And according to the supreme court, theft requires "misappropriation of physical property". But if the TV says it is theft, then the Supreme Court must be wrong... so long as I can trust Big Media doesn't have any conflict of interest with television.
I would completely agree, this is not the poster boy you are looking for. Maybe someone a little more like... Eric Eldred? Oh wait... nevermind.
Too bad we couldn't just use "culture" as an example of what we get from the free exchange of ideas. What irony.:(
I find it hilarious that what makes this the worst possible example of a reasonable defense of a free culture is the fact that it was such a terrible movie... but then we say "serves you right, kid. You should have been pirating The Fountainhead".
Lets say he works hard and gives ALL his money to the gods that give us books and movies. Would you have more sympathy if he pirated the textbooks and paid for the movie than for buying his textbooks and pirating the movie? Or is it pick one, and college students can just watch movies after they graduate and get a good job? I can tell you if I spent my money on Angels & Demons instead of a textbook I needed, I'd be REALLY upset.
Since I can assume you are not a television executive or big time politicians (since they probably have JOBS or ski lodges instead of playing on slashdot), would it be fair to guess you are just a tool, or do you really believe that all derivatives of an authors ideas should have the full protection of force by the government for their entire life + 70 years for all circumstances has significantly met its burden of producing better artistic expressions than, say, you would have personally benefited from the "limited" number of works that might have been available, say, we still followed the Statute of Anne, and for the hell of it, even Donaldson v. Beckett?
I am going to guess NOT, and that you are just a tool. But if you really have a rational argument for your position, please excuse the language: you will have my undivided attention.
But whatever James Madison had sought to protect through limited copyright... this wasn't it. ACLU picked Rosa Parks cause she was pretty and would make a great poster child for the cause. Doesn't make the cause any less just, just acknowledging that there were some politics involved. If I were going to make an argument for the intellectual pursuits of mankind, I don't think this kid and his Angels & Demons download would be my poster child. I think I would pick someone a little more like... Eric Eldred, just to throw a name out there.
And what happened to Eric Eldred AND Rosa Parks when they had their day in court? They got SHAFTED! They LOST! But Rosa Parks and the ACLU had their boycott, and Eric Eldred with Lawrence Lessig have Creative Commons.
But honestly, I see your point. That really isn't the same. Creative Commons is more like if, taking another free market approach, the ACLU started their own bus system, and anyone that believed in all the colors of the rainbow could ride, hopefully beating out those mean ol' segregated buses.
So no, Rosa Parks isn't like any of those people. Guess I'd have to say she was a little more like Peter Sunde (if she had a transporter from Star Trek).
It is a "gross affront to human dignity" to be told where to sit on the bus? ACLU paid her to make a scene so that they could use her pretty face in court, just like when they paid Homor Plessy. In BOTH those cases they LOST. What was bullshit about segregation was that it was stupid and annoying. We have the same thing today with handicap seats on the bus, but nobody makes a big stink about it. And just like Rosa Parks, you can sit in the front of the bus until some crippled old white woman wants it.
and as a loud mouth free market evangelical, it was the free market and nothing else that fixed that resolved that issue. It was a big enough annoyance for people to band together and boycott the bus system. Bus system could not operate without their fair, so they had to get rid of the BS rules. It was so detrimental it was obvious to other cities that they should change their policies before they have the same problem.
Same thing with Woman's Suffrage, but nobody ever had to break the law: States with very small female populations ( I went into it in another post (and subsequently put on my website) that copyright is extremely unnatural today and requires the threat of force to keep any type of compliance. There is no rule of law or social contract being enforced, these are bullies with enough money and lawyers to threaten anyone they like. But politicians can't get elected if they can't get on TV owned by big media. The Internet is changing that, but only so quickly. But every member of congress that doesn't see the atrocity that has become our copyright law in a practical way has violated their oath of office to uphold the constitution. Cleverly and intentionally misinterpreting it while someone feeds money and political ambition into your back pocket doesn't make it excusable.
Social Contract Theory, nearly as old as philosophy itself, is the view that persons' moral and/or political obligations are dependent upon a contract or agreement between them to form society. REF
Hobbes argues that we will do ANYTHING to avoid the State of Nature and will always, rationally, pick absolute authority.
I can not be told better, from the same article:
According to Locke, the State of Nature, the natural condition of mankind, is a state of perfect and complete liberty to conduct one's life as one best sees fit, free from the interference of others. This does not mean, however, that it is a state of license: one is not free to do anything at all one pleases, or even anything that one judges to be in oneâ(TM)s interest. The State of Nature, although a state wherein there is no civil authority or government to punish people for transgressions against laws, is not a state without morality. The State of Nature is pre-political, but it is not pre-moral. Persons are assumed to be equal to one another in such a state, and therefore equally capable of discovering and being bound by the Law of Nature. The Law of Nature, which is on Lockeâ(TM)s view the basis of all morality, and given to us by God, commands that we not harm others with regards to their "life, health, liberty, or possessions" (par. 6). Because we all belong equally to God, and because we cannot take away that which is rightfully His, we are prohibited from harming one another. So, the State of Nature is a state of liberty where persons are free to pursue their own interests and plans, free from interference, and, because of the Law of Nature and the restrictions that it imposes upon persons, it is relatively peaceful.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau:
Humans are essentially free, and were free in the State of Nature, but the âprogress' of civilization has substituted subservience to others for that freedom, through dependence, economic and social inequalities, and the extent to which we judge ourselves through comparisons with others. Since a return to the State of Nature is neither feasible nor desirable, the purpose of politics is to restore freedom to us, thereby reconciling who we truly and essentially are with how we live together. So, this is the fundamental philosophical problem that The Social Contract seeks to address: how can we be free and live together? Or, put another way, how can we live together without succumbing to the force and coercion of others? We can do so, Rousseau maintains, by submitting our individual, particular wills to the collective or general will, created through agreement with other free and equal persons. Like Hobbes and Locke before him, and in contrast to the ancient philosophers, all men are made by nature to be equals, therefore no one has a natural right to govern others, and therefore the only justified authority is the authority that is generated out of agreements or covenants.
Thomas Jefferson in a letter to James Madison on Shay's Rebellion (a violent opposition by ~1200 farmers regarding free trade agreements with Spain on the Mississippi River. Farmers feared the agreement would affirm sovereignty of Spanish traders):
I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical. Unsuccessful rebellions, indeed, generally establish the encroachments on the rights of the people which have produced them. An observation of this truth should render honest republican governors so mild in their punishment of rebellions as not to discourage them too much. It is a medicine necessary for the sound health of government. REF
In another letter criticizing the (not yet ratified) constitution:
The new boss is the same as the old boss. Its always been this way, it always will be that way.
While I completely agree, I find it too cynical to be completely passive about what is going on. There are people making decisions that make a difference. I get stuck between believing in "old times", and the spirit of the enlightenment and Renaissance, but those times had their really sucky parts too. Communication has advanced so rapidly we can see the suffering of every person on the planet streaming live with a click, and maybe everything is great and we just have to bitch cause there is nothing better to do. Maybe The Founders really understood something that died with them, but they also had smallpox.
Maybe we just still need some time to catch up to the reality of our technology. Communication and transportation are VERY fast there days. Wars took so long in the past cause it took months to get one stupid letter across the ocean. That probably gave people a lot more time to sit around, drink beer and get laid. Now people from every continent in the world can collaborate in real time to argue about from My Little Pony hair colors to kernel scheduling implementations. My only luck is that I am drinking right now while I type this. Sadly, I have to give a lot of credit to Anarchists; I may not get a lot of their strange zenes, but a significant number of them have really lived up to what they say, tell everyone else to go F themselves and build a commune up in the mountains where they maintain private property and free association rights. Its like Omish, but hip and trendy nerds (I just wish they would bathe more often).
but if were as screwed as you say we are in such respect, then what it sounds like what we really need it for congressmen to be picked like jury members, and lock them all in a house together like "The Real World". From there, the only information they can get from anything is wikipedia. Sadly, I really think it would work a whole lot better. Couldn't be worse.
I'm afraid I'll have to let your other points fall by the wayside. I've had enough arguing with libertarians these past weeks, and now need to balance things out by arguing with some leftists somewhere.
Long time reader, pretty much from the beginning, but only been reading the comments and getting involved, or whatever you want to call it for about the last 5. I am new to Rand philosophy, but enjoying it. I look at Howard Roark and really don't see where there could be any controversy; isn't this exactly the American Hero type we have always loved in so many other contexts? Fountainhead was just more technical and dry (just what I love). I can think back to those days long ago that got me always far more interested in what people were commenting than the actual articles, though sometimes I still read them; I can easily see how a Rand reference on ANY topic would make you a karma whore.
Think more geeks out of work is turning them into whores for the welfare state? Yeah, times are tough. I got it hard at home too because of a lot of this. I am just grateful that in this current mess of things, at least the price of gas isn't what it was a year ago. I want to start a business, but it isn't more lack of available credit or any 'issue' the administration is dealing with I want to see fixed, I am just scared to death of how they are going to fuck with it in a way that is going to make my job unnecessarily harder, mostly for the sake of wondering what the hell they are going to make a crisis out of next. I can't see myself ever falling into the trap of trying to get big government to fix my problems; have you ever read the book or seen the movie Needful Things? Sorry, can you know what happened in that town and then have things get so bad you would go back and give him "another chance"? WTF???
I am HAPPY for Obama, and I am delighted he stands up for what he believes in. We need more Americans like him in that respect. BUT, following blindly is to completely ignore what he represents! The highest respect you can ever give a great leader is a thoughtful debate. A great leader doesn't want to be lead some sheep, he wants to lead soldiers. If you love Obama, give him the respect he deserves and allow him to be the leader of a people that still believe in the American Dream of working as hard as you please to determine the outcome of your own circumstances.
Thank you very much for the detailed response. As I am sure you noticed, I love to rant, but it comes from the heart, so taking the time to cover each detail is appreciated.
What if instead of buying foreign oil we started letting Americans across the country tap into the huge reserves of oil we have right here? I think the only argument I have heard is that "we need to protect our reserves", but when it comes to many of the problems of oil, a lot of the arguments are over the fact that it is foreign (we are not at war over the environment).
This may sound harsh, but rather than this expensive, preemptive attack on oil and energy and trying to force alternative energy upon a very stubborned market, instead we can stop subsidizing, and stop regulating, let it run free and when the oil runs out or gets outrageously expensive, I truly believe some brilliant, greedy team of scientists from Berkley, Stanford, MIT, Harvard, or wherever are going to respond to that situation and use their brains to come up with a competitive solution determined by the real, natural economy. The problem with the present situation of bail outs and subsidies is that it is artificial, and even if you could get into the circle to earn a grant or whatever, you are expected to give it over to the government. Even if someone could come up with a solution now to solve the energy crisis and develop alternative energy in 20 years time, who is to say that the up to 5 different administrations won't change those laws making all of your work worthless.
I really believe that the more changes and fixes created by the government made right now in an attempt to make things right is intimidating people with real skills, real money, and real ideas to keep them all to themselves and wait for this whole situation blows over to a point where there is something stable enough for people to count on.
I thought that Keynes was all about macro stuff
I actually just started reading Human Action today, and really enjoying it. In the scholar edition (that is the edition linked), the introduction covers a lot of the personal relationship and rivalry. I always had that impression, and had been told, that Microeconomics was about small local economies, while macroeconomics looks at the economy from the big picture / national level. But the impression I was getting from the intro of that book was that to a certain extent the interpretation of what "micro" and "macro" meant was intentional by proponents of Keynes. I think a more appropriate (though maybe just as bias) meaning of "micro" (which Mesis agreed with) was that he advocated for a bottom-up approach, and that Keynes "Macro" philosophy was a top-down approach. I could only hope to ever explain the fundamental differences between bottom-up and top-down as well as this guy. It is a great read, and MUCH shorter than the link above that covers a mans life work; Feynman on the Challenger disaster. Looking at the big picture is useful, but trying to control it directly will not cause the changes intended because too many things can be tied to that element that were not realized. Looking at a problem from the bottom-up, not to advocate for micro-management so much as delicate management, you get a much better perspective on all variables, and any policies taken from such an approach will be more precise, and better learned from to build upon appropriately. Anyway, I'll not just keep going on with that, but see how that definition of "microeconomics" is really different than to mean small and only appropriate when involving a few number of people?
Oh, and as long as were on the topic, I am actually a big fan of The Fair Tax. I think it is much more than "a national sales tax" and is worth looking at in fine detail. I think our tax code has
I think that was the whole debate in The Fountainhead; what are you really doing? Sorry, just read it recently and enjoyed it. If this is a career and not just a "job", I think it is fair to be selfish and stand up for what you believe in rather than trying to mold yourself as closely as possible to what others will be ok with without criticism. Careers take up a lot of your life, and if the purpose is just do what I can to make money and THEN go live my life, work gets really depressing quick, imo. Everything you do every day IS your life. Further I'd argue that people that just want to go to work and take home money aren't typically the kind of people making documentaries. And if I may channel Rand once again, each small sacrifice of what you believe in is a small sacrifice of yourself and is equivocal to corruption (knowing the rational thing to do and not doing it due to self-doubt). I think it is important to consider your philosophy of life when choosing a career path, otherwise, how much respect can you really have for yourself? Anyway, done with that little rant...
Not to say that it necessarily applies directly to this situation, but one of the things I have enjoyed about OpenSource / Linux is that projects often changes hands and software doesn't suddenly disappear when people leave. A number of major projects have been simply dropped without any intention of lead people coming back, it just sits there for awhile, and some random team of people come by and pick it up again. Often this situation could not occur in the proprietary world due to copyright issues. Distribution of abandonware is still considered piracy. Linux has no sense of abandonware, just projects either deprecated or not currently in development.
And while I would agree that once you have spent money and time on anything, there is a certain "vendor lock-in" because to switch would be a waste of resources (unless of course their purpose was research/testing, but that's different). I'll agree that there is a large time expense getting into Linux, but interoperability has always been a shining star of Linux. Most applications (like anything worth using) has an open standard / specification for files as well as the ability to export to any similar proprietary application. For example, if some disaster happens and the team changes, moving a project developed in Linux and moving it to some application only supported by Mac or Windows is going to be easy. I remember quite some time ago it was necessary to use Linux to get Windows and Mac to work together at all in any useful way (IPX / Appletalk translator or something. LONG ago). If I might be so bold, I think if there is a level of uncertainty between Mac and Windows, the differences are great enough to consider Linux because if you don't know, then there isn't some knowledge you already have that is being wasted. Further, imo, Linux tends to guarantee better interoperability because they are designed that way from the beginning. If the core of the project is Standardized to Linux, then teams could pick whatever they want, and then import the pieces to Linux. Of course that is going to add another choice between simple and flexible, but I really don't think without already being tied to any particular platform or application, it would be a smart approach to start from. If it so happens there needs to be a change, cost of change is going to be as low as possible by design.:)
What do you think? Think that would keep things smart and efficiently idealistic?
They call it a Sequencer rather than a NLE. It has been their main focus of development for the past, and they had a recent release. They are working hard to get it up to par with what Final Cut pro can do, but the Blender way, not to mention the other integrated Blender features, which I expect will make it awesome. I look forward to trying it out when I get a chance.
He recommended emailing the guys at Blender, not use Blender necessarily. If they had the time to respond, and if this is a serious project, and would like some assistance in helping keep the project free, the PEOPLE at Blender would be some great advocate to have on your side.
Further, the OP wasn't looking for a NLE, but for the sake of argument Blender has a great NLE. I will agree that Blender is designed with the productive professional in mind that needs GOOD software, not "easy to figure out because I am opposed to reading documentation" software. Blender is worth learning if you are serious about professional multimedia. But just as far as knowing people in FOSS for professional multimedia, that is a different argument.
Anyone that thinks this is off-topic could not be the slightest bit familiar with the Blender Project. I think this is a great idea. While Blender may pride itself in being a great 3d modeling / rendering program, it is quite the suite for everything you could ever want to do with video. But aside from the application itself, the people who primarily support the Blender project are greatly involved with archive.org and Creative Commons, and if such a license would be appropriate, I know that they provide free storage and hosting among other things.
And yes, Avidemux is included in UbuntuStudio.
Thank you for making a quality contribution to the discussion.
Sure I am going to get flamed for this, but as much as I can understand the argument, just reading The Fountainhead, and "out of context", you sound like you could be quoting any of the big businessmen from the novel. I was thinking as I was reading the book that the way they were speaking was for dramatic effect, but that people don't actually speak that way, but I guess I have been humbled today. Thanks.
Agreed. Howard Roark was an idiot. If your goal is to make a documentary then focus on that value needs to come first. Unless your documentary is about standing up for principles, then you might be in trouble.:)
Ok, joking aside, you need to know what is going to work best, and as the parent mentioned you could likely save a lot of hassle letting the people who are going to be doing the work pick the tools as they would both already be trained, and the most well informed. My brief point above was that there can be worth in considering the big picture if this documentary is going to be your life for awhile and not just a job.
my experience is that on FOSS there's too much time spent working with tools than using tools to do the work
I have had similar experience in that there are always way more options and ways of doing or learning things that you can spend all your time figuring it out and get nothing done. Discipline in outlining what do you need to know to get the job done right is really a challenge, and I think that Apple thrives to give you the best options with the least amount of worry at what seems to be the cost of unnecessary alternatives. Apple is really great at simplifying the top down approach of "What can the software do?", "Which features are going to be most useful to my project?", "How do I go about implementing them?" steps. Apple makes that a very narrow and logical path to follow, and teaches you stuff along the way. If you try to take the same approach with Linux/OSS, you will find you can spend all the time in the world reading through documentation of many pieces of software with all kind of features that can often spark the imagination, but can make you feel dizzyingly hopeless.
When I approach a major project, I will designate a limited amount of time to just surf through what is available to get things started planning wise, then totally forget forget it and start WRITING DOWN what specific tasks will need to be completed at each stage of development. Next, what is the best tool for completing that task, and evaluate how well I know the tool, and how much time may be necessary to learn a good tool I have not used before. Next, find the smallest possible example that would allow you to test a "proof of concept" and see if it is possible to take some info/footage/whatever and move it through each of the stages to a quality level of completion without having to mix steps, go backwards, or whatever. Then people can be broken into teams, you can show them what they are going to get footage/info wise, the tools they are going to get, how they are going to use them, and who to pass it onto when it is finished.
Typical business organization / delegation type stuff, I just think it really needs to be pointed out that Linux is by design aggressively in support of the bottom-up engineering principle and it is easy to see that ignoring that reality can manifest itself as a load of nightmares.
If you are buying equipment at random and not considering whether or not is is compatible, I would completely agree, but with so many Linux HCL web sites out there, "lack of support" is unlikely to be a barrier. Linux tends to have best support for the highest quality equipment, and particularly great legacy equipment no longer supported by other systems. But if one is serious about picking good equipment and are not presently tied down with any vendor lock-in, then it is all a matter of personal preference.
If you want the highest quality equipment, and time is far more precious than money, I'd say Mac. If you are looking for most economical and you have a small staff that is open minded to learning, I'd say look at the features available among Linux A/V Software and see if it will meet your needs, and check the documentation to ensure that you don't need to be a Linux guru to understand it. Next, Check the Linux HCL (Hardware Compatibility List) for the best reviews, then find what equipment is the cheapest that meets all your needs. Word of warning, always look at the pros and cons and see which ones meet your bottom line. Some well reviewed stuff may be missing an "minor" feature you need, and sometimes poorly reviewed devices are rated as such because they are missing some non-critical "major" feature, like only have one supported output. If that output type meets your needs, who cares which inferior transfer method isn't supported. I am sure other people will have good arguments for Windows and Mac, so I will leave that to them, but if you are seriously considering Linux, I would highly recommend checking out and having this same discussion at the Ubuntu Multimedia & Video forum and the Multimedia Production forum.
Ok, so I was just upset and belligerent at the time, but what I was referring to was that it ignores the fact that it takes ~20 years to bring a car to market. To impose such a change means car companies have been planning this for awhile. If other car companies had not been planning from meeting such standards, then they are not going to be able to compete. Of course that is the idea, and I hope that is what the president/congress/sierra club/ whoever means to do, even if they ignore how it might bad for consumers.
2016 seems like some time from now, but in car development years, it is very near and will mean redesigning cars that could already be close to the end of their development cycle. Having seven years to redesign a major component of the vehicles is "ambitious" at best assuming you buy that this is all a humanitarian effort. Having seven years to redesign major parts of roughly thirteen years of vehicles with so many years of development is TOTALLY DIFFERENT from insisting that each year vehicles with 19 years of development having major components go through progressively minor redesigns the year before they are supposed to be on showroom floors.
That is all I meant, that wanting something to be a certain way doesn't make it a reality. If people want better cars, car companies would take advantage of that information and build the cars people wan to buy. The only thing this legislation can do is hurt car companies that are attempting to make cars for another market.
Ok, I'll admit that the comments about all what we need to do were upsetting, particularly when in my opinion, most all counter arguments to this legislation was mod troll or flamebait. However,
Gasoline usage has substantial externalities, roads, noise, pollution, congestion and diplomatic...
Are these not things that actually effect real people? Are these not things that real people want to get involved in? Ok, you are right. This is not Keynesian economics, nor did you make reference to such, but it is grounded in the idea that the way to "fix" these things isn't to demand better products from the people that make them, but force the federal government to come in and do something about it. Why is it necessary for the federal government to come in and fix the price of gas? Initially, it was "well we can tax this and that from the minority to benefit a majority of people", but what you propose is that taxation can be a means unto itself to control people's behavior. And yes, I feel that such a proposal and the many like it are grounded in mystical and misguided interpretations of Keynesian Economics that Keynes himself would have opposed.
I'd also ASSUME that such a clearly interventionalist means to your own end policy that you rationalize with "pretty much every economist knows" could have only come an interpretation of a public high school economics class where they cover only in general Marx, Smith, and Keynes to any depth. Marx may have been a collectivist / socialist / communist, but he never proposed anything that could be interpreted as interventionalism for the pure sake of it. Smith... no. And Keynes wasn't ever particularly explicit about limits on such things. I could not believe that any other economic theorist ideas, no matter how badly interpreted, would ever be generalized as "every economist knows".
So there you go. If there is some other economic theory that you drew from to support your argument, I would be generally interested. If it just came from a general belief of "oil bad" and would like regulation to follow in the shining example of the War on Drugs, just let me know.
I was getting upset at reading the arguments being made, and in particular the very rough moderation bias against anyone that even suggested that maybe people should have the right to choose what they want to support and how rather than giving legislative power to the executive branch of government. So in response, I just felt like being obnoxious.
Keynes theories I think are great for the laymen (today) and it did revolutionize economic thinking. The problem, I see, is that those with no interest in economics were forced through a semester of Economics (in public high schools) where Keynes is proposed as the only economic theory, and that the non-interventionalism of the past was influenced solely by ignorance.
I believe Keynes is grounded in objective reality, but that the model does not propose a balance so much as a justification for government regulation. The Austrian School expanded on the theory attempting to give limits of at which the threat of force can encourage directed behavior before it becomes counter-productive. Keynes (and his predecessor Ricardo for that matter) were generally in agreement with Mesis. Mesis didn't even really preach non-interventionalism as much as rationalized the practical limits of government; not what the government should not control, but what it can not control. It can try, and it will have an influence but, call me a cynic, in the unlikely event this legislation (not to mention unprecedented violation of separation of powers) does any measurable good, I see it as coincidental and suspect. Will the car manufactures be able to produce cars that will meet some EPA definition for mpg? Sure, that I have no doubt. Will what is involved overall lead to cleaner air and water leading to a healthier society... skeptical. Is this overall better for people economically? Well, the proponents of this legislation that led to these changes have already said that it is a necessary sacrifice we as Americans need to make for the greater good, so I will side with them and say no.:)
I'd say that the economic schools have grounded objectively; but I think much of the regulation in which politicians attempt to support their position through reference of the Keynesian school is grounded in mysticism, namely Keynes supports moderate interventionalism, and ambitious politicians take a crisis as an opportunity to propose feel good legislation that has little to no basis in reality. To be fair, this is more my general feeling about much of the politics of the past year... and then some for that matter.
You have a very interesting perspective on automobile development. That's really cute that you think the new 2009 vehicles began development and engineering in 2008. Kant wasn't a fucking economist. Cars are built in reality, not the will of ambitious politicians and their constitutients.
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and of course any "failure" on their part will be directly attributed to not enough regulation.
And according to the supreme court, theft requires "misappropriation of physical property". But if the TV says it is theft, then the Supreme Court must be wrong... so long as I can trust Big Media doesn't have any conflict of interest with television.
Hmm...
If you knew how bad Angels and Demons was, you might understand. I pirated that movie months ago, and it sucked!
err... and if anyone from the MPAA is reading this, it was meant as a joke. Please don't get me evicted.
I would completely agree, this is not the poster boy you are looking for. Maybe someone a little more like... Eric Eldred? Oh wait... nevermind.
:(
Too bad we couldn't just use "culture" as an example of what we get from the free exchange of ideas. What irony.
I find it hilarious that what makes this the worst possible example of a reasonable defense of a free culture is the fact that it was such a terrible movie... but then we say "serves you right, kid. You should have been pirating The Fountainhead".
Lets say he works hard and gives ALL his money to the gods that give us books and movies. Would you have more sympathy if he pirated the textbooks and paid for the movie than for buying his textbooks and pirating the movie? Or is it pick one, and college students can just watch movies after they graduate and get a good job? I can tell you if I spent my money on Angels & Demons instead of a textbook I needed, I'd be REALLY upset.
Since I can assume you are not a television executive or big time politicians (since they probably have JOBS or ski lodges instead of playing on slashdot), would it be fair to guess you are just a tool, or do you really believe that all derivatives of an authors ideas should have the full protection of force by the government for their entire life + 70 years for all circumstances has significantly met its burden of producing better artistic expressions than, say, you would have personally benefited from the "limited" number of works that might have been available, say, we still followed the Statute of Anne, and for the hell of it, even Donaldson v. Beckett?
I am going to guess NOT, and that you are just a tool. But if you really have a rational argument for your position, please excuse the language: you will have my undivided attention.
I disagree
A 'right' to 'download' 'Angels & Demons'? No.
But whatever James Madison had sought to protect through limited copyright... this wasn't it. ACLU picked Rosa Parks cause she was pretty and would make a great poster child for the cause. Doesn't make the cause any less just, just acknowledging that there were some politics involved. If I were going to make an argument for the intellectual pursuits of mankind, I don't think this kid and his Angels & Demons download would be my poster child. I think I would pick someone a little more like... Eric Eldred, just to throw a name out there.
And what happened to Eric Eldred AND Rosa Parks when they had their day in court? They got SHAFTED! They LOST! But Rosa Parks and the ACLU had their boycott, and Eric Eldred with Lawrence Lessig have Creative Commons.
But honestly, I see your point. That really isn't the same. Creative Commons is more like if, taking another free market approach, the ACLU started their own bus system, and anyone that believed in all the colors of the rainbow could ride, hopefully beating out those mean ol' segregated buses.
So no, Rosa Parks isn't like any of those people. Guess I'd have to say she was a little more like Peter Sunde (if she had a transporter from Star Trek).
It is a "gross affront to human dignity" to be told where to sit on the bus? ACLU paid her to make a scene so that they could use her pretty face in court, just like when they paid Homor Plessy. In BOTH those cases they LOST. What was bullshit about segregation was that it was stupid and annoying. We have the same thing today with handicap seats on the bus, but nobody makes a big stink about it. And just like Rosa Parks, you can sit in the front of the bus until some crippled old white woman wants it.
and as a loud mouth free market evangelical, it was the free market and nothing else that fixed that resolved that issue. It was a big enough annoyance for people to band together and boycott the bus system. Bus system could not operate without their fair, so they had to get rid of the BS rules. It was so detrimental it was obvious to other cities that they should change their policies before they have the same problem.
Same thing with Woman's Suffrage, but nobody ever had to break the law: States with very small female populations (
I went into it in another post (and subsequently put on my website) that copyright is extremely unnatural today and requires the threat of force to keep any type of compliance. There is no rule of law or social contract being enforced, these are bullies with enough money and lawyers to threaten anyone they like. But politicians can't get elected if they can't get on TV owned by big media. The Internet is changing that, but only so quickly. But every member of congress that doesn't see the atrocity that has become our copyright law in a practical way has violated their oath of office to uphold the constitution. Cleverly and intentionally misinterpreting it while someone feeds money and political ambition into your back pocket doesn't make it excusable.
Social Contract Theory, nearly as old as philosophy itself, is the view that persons' moral and/or political obligations are dependent upon a contract or agreement between them to form society. REF
Hobbes argues that we will do ANYTHING to avoid the State of Nature and will always, rationally, pick absolute authority.
I can not be told better, from the same article:
According to Locke, the State of Nature, the natural condition of mankind, is a state of perfect and complete liberty to conduct one's life as one best sees fit, free from the interference of others. This does not mean, however, that it is a state of license: one is not free to do anything at all one pleases, or even anything that one judges to be in oneâ(TM)s interest. The State of Nature, although a state wherein there is no civil authority or government to punish people for transgressions against laws, is not a state without morality. The State of Nature is pre-political, but it is not pre-moral. Persons are assumed to be equal to one another in such a state, and therefore equally capable of discovering and being bound by the Law of Nature. The Law of Nature, which is on Lockeâ(TM)s view the basis of all morality, and given to us by God, commands that we not harm others with regards to their "life, health, liberty, or possessions" (par. 6). Because we all belong equally to God, and because we cannot take away that which is rightfully His, we are prohibited from harming one another. So, the State of Nature is a state of liberty where persons are free to pursue their own interests and plans, free from interference, and, because of the Law of Nature and the restrictions that it imposes upon persons, it is relatively peaceful.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau:
Humans are essentially free, and were free in the State of Nature, but the âprogress' of civilization has substituted subservience to others for that freedom, through dependence, economic and social inequalities, and the extent to which we judge ourselves through comparisons with others. Since a return to the State of Nature is neither feasible nor desirable, the purpose of politics is to restore freedom to us, thereby reconciling who we truly and essentially are with how we live together. So, this is the fundamental philosophical problem that The Social Contract seeks to address: how can we be free and live together? Or, put another way, how can we live together without succumbing to the force and coercion of others? We can do so, Rousseau maintains, by submitting our individual, particular wills to the collective or general will, created through agreement with other free and equal persons. Like Hobbes and Locke before him, and in contrast to the ancient philosophers, all men are made by nature to be equals, therefore no one has a natural right to govern others, and therefore the only justified authority is the authority that is generated out of agreements or covenants.
Thomas Jefferson in a letter to James Madison on Shay's Rebellion (a violent opposition by ~1200 farmers regarding free trade agreements with Spain on the Mississippi River. Farmers feared the agreement would affirm sovereignty of Spanish traders):
I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical. Unsuccessful rebellions, indeed, generally establish the encroachments on the rights of the people which have produced them. An observation of this truth should render honest republican governors so mild in their punishment of rebellions as not to discourage them too much. It is a medicine necessary for the sound health of government. REF
In another letter criticizing the (not yet ratified) constitution:
I do not like... the omission of a bill of r
The new boss is the same as the old boss. Its always been this way, it always will be that way.
While I completely agree, I find it too cynical to be completely passive about what is going on. There are people making decisions that make a difference. I get stuck between believing in "old times", and the spirit of the enlightenment and Renaissance, but those times had their really sucky parts too. Communication has advanced so rapidly we can see the suffering of every person on the planet streaming live with a click, and maybe everything is great and we just have to bitch cause there is nothing better to do. Maybe The Founders really understood something that died with them, but they also had smallpox.
Maybe we just still need some time to catch up to the reality of our technology. Communication and transportation are VERY fast there days. Wars took so long in the past cause it took months to get one stupid letter across the ocean. That probably gave people a lot more time to sit around, drink beer and get laid. Now people from every continent in the world can collaborate in real time to argue about from My Little Pony hair colors to kernel scheduling implementations. My only luck is that I am drinking right now while I type this. Sadly, I have to give a lot of credit to Anarchists; I may not get a lot of their strange zenes, but a significant number of them have really lived up to what they say, tell everyone else to go F themselves and build a commune up in the mountains where they maintain private property and free association rights. Its like Omish, but hip and trendy nerds (I just wish they would bathe more often).
but if were as screwed as you say we are in such respect, then what it sounds like what we really need it for congressmen to be picked like jury members, and lock them all in a house together like "The Real World". From there, the only information they can get from anything is wikipedia. Sadly, I really think it would work a whole lot better. Couldn't be worse.
I'm afraid I'll have to let your other points fall by the wayside. I've had enough arguing with libertarians these past weeks, and now need to balance things out by arguing with some leftists somewhere.
Have fun, and thanks again.
Long time reader, pretty much from the beginning, but only been reading the comments and getting involved, or whatever you want to call it for about the last 5. I am new to Rand philosophy, but enjoying it. I look at Howard Roark and really don't see where there could be any controversy; isn't this exactly the American Hero type we have always loved in so many other contexts? Fountainhead was just more technical and dry (just what I love). I can think back to those days long ago that got me always far more interested in what people were commenting than the actual articles, though sometimes I still read them; I can easily see how a Rand reference on ANY topic would make you a karma whore.
Think more geeks out of work is turning them into whores for the welfare state? Yeah, times are tough. I got it hard at home too because of a lot of this. I am just grateful that in this current mess of things, at least the price of gas isn't what it was a year ago. I want to start a business, but it isn't more lack of available credit or any 'issue' the administration is dealing with I want to see fixed, I am just scared to death of how they are going to fuck with it in a way that is going to make my job unnecessarily harder, mostly for the sake of wondering what the hell they are going to make a crisis out of next. I can't see myself ever falling into the trap of trying to get big government to fix my problems; have you ever read the book or seen the movie Needful Things? Sorry, can you know what happened in that town and then have things get so bad you would go back and give him "another chance"? WTF???
I am HAPPY for Obama, and I am delighted he stands up for what he believes in. We need more Americans like him in that respect. BUT, following blindly is to completely ignore what he represents! The highest respect you can ever give a great leader is a thoughtful debate. A great leader doesn't want to be lead some sheep, he wants to lead soldiers. If you love Obama, give him the respect he deserves and allow him to be the leader of a people that still believe in the American Dream of working as hard as you please to determine the outcome of your own circumstances.
What if instead of buying foreign oil we started letting Americans across the country tap into the huge reserves of oil we have right here? I think the only argument I have heard is that "we need to protect our reserves", but when it comes to many of the problems of oil, a lot of the arguments are over the fact that it is foreign (we are not at war over the environment).
This may sound harsh, but rather than this expensive, preemptive attack on oil and energy and trying to force alternative energy upon a very stubborned market, instead we can stop subsidizing, and stop regulating, let it run free and when the oil runs out or gets outrageously expensive, I truly believe some brilliant, greedy team of scientists from Berkley, Stanford, MIT, Harvard, or wherever are going to respond to that situation and use their brains to come up with a competitive solution determined by the real, natural economy. The problem with the present situation of bail outs and subsidies is that it is artificial, and even if you could get into the circle to earn a grant or whatever, you are expected to give it over to the government. Even if someone could come up with a solution now to solve the energy crisis and develop alternative energy in 20 years time, who is to say that the up to 5 different administrations won't change those laws making all of your work worthless.
I really believe that the more changes and fixes created by the government made right now in an attempt to make things right is intimidating people with real skills, real money, and real ideas to keep them all to themselves and wait for this whole situation blows over to a point where there is something stable enough for people to count on.
I thought that Keynes was all about macro stuff
I actually just started reading Human Action today, and really enjoying it. In the scholar edition (that is the edition linked), the introduction covers a lot of the personal relationship and rivalry. I always had that impression, and had been told, that Microeconomics was about small local economies, while macroeconomics looks at the economy from the big picture / national level. But the impression I was getting from the intro of that book was that to a certain extent the interpretation of what "micro" and "macro" meant was intentional by proponents of Keynes. I think a more appropriate (though maybe just as bias) meaning of "micro" (which Mesis agreed with) was that he advocated for a bottom-up approach, and that Keynes "Macro" philosophy was a top-down approach. I could only hope to ever explain the fundamental differences between bottom-up and top-down as well as this guy. It is a great read, and MUCH shorter than the link above that covers a mans life work; Feynman on the Challenger disaster. Looking at the big picture is useful, but trying to control it directly will not cause the changes intended because too many things can be tied to that element that were not realized. Looking at a problem from the bottom-up, not to advocate for micro-management so much as delicate management, you get a much better perspective on all variables, and any policies taken from such an approach will be more precise, and better learned from to build upon appropriately. Anyway, I'll not just keep going on with that, but see how that definition of "microeconomics" is really different than to mean small and only appropriate when involving a few number of people?
Oh, and as long as were on the topic, I am actually a big fan of The Fair Tax. I think it is much more than "a national sales tax" and is worth looking at in fine detail. I think our tax code has
I think that was the whole debate in The Fountainhead; what are you really doing? Sorry, just read it recently and enjoyed it. If this is a career and not just a "job", I think it is fair to be selfish and stand up for what you believe in rather than trying to mold yourself as closely as possible to what others will be ok with without criticism. Careers take up a lot of your life, and if the purpose is just do what I can to make money and THEN go live my life, work gets really depressing quick, imo. Everything you do every day IS your life. Further I'd argue that people that just want to go to work and take home money aren't typically the kind of people making documentaries. And if I may channel Rand once again, each small sacrifice of what you believe in is a small sacrifice of yourself and is equivocal to corruption (knowing the rational thing to do and not doing it due to self-doubt). I think it is important to consider your philosophy of life when choosing a career path, otherwise, how much respect can you really have for yourself? Anyway, done with that little rant...
:)
Not to say that it necessarily applies directly to this situation, but one of the things I have enjoyed about OpenSource / Linux is that projects often changes hands and software doesn't suddenly disappear when people leave. A number of major projects have been simply dropped without any intention of lead people coming back, it just sits there for awhile, and some random team of people come by and pick it up again. Often this situation could not occur in the proprietary world due to copyright issues. Distribution of abandonware is still considered piracy. Linux has no sense of abandonware, just projects either deprecated or not currently in development.
And while I would agree that once you have spent money and time on anything, there is a certain "vendor lock-in" because to switch would be a waste of resources (unless of course their purpose was research/testing, but that's different). I'll agree that there is a large time expense getting into Linux, but interoperability has always been a shining star of Linux. Most applications (like anything worth using) has an open standard / specification for files as well as the ability to export to any similar proprietary application. For example, if some disaster happens and the team changes, moving a project developed in Linux and moving it to some application only supported by Mac or Windows is going to be easy. I remember quite some time ago it was necessary to use Linux to get Windows and Mac to work together at all in any useful way (IPX / Appletalk translator or something. LONG ago). If I might be so bold, I think if there is a level of uncertainty between Mac and Windows, the differences are great enough to consider Linux because if you don't know, then there isn't some knowledge you already have that is being wasted. Further, imo, Linux tends to guarantee better interoperability because they are designed that way from the beginning. If the core of the project is Standardized to Linux, then teams could pick whatever they want, and then import the pieces to Linux. Of course that is going to add another choice between simple and flexible, but I really don't think without already being tied to any particular platform or application, it would be a smart approach to start from. If it so happens there needs to be a change, cost of change is going to be as low as possible by design.
What do you think? Think that would keep things smart and efficiently idealistic?
They call it a Sequencer rather than a NLE. It has been their main focus of development for the past, and they had a recent release. They are working hard to get it up to par with what Final Cut pro can do, but the Blender way, not to mention the other integrated Blender features, which I expect will make it awesome. I look forward to trying it out when I get a chance.
He recommended emailing the guys at Blender, not use Blender necessarily. If they had the time to respond, and if this is a serious project, and would like some assistance in helping keep the project free, the PEOPLE at Blender would be some great advocate to have on your side.
Further, the OP wasn't looking for a NLE, but for the sake of argument Blender has a great NLE. I will agree that Blender is designed with the productive professional in mind that needs GOOD software, not "easy to figure out because I am opposed to reading documentation" software. Blender is worth learning if you are serious about professional multimedia. But just as far as knowing people in FOSS for professional multimedia, that is a different argument.
Anyone that thinks this is off-topic could not be the slightest bit familiar with the Blender Project. I think this is a great idea. While Blender may pride itself in being a great 3d modeling / rendering program, it is quite the suite for everything you could ever want to do with video. But aside from the application itself, the people who primarily support the Blender project are greatly involved with archive.org and Creative Commons, and if such a license would be appropriate, I know that they provide free storage and hosting among other things.
And yes, Avidemux is included in UbuntuStudio.
Thank you for making a quality contribution to the discussion.
Stop assuming people read the article you insensitive clod.
Sure I am going to get flamed for this, but as much as I can understand the argument, just reading The Fountainhead, and "out of context", you sound like you could be quoting any of the big businessmen from the novel. I was thinking as I was reading the book that the way they were speaking was for dramatic effect, but that people don't actually speak that way, but I guess I have been humbled today. Thanks.
Agreed. Howard Roark was an idiot. If your goal is to make a documentary then focus on that value needs to come first. Unless your documentary is about standing up for principles, then you might be in trouble. :)
Ok, joking aside, you need to know what is going to work best, and as the parent mentioned you could likely save a lot of hassle letting the people who are going to be doing the work pick the tools as they would both already be trained, and the most well informed. My brief point above was that there can be worth in considering the big picture if this documentary is going to be your life for awhile and not just a job.
my experience is that on FOSS there's too much time spent working with tools than using tools to do the work
I have had similar experience in that there are always way more options and ways of doing or learning things that you can spend all your time figuring it out and get nothing done. Discipline in outlining what do you need to know to get the job done right is really a challenge, and I think that Apple thrives to give you the best options with the least amount of worry at what seems to be the cost of unnecessary alternatives. Apple is really great at simplifying the top down approach of "What can the software do?", "Which features are going to be most useful to my project?", "How do I go about implementing them?" steps. Apple makes that a very narrow and logical path to follow, and teaches you stuff along the way. If you try to take the same approach with Linux/OSS, you will find you can spend all the time in the world reading through documentation of many pieces of software with all kind of features that can often spark the imagination, but can make you feel dizzyingly hopeless.
When I approach a major project, I will designate a limited amount of time to just surf through what is available to get things started planning wise, then totally forget forget it and start WRITING DOWN what specific tasks will need to be completed at each stage of development. Next, what is the best tool for completing that task, and evaluate how well I know the tool, and how much time may be necessary to learn a good tool I have not used before. Next, find the smallest possible example that would allow you to test a "proof of concept" and see if it is possible to take some info/footage/whatever and move it through each of the stages to a quality level of completion without having to mix steps, go backwards, or whatever. Then people can be broken into teams, you can show them what they are going to get footage/info wise, the tools they are going to get, how they are going to use them, and who to pass it onto when it is finished.
Typical business organization / delegation type stuff, I just think it really needs to be pointed out that Linux is by design aggressively in support of the bottom-up engineering principle and it is easy to see that ignoring that reality can manifest itself as a load of nightmares.
If you are buying equipment at random and not considering whether or not is is compatible, I would completely agree, but with so many Linux HCL web sites out there, "lack of support" is unlikely to be a barrier. Linux tends to have best support for the highest quality equipment, and particularly great legacy equipment no longer supported by other systems. But if one is serious about picking good equipment and are not presently tied down with any vendor lock-in, then it is all a matter of personal preference.
If you want the highest quality equipment, and time is far more precious than money, I'd say Mac. If you are looking for most economical and you have a small staff that is open minded to learning, I'd say look at the features available among Linux A/V Software and see if it will meet your needs, and check the documentation to ensure that you don't need to be a Linux guru to understand it. Next, Check the Linux HCL (Hardware Compatibility List) for the best reviews, then find what equipment is the cheapest that meets all your needs. Word of warning, always look at the pros and cons and see which ones meet your bottom line. Some well reviewed stuff may be missing an "minor" feature you need, and sometimes poorly reviewed devices are rated as such because they are missing some non-critical "major" feature, like only have one supported output. If that output type meets your needs, who cares which inferior transfer method isn't supported. I am sure other people will have good arguments for Windows and Mac, so I will leave that to them, but if you are seriously considering Linux, I would highly recommend checking out and having this same discussion at the Ubuntu Multimedia & Video forum and the Multimedia Production forum.
Ok, so I was just upset and belligerent at the time, but what I was referring to was that it ignores the fact that it takes ~20 years to bring a car to market. To impose such a change means car companies have been planning this for awhile. If other car companies had not been planning from meeting such standards, then they are not going to be able to compete. Of course that is the idea, and I hope that is what the president/congress/sierra club/ whoever means to do, even if they ignore how it might bad for consumers.
2016 seems like some time from now, but in car development years, it is very near and will mean redesigning cars that could already be close to the end of their development cycle. Having seven years to redesign a major component of the vehicles is "ambitious" at best assuming you buy that this is all a humanitarian effort. Having seven years to redesign major parts of roughly thirteen years of vehicles with so many years of development is TOTALLY DIFFERENT from insisting that each year vehicles with 19 years of development having major components go through progressively minor redesigns the year before they are supposed to be on showroom floors.
That is all I meant, that wanting something to be a certain way doesn't make it a reality. If people want better cars, car companies would take advantage of that information and build the cars people wan to buy. The only thing this legislation can do is hurt car companies that are attempting to make cars for another market.
Gasoline usage has substantial externalities, roads, noise, pollution, congestion and diplomatic...
Are these not things that actually effect real people? Are these not things that real people want to get involved in? Ok, you are right. This is not Keynesian economics, nor did you make reference to such, but it is grounded in the idea that the way to "fix" these things isn't to demand better products from the people that make them, but force the federal government to come in and do something about it. Why is it necessary for the federal government to come in and fix the price of gas? Initially, it was "well we can tax this and that from the minority to benefit a majority of people", but what you propose is that taxation can be a means unto itself to control people's behavior. And yes, I feel that such a proposal and the many like it are grounded in mystical and misguided interpretations of Keynesian Economics that Keynes himself would have opposed.
I'd also ASSUME that such a clearly interventionalist means to your own end policy that you rationalize with "pretty much every economist knows" could have only come an interpretation of a public high school economics class where they cover only in general Marx, Smith, and Keynes to any depth. Marx may have been a collectivist / socialist / communist, but he never proposed anything that could be interpreted as interventionalism for the pure sake of it. Smith... no. And Keynes wasn't ever particularly explicit about limits on such things. I could not believe that any other economic theorist ideas, no matter how badly interpreted, would ever be generalized as "every economist knows".
So there you go. If there is some other economic theory that you drew from to support your argument, I would be generally interested. If it just came from a general belief of "oil bad" and would like regulation to follow in the shining example of the War on Drugs, just let me know.
oh, and your sig is one of my favorite quotes :)
I was getting upset at reading the arguments being made, and in particular the very rough moderation bias against anyone that even suggested that maybe people should have the right to choose what they want to support and how rather than giving legislative power to the executive branch of government. So in response, I just felt like being obnoxious.
:)
Keynes theories I think are great for the laymen (today) and it did revolutionize economic thinking. The problem, I see, is that those with no interest in economics were forced through a semester of Economics (in public high schools) where Keynes is proposed as the only economic theory, and that the non-interventionalism of the past was influenced solely by ignorance.
I believe Keynes is grounded in objective reality, but that the model does not propose a balance so much as a justification for government regulation. The Austrian School expanded on the theory attempting to give limits of at which the threat of force can encourage directed behavior before it becomes counter-productive. Keynes (and his predecessor Ricardo for that matter) were generally in agreement with Mesis. Mesis didn't even really preach non-interventionalism as much as rationalized the practical limits of government; not what the government should not control, but what it can not control. It can try, and it will have an influence but, call me a cynic, in the unlikely event this legislation (not to mention unprecedented violation of separation of powers) does any measurable good, I see it as coincidental and suspect. Will the car manufactures be able to produce cars that will meet some EPA definition for mpg? Sure, that I have no doubt. Will what is involved overall lead to cleaner air and water leading to a healthier society... skeptical. Is this overall better for people economically? Well, the proponents of this legislation that led to these changes have already said that it is a necessary sacrifice we as Americans need to make for the greater good, so I will side with them and say no.
I'd say that the economic schools have grounded objectively; but I think much of the regulation in which politicians attempt to support their position through reference of the Keynesian school is grounded in mysticism, namely Keynes supports moderate interventionalism, and ambitious politicians take a crisis as an opportunity to propose feel good legislation that has little to no basis in reality. To be fair, this is more my general feeling about much of the politics of the past year... and then some for that matter.
You have a very interesting perspective on automobile development. That's really cute that you think the new 2009 vehicles began development and engineering in 2008. Kant wasn't a fucking economist. Cars are built in reality, not the will of ambitious politicians and their constitutients.