracy and allowing that label makes it appear as if you are stealing something. It is not stealing it is copying without permission plain and simple. If I can't copy I just won't buy it; I can still read and borrow from the library until they stop those.

That will happen, they already stop audio books or PDFs on CD, or ebooks and they sometimes get to charge the library more for a copy of something because its going to be loaned out; like they do for rentals. It will get worse because this is all about investors and endless growth at some point they will be starved for growth and blame libraries and campaign for a few decades then take those down, like they did with copying and all their failed attempts to limit our technology to stop copying. Hell, Japan and others had DVRs and DVD recorders ahead of the USA because of the movie industry (especially the latter.)

Re:Pricing is too high?

[Anonymous Coward]

If you don't want them to make so much money, stop giving them money. What's the problem?

I haven't paid for a movie since the late 90's. You should stop too.

Good luck getting millions of other people to stop as well.

Your argument only proves how valuable and valid the concept of intellectual property is.

Re:Pricing is too high?

[kurzweilfreak]

If their "shitty content" was really as crappy as you want to believe it is, people wouldn't be pirating it in the first place. Or is it just your douchiness that makes you think you have the most impeccable taste on the planet and everyone else is retarded?

Obama's point is a shot across the bow.

[Karmashock]

This is a warning. We have to come up with competing systems to address the problem. Simply saying "do nothing" isn't going to work. They're going to pass something. And if we offer them nothing to pass they'll just take what the RIAA gives them and run with it.

It's very important that the EFF amongst others come up with some alternative... Or we're boned.

Re:Obama's point is a shot across the bow.

[forkfail]

Problem is - they're never, ever going to accept a solution that limits corporate power as opposed to limiting the rights of the natural individual.

So, while I certainly see your point, I fear that any proposals would just be used as cover for the standard corporate friendly crap that his administration is so good at producing under the guise of actually being, you know, Democrats.

Re:Obama's point is a shot across the bow.

[russotto]

This is a warning. We have to come up with competing systems to address the problem.

So we're going to put the chains on ourselves, or they'll put them on us? Sorry, I refuse to fashion my own bonds, even if they'd be laxer than the ones they'll come up with.

It's very important that the EFF amongst others come up with some alternative... Or we're boned.

Here's an alternative: "Title 17 of the United States Code is hereby repealed in its entirety." No more copyright, no more piracy.

What's actually going to happen, though, is either SOPA/PIPA will be tabled or they'll pass a slightly watered-down version. Then in the lame duck session they'll pass what remains.

Re:Obama's point is a shot across the bow.

[Anonymous Coward]

Why not 'do nothing'? Show me where the current laws are failing? I read about people getting ~1.7 million dollar fines for a few dozen songs. I would think the system is working, if anything, TOO well.

When the almost equivalent of shoplifting is treated as a crime worse than murder something is WRONG.

I am voting Ron Paul. He is the only one to come forward and say "I am gutting this bitch". It is the only way at this point. There is too much money and too much power there. Lawrence Lesig put it best when he gave up his copyright fight for awhile. He is instead attacking the root of the problem. Power and money. Unfortunatly this is yanking off the band aid. We are going to get a good view of how bad the infection is. I think it is much worse than we are lead to believe.

Remove the power and the money will go elsewhere. Then for a small period of time we can at least have some justice in our society.

I believe in a good governance of law and not the 'hand of the market'. But at this point the gov has over reached. It is quietly snorking up our rights just for the ability of maybe someone to maybe make a buck.

To tell you the truth I am one strange republican :)

Re:Obama's point is a shot across the bow.

[Karmashock]

Tell me that after they've rejected a proposal we've offered. because right now that's just conjecture on your point to justify not offering another solution.

Maybe you're right but it would have more weight if it were proved.

We need to offer something. Right now you're backing congress into the position of either supporting the RIAA or Pirates... that's how this looks to them. They hear you're upset but they take the lack of a solution as evidence that you're just pirates. Because only pirates would want no solution. that's their perspective on this issue. Just take that for what it is worth.

We'll have a MUCH better chance of defeating SOPA if we have another solution to offer. If we have nothing we're probably screwed.

Re:Obama's point is a shot across the bow.

[Karmashock]

Your solution of dispensing with copyrights entirely is about as practical as responding a debate by covering yourself in whip cream and then singing the thong song.

I guess it makes sense to you... but to everyone else it just looks like you went crazy and started wigging out.

It's also a strawman to say I have advocated we forge our own bonds. Rather we have to come up with some legislation that solves the piracy issue in a constructive way that also respects our rights. Simply saying no more copyrights is madness. It won't happen and you might as well give in to your corporate overlords now. because if that's the best you've got then they'll eat you alive.

What I am proposing is that we come up with some legislation addresses the concern without giving them license to turn the internet into a pirate witch hunt.

There has to be some kind of compromise you're willing to offer... because if the best you've got is the whip cream and thong song then... you've basically disqualified yourself from participating in the discussion. Everyone will just passively ignore you.

I'm not saying any of this to insult you. I'm just cluing you into how that looks. THAT strategy won't work. It is already backfiring. SOPA has only gotten this far because that strategy isn't working. If you want to fight a revolution or something then get your gun now. Because short of a compromise you might as well.

Re:Obama's point is a shot across the bow.

[russotto]

Your solution of dispensing with copyrights entirely is about as practical as responding a debate by covering yourself in whip cream and then singing the thong song.

I guess it makes sense to you... but to everyone else it just looks like you went crazy and started wigging out.

Of course it's extreme. But so is what the other side is offering.

It's also a strawman to say I have advocated we forge our own bonds. Rather we have to come up with some legislation that solves the piracy issue in a constructive way that also respects our rights.

No such solution exists. We have devices which can create copies at the push of the button. We have a system which can transmit copies -- of any sort of information -- around the world almost as easily. Under such circumstances, "solving" the problem of preventing reproduction and distribution of certain material simply cannot be done, not without taking away those devices, breaking that system, and destroying our rights.

There has to be some kind of compromise you're willing to offer.

Perhaps. But if we're going to play the compromise game, we shouldn't start compromising between the status quo and their position. We should start compromising between what we want and what they want. Because if we "compromise" today and offer them something which takes only half as many rights, you know what happens? Piracy won't be stopped. Next year, they'll be screaming for even more extreme legislation, and get another compromise -- starting from the status quo.

Re:Obama's point is a shot across the bow.

[Anonymous Coward]

The thing is that there is no problem to solve. (or an unsolvable one, depending on how you look on things)

Whatever "solution" they will be satisfied with will be something that will limit the internets.
There is no technical way to stop copying. Therefore piracy will never be stopped, you, me and the rest of Slashdot knows that.

But as you said, that is not what they want to hear.
This is some ideas that i've heard while lurking this part of the internets.

Ideas that could push things forward:

1. (Requires no change)
Force the entertainment industries to move on to new markets by not changing the law.
It really shouldn't be that hard to make a service that is better and easier to use than what the pirates are providing.
You are getting paid for it the pirates are not. (we already have Steam, Spotify, Netflix etc. so it can be done)

2. (Requires some change)
Let the copyright holders report their losses and provide evidence that there has been a infringement to an government organisation,
If the case is dismissed, the copyright holder pays a fine to the government organisation.
If the case is approved, there will be a trial as usual.
If the reported case hasn't been taken care of after a period of XX months, the government pays a fine to the copyright holder.
(in my opinion this one isn't that great for anyone)

3. (Requires more change)
Tax people. Create "Public libraries" that is easy to access and use, pay each artist according to views or whatever.
If your work is not present you will not receive any compensation for lost sales.

4. (Requires extreme change)
Stop treating Intellectual property as real property (Extreme, but in fact the most sane solution)
This would change the way we make, share, distribute and experience entertainment/art, it is scary i know, but it would be worth it.

Re:Obama's point is a shot across the bow.

[Hentes]

Looks like you have fallen for their door in the face tactics.

Re:Obama's point is a shot across the bow.

[Karmashock]

You're going to lose if you don't play the game strategically.

This isn't tic tac toe.

Re:Obama's point is a shot across the bow.

[Karmashock]

You think they put SOPA out there to be rejected so we'd then agree to something else? ... Look... if we could just shut all this done, stick our fingers in our ears, and hum... then that might be a functional response.

However, you can't. Your idea just will lead to them getting SOPA in one form or another. You have to put something out there to mitigate the piracy issue. You have to at the very least show good faith here. If you don't do that then you've effectively shown bad faith and at that point your ability to influence the situation will be limited.

Re:Obama's point is a shot across the bow.

[russotto]

However, you can't. Your idea just will lead to them getting SOPA in one form or another. You have to put something out there to mitigate the piracy issue. You have to at the very least show good faith here. If you don't do that then you've effectively shown bad faith and at that point your ability to influence the situation will be limited.

Good faith? With these guys? The ones who tried to ban the VCR? The ones who tried to ban the MP3 player? I said in a prior post that any sort of compromise would only lead them to demand another compromise, starting from the new status quo. That wasn't a guess: That's the situation we're in. The DMCA was supposed to have been that compromise. They've already demonstrated bad faith by coming back and demanding more.

Re:Obama's point is a shot across the bow.

[Karmashock]

Very well... we'll see what happens... For what it's worth to you I don't want SOPA passed either... I just worry that this is going to keep eating away until we find some sort of bargain we can both live with... but maybe you're right... maybe they won't stop until they get unreasonable levels of control. In case, I think it's important to discredit the people pushing the legislation. Part of the purpose of a compromise would be do that. But if you have a better way I'm open to ideas.

Re:Obama's point is a shot across the bow.

[Anonymous Coward]

It's very important that the EFF amongst others come up with some alternative... Or we're boned.

Not really. We can be Terry Childs and shut down the internet. Any lawmaker that passes this can be DDoS'ed off the face of the earth during the next election. We can and will invent a new DNS system. So fsck them. This has door in the face written all over it, but they expect us to dig our own graves for them. If they plan on executing us anyway, let them dig the grave. Just say NO!

Re:Obama's point is a shot across the bow.

[Karmashock]

if you start DDoS's politicians they're going to get angry. And then they're just going to pass the first thing that comes across their desk that hurts you.

In short... your idea would massively backfire. You might as well pull the pin on a grenade and then eat it.

Offshore

[tepples]

Don't they already have the ability to take down sites (with a certain amount of due process), sue for damages, etc?

Not if a site is hosted and operated offshore. For example, AllOfMP3 operated with a license valid only in Russia, and from the perspective of U.S. law, it was selling infringing copies.

Re:I'll tell you what's right

[wonkavader]

On what grounds? I'm open to idea.

However, I don't think utter incompetence is available.

Show Me the Data

[jmactacular]

"While we believe that online piracy by foreign websites is a serious problem that requires a serious legislative response"

People like to focus on right and wrong, but no one is scrutinizing whether a "legislative response" is EVEN NECESSARY at all. Show me data, independent verifiable data of the "losses". The GAO has already concluded:

"Three widely cited U.S. government estimates of economic losses resulting
from counterfeiting cannot be substantiated due to the absence of underlying
studies."

Source: www.gao.gov/new.items/d10423.pdf

As reported by Ars:
http://ars/technica.com/tech-policy/news/2010/04/us-government-finally-admits-most-piracy-estimates-are-bogus.ars

This industry over blows perceived threats of technology, just as it did with the VCR and the MP3 player. The solution is innovation, not legislation or litigation.

Re:Show Me the Data

[jamstar7]

This industry over blows perceived threats of technology, just as it did with the VCR and the MP3 player. The solution is innovation, not legislation or litigation.

Innovation costs money. Litigation creates money, if they can collect.

Solutions

[Oxford_Comma_Lover]

This.

A part of the solution is to be less draconian in punishment and more successful at catching people. Violating copyright is something that should basically be a traffic offense, and instead the law literally makes every American a felon.

A part of the solution is to establish reasonable protections. Copyright terms have been extended periodically since the first copyright act was passed in 1790 or so. It is insane--nobody, and I mean nobody, is making a decision about whether to invest based on potential profits fifty years from now. While perhaps extended protection is fair for works that have never turned a profit or where the profit is not significant compared to the labor involved, it certainly is not justified once fifteen years have passed and a work has earned a 1000% return. We need something more just than the current blanket number of years.

A part of the solution is international relations. If a foreign nation doesn't enforce a reasonable copyright law, we dredge up some sanctions or incentives if they are cost-justified. This makes it so that it will be in the other nation's interest to enforce copyright law. If we can't pay them enough from profits to make it a net gain for them to enforce copyright law, then economically speaking it shouldn't be enforced. (Obviously unless transaction costs of the incentive structure are too high, but that's a relatively narrow range of profits).

Re:Solutions

[Black Parrot]

A part of the solution is to be less draconian in punishment and more successful at catching people. Violating copyright is something that should basically be a traffic offense, and instead the law literally makes every American a felon.

The *AA has adopted a strategy of making an example of a few petty offenders, presumably in order to scare everyone else. They can't possibly prosecute everyone who is stealing $1 MP3s.

Re:Solutions

[Oxford_Comma_Lover]

The RIAA doesn't prosecute people. The RIAA sues people. The massive statutory penalties are a different issue than the criminalization, although both speak to disproportionate severity of the judicially sanctioned response.

Re:Solutions

[TENTH SHOW JAM]

I'd monitor the other way. If a work is turning a profit, then let it remain in copyright. Hell. Make it an exponential fee. Register a work for $1 the first year, $2 the second. $4 the third. This means everything is cheap to protect it's initial release. It also means that come year 20 you better be making $2,000,000 to be breaking even. More works will slide out of copyright protection as soon as protecting it is going to cost you that much.

What's Right? Repeal the DMCA and ACTA

[Bob9113]

'So, rather than just look at how legislation can be stopped, ask yourself: Where do we go from here? Don't limit your opinion to what's the wrong thing to do, ask yourself what's right.'

Easy -- repeal the DMCA and ACTA, don't pass SOPA, PIPA, or OPEN, roll copyright back to, say, 50 years, and give that a ten year test run while we do some serious data gathering and analysis.

Most of our copyright law over the past 15 years has been "The sky is falling" stuff. Wild overstepping of the balance between copyright holders and the interests of the public. We are spending an enormous amount of money doing a lousy job of protecting something that might not need protecting, and might not work any longer. We have very little data on the cost/benefit of all this enforcement, no research on alternatives, what data we do have shows extremely poor correlation between enforcement and increased revenue, does not consider the cost of new business models foregone, and the data that we have that claims to show the cost of infringement is based on the wildly inaccurate theory that every infringement is a foregone sale.

The right answer, if you are a copyright supporter like me, is to ease back to something that the public will be less likely to revolt against while we do some serious objective research on the problem. The right answer is to find out how we can fund the progress of science and the useful arts under this new reality. Copying does not cost any money any more. That is a fundamental change that we need to adapt to. Copyright was invented based on a premise that is no longer true. Failing to consider the new reality and research how to adapt to it is as stupid as Krushchev insisting on Communism. Nice theory, except it does not work.

We need to think about that and come up with a solution, not just fire wildly into the dark. None of the legislation over the past 15 years has made a hint of a dent in infringement. Same thing we've been saying ever since the DMCA was just a twinkle in the RIAA's eye. These laws cannot work, mathematically speaking, because reality has changed. We need to stop the wishful madness and think of how to turn free copying into a win. Seeing as how it is a massive boon to society to be able to reproduce things for free, that shouldn't be too hard. We are making this harder than it needs to be.

Re:What's Right? Repeal the DMCA and ACTA

[roman_mir]

Seriously, you are asking them to reverse bad legislation that takes away your right to freedom of speech/business/happiness/property while they are in constant process of destroying more of your liberties.

Patriot Act and NDAA are much worse than all of these other issues and Obama just signed NDAA, and it means martial law, it means military will detain you indefinitely, it really means concentration camps for all, including Americans, eventually on American soil too, not just funny looking people from other countries.

Obama isn't interested in your quest for liberty and civility, he is a self imposed dictator at this point, he can kill you wherever you are in the world and he can capture you and torture you, and he can do it because he has huge military in his disposal, that's the extent of the reason behind it - just power and he wants more of it and his handlers want more of it.

Re:What's Right? Repeal the DMCA and ACTA

[Anonymous Coward]

Consider hand-writing this to Obama. President's are more likely to be given hand-written letters than something sent through email. It would be more sincere, and it shows you're willing to stake your name behind your opinion.

The Problem Isn't With SOPA

[Greyfox]

It's with the fundamentally broken intellectual property infrastructure that supports it. Copyright was originally designed so that artists could make a living with their art, and then after a while the work would go into Public Domain and be free to all thereafter. Patents were originally designed to encourage inventors to innovate. Corporate interests have subverted the workings of both. And the USA happily does its best to spread this cancer to the rest of the world.

We need an IP law overhaul in thus country and around the world. We need to balance the rights of the artists who create the works and rights of the societies that support them as well. What we don't need to do is guarantee some parasitic corporation a free lunch for all eternity at the expense of both the artists AND everyone else. We also need to eliminate the perception (real or imagined) that since it's the parasitic corporation that makes the campaign donations, they're the ones who still end up making the laws. Such an idea is toxic to our democracy.

This is why we need a Pirate Party here in America. Who wants to start one?

Re:The Problem Isn't With SOPA

[forkfail]

Welcome to the Ownership Society, where it's all about owning, and not so much about ongoing creation.

Licensed for Use in Japan

[Anonymous Coward]

There is the reverse, too. When someone can't buy, they pirate. Anyone who imports also counts as pirate. THEY DO NOT HAVE A VALID LICENSE.

So many 100's of millions of $$

[future assassin]

wasted on paying off politicians instead of setting up a distribution channels/websites that makes all music, movies, written works available to customers world wide at digital media price.

Gimme movies at 4$ with out DRM and I'll buy 20 per month instead of downloading them for free where at the end you don't get a penny from me

How will it scale

[tepples]

All DNS names are stored with transaction data within namecoin block chain.

If it's anything like the Bitcoin that I've seen before, Namecoin is like the pre-DNS method of passing /etc/hosts around to everyone. How will this scale up to tens of millions of domains?

Re:How will it scale

[Janek Kozicki]

it's not like passing /etc/hosts around, because DNS servers can read blockchain and serve DNS information in usual format. As a bonus - all DNS changes propagate instantly - within minutes in the p2p network, and take effect as soon as are confirmed by next block.

Re:How will it scale

[tepples]

it's not like passing /etc/hosts around, because DNS servers can read blockchain and serve DNS information in usual format.

So in other words, we'll have providers that offer a DNS front-end to a NMC resolver, just as we currently have providers that offer a web front-end to a BTC wallet. Now I think I'm starting to understand.

"So, what's right?"

[Black Parrot]

First, do no harm.

So, what's right?

[SuperTechnoNerd]

My right is:
Don't buy their music CD's
Don't buy their movie DVD's or Blue ray
Don't buy DRM'ed media/software
Don't go to their movies
Go Indie!

Not much there

[khallow]

Seems pretty buzzword-laden to me. For me the issue is how these promises are broken in administration policy elsewhere. Let's look at the bolded points:

Any effort to combat online piracy must guard against the risk of online censorship of lawful activity and must not inhibit innovation by our dynamic businesses large and small.

Sounds almost libertarian. Support for the First Amendment (to the point of even "guarding" against possible infractions of it) and support for "dynamic businesses". I can't help but notice their support for "dynamic businesses" vanish when it comes to taxation policy.

the term also ignores that the law in question is basically trying to create rent-seeking opportunities for businesses that couldn't survive in a free market. I wouldn't call those sorts of businesses "dynamic".

We must avoid creating new cybersecurity risks or disrupting the underlying architecture of the Internet.

Such as creating backdoors for law enforcement and hackers who target Iranian nuclear facilities? A concern that only seems to be selectively worried about when campaign donors need some laws passed.

That is why the Administration calls on all sides to work together to pass sound legislation this year that provides prosecutors and rights holders new legal tools to combat online piracy originating beyond U.S. borders

My take is that SOPA was not this "sound legislation" but rather a power grab by certain content providers. Nor do I see how "new legal tools" in the US provide for legal problems outside the US. The jurisdiction issue gets in the way. To give an example, China isn't going to stop blatant and widespread copying of software just because laws are passed in the US. So there's no compelling need to pass the laws in question.

We expect and encourage all private parties, including both content creators and Internet platform providers working together, to adopt voluntary measures and best practices to reduce online piracy.

The bizspeak gets rather dense here. And these goals are so easy to subjective interpret as you will.

I propose as a voluntary measure, driving out of business via boycotts any content creator or internet platform provider that runs their business at the expense of the functioning of the internet and free exchange of knowledge. I suggest as "best practices", no compromise on the Constitution and to block or disobey any law or regulation that would illegally constrain the freedoms granted by that Constitution. That fits in quite nicely with this quote above, but obviously that isn't the interpretation that the administration is looking for.

Ultimately, I see this sort of response as what to expect when the administration is doing something harmful for its base and trying to sugar-coat it.

Re:Not much there

[cpghost]

The bizspeak gets rather dense here.

Not really. What they mean is that ISPs will be forced to police the Net instead of the content providers or even the State. This way, there would be no costly and hazardous legal proceeding should some poor guy get cut off: it will be a business decision, not an administrative one. That's similar in spirit to what other ACTA member countries are doing: making ISPs responsible and turning them into an internet police whose decisions can't be appealed. Pretty slippery slope and dangerous precedent here.

How about the OPEN Act?

[guises]

Many people here are saying that we need to get away from DNS as it is now, use Namecoin or some other distributed method. That's great for the long term, certainly something we should work towards, but for the moment there doesn't seem to be too much that's wrong with the OPEN Act as an alternative to SOPA. It gives no power to private organizations, it combats piracy without censorship, and the *IAAs hate it - that can only be a plus. So the White House is looking for a positive answer to the question, why not that?

bullies

[eudas]

Simply coming back with "ok, we get the message - you don't like SOPA. But i don't hear you jackoffs coming up with any better ideas, do I?" is bully psychology. it is a sorry attempt to rephrase the conversation as "well, do you prefer A or B?"

but that's not the issue. the issue is, "does this problem need to be solved at all?"

because if we simply accept the choice between horrible implementation that infringes on our rights A and horrible implementation that infringes on our rights B, we're not actually thinking about all of the possibilities. maybe piracy, ultimately, is better for the public than either choice A or choice B.

just a thought.

Right

[Tom]

So, what's right?

Laws that serve the people. Really, you need that spelled out?

Put strict limits on lobbyism, campaign contributions and the rights of large corporations. Don't fix the symptoms of a bad system, fix the system.

Oh, and fix the tax laws. The USA once revolted with the slogan "no taxation without representation". It's high time to reverse it: No representation without taxation. If a corporation wants to dodge taxes, fine. But make it very, very illegal for tax-evaders to influence politics.

And finally, (and yes, you need all three) re-introduce the death penalty for corporations. Come up with a good way to take down a corporation so taking it down does minimal damage to society. Then do it on the appropriate crimes. Like endangering the economy - if Al Qaida had done 10% of the damage that greedy speculators have, you guys would have bombed Afghanistan and everything within a 1000 mile radius into near-earth-orbit.
 

Re:Right

[bugger41]

I agree with everything you say it couldn't be clearer stop giving more rights to greedy corporations who already have more leverage than they need and put Joe American first because without due American greedy corporations couldn't possibly exist by the way Joe American wake up you dummy stop bending over in front of your abusive corporate cellmate and I shouldn't have to explain the rest it gets a little graphic after that.

The right thing to do?

[koan]

Well lets be "conservative" and keep the Internet the way it is.

Another petition telling them what's right?

[Anonymous Coward]

How about this? https://wwws.whitehouse.gov/petitions/!/petition/stop-futile-efforts-combat-online-piracy-and-reform-copyright-law-be-compatible-21st-century/dJ7px26v

I squeezed as much eloquence into the 800-character limit as I could, but I think it encompasses most people's opinions, ranging from IP-reformists to abolitionists. I don't know if it'll change anything, but if they're forced to respond, it'll at least get it some attention.

Help out the little guys...

[thestudio_bob]

I'm all for anti-piracy measures, but any new law should also have a means for the little guy (or business) to address infringement from a large corporation. Creating something the further empowers the large corporations is not the answer. It seems as of these corporations want to screw everyone in the world when it comes to copyright violations, but they want immunity or just flat out ignore it when they get caught "lifting" someone else's work.

And I've said this before, if these media companies want to use tax dollars to fight "piracy" (or to keep their dying business model alive), then before anything gets passed into law based on their "facts", then someone should do a complete and comprehensive audit of their bookkeeping to ensure that this is the case. Of course, that'll never happen.

Choose your side

[PPH]

"better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer" - Sir William Blackstone

"better that ten innocent men suffer than one guilty man escape" - Pol Pot

Re:Choose your side

[genner]

"better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer" - Sir William Blackstone

"better that ten innocent men suffer than one guilty man escape" - Pol Pot

I'd rather let a thousand guilty men go free than chase after them -Chief Wiggum

What do you mean no politics?

[betterunixthanunix]

There have always been politics at work with the Internet:

• At one time, only researchers had access to the Internet. Non-researchers had Usenet and Fidonet.
• One day, congress decided that it was time to open the Internet to commercial users in addition to researchers, and suddenly everyone had access to it.
• It took years of political fighting to work out the legal problems with encrypting the Internet, and thus the system was left with security problems left and right.
• ICANN works for the benefit of the US government
• The Internet became part of the globalization agenda in the 90s.

These are, of course, merely the highlights. There is a long history of politics governing Internet growth; this is just another chapter in that book. If you want a network that is driven by technology, you need a network that is controlled by its users, which is not what the Internet is.

There is no "right"

[Anonymous Coward]

As we've seen countless times with DRM efforts there simply is no "right" way that doesn't have some other unwanted chilling effect.

But here's a start:

1.) Restore copyright to 20 years after creation. This BS of shit being locked up till infinity-1 is just that, bullshit. The public is entitled to more than 100+ year old works in the public domain.
2.) Establish clear rules that impose REASONABLE penalties for FOR-PROFIT distribution, especially against individuals. The current penalties were never intended to be levied against people and it's completely ridiculous to think it's a-ok to do so.
3.) Rework the DMCA to allow fair use copies for personal use and to close all the loopholes that the MAFIAA currently exploits to their benefit at the detriment to the public.
4.) Tell the MAFIAA to go fuck themselves. Make a good product at a reasonable price and people will buy it. If you can't do that and must rely on paying off congress and judges to secure your horribly outdated business model so you can strongarm and extort people you deserve to go bankrupt. And like a phoenix from the ashes the movie, music, and gaming industries will arise reborn and be better off without you.

They are attempting to change the argument

[Anonymous Coward]

'So, rather than just look at how legislation can be stopped, ask yourself: Where do we go from here? Don't limit your opinion to what's the wrong thing to do, ask yourself what's right.'

No! Stop, just stop. You are attempting to frame the argument as change is inevitable. It isn't - not in this case at least. The media companies are attempting to force a change to existing law. It is incumbent on them, and you (as the legislative and executive branches responsible custodians of the law) to explain and defend why this is a necessary change - it is NOT the responsibility of those who oppose this change to propose alternative measures to limit our rights.

D's and R's

[Anonymous Coward]

The Lamar R of San Antonio, along with John Conyers D New Jersey, and Howard Berman D Hollywood supported the lobbyists pushing SOPA.

Darrell Issa R So. Cal. was pushing PIPA but now OPEN. To his credit, he was at CES, spoke to a lot of people, ten publicly supported the OPEN solution. He's still a right-winger, but he should get some points for actually talking to people and listening to them.

I hope piracy goes away when IP is easy to buy and download. I suspect the piracy of music has declined with the emergence of online music sales. I don't miss the $20 / ten song CDs at all, although the RIAA would love to see that one-hit per CD business model come back. As bandwidth becomes more widespread, I hope video and software shrink-wraps go away, too.

Prediction

[Anonymous Coward]

to placate the masses, a very weak, toothless form of the law will pass. each year afterward, more teeth will be added either unnoticeably or as tiny addendums to large unprotested bills.

First, make them prove damage

[kawabago]

Make rights holders give solid proof that they are in fact being hurt by piracy. Right now I can say that piracy adds 200 billion dollars to the US economy every year and that figure is just as believable as the ones offered by the rights holding industry. Also make no mistake that it is a rights holding industry not a creative industry. The fact that 90% of musical groups promoted by the industry fail to make a profit tells me that the losses are not from piracy but from bad choices by the rights holding industry. If you back a losing horse you're going to lose your money. It isn't piracy, it's bad management.

Re:First, make them prove damage

[the eric conspiracy]

I'd like to point out that a 90% failure rate for entrepreneurs is common. 90% of small businesses go bankrupt within 5 years of founding. A lot fewer than 10% of all actors actually make a living in their profession.

The problems with copyright are interesting. On one hand there is I think the legitimate need for copyright as was laid out in the Constitution. On the other hand we have the impossibility of enforcing it given the ease of copying and distribution given the internet and the incomparable rapacious exploitation of the copyright concept by business interests far in excess of the original intent.

The result is the conflict we have today. I don't think it is soluble without distortion of the way we live, meaning that copyright will have to be replaced by some other means of incentivising creative works.

Re:First, make them prove damage

[Anonymous Coward]

I would take that a step further. If copyright laws exist for the benefit of society as a whole, and protecting the artist is just a means not an end, then the rights holders should have the burden of proving damages to society.

A Car Analogy... seriously

[w0mprat]

The internet is an intangible end-to-end network with no storage, no brains and no memory. No matter what kind of internet connected service you use you are connecting across the internet from your equipment to some physical equipment somewhere else on planet earth. There is no such thing as cyberspace, although politicians seem to think so. Any illicit activity "on the internet" is still actually taking place in the real world with some meat bag person running it. So if the crimes still real world, why fight it with censorship? This seems to be the problem in understanding the politicians and their lobbyist masters have.

To use the car analogy, censoring the internet makes as much sense to setting up roadblocks to search public vehicles as they go about their business, and the purpose of this would be to prevent the movement of stolen goods. Burglaries and theft are a huge problem in society, that have always been there as a background noise to day-to-day life, but we aren't destroying civil liberties to try and stop it once and for all. Nor are we doing it by an absurd method such as censorship - so much industry depends on the movement of vehicle traffic, which is why we don't censor traffic, mail, phone calls.

Crime is a symptom not a disease.

Piracy is a symptom not a disease.

Right now we're being force-fed some particularly nasty painkillers to treat a headache.

The trouble with Obama

[DarkOx]

That is the problem with Obama and everyone like him right there. He starts from the assumption "something must be done". No the correct thing to do is start from the assumption there is nothing wrong with natural law and the market.

From my perspective, the media industry is highly profitable, and their output is prolific. That to me indicates there is in fact no problem with current situation at all. The onus should always be on those who "want something done" to prove that majority would benefit from it or that it is absolutely a necessity to protect the rights of a minority that is actually experiencing real abuse. To that end most legislation enacted in the past five or six decades and plenty before it is unjust and wrong.

Re:The trouble with Obama

[multimediavt]

Has nothing to do with Obama. This problem of misused copyright has been around for longer than you, I or Obama have been alive. Obama is at least asking the people for suggestions, unlike any of the others across the aisle from him politically. Natural law? Please define and then put in context? As humans we have not been subject to survival of the fittest since, at least the invention of the supermarket. Natural law has never applied to commerce as there is nothing "natural" about it, so you're left with a market that is (obviously if pirating is as bad as they claim, which it is not) not too happy with the status quo and could give a fig about copyright enforcement on something they seem perfectly entitled to possess and share.

So, the problem with the situation is greed and the misuse of copyright to feed that greed. So, yes something does need to be done. Copyright law needs to be modified to better reflect its original intent. Kinda like the folks claim they want to do with the Constitution from the other side of the aisle than Obama. Funny how that view only seems to apply to things they choose it to.

Re:The trouble with Obama

[Anonymous Coward]

I agree, the default should be "do no harm" first and only accept legislation that's been shown to be a net positive for the country. Opening the discussion like this should also trigger a re-evaluation that can just as easily result in a relaxation of copyright laws. People tend to take pot shots indefinitely when the cost is low and they don't stand to loose anything. The result is racheting laws that just get more and more extreme over time. If the RIAA and MPAA believed their lobbying could result in a return to ~20 year caps on copyright (or better yet, punitave damages for pushing for and abusing the DMCA), the digital piracy problem would probably vanish over night.

Re:Protecting rights - its the marketplace stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

Allow me to rebutt most of the body of this, because I can agree that people should get paid, but as I said to an old friend after Napster became popular and the RIAA started going after them, "Napster may not live through this, but the game has changed and they will need to adapt." I don't really agree here:

The point being that there probably should be an attempt made to hinder online piracy in some way. We can't just let it spiral completely out of control, to the point where it's no longer lucrative to produce anything. Part of the reason the console platform became so appealing to game developers is the reduced amount of piracy compared to the PC platform. In other words, they can actually make money from their work, money that is used to make more games. You can't have a functioning long-term economy in which people never get compensated for anything; people are trying to make a living, and they use the income to produce more contributions to society. If your boss withheld your paycheck and told you that the code you wrote is now theirs free of charge because "information wants to be free," you'd sue for the wages and win. But if the code you wrote is included in a game, and the game appears on Pirate Bay, downloaders will happily pirate it and never even dream of spending a time, and they'll justify it until they're red in the face.

The most common one they use is that it's "free advertising"--that pirating games leads them to purchase games. Correlation doesn't equal causation, however, and the fact they buy games as well as pirate them simply suggests that they like games so much that they acquire them by any means possible, and when they can't pirate, they buy. Either that, or they buy to resolve their feelings of guilt.

I fear getting modded down as well for the title. However, I am an iPhone user (insert derision here). That is because regardless of the restrictions placed on it, it is elegant and for the most part does what it is supposed to do all the time. I love the music store in it, it is a guilty pleasure to mark something I am hearing and immediately down load it for $0.99 - $1.29 (thank you reasonable price with instant gratification).

The same goes for my amazon kindle (for my school books and pleasure reading). The one thing I don't like is the restrictive nature of these marketplaces. I would enjoy more indie works on both types of marketplaces. What is unconscionable (on kindle fire and iTunes) is the price of a TV show (even the free ones I can record from my Silicon Dust TV tuner to my home server served up via XBMC, I stream everything else through PlayOn.tv or I get downloads from a private torrent me and a couple of friends brace up through a VPN).

Are you seeing what I am getting at here? The MPAA and RIAA give those industries a huge over-head. Apple and Amazon have removed the over-head for these industries through their market place and people have come streaming to them (wince, that was bad, sorry). The MPAA and associated companies are still fighting any legal, elegant, and financially viable market place. They have tried to murder Netflix outright, keep Hulu like an orphan in a closet where they drilled and hole and jab a broomstick at it occasionally, and almost the same can be said for YouTube, but it is more like the rebellious runaway teenager that can come back and beat up the parent.

So my challenge back to the Whitehouse, why haven't you done anything about the monopolistic holds some of these corporations have on the media? Why do you think there is such friction? Why do you allow the harassment of your citizenry by corporate thugs? Who is actually the problem here?

Keep in mind that most savvy down-loaders realize every time you download something it is like going into Bangkok without a condom. Most people don't want to take these risks, but it still persists.

Why War On Piracy, not a War on Banksters

[Anonymous Coward]

The priority is all fucked up here.

Piracy is directly proportional to the damage the banksters and officials caused. They are openly destroying the monetary system, TREASON. And yet they want to fuck with the fallout (people who don't have shit anyway) instead of stopping the next motherfucking al queada Bankster.

FINAL WARNING: Adults Can't be Tricked.

Pippa

[HRbnjR]

Yeah! And also, I have no problem with Pippa - frankly, I don't even understand what she did to deserve getting dragged into this mess?!

What's right?

[multimediavt]

Seriously, that's what they came back with? How about starting with copyrights being to protect the identity of a work of art's originator, not as a financial weapon and then go from there!

Hopefully, NewYorkCountryLawyer hasn't posted yet because he's actually writing a brief to send to the WH starting with just that.

Re:What's right?

[Anonymous Coward]

i_approve.jpg

Re:What's right?

[tobiah]

+1 Nice list

Re:What's right?

[Pecisk]

Moderate this up. I'm all for some limited copyright, but twenty years - no more, no less. You can recoup your costs easily. Also all patents should be valuated very strictly. You do R&D to compete, not to get some guaranteed profit. And looking to numbers, proper marketing and actual products brings you money, not protected R&D.

I'm not sure about trademarks - I think current situation is problematic because of abuse of system, like trademarking generic words and stuff. This must be more regulated too.

Agreed about penalties of abusing from corporations - they must be much harsher, especially knowingly claiming false copyright ownership.

Creativity is a virtue

[betterunixthanunix]

What you meant to say is,

Without copyright, the only ways that I can think of for artists to get paid in the digital age is through draconian DRM and black box playback devices.

There are other payment models that are possible and that have been used with varying degrees of success so far. Just because you cannot think of other payment models does not mean they do not exist.

Fuck The Whole Damn Lot

[Arancaytar]

When it comes to Wikileaks, the freedom of the internet and the cancerous copyright law we now have, there is no such thing as a voice of sanity in the government. The only reason I'm voting for Obama again is because I know that whatever loonie the Republicans rally behind will put up the exact same platform (with the added bonus of fucking social services and civil rights).

This is depressing.

Re:Fuck The Whole Damn Lot

[SkOink]

When it comes to Wikileaks, the freedom of the internet and the cancerous copyright law we now have, there is no such thing as a voice of sanity in the government. The only reason I'm voting for Obama again is because I know that whatever loonie the Republicans rally behind will put up the exact same platform (with the added bonus of fucking social services and civil rights).

This is depressing.

That mentality is what let our country get to the state it's in right now. As a nation, we need to stop playing "lesser of two evils", and start voting for third party candidates. Any third-party candidates. It doesn't even matter which ones.

In a nation where (D) and (R) are both (F)'ing us in the (A), continuing to vote for whichever one will screw us _less_ is a sort of tragedy-of-the-commons kind of scenario. It makes sense as an individual choice, but when the entire country thinks like this we get the mess we're in now.

Re:Fuck The Whole Damn Lot

[Anonymous Coward]

Aw, that's cute. You still think your vote means anything.

It doesn't matter what letter they've got next to their name. As soon as they gather enough influence, they'll draw the attention of the corporate interests and then you're right back where you started.

You're a hundred years too late to change anything by voting, my friend.

People Must Be Allowed To Break The Law

[The Immutable]

Yeah, wrap your head around that one.

If you want to do what's RIGHT, take the example of red light cameras. Everyone hates them. They get massive opposition (at least in my area) whenever they're introduced. Now, why, exactly do you think this is? It's not because it's a waste of money, it's actually quite profitable. It's because they WORK. People run red lights all the time and they don't want to get caught.

To continue the driving metaphor, you speed on the highway. I know you do, everyone does. It's an open secret that at some point in your life you've probably gone above 80 and NOT gotten caught. This would be so trivial to stop it's laughable. A couple lines of code in the onboard computer to limit your speed to 70 mph. Depending on your region you could just take it to a mechanic and have them adjust the limit in accordance with local laws. Now how would you feel if they did that? Pretty pissed I'm sure. I know why I would be, because they're taking away my freedom to break the law.

Now I'm sure by now you think I'm going to say piracy serves some important moral purpose. It doesn't, it's wrong. But the RIGHT thing to do is to let it happen, because like the occasional speeder or the kid with a dime bag of pot, it is not something life threatening that MUST be stopped in its entirety. You have a choice to make between harming the tech sector or harming the entertainment sector. The right thing to do is to take the choice of lesser harm. SOPA and PIPA will hurt EVERYONE in a fantastic myriad of ways I'm sure you're all familiar with. Piracy only hurts those who are pirated against, and only in one way - by eroding their profit margin.

This isn't to say we should give up the fight against piracy. That would be like abolishing all traffic laws, there would be chaos on the streets. Nobody wants that. But we have to take MEASURED steps against it. We can never eradicate piracy, so in taking steps to fight piracy, the government should first make sure nobody is going to get hit in the crossfire.

Or you could just subsidize the entertainment industry and institute a piracy tax on high speed internet connections, that could work too. Didn't Switzerland already do that?

Re:People Must Be Allowed To Break The Law

[Anonymous Coward]

Somewhat off-topic rant:

If you want to do what's RIGHT, take the example of red light cameras. Everyone hates them. They get massive opposition (at least in my area) whenever they're introduced. Now, why, exactly do you think this is? It's not because it's a waste of money, it's actually quite profitable. It's because they WORK. People run red lights all the time and they don't want to get caught.

I and several people I know oppose them for a variety of reasons, none of which include any desire to run red lights: governments shouldn't be allowed the broad surveillance capabilities provided by such devices (you might disagree, but it is a common counterpoint); such devices create a potentially corrupting profit motive for the local government (you've noted the profitability, and some cities have been caught intentionally shortening yellow light times below safe DOT recommendations in order to generate more revenue); simpler approaches (brief all-red cycles, longer yellows, and so on) have been shown to be similarly effective; constitutional challenges are slowly forcing camera tickets into being civil fines only (so, no license suspension), leading to the undesirable situation where running red lights becomes a "cost of driving" for the well-off; unlike a traffic cop, the cameras don't stop reckless drivers from causing an accident; their use trades a (dubious and arguably unproven) reduction in severe cross-path intersection accidents for an increase in lower impact same-path accidents (i.e. rear-enders due to people stopping suddenly on yellows to avoid a camera ticket).

To continue the driving metaphor, you speed on the highway. I know you do, everyone does. It's an open secret that at some point in your life you've probably gone above 80 and NOT gotten caught. This would be so trivial to stop it's laughable. A couple lines of code in the onboard computer to limit your speed to 70 mph. Depending on your region you could just take it to a mechanic and have them adjust the limit in accordance with local laws. Now how would you feel if they did that? Pretty pissed I'm sure. I know why I would be, because they're taking away my freedom to break the law.

That wouldn't stop speeding, it would merely stop speeding on some highways. Many newer high-end vehicles in the US with the capability to go very fast already have limiters, just set at 120 mph, 140 mph, or whatever; that doesn't piss me off, nor anyone I know. And not everyone speeds on the highway; I pass plenty of those who don't speed most every time I drive on one. What I don't do is speed on wet/icy roads, in areas with poor visibility (blind corners, etc.), on residential streets where you have no idea when some kid is going to run out in front of you, and so on. Maybe we should all agree on which varieties of speeding are more likely to end in tragedy, and police those appropriately.

The rest of your post is hit-and-miss, but I'll just say this: I think you're fundamentally wrong in your assertion that most of us have some need to break the rules.

- T

why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Who says we need to do anything?

Creative Destruction

[Anonymous Coward]

Or corporate Darwinism.

nobody disagrees

[luther349]

i don't think anyone will disagree bought that statement but its not bought the people saying where should we go from hear because your supposed to for the people and that means if the people say copyright is broken and needs to change and these businesses bribing there laws in need to go that's what should be happening.

Hell has frozen...

[LVSlushdat]

Ok.. That does it.. Hell HAS frozen over... A statement from this administration that I 100% agree with??? Will wonders EVER cease?? I guess the old saw "A broken clock is correct twice a day" applies here... There IS no doubt that this administration is a "broken clock"...

You can't...

[Anonymous Coward]

You can't stop piracy. There will always be some who will find ways to pirate content. However piracy could be greatly reduced by content producers doing the following:

Create Quality content. Far to much if the content avsailable todat is crap, and is poorley recorded/produced.

Drop DRM and draconian laws. In other words stop treating every customer like a criminal!

Keep prices reasonable, and consistant with tha actuall cost of production. Consumers are nor stupid, we know when w are being asked to pay outragious prices. Don't expext to make 1000% to 100000% profit on everything!

Eliminate software and business method patents, make patents and copyrights 7 years (retroactivley) with no extensions for any reason. No exceptions! Current patent laws and greatly over-extended. copyrights encourage piracy of content that should be in the public domain.

Stop granting and revoke overly broad and poorley defined patents.

Stop trying to prop up outdated business models and embrace the new and better ways to sell and deliver content.

Realize that you cannot stop or reduce piracy by buying or sponsering more and more draconian laws. Realize that proposed laws like SOPA, Protect IP etc... will only disrupt the internet without acomplishing their stated goals.

Realize that consumers are NOT going pay a fee every time they read/listen to/watch content. Stop trying to take away consumers fair use rights, and rights to do what they want with purcased content (aside fron giving away or selling copies)

Piracy cannot be legislated away by laws that cannot adress the real causes listed above.

Protect coporate rights while ignoring individuals

[sowth]

If this law would only combat copyright infringement, I would be all for it. But it doesn't. This law is based on blocking from vague accusations just like the DMCA, and look how that law has been abused. Takedown requests generated by bots who select files which have the same words as the title of a movie/song or whatever. Takedown requests for things they don't even own. And of course, religious organizations abused the DMCA to silence critics.

Then there are the lawsuits. Suing Veoh which destroyed them, even though they won the lawsuit. Then there is Viacom v. YouTube where viacom sued YouTube, even though Viacom was uploading the videos for promotion. Then there is this video which I am not sure I agree with, but he has a point.

Then there is what happened in Denmark.

It all seems to me that the big media companies main goal is to turn the Internet into a one way TV medium which doesn't allow user content, not protect their copyrights.

What's right?

[cas2000]

The following are both right and fair:

1. Restore original copyright length of 20 years. Failing that, abolish copyright altogether. Tighten the language to make clear that *only* the specific work of art (writing, music, painting, sculpture, etc) is copyrighted - NOT any ideas, characters, setting/background etc, and that the public's fair-use right to re-use & remix existing works is unabridged.

2. Revoke all Software, Design, Business Methods, Gene, and Pharmaceutical Usage patents and all other patents that aren't actually inventions.

3. Restrict Trade Marks to just company names and brand names. No slogans, no words, no phrases. The only valid purpose of trademarks is to protect purchasers from fakes.

4. For all three, explicitly acknowledge and acknowledge that they are not rights or property, they are artificial monopolies granted for specific civic purposes - and that where they conflict with those civic purposes, the monopoly power is revoked (e.g. if it can be proved that a patent stifles innovation rather than fostering it, it is to be revoked).

5. Penalties for abusing the monopoly powers granted by copyrights, patents, and trademarks must be sufficient to discourage such abuse even by corporations with deep pockets.

6. Penalties for infringing the monopoly powers should be restricted to commercial and large-scale infringements by businesses, companies, corporations, and other organisations.

What's Right

[Anonymous Coward]

1. Artists and publishers should give back to the public. 20 year term of copyright, and even that is generous.

2. Punish criminals. Don't hobble the most important technology since the printing press with government-mandated DRM. https://github.com/jwise/28c3-doctorow/blob/master/transcript.md

3. Respect the rights of individuals. Don't violate the 1st, 4th, or 5th amendments by writing (and attempting to pass) laws which de-facto create censorship, force people to submit to warrant-less, trial-less punishment, etc.

What's right? Shorten copyright term back to 14+14

[Anonymous Coward]

What's right? Try starting by making copyright terms for "limited Times" (as the original language had it), limited with respect to a lifetime. The original 14 year period, maybe renewable, would be a good start. Start by making it mandatory that patents be checked in ALL fora for prior art (not just patent applications) and enforce rules against obviousness with the following test: pose the problem in the patent to 10 experts. If any of them get the same answer, the patent was obvious. If not, not. But the experts should be knowledgeable and creative people in the field. Make the search need to show evidence that it was done. Currently the inventor just says "I didn't know about any prior art". The 20th person to invent something obvious can say this. However, patents are supposed to be for the first, and only if what was invented is non-obvious (as a 20th invention is likely to be). I've had ideas I published years ago patented by Johnny-come-latelies long after. (All fora means not only patent apps but magazines, user libraries, journals, newsletters, and online discussions. Searching them will not be trivial.) Far too much of theculture is being turned over to intellectual land-grab artists. As for the legalities about piracy, if the land-grabbers are no longer in control, there is better ground for users to be named (the net is kind of a glass house that way), but selling secrets, which is what music/movie companies want to do, gets hard where the secrets can be copied ad nauseam at practically zero cost. The business model needs to change somehow; at any rate there has to be something offered that is not trivial to copy because you can only create scarcity in that case by destroying free speech and publication. I would suggest the "shaming" model that Tolkien used when someone published Lord of the Rings without his consent (it had gone into public domain) as a useful example for book authors and possibly others, but people must then see some value in having that consent. (Recall too the problems the Pythagoreans caused for Plato due to claims of his stealing their doctrine.) If movie producers don't want stuff copied, they must keep it to themselves, release in theaters or the like, release copies... it is not clear they are losing anything actually by copies because at the moment at least the higher def versions are viewed as better and worth seeing (if story is good) in movie houses. But free speech needs to trump the need of a business to keep secrets that are not, and cannot be kept, secret.

Economics 1

[Anonymous Coward]

From an Economics 1 point of view, isn't "piracy" just one of the price adjustment measures that come into play in a monopoly market ?

- km

Due process

[Anonymous Coward]

What makes our "leaders" think that passing laws which circumvent due process is a good thing. It should be obvious (even to them) that circumventing due process is unconstitutional.

Libraries

[Fnord666]

What I want to know is when are they going to start pursuing libraries for their egregious practice of making available copyrighted works for any Tom, Dick or Harry that happens to walk through the door. Each time a book is checked out it could have been copied so that's another violation right there. It's time to start cracking down on these serial offenders. Persecution shouldn't be too difficult either. I hear that they keep detailed records of each time a copyrighted work is lent out and potentially duplicated. My understanding is that they even collect money for this sometimes. This sort of thing has to stop before our entire civilization descends into anarchy and chaos. Won't someone think of the children?

Obama doing his usual thing

[zizzybaloobah]

This is Obama playing both sides of the fence. I recently read an article that aptly articulated Obama's modus operandi for issues like this, where he needs to placate the opposition, esp. when it comes from those within his own party: Issue statement via WH staff or other outlets without actually saying anything himself. In this case, the 'White House statement' attempts to placate SOPA opponents, but without Obama himself actually saying anything himself that might be an offense toward the big money interests (i.e. Hollywood, the MPAA, etc., and their deep-pocketed lobbyists) he can't risk losing, especially in an election year.

Re:Obama doing his usual thing

[symbolset]

In an election year it's easy enough to turn the migration of birds into a D vs R thing. But not this time. This thing has adherents on both sides of the aisle. We can safely leave partisan politics out of this one.

The issue here is that there are members of the body politick - elected representatives in the hallowed halls of Congress - who believe that it's quite acceptible to sacrifice the core values of freedom of speech and due process of law that our nation was founded on, to preserve the profitability of a 90 year old mouse cartoon. What political party these men adhere to is neither here nor there. They're a threat to the Republic and should be removed from office as swiftly as the democratic process will allow. To do anything else is just to admit that democracy has failed.

What's right depends on what the lobbyists say.

[Anonymous Coward]

And what they say depends on what they get paid to say.
I know that's true for YOU.

For me thought, your bullshit brainwashing simply doesn't stick anymore.
Even listening to you has become a risk. (Since as a political social engineer, I know that all it takes, is to listen at all. If you argue against is does not matter at all. [Ok, some argue that reasoning about it only solidifies the validation of the concept in the target's brain])

So all I'm gonna say: You will pay for this! And you will be on your knees and *beg* to be just punished, in face of the alternatives!

WWWS?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why does the url look like this?

https://wwws.

The right thing..

[nurb432]

Is for the government to butt the hell out.

They're turning from DNSBL's because

[Anonymous Coward]

Using a custom HOSTS file can circumvent them easily (DNS request logs too, by bypassing calling out to a remote DNS server @ all/period...).

* Besides - There's more powerful methods to block out these allegedly "infringing" sites/servers!

(DNSBL's (DNS Block Lists) aren't going to be a solution that compares to them (just easier & less costly to implement, holding out a good chunk of the possible users BUT, not anyone that knows what they're doing)).

The ONLY truly valid & useful DNSBL's I have seen are implemented by Norton DNS, OpenDNS, & ScrubIT DNS vs. malware serving sites, maliciously scripted sites, &/or phishing/spamming...

(Those are things folks are interested in seeing, not limiting their abilities to "pirate" films &/or music online (I don't recommend that, but that's how it is)).

APK

P.S.=> I didn't read the article, but, it sounds like they're giving up on DNSBL filtering here, and here today in the news as well:

http://yro.slashdot.org/story/12/01/13/2222203/dns-provision-pulled-from-sopa

Yes, they ought to, as it's NOT terribly effective blocking simply because, again:

It's easily gotten around in custom HOSTS files usage alone, & moreso via things like TOR!

... apk

ideas money

[Anonymous Coward]

Are we forgetting the power of the entertainments industry to influence culture aka people. In The Republic, Plato speaks about the power of music. I doubt this is wholly about money. As much fun as it is to have.

BoingBoing is in the fight, will go dark

[symbolset]

As reported by Cory Doctorow, on BoingBoing.

This From the President Who signed ACTA?

[Anonymous Coward]

While I applaud the administration for this statement in opposition to SOPA/PIPA, I am reminded that it was this administration which negotiated ACTA in secrecy, pressured Spain to adopt SOPA-like laws, signed the ACTA treaty, and who has appointed former lawyers for RIAA/MPAA to positions in the Justice Department dealing with copyrights enforcement.

For example...

[Anonymous Coward]

Live gigs is an example of ways that artists can get paid...

Posting AC for obvious reasons. I torrent music personally, and occasionally an older movie (>5y or so). Firstly, except for the super-huge like U2, Coldplay or Lady Gaga, most artists get almost zero from the recording label anyway, so don't feel bad about stealing from your favourite artist, it's ok, Sony or EMI or Universal has already done that. Secondly, if you assume that that problem is solved, I'm of the opinion that copyright should only be for a short time anyway. Sure, you should be paid for your work, but you shouldn't be paid for the rest of eternity for work which you did once. That just doesn't make sense at all.

Re:For example...

[mark-t]

How do you propose to do a live gig for a movie? Replace it all with live theatre?

What about books? What about software?

Re:For example...

[Anonymous Coward]

What about them?

    For movies, relegate playback to theatres only. It is not uncommon for a market niche to run dry, especially an abused one. So the established home theatre market has dried up -shrug- who gives a fuck? Others are willing to move in at a lower ROI than Hollywood. If they retreat to their controlled environments, customer's rights rare etained, creator's rights are retained, and no new criminalization is needed. And, for the record, live theatre is a fine replacement for movies - different, to be sure, but giving local troupes more access to a bigger market share would be awesome, vibrant, productive. Many small independents - does that ring any economic bells for you?

re:Books. Software.
    What about micro-patronage? What about pre-patronized writing & coding? What about customer-determined value? Why shouldn't writers/coders run some of the risk of the new market dynamic? Why should everyone outside of that trade be forced to endure their special treatment, their re-definition as a special class of citizen? I mean, hey, I know they feel you should be making more than others, but maybe their specialty just isn't that special to the rest of us. Maybe one of them could write some software that auto-writes a book/story, based on a few inputs from a user? At least that would take care of the "book" problem.

It's about our culture, not just money

[gottabeme]

People deserve to get paid for their work.

"Deserve" is such a strong word. How about this: Employees deserve to be paid by their employers the amount they agreed upon. "Content producers" do not "deserve" anything from anyone. They are no more entitled to payment than "pirates" are entitled to "creative works."

(Yes, I use a lot of quotation marks there, because these words have been appropriated from the language and redefined by the cartels in order to villify people who rebel against their evil, monopolistic, greedy practices.)

This is the problem: people think it's all about money. It's much bigger than that. It's about our culture and our society. We all have a stake in IP rights. "They" claim "their" "property" is being "stolen". Well I claim that they are holding our culture for ransom. That is a much deeper problem, and it should be more important to all of us than a few percentage points of billion-dollar profits.

You don't understand the GPL.

[gottabeme]

False. The GPL does not "expect" users to contribute anything. The GPL requires that parties who modify and redistribute the code make their modifications available.

Classic Misdirection

[Anonymous Coward]

"Don't limit your opinion to what's the wrong thing to do, ask yourself what's right."

No. It's wrong, and that's where this discussion ends. The White House should veto the bill if it comes across the desk. It's Congress' job to come up with "the right thing", not the White House. It's the White House's job to approve or disapprove what Congress comes up with. By using this "here's some more busy work" method, the White House is showing that they'll approve anything the RIAA/MPAA drafts. Proof that the White House doesn't have any real power. POTUS is a slave to his media masters.

Right?

[Anonymous Coward]

Right would be to the goverment et al to stop messing with the price system: Producers get paid what the consumers are willing to pay them. Also producers get paid when they're actually working to make the goods, an artist after he releases the piece of art is no longer working except when performing a piece of art that is performable.

People don't have to pay artists just because they don't want to work, just like you don't pay an architect everytime you see or use a building he designed. Still multimedia artists want you to pay everytime you give them the honour of appreciating the piece of art they've created.

There have always been art, copyright is an addition by lazy and/or bad artists.

Seriously, Slashdot:

[Penguinisto]

...is there any frickin' way to occasionally allow someone to mod comments up to 6, or in this case 10? Because parent comment damned sure deserves to be.

What should be done?

[Anonymous Coward]

Embrace abundance.

Implicit in the wording of the question is the notion that free data exchange should be stopped. But why?

Simple....people want to treat ideas as property. We want our ideas to hold their value and as such keep us wealthy.

But an idea is not a brick of gold. It just isn't. Laws that pretend like it is are all doomed to failure. People may be manipulable sheep, but they are smart enough to see that pretending like ideas are bricks is ultimately harmful to them, so they resist.

Despite what the visionless naysayers claim, there are ways to make money off of freely-available content. You can't make as much money as you would in a world of perfectly locked-down content...but that world is a fantasy. It cannot be realized due to human rebellion.

Embrace abundance, build business models on top of abundance, pass laws that respect abundance. That is the right thing to do.

Specific examples: Jonathan Coulton, Hulu, MMOs, Google.

That is the right thing to do.

What could be done?

[AlanBDee]

I agree that piracy is wrong and that the artists should be paid for their work. The best solution I can think of would be to redirect suspected sites through a monitored proxy for closer evaluation. So, if I go to the pirate bay instead of getting redirected to a site saying it has been shut down I get redirected through a proxy server that carefully tracks all my traffic then to the pirate bay. Then, I am still free to pirate if I choose to knowing that my traffic is being monitored. This addresses the concern of censoring the Internet, you can access it all. Of coarse, this can still be circumvented by going to the direct IP address of the pirate bay. It also doesn't address file sharing cloud services or direct peer-to-peer sharing.

So therein lays the problem, everything I can think of can be circumvented, period. It think it's safe to assume that the RIAA, MPAA, etc are also stumped. As soon as they do one thing, someone else will circumvent it. it's a cat and mouse game.

I always have and still maintain that NetFlix did more to stop piracy then anything else, ever. And for one simple reason, they made the material accessible for a reasonable price.

The producers get paid and people are happy. That's your win-win solution!

It's not the government's problem.

[Anonymous Coward]

And the government should not introduce legislation, one way or the other, to fix it.

It is a problem for the industry, be it movies, music, books or otherwise.

An example..
Since the introduction of writeable CDs, it has become possible for people at home to create mirror images of goods bought at the store, in a way that wasn't possible with tapes. When you compare the $0.20 you pay for a CD with the $20 you pay for a cd in the store, you can't help but wonder where does the all that extra money go? In the internet age with information so readily available, people can find out - that a large slice of it does not go to the artists. This leads to users concluding that CD copying does not rob the actual artists as much as it does all of the middle men - and those middle men are not what the user cares about.

The solution here isn't to introduce legislation to restrict copying but for the industries to restructure themselves in a manner that allows them to deliver content to people over the Internet that reflects the absence of middle men and fancy packaging. Apple's iTunes is a good example of this, however much the industry groups such as the RIAA hate it. iTunes works because it places the same value on all content of a similar type, which is the correct thing to do as the cost to Apple for delivering a 5 minute song from the 1940s is the same as delivering a 5 minute song from 2011. Unfortunately the government can't force companies to do this.

Maybe the correct thing for the Government to do is award a bunch of research dollars to various universities to come up with better models for how selling and distributing digital entertainment in the 21st century. Encourage a bunch of professors, along with students (who are often those that benefit most from piracy) to come up with competing and viable methods and models that will work for at least the next 50 to 75 years. And tell them to start with a blank slate. At the same time, tell the MPAA and RIAA that they need to work with said universities because no legislation will be introduced to stop piracy, so they either adapt or die.

It doesn't matter that much

[Anonymous Coward]

So what if they pass draconian anti-pirate laws?

I don't pirate - no need!

Music: What little music I hear, I can afford to pay. No problem there. anyway, going to concerts is more interesting than playing a CD . . .

Movies: Again, I can afford the few worth watching. No need for piracy. And the good ones appear on TV after a few years anyway. no real need to see them when released.

Software: Open source gives me everything, no need to pirate anything here! OS, anything I need for office work & development - even quite a few games! Yes, let them crack down real hard on software pirates. Till the point where people who find commercial software expensive go for open source instead of pirating stuff.

Catch the uploaders, not the downloaders.

[master_p]

The damage is done by those who upload movies, games and music to public sites. The damage is done by those who post links to copyrighted material.

As the acts are written, they are trying to scare people from even posting a link to a youtube clip. That will never work. If you want to combat piracy, go after the uploaders, i.e. the people who actually upload the stuff, not those who download the stuff.

Reminiscent

[Anonymous Coward]

This is almost exactly like Saddam Hussein in South Park saying:

"Ahh don't worry about that, take a load of, look over here"

So they get everyone who is against SOPA to argume amongst each other about what would be better... distracting the large and argumentative opposition long enough to pass it.

Are you currently answering what should be done instead of SOPA? Then you are being distracted from SOPA. Focus and move one step at a time, refuse to be drawn into a debate until SOPA is stopped.

Payment never is or was about costs.

[master_p]

Payment does not reflect costs.

Payment is defined by supply and demand.

For example, a Picasso painting may cost a few million dollars, not because of the effort of the painter, but because of the perceived value of it: it is considered a symbol of status, and therefore demand for it is very high, and therefore its price is very high.

The law of supply and demand is the basis of capitalism.

Capitalism helped mankind make huge progress in the last century.

As for not being creative due to copyright, why is that bad? as long as there is demand, why someone has to create anything else? having demand for your 70+ year old creation means that you created something that everybody wants, so it is fair for you to be able to be compensated for it for as long as there is demand for it.

Re:Payment never is or was about costs.

[Raenex]

The law of supply and demand is the basis of capitalism.

That's true, but it is only as a society that we determine to what extent this supply can be artificially limited. People have been learning and copying ideas from each other for as long as the history of humanity, and in general we have benefited from it greatly as a whole.

it is fair for you to be able to be compensated for it for as long as there is demand for it.

That "fairness" comes at the expense of everybody else's freedom. Maybe I don't think it's fair that every copy needs to be paid for once a work has been created, that society should be held back by imposing these limitations and people turned into criminals because they copied some bits.

Re:Payment never is or was about costs.

[Froze]

This is a classic argument made in favor of capitalism. However, it also ignores the skeleton in the closet, and that is that external cost are not accounted for and those costs include things like policing your property, prosecuting violators, maintaining records of ownership, etc. If you as a creator are willing to bear all those costs then you are entitled to indefinite profit from your work, but if you offload the cost burden onto the populace then at some point the value added to the economy by your creation is outweighed by the cost of protecting it and it rightfully should fall into public domain.

Re:Payment never is or was about costs.

[marnues]

Copyright is not capitalism. Government granted monopolies are about the highest definition of anti-capitalism. If supply and demand were actually encouraged then publishing and distribution would hit the cost of $0.00 as competition would push the natural cost to nil. However, due to copyright laws and government backed monopolies, there is no competition. Only one entity gets to determine these prices on the white market.

Picasso paintings are worth millions because everyone wants the original. It has nothing to do with copyright, which speaking of Picasso, I can obtain a legal copy here for significantly less than millions. And such a product is a great service as physical paintings cannot take advantage of digital distribution. I am not nearly so interested in The Beatles (White Album) master tapes, even though it is consistently one of my favorite listens. Yes, it'd be cool to have, but I can't "use" them like I can "use" a Picasso original on my wall.

Your statement about fairness is disagreeable to me. I do not find it fair for someone to sit on their ass because their grandparent was able to create 1 item of considerable value. I don't even find it fair for the grandparent to do the same. I especially do not find it fair for that same grandparent to control who is able to modify, perform, or distribute that work.
Fairness is in the eye of the beholder and not worth arguing.
What I do find worth arguing is that copyright has hurt artistic creation more than aided it. Copyright steals the ability of artists to build from each other, and has developed a nonsensical desire for "original" work, as though art can be designed without copying the techniques of those that came before. There exists a legal point at which one work of work is too similar to another. Why don't the markets decide that someone is building too strongly on someone else's work? Currently it isn't allowed. Assume that Vanilla Ice really did take the bass line for "Ice Ice Baby" straight from Queen's work. Does that truly hurt Queen's ability to create? Which is the greater promotion of art, fining Vanilla Ice? Or letting people judge the quality of both works on their own time and to their own tastes?

If games are good for 5 years, why the fuss?

[master_p]

It seems to me that wanting game copyright to expire after 5 years is just an excuse for making pirating of older games legal.

In reality, 5 years is a very short time for games, given the emulator, abandonware and retro game activity online.

From the success of the MAME emulator alone, it is obvious that 5 years of copyright for games is not enough.

Re:If games are good for 5 years, why the fuss?

[Tom]

In reality, 5 years is a very short time for games, given the emulator, abandonware and retro game activity online.

The relevant time period for a game is not how long it is in use - just like it isn't for books. The relevant period is how long it takes an author to make enough money off his work so that he can then go and create more good stuff for the benefit of society.

The commercial period of a good game is a few years at best, 5 is very optimistic. Whatever money you haven't made after 5 years you almost certainly won't make in year 6, 7, etc.

Copyright law is a compromise between getting the author his fair share and getting the work into the public domain. That means that with any sane copyright law, the author will not get the maximum-possible, best-deal-imaginable, but a compromise that allows him to make a good part of the money, but not the best-case-maximum-imaginable.

For books, a longer time is fine because it does happen regularily that a book is really "discovered" after a while, or that it sells slowly, but constantly over a long period of time.

Computer games and movies have a different curve, they usually sell most of their copies within the first few months. Allow for late-starters and give it a couple years, that should be a good compromise.

Music falls somewhere inbetween. While there's the charts phenomenon that works much like movies (top today, forgotten tomorrow), many smaller bands sell albums for years, and are constantly discovered by new fans when they play at festivals, etc.

So my suggestion would be 20 years for books, painting and other artwork, 10 years for music and 5 years for movies and computer games. But that's just a rough outline, a discussion-starter. I don't claim that's the final word.

The point is: Adapt the laws to the changing reality - and that includes much more than illegal online copying. It also includes the changes in the way that copyrighted material is consumed.

You are insanely wrong; Ideas ARE property.

[master_p]

The value of a product, real or abstract, is not defined by the cost of its material, it is defined by the demand for it. The higher the demand, the higher the price.

I wonder why so many slashdotters have this wrong idea about the value of a product. It is even more amazing that most of you are Americans, you consider America the best country ever, yet you fail to acknowledge the fact that America was build on capitalistic principles, which is basically the law of supply and demand and economic freedom.

By saying that IP is not property, you effectively go against the very principles that made you the greatest, because if IP is not treated like property, then neither the law of supply and demand works and there is no freedom to choose the way to make your property available to the market.

Re:You are insanely wrong; Ideas ARE property.

[trout007]

Sorry but it is you that is wrong. Value is completely subjective. Everyone has their own individual value scale.

Price is where the market can clear the supply based on demand. An idea once created can be copied infinitely with little cost. So supply is infinite. Since supply is infinite the price will be zero regardless of demand.

I think the free market is an ideal to strive for. That is why I don't want the complexities and burden of the government getting in the way running a temporary IP monopoly scheme. The market rewards the first person to come up with an idea. Apple is an excellent example. They are typically first and even when someone else copies their products they are not as profitable. Imagine how many better products we would have if all of the tech companies fired the lawyers and hired more engineers and technicians?

Why is this a criminal matter at all?

[Anonymous Coward]

Make copyright infringement a civil, not a criminal matter. Stop spending so much government money protecting the interests of companies.

subject

[Legion303]

Perhaps the "right" thing to do is stop bending over for media companies, who are still free to compete like everyone else. Perhaps the "right" thing to do is for politicians to stop taking bribes from corporations in exchange for legislative favors. Ha ha! Just fucking with you.

Is this about copyright, or censorship?

[Anonymous Coward]

Everybody seems to assume this is about copyright, but I'm not so sure.

Where do we go from here?

[royj]

If you want to solve a problem, you need to find the root cause and resolve that. For that the question to ask is not "Where do we go from here?" but "Why are we here?"

Whats Right

[Anonymous Coward]

Check the economic damage of online piracy.
The double check it independently.

The REAL problem

[Anonymous Coward]

They are focusing their efforts on piracy, instead of sales. So, what do they get? Piracy. The more energy they poor in piracy, the more piracy they will get. Some examples of this include DRM (in most cases this turns out to be an annoyance), keys to enter (which is annoying), online legal copy checks (which requires you to be online), cd copy protection (which can render the CD/DVD unusable in some cases).

As if that wasn't enough most games simply are complete and utter crap not worth their money, so most people pirate first before actually deciding to buy.

So, instead of thinking "piracy" they need to think "sales". So, what can increase sales? There are multiple answers:
1) Make sure everybody knows the game is available (advertising campaigns) -> is already being done, but only with big titles.
2) Make sure the games are easy to find and available -> being worked on.
3) Make sure the game is actually worth its money -> invest in quality, not graphics/sound. A lot of really good games suck a lot at graphics and sound, but are real fun to play. Some fun games to play are actually really unstable or filled with bugs.
4) Lower those prices to the point where most people don't think about the price. Make those games dirt cheap (about €5) and rake in the profits.
5) Some games are free to play, but make you pay once you want online play.
6) Yet other games are free to play (to the end), but you need to pay for the extras. Those extras are present in abundance, but dirt cheap.

Now, people won't buy a game which is dirt cheap but contains all kinds of copy protections which wreck havoc on their machines. So, those cheap games either need a subtle copy protection (one which the users don't notice) or no copy protection at all.

Here's what government could do:
1) Subsidize game projects which contain no (or not obstructing) copy protection which are at the €5 mark in price, or lower. Of course government can make up some requirements to make sure the studio actually does its job and makes a quality game with little or no copy protection.
1.1) Encourage developers to continue to maintain the game.
1.2) Encourage developers to do everything in their power to grow a community around the game, including mod support.
1.3) Penalize developers which abandon a game too soon (of course conditions apply).
2) Keep copyright infringement a civil offense. There is no point in sending somebody to jail because he wanted some entertainment and didn't have any money to get it in the first place. On top of that some pirates do this for political reasons.
3) Payment methods: some manufacturers figure that everyone has a credit card or a paypal account... well, guess what: not everybody has your credit card or paypal. Something on which all banks can agree would be nice (something like iDeal in the Netherlands, for example). So, getting the banks, credit unions and credit card companies to agree to a secure, fast and simple to use payment method should be a good idea.

All those measures would probably help a lot. Take away reasons to copy and sales will increase.

Re:A Car Analogy... seriously

[Anonymous Coward]

Not a headache, but rather Cancer. We are being fed painkillers to cure a cancer. The cancer? Overpricing, invasive copy protection, abusive (greedy) companies, an avalanche of low quality (fantastic graphics/sound... and weak game-play) games.

It's not an abundant good, that's the problem

[LrdDimwit]

One of the reasons, I think, that copyright is so screwed up is that the thing that it is actually attempting to regulate, and the thing the regulations directly affect, are not the same.

Copyright isn't actually about the thing being copyrighted. After a work has been created, is an abundant good - but the problem is, this ignores the part of the process that is not abundant. By the same logic, cars are an abundant good - the raw materials to duplicate them are (considering the volume of the earth) nigh-inexhaustible, if you ignore the energy sunk retrieving and refining said raw materials.

Similarly, people's time is not an abundant good. And the purpose of copyright is to regulate this non-abundant good: It's to create an incentive for people to spend their time in creative endeavors.

Things get weird, because to do this, the law cracked down on the duplication of legally-protected information. This worked just fine for hundreds of years, because you needed large and expensive machinery to duplicate in any significant way. It's not working nearly as well anymore. But attempting to protect information was never the goal, it was always a means to an end.

Agreed.. .but

[LostMyBeaver]

I like your response on this one. I personally do purchase substantially more than I pirate. In fact, every time I pirate something, I send a mail (with my contact information) to the rights holder explaining why I pirated it and how they could have avoided having me pirate it. For the most part, the majority of my current piracy activity is due to either :
1) Price gouging. I'll pay for the first 10 episodes of a TV season and pirate the remaining 12. This being because I shouldn't have to pay $50 for a TV season from the online providers when it's average price is $20 at the stores.
2) Releasing it online and then restricting me from purchasing it because I'm not in the right location. This is 2012, eBooks, AudioBooks, music and movies do not need to be printed or distributed in other countries through third party printers or CD/DVD duplicators and more. If I go to Amazon, Audible, iTunes etc... and am told I need to wait to download the U.S. version (meaning color instead of colour) versions of ebooks or audiobooks or whatever, I'll pirate the book as it's the only way to get it. Then, when they decided to release that same book at the same price they charge to Americans (or direct dollar to euro conversion is barely acceptable) then I'll consider buying from them.
3) Location based price gouging. I refuse to pay extra to download something in Norway than to download it from the U.S. or the U.K.. This type of gouging is wrong. Again, I'll spend the same price as I would have in the states.. like buy 4 tracks of the album and pirate the rest, just so the publisher gets from me what they would have gotten if they let me pay U.S. prices, but I won't be taken advantage of just because I live in a country that generally allows itself to be exploited.

There are other reasons as well. But those are the key ones. And... as I am an American, I feel like so long as the publisher doesn't need to pay shipping and tariffs, I should pay what Americans pay in the U.S.

I am in agreement with the White House response to this. SOPA as it is written is entirely wrong. The spirit of what SOPA is trying to accomplish... basically attempting to protect rights holders from piracy is probably a good thing. I think however that the laws unfortunately are being written by law makers and not by people who actually understand it. The people presenting the laws are the ones who feel like they're under attack and their response is inappropriate and instead of someone detached from IP law attempting to devise a solution that would best represent everyone's needs, their are two entirely different sides involved.

There are some real issue with SOPA beyond the whole "Great Firewall" problem which is what gets my panties in a bunch.

1) SOPA, PIPA, etc... do nothing to present any solution related to the problem. They have no practical application beyond making a statement. People currently use torrents because they're easy and established. But just like napster, kazaa and everything else, there's always and the technological solutions proposed to the bill are meaningless and are just wasting government funds if they truly believe that the bill is to in fact protect IP. The bills as they stand today do however give what I feel to be unjustified power to the government that can be used to manipulate the internet in a terribly negative way. For example, under the provisions involved, the white house would be allowed to hijack websites lawfully until such time as their objection to the site can be properly disputed. So, for example, if a website were to be overly critical to the standing first term president (doesn't have to be the one we have now, can be the next one or the one after), the whitehouse could in theory start using interesting interpretations of copyright infringement to take down websites that they feel could be seen a hurtful to the presidential campaign. Of course this would likely be political suicide to try, but on a wide enough scale, it could seriously hu