I suspect, though I could be wrong, that the author of the parent is not in favor of such tactics in that context. If they are, then there can be no meaningful debate. If not, then I am highly curious to see how they reconcile theft with freedom.
As I said in this reply your thoughts can never be theft. I also don't see using your labor as you see fit as theft. Theft to me means going onto someone's physical property and taking a physical belonging. Using your thoughts and your hands in any way you want (on your own property) should always be legal.
My sample idea holds true. If a plumber fixes your toilet, do you pay him for every flush? If you learn from him and go fix toilets, do you pay for his knowledge every time?
If I open a soccer store in your town, can you open one across the street? Absolutely. Should I have a right to being the only one in town? Not a chance.
ut your call for an absolute repudiation of all IP laws is just plain silly. Nobody is going to make games/books/movies/music if they can't protect them. Otherwise it is impossible to recoup the initial investment. Copyists have no initial investment, so they can offer copies of the work at the price of the copy.
Thousands of bands play music without worrying about copyright. Thousands of theatre groups put on performances without worrying about copyright. Millions of bloggers post daily without worrying about copyright.
It is ridiculous to think that all art has commercial motivations. When you create a product for commercial purposes, you have to think of the marketing and how you'll profit from the time you spent making a product -- knowing full well that knockoffs will occur.
I created a game in the BBS days that I released without copyright. I wrote some songs, too. I published 2 books that are copyright free and still earn me money. I use my writings as a gateway to my person -- which I bill out at a high rate.
Your labor is your labor, do with it as you please. If you're worried someone will copy you, then you have to build up your customer base slowly, and they'll see you can make new creative content that they'll gladly pay you for. I publish 2 print newsletters without copyright and people continue to subscribe when they could photocopy them and send them to friends. In fact, some do, and those friends appreciate my work and then pay me for a subcription.
The law is in the hands of the powerful and completely tramples on my freedom to do with my labor as I want to as long as I don't physically harm anyone or their property. Intellectual property laws are the equivalent of mind control.
While I understand what you mean, you might want to avoid casual use of the term 'prior art' as it is a term of art in patent law, and this is essentially a copyright discussion.
I care not for laws -- when I mean prior art I mean the work of previous individual using their time as they please, freely. When the law takes over terms, there is a problem.
If I bought a bottle of soda with the word 'Coke' all over it, I don't want it to actually contain coffee or something.
If you went to Target and bought a bottle of Soda with the word 'Coke' on it, and it had coffee in it (actually, see Coke Blak, heh), or had a knockoff cola, you'd stop shopping at Target. Leave the quality control to the middle man between you and Coke -- that's their job to make sure you're happy.
If we have this right, then that means more of the possible profit that can be made from a work is directed to the author.
So the labor of one person is worth more than the labor of another because of government force? That's unwise to me. If you can do a job cheaper, the market will prosper. I don't believe in derivative profits being forced by law -- I believe the market sets many precedents why people will buy the original over the knockoff (see "generic products" for details). I also see no reason to force me to pay for previous work done after I've bought a product. Do you pay your plumber every time you flush the toilet? If you see how he fixed your toilet, do you have to license that knowledge in order to do it yourself? It is your labor, do with it as you please.
First, I would strongly encourage you to not use the term 'intellectual property.' It includes bodies of law such as trademarks and patents which have nothing to do with artists, and which have quite different reasons for existing.
Again with the laws. I care not for them. Intellectual property means that someone has the right to control how you think -- and what you do with those thoughts. My labor is mine, my time is mine, I should be able to do with it as I please. Nothing should stop me unless I am directly harming the physical body or physical property of another person -- but there should be no law against hurting their "thoughts."
Second, however, the quantity of those acts would likely decrease sharply. So we have to decide whether unrestricted competition or some degree of monopoly granting will yield the best overall benefit. Looking only at competition or only at stimulating creation is too narrow. Both should be considered and weighed.
Complete BS. The blog world has taken over in just a few years, and millions of artists are writing great works and they're getting better. They don't do it because of copyright or even a profit motive, and the news corporations that previously controlled copyright are freaking out. Copyright creates cartels, patents creates cartels, regulations creates cartels and licensing creates cartels. Cartels are bad for business.
There is no reason to control the thoughts of others and how they use those thoughts.
Funny, one of the word of the day phrases on Google today is "The chief obstacle to the progress of the human race is the human race." - Don Marquis.
That's funny, actually, because I was looking up that quote a few weeks ago. I tend to think of it a bit differently: "The chief obstacle to the progress of an individual is democracy."
It ties in that Blizzard will stifle any competition because it only wants itself to make money. Maybe Blizzard wants to release its own Game Guide. I, for one, hope Blizzard loses or else this may set precedent for others to sue publishers for producing Game Guides.
The precedents set can affect more than game guides. Why isn't it illegal to do a review of a product? Why isn't it illegal to complain about a product? I'm sure there are cases where both were true.
Here's another person creating his own art based on the prior art of someone else. The copyright and IP laws make no sense to me -- why is it OK to protect the overall look of a game or the name when pieces of the game are taken directly from thousands of games before it? Why is it wrong for someone to use their own labor to make a product (even a direct knock off) and go and sell it?
I believe in true freedom and true competition. Both are what is best for the consumers in the market and the producers as well. If someone is willing to spend their own time and their own labor creating something with their own hands, I see no reason why the product shouldn't be allowed to sell. I personally tend to buy some items from large companies just because I feel I've gotten better quality products, but there are many items I won't buy from a big company because I prefer the unique feel of the item.
Intellectual property laws were originally created to protect artists and artists alone. Blizzard is not an artist, it is a co-op of artists. The idea that a co-op can have more rights than an individual is ridiculous -- individuals have rights, co-ops are just groups of individuals trying to market a huge variety of products together. Each artist at Blizzard has their own art they've created, and they should worry individually about making the best produt they can at the lowest price. That is competition.
Making a knockoff or a product that supports another is the best part of competition -- it gives the market a choice in goods of varying prices and quality, and it also allows others to make a product better by supplementing it with add-ons, upgrades, modifications and third party support services. Can you see Google suing someone for writing a guide to using Google? Wouldn't that guide give Google free marketing and promotion for their product?
Blizzard is run by MBAs, I guess, not artists. These "educated" businessmen don't see the value of free promotion; they should be taking advantage of this guy's supplementary art by promoting his product just as he's promoting theirs. They can both profit, and the consumers will walk away with the products they want at a price they're willing to pay. That is competition, and that is freedom.
The argument that invention and art would not occur without the force of copyright and IP is over. We see proof here that people can't create something based on previous work (as every work is) because the cartels with the power of the legal industry are the ones controlling the law -- the law meant to keep opportunities open, not close them off.
You do not have a first ammendment right to give money to your candidate for the very reason that Money IS speech
Actually, money is time -- you get money when you save someone time in doing a service or providing them a product. The money they give you their time saved -- they received in doing the same thing for someone else. Rothbard's (free e-)book available here offers a simple explanation of what money is.
Because money is my time saved, I should be free to use my time (or time saved) as I want as long as I don't directly use that time to harm someone's person or property. If I want to use my time saved ("money") to promote something, I should be free to.
The difficulty I have with campaign finance laws is that they were written specifically to prevent me from using that time saved in the way I want to. They were written to keep both parties more powerful than the individual, and to also block any third party from using a smaller crowd of individuals to finance their elections.
The biggest problem with government today is that it is too powerful, taking over rights left to the individual. When a government gets powerful, it attracts the time-saved ("money") from powerful individuals. It uses this over-broad power to harm the masses at the profit of the few.
If you want to fix the system, you need to remove the powers they've taken against their Constitutional and ethical limits. Ridding Congress and the Executive Branch of their excessive powers will remove most people's desires to finance the elections in order to get favoritism-treatment (ie, cronyism).
The idea of public funding is bad because there are other laws preventing most people from getting on a ballot. The problem is not the funding, the problem is the power given to the elected.
The FEC is the number one reason we continue our slide towards tyranny. They regulate speech where the 1st Amendment prevents them from trampling on that basic right. They regulate money -- and money is a store of your labor to be used as you please (a form of expression). They regulate who can run as a candidate as they completely destroyed the ability for an independent to raise the needed funds due to the incumbent protection clauses. They also have taken huge steps to destroying the voice of people who are not just against one party or another but against the entire system.
These laws and these regulations are so counter-freedom that it amazes me that people don't READ THE LAWS and see how attrocious they are. McCain-Feingold should be renamed "The Incumbent Protection Act" -- read it carefully and you'll see that it was written to kill the Greens and the Libertarians and any other 3rd party by reducing their ability to gain financing from a few campaign donors.
The problem with elections is not money, not corporations, not anything that the politicians say it is. The problem with elections is that the seat one is trying to win has too much power. If you want to fix elections, fix the political seat -- reduce the power of government to where it should be under the Constitution. When the power is reduced, no amount of money will create protectionism, favoritism and cronyism.
I don't want to be able to enjoy the freedoms because government says I "can." I want to use my freedoms to never worry that government might tell me how narrow those freedoms are becoming.
I agree. That's why I am an anarcho-capitalist and not a libertarian. My only Constitutional beliefs are in the proper 1st and 2nd Amendment and the individual's right to property mixed with their labor, and everything else matters little to me.
No, you're right -- the framers were vague (and conflicting) in their desire for the commerce clause. It's a debate I lose based on the facts. I still don't think the Constitution allows these barriers to be created, though.
At the time of the framing of the Constitution, commerce meant ""[i]ntercourse, exchange of one thing for another, interchange of anything; trade; traffick." This is per Sam Johnson's Dictionary of the English Language, Third Edition 1765. I believed based on this definition alone I lose the debate with international trade (but win the debate with interstate trade).
The problem is that one should dig deeper. The Constitution was accepted because James Madison promised that "The commerce clause would forever be used to protect the liberty of every American to trade in an unhindered way." This lets me believe that the intent was not for the federal government to restrict trade but to try to help enable trade.
It is a deeper problem than a few words or paragraphs can deal with, but I'm still reading and researching more on the intent of the ideas of the Framers. I believe we've twisted so many words in the past 200 years that it is very hard to see any reason to even refer to the Constitution as it stands today.
I really am frustrated that we've allowed the Feds this power -- there really is no Constitutional or reasonable allowance for letting them disturb trade. The "secrets" everyone is so adamant in protecting are already all over the world, almost nothing is secret anymore.
The reason I am frustrated is not just because the Feds attempt to use security as a reason for trade barriers, but because it also seems to leave me with the opinion that such coercion could have underlying cronyist reasons. I don't like giving powers and rights up to the Feds when I don't know who is truly profiting from these actions. There are a lot of global motivators hidden in the closet, and we don't have an open book to the finances of those in power.
I don't trust anyone with securing the borders anymore, not when they do it with trade barriers rather than a real defense of our land and only our land. I prefer isolationism of government -- keeping our government only in our sight, away from prying and entangling and financing others. I prefer open trade -- no tariffs, no embargoes, no taxes, no favoritism, no protectionism and no limits to what people can sell and buy.
Compelling experiences are carved out, made of gaps. We have bathrooms in our environments because it's more realistic. One day someone will think eating and shitting should go into a game because there's a bathroom to use. This is not a good idea.
I agree. The game experience for me is about two things: suspending disbelief and living a fantasy experience. Games that try to mimic life, to me, create complete disbelief. I tried the Sims and all that, but I'm thankful that Civ4 doesn't have toilets. My favorite games still go back to text mode, though, because I prefer my imagination over the "one-size-fits-all" imagination of 3D designers. I'm amazed at the visual quality levels of games today, but they don't suspend disbelief just because they look real.
We don't have an Oscars. We don't have an academy.
Be thankful. The Oscars are a self-serving joke for a cartel-driven industry. The gaming industry does have their own oscars: it is called game sales, game profits, and happy consumers.
You guys are the future, and it's a beautiful future if you open your mind and actually think about business a bit more.
See my previous point. The idea of thinking about business more is of massive importance. Profit for a product you make means you have happy customers who want your product. They're exchanging their store-of-time ("money") for your time, and if they're happy, they'll happily pay. En masse.
We need to make games that people care about so much that people can't not play them.
Yes! We gamers want not just to play a game, we want to be able to have a desire to play it. Most games today look cool, sound cool and have all the jazz but I want to not play them because they don't offer me the experience I desire. Have you seen the drive to return to table-top D&D gaming? That is an RPG. A keyboard and a mouse are not RPG-efficient in my mind, because my mind is not part of the interface.
Maybe we need to become fossil fuel for the next generation to come along and show us how it's done.
They will, but I think it will be taking a step backwards. The more hardware that is needed to play a "coolness-factor" game, the more bugs I find, the more difficult it is to play and the more it works to create disbelief and take me out of the picture.
I have to tell ya, there's nothing better that can be done because the games industry is d.e.a.d.
GIGO - Garbage In, Garbage Out.
We put food in, shit comes out.
See previous 2 points.
The second I'll just mention that I'm going down the corridor to the maternity room where there's an infant that has a better future than the games business and it's called interactive storytelling.
For me a big part of interactivity is letting my brain create the image I believe I will soon see. That is part of fear, part of desire. If I am fed everything, I won't be hungry for what is ahead. Games have to create a hunger and a thirst every step of the way.
Your number one beef with the industry or your job. And tomorrow.. no,, Saturday.. hahah.. do something about it!
Actually, the market will cause you to do something about it. Your paycheck might be great, so that means there are customers. But the big part of a job is also being satisfied in your work, and that might mean taking a paycut in order to find new markets.
but I realise that the people in the audience are actually very intelligent here and only stupid people think that patents is a good idea, so that'd be a waste of time.
Whoa, did your friendly neighborhood anarcho-capitalist just say that? I don't think I did!
I didn't wanna rant, I wanted to rave. Games are really totally amazing.
Yet when I complete a game, I am only happy when I realize that my mind is truly am
I always have something to say but loading up this app left me speechless. For years I've been researching a better interface to remote applications. In the BBS days we had ASCII and then ANSI and then a variety of ANSI knockoffs which all sucked. Then RipTerm came along and I thought it was amazing, until the net came by and destroyed all that hard work (and no more cool ANSI animated files).
Yet the web has always been lacking in the interface. This application is an amazing glimpse of things to come.
The bigger news is what can Microsoft do to control the desktop now? A basic computer running Firefox with the most limited operating system could likely dominate when AJAX applications start being released. Very scary for those in the IT field if someone finds a way to encapsulate a very solid browser into a very solid mini-OS. Why worry about the end user when everything runs on the server?
Eh, it happens. I'd love to see a slashdot feature to track a post's moderation over the first few hours, that would be fun:)
I actually have a copy of Bracken's book in my library but haven't had time to read it. Maybe I'll make the time.
Your thoughts on UC are accurate, but I still love the book. Ross seems to be a bit of a weirdo in real life and his site hasn't been updated in almost a year -- I'm interested in why he hasn't continued writing.
A supermarket's margins are notoriously cut-throat.
Actually, this isn't quite true -- supermarkets have very thin margins on certain items, but they have many items with very good margins. I've consulted in the past on some POS systems for smaller supermarkets and was always very surprised at the gross margins of the average sale.
For the discount card, I use the phone number of a friend of mine at check-out. It's always funny when the clerk says "Thank you Mr. Martin" even though my last name is Dada:)
I'm not a huge fan of advertising because I hate paying increased prices for products -- I tend to buy generic if the quality is close (or I just make dinner from scratch). Yet advertising is a huge portion of the economy, and if the old media formats don't work, the companies have to evolve.
I actually like this form of advertising IF it gives me some interesting information. If it is the same 4 minute segment run over months, I'll ignore it and it will likely fail. If they give me something interesting to do with produce, I can actually see it working.
"Buying onions? Try them with Hamburger Helper for a delicious meal for the family!" isn't going to get me to buy packaged junk. But if they combine it with an interesting recipe (or fact) about the onion, I may just stick around to watch it.
For those anti-advertising in general, remember that much of the old media that you might have loved (think: Firefly, Futurama, etc) may have died because advertisers wouldn't pay for it -- and we never had the chance to ourselves. Don't knock advertising until you understand how forcing millions to pay a nickel more for a product might be better than asking a few tens of thousands of media users to pay $5 each.
Then again, the iTunes format may destroy TV and radio anyway. I guess CBS is seeing the forest for the trees.
It isn't a threat. It's a "cold, dead hands" comment. I would never shoot anyone offensively nor defensively unless I felt my life was in danger. The 2nd amendment allusion is a joke on the "I plead the 5th" Enron mockery of the Constitution:)
As for the FAA, the FAA is stuck in the 60s and always will be. We're seeing privatization and partial privatization of various "FAA" style organizations throughout the world and we're seeing them overcome many of the problems with the FAA. Canada did it in 1996 with great results, although now it looks like they may take it back (if they haven't already).
The airline industry is in a very unique position -- many of the airlines are living on subsidies and loan grants, so they have to stick with the FAA. On top of that, the FAA is part of the problem with the airlines in many ways.
I believe solutions to the problem you mentioned are available. I don't have all the answers, I just know that over-regulation and coercion is not it.
This is not true, actually. First of all, transmitters sending more than a minimal signal are costly -- a 50,000 watt transmitter on one frequency would costs thousands a day in power. To broadcast over a wide range of frequencies would cost millions.
Secondly, I promote the idea of freq-hopping software radios that utilize technology designed to avoid interference. In my own neighborhood there are about 20 WiFi access points I can see, and I still get great wireless networking at my home. We're sharing bandwidth here, and while there may be some problems, the situation is getting better in an minimally regulated spectrum. Open up the entire spectrum the FCC monopolizes and you'll see much less interference, not more.
Thirdly, I believe in the power of the market -- the current need to design better freq-hopping transceivers is not very high due to the regulations out there. Over time, though, I believe we'll see more deregulation of various frequencies as the need for more wireless transmissions goes up. I can only hope it happens sooner rather than later.
Look at all the wasted bandwidth right now. We have digital and analog TV, digital and analog radio, cell phones, FRS, and dozens of other "regulated" bandwidths. This is all data -- and digital data is more efficient -- so why not work to slowly deregulate more and more bandwidth so more and more people can take advantage of it?
Do we NEED analog and digital TV frequencies anymore? Cable and satellite have replaced MOST people's needs for broadcast media, yet BitTorrent is starting to hurt the old media companies, too. Why not use it all for whatever data the user and the sender both need?
I have a solution to fixing the FCC and it has to do with my subject line. Figure it out.
I believe the FCC is one of the most unconstitutional departments in the Federal government and completely destroys the reason why it was set up in the first place. If the airwaves are public property, why are they regulated to the point that no one but the elite can access them? How is the Internet considered public airwaves if it is run over mostly private lines?
It is time for a second Internet to come into action -- one that is voluntarily connected, one that is run over cabling (or satellite) connections that are not subsidized by any government regime. If we want it, it will happen, we just have to support the initial costs. These costs might be higher but in the long run they're lower because we won't be taxed to subsidize the costs.
I don't care much for the idea of regulating any speech -- broadcast or face-to-face. I don't see the Constitution giving the Federal government any power to regulate the airwaves (the interstate commerce clause was not meant to give the Feds power to tariff and tax, it was meant to give the Feds the power to prevent the individual states from tariffing and taxing interstate commerce).
The reason for this FCC mention is because the distribution cartels who have used copyright, airwaves regulation and subsidies for decades are now scared that their cartel will fall apart. Copyright has been antiquated by the Internet -- creating opportunities for millions of artists to distribute their artwork themselves (not needing the cartels). The subsidies for the phone companies and the old media companies have proved to be worthless as almost anyone can now afford to be not just a receiver on the mediacast network, but a sender as well. The regulations that were used to keep others from entering the market are now working against the big media companies.
This means that they want blood. They want control. They want their cartel to stay together, and the only way they can do it is through the use of force and coercion -- which is basically what the FCC is about. Maybe Google will come up with a free GoogleNet and let anyone (including competitors) connect to it. Maybe some kid in a garage will figure out a way to get a secondary network structure built, I have no idea, nor do I care, there are billions of people out there, I have faith in humanity.
The future will not be able frequencies or bandwidth or censorship or control. The future will be about freedom; I am just waiting for the day that software radios with reasonable frequency hopping methods can be used to give everyone high bandwidth at low costs without worrying about what monopoly their village lets run cable or worry about paying for someone out in Montana who can't afford their own wires run. For this, though, the FCC will need to completely vacate the airwaves. The day will come, we just have to find a solution to the FCC who keeps it all down.
I prefer to use the term Jacobin over neo-conservative.
I was using the term "libertarian" since the term "liberal" was stolen by the progressives. Classic liberals are today's libertarians. I use the term anarcho-capitalist (for my own views) rather than market anarchist since anarchist was stolen by today's left-fascists and nihilists. The neo-conservatives stole the term conservatives in order to try to convert the Republic to an Empire (as Lincoln had desired, the first true Republican). The current-day Republicans are closer to Whigs than conservatives, but Jacobin tends to be the best choice word.
The manufacturer shouldn't have to -- it is the purveyor/buyer that has to accept responsibility that the item they're buying is legal in their area. Some states allow fireworks, but they make out-of-staters sign a waiver that they're not going to take them to places where they are illegal. The same is true of porn or any information, in my opinion.
Most people believe the interstate commerce clause was written to "promote the general welfare" of the people -- giving the Feds incredible control over "sinful" items.
Yet we have to think of the general welfare of the people very clearly. When drugs are federally criminalized, does banning drugs promote the general welfare of everyone? I don't think so. Some drugs that are illegal (most, I'd say) can greatly help a minority of people -- so criminalizing them is NOT helping everyone. Porn can be similarly looked at: what is art to one community might be horrific to another. This means that even porn being banned does not promote the general welfare. The federal government was to promote the general welfare by making sure that opportunities were not destroyed by the individual states -- through tariffs and taxes. The general welfare was also to be kept by defending the borders, protecting against piracy and watching out for counterfeiting (which the Federal Reserve now does openly and legally).
I don't think you've thought this through at all. What happens when the people of my community decide that your website, published by you from your community, is obscene and worthy of prosecution? What happens when my community issues a warrant for your arrest?
I think this is a very important discussion to bring up, actually.
My view is that the manufacturer of any marketable product (including information) should not be held liable for their product as long as the product is legal within their community. If someone wants to transfer it out of the community, they take the responsibility for it.
With data, we normally think of the ISP as the transporter, yet we shouldn't The ISP to me is the equivalent of a roadway -- sure they're driving the truck, but it is the end purveyor of the goods that is requesting the transfer. Just as UPS shouldn't be held liable for what they transport, I don't think the ISP should be either.
In the end, the person bringing porn into a community that criminalizes it has to make the decision to move or change the local law.
Slashdot Mirror
I suspect, though I could be wrong, that the author of the parent is not in favor of such tactics in that context. If they are, then there can be no meaningful debate. If not, then I am highly curious to see how they reconcile theft with freedom.
As I said in this reply your thoughts can never be theft. I also don't see using your labor as you see fit as theft. Theft to me means going onto someone's physical property and taking a physical belonging. Using your thoughts and your hands in any way you want (on your own property) should always be legal.
My sample idea holds true. If a plumber fixes your toilet, do you pay him for every flush? If you learn from him and go fix toilets, do you pay for his knowledge every time?
If I open a soccer store in your town, can you open one across the street? Absolutely. Should I have a right to being the only one in town? Not a chance.
ut your call for an absolute repudiation of all IP laws is just plain silly. Nobody is going to make games/books/movies/music if they can't protect them. Otherwise it is impossible to recoup the initial investment. Copyists have no initial investment, so they can offer copies of the work at the price of the copy.
Thousands of bands play music without worrying about copyright. Thousands of theatre groups put on performances without worrying about copyright. Millions of bloggers post daily without worrying about copyright.
It is ridiculous to think that all art has commercial motivations. When you create a product for commercial purposes, you have to think of the marketing and how you'll profit from the time you spent making a product -- knowing full well that knockoffs will occur.
I created a game in the BBS days that I released without copyright. I wrote some songs, too. I published 2 books that are copyright free and still earn me money. I use my writings as a gateway to my person -- which I bill out at a high rate.
Your labor is your labor, do with it as you please. If you're worried someone will copy you, then you have to build up your customer base slowly, and they'll see you can make new creative content that they'll gladly pay you for. I publish 2 print newsletters without copyright and people continue to subscribe when they could photocopy them and send them to friends. In fact, some do, and those friends appreciate my work and then pay me for a subcription.
The law is in the hands of the powerful and completely tramples on my freedom to do with my labor as I want to as long as I don't physically harm anyone or their property. Intellectual property laws are the equivalent of mind control.
While I understand what you mean, you might want to avoid casual use of the term 'prior art' as it is a term of art in patent law, and this is essentially a copyright discussion.
I care not for laws -- when I mean prior art I mean the work of previous individual using their time as they please, freely. When the law takes over terms, there is a problem.
If I bought a bottle of soda with the word 'Coke' all over it, I don't want it to actually contain coffee or something.
If you went to Target and bought a bottle of Soda with the word 'Coke' on it, and it had coffee in it (actually, see Coke Blak, heh), or had a knockoff cola, you'd stop shopping at Target. Leave the quality control to the middle man between you and Coke -- that's their job to make sure you're happy.
If we have this right, then that means more of the possible profit that can be made from a work is directed to the author.
So the labor of one person is worth more than the labor of another because of government force? That's unwise to me. If you can do a job cheaper, the market will prosper. I don't believe in derivative profits being forced by law -- I believe the market sets many precedents why people will buy the original over the knockoff (see "generic products" for details). I also see no reason to force me to pay for previous work done after I've bought a product. Do you pay your plumber every time you flush the toilet? If you see how he fixed your toilet, do you have to license that knowledge in order to do it yourself? It is your labor, do with it as you please.
First, I would strongly encourage you to not use the term 'intellectual property.' It includes bodies of law such as trademarks and patents which have nothing to do with artists, and which have quite different reasons for existing.
Again with the laws. I care not for them. Intellectual property means that someone has the right to control how you think -- and what you do with those thoughts. My labor is mine, my time is mine, I should be able to do with it as I please. Nothing should stop me unless I am directly harming the physical body or physical property of another person -- but there should be no law against hurting their "thoughts."
Second, however, the quantity of those acts would likely decrease sharply. So we have to decide whether unrestricted competition or some degree of monopoly granting will yield the best overall benefit. Looking only at competition or only at stimulating creation is too narrow. Both should be considered and weighed.
Complete BS. The blog world has taken over in just a few years, and millions of artists are writing great works and they're getting better. They don't do it because of copyright or even a profit motive, and the news corporations that previously controlled copyright are freaking out. Copyright creates cartels, patents creates cartels, regulations creates cartels and licensing creates cartels. Cartels are bad for business.
There is no reason to control the thoughts of others and how they use those thoughts.
Funny, one of the word of the day phrases on Google today is "The chief obstacle to the progress of the human race is the human race." - Don Marquis.
That's funny, actually, because I was looking up that quote a few weeks ago. I tend to think of it a bit differently: "The chief obstacle to the progress of an individual is democracy."
It ties in that Blizzard will stifle any competition because it only wants itself to make money. Maybe Blizzard wants to release its own Game Guide. I, for one, hope Blizzard loses or else this may set precedent for others to sue publishers for producing Game Guides.
The precedents set can affect more than game guides. Why isn't it illegal to do a review of a product? Why isn't it illegal to complain about a product? I'm sure there are cases where both were true.
Here's another person creating his own art based on the prior art of someone else. The copyright and IP laws make no sense to me -- why is it OK to protect the overall look of a game or the name when pieces of the game are taken directly from thousands of games before it? Why is it wrong for someone to use their own labor to make a product (even a direct knock off) and go and sell it?
I believe in true freedom and true competition. Both are what is best for the consumers in the market and the producers as well. If someone is willing to spend their own time and their own labor creating something with their own hands, I see no reason why the product shouldn't be allowed to sell. I personally tend to buy some items from large companies just because I feel I've gotten better quality products, but there are many items I won't buy from a big company because I prefer the unique feel of the item.
Intellectual property laws were originally created to protect artists and artists alone. Blizzard is not an artist, it is a co-op of artists. The idea that a co-op can have more rights than an individual is ridiculous -- individuals have rights, co-ops are just groups of individuals trying to market a huge variety of products together. Each artist at Blizzard has their own art they've created, and they should worry individually about making the best produt they can at the lowest price. That is competition.
Making a knockoff or a product that supports another is the best part of competition -- it gives the market a choice in goods of varying prices and quality, and it also allows others to make a product better by supplementing it with add-ons, upgrades, modifications and third party support services. Can you see Google suing someone for writing a guide to using Google? Wouldn't that guide give Google free marketing and promotion for their product?
Blizzard is run by MBAs, I guess, not artists. These "educated" businessmen don't see the value of free promotion; they should be taking advantage of this guy's supplementary art by promoting his product just as he's promoting theirs. They can both profit, and the consumers will walk away with the products they want at a price they're willing to pay. That is competition, and that is freedom.
The argument that invention and art would not occur without the force of copyright and IP is over. We see proof here that people can't create something based on previous work (as every work is) because the cartels with the power of the legal industry are the ones controlling the law -- the law meant to keep opportunities open, not close them off.
I agree partially but mostly disagree with you.
You do not have a first ammendment right to give money to your candidate for the very reason that Money IS speech
Actually, money is time -- you get money when you save someone time in doing a service or providing them a product. The money they give you their time saved -- they received in doing the same thing for someone else. Rothbard's (free e-)book available here offers a simple explanation of what money is.
Because money is my time saved, I should be free to use my time (or time saved) as I want as long as I don't directly use that time to harm someone's person or property. If I want to use my time saved ("money") to promote something, I should be free to.
The difficulty I have with campaign finance laws is that they were written specifically to prevent me from using that time saved in the way I want to. They were written to keep both parties more powerful than the individual, and to also block any third party from using a smaller crowd of individuals to finance their elections.
The biggest problem with government today is that it is too powerful, taking over rights left to the individual. When a government gets powerful, it attracts the time-saved ("money") from powerful individuals. It uses this over-broad power to harm the masses at the profit of the few.
If you want to fix the system, you need to remove the powers they've taken against their Constitutional and ethical limits. Ridding Congress and the Executive Branch of their excessive powers will remove most people's desires to finance the elections in order to get favoritism-treatment (ie, cronyism).
The idea of public funding is bad because there are other laws preventing most people from getting on a ballot. The problem is not the funding, the problem is the power given to the elected.
The FEC is the number one reason we continue our slide towards tyranny. They regulate speech where the 1st Amendment prevents them from trampling on that basic right. They regulate money -- and money is a store of your labor to be used as you please (a form of expression). They regulate who can run as a candidate as they completely destroyed the ability for an independent to raise the needed funds due to the incumbent protection clauses. They also have taken huge steps to destroying the voice of people who are not just against one party or another but against the entire system.
These laws and these regulations are so counter-freedom that it amazes me that people don't READ THE LAWS and see how attrocious they are. McCain-Feingold should be renamed "The Incumbent Protection Act" -- read it carefully and you'll see that it was written to kill the Greens and the Libertarians and any other 3rd party by reducing their ability to gain financing from a few campaign donors.
The problem with elections is not money, not corporations, not anything that the politicians say it is. The problem with elections is that the seat one is trying to win has too much power. If you want to fix elections, fix the political seat -- reduce the power of government to where it should be under the Constitution. When the power is reduced, no amount of money will create protectionism, favoritism and cronyism.
I don't want to be able to enjoy the freedoms because government says I "can." I want to use my freedoms to never worry that government might tell me how narrow those freedoms are becoming.
"One thing's for sure, we're all gonna be a lot thinner."
"Who's scruffy-lookin'?"
"Where did you dig up that old fossil?"
"And I thought they smelled bad on the outside"
"It's not my fault!"
"I've got a bad feeling about this"
"Then I'll see you in hell"
I agree. That's why I am an anarcho-capitalist and not a libertarian. My only Constitutional beliefs are in the proper 1st and 2nd Amendment and the individual's right to property mixed with their labor, and everything else matters little to me.
No, you're right -- the framers were vague (and conflicting) in their desire for the commerce clause. It's a debate I lose based on the facts. I still don't think the Constitution allows these barriers to be created, though.
At the time of the framing of the Constitution, commerce meant ""[i]ntercourse, exchange of one thing for another, interchange of anything; trade; traffick." This is per Sam Johnson's Dictionary of the English Language, Third Edition 1765. I believed based on this definition alone I lose the debate with international trade (but win the debate with interstate trade).
The problem is that one should dig deeper. The Constitution was accepted because James Madison promised that "The commerce clause would forever be used to protect the liberty of every American to trade in an unhindered way." This lets me believe that the intent was not for the federal government to restrict trade but to try to help enable trade.
It is a deeper problem than a few words or paragraphs can deal with, but I'm still reading and researching more on the intent of the ideas of the Framers. I believe we've twisted so many words in the past 200 years that it is very hard to see any reason to even refer to the Constitution as it stands today.
I really am frustrated that we've allowed the Feds this power -- there really is no Constitutional or reasonable allowance for letting them disturb trade. The "secrets" everyone is so adamant in protecting are already all over the world, almost nothing is secret anymore.
The reason I am frustrated is not just because the Feds attempt to use security as a reason for trade barriers, but because it also seems to leave me with the opinion that such coercion could have underlying cronyist reasons. I don't like giving powers and rights up to the Feds when I don't know who is truly profiting from these actions. There are a lot of global motivators hidden in the closet, and we don't have an open book to the finances of those in power.
I don't trust anyone with securing the borders anymore, not when they do it with trade barriers rather than a real defense of our land and only our land. I prefer isolationism of government -- keeping our government only in our sight, away from prying and entangling and financing others. I prefer open trade -- no tariffs, no embargoes, no taxes, no favoritism, no protectionism and no limits to what people can sell and buy.
Compelling experiences are carved out, made of gaps. We have bathrooms in our environments because it's more realistic. One day someone will think eating and shitting should go into a game because there's a bathroom to use. This is not a good idea.
I agree. The game experience for me is about two things: suspending disbelief and living a fantasy experience. Games that try to mimic life, to me, create complete disbelief. I tried the Sims and all that, but I'm thankful that Civ4 doesn't have toilets. My favorite games still go back to text mode, though, because I prefer my imagination over the "one-size-fits-all" imagination of 3D designers. I'm amazed at the visual quality levels of games today, but they don't suspend disbelief just because they look real.
We don't have an Oscars. We don't have an academy.
Be thankful. The Oscars are a self-serving joke for a cartel-driven industry. The gaming industry does have their own oscars: it is called game sales, game profits, and happy consumers.
You guys are the future, and it's a beautiful future if you open your mind and actually think about business a bit more.
See my previous point. The idea of thinking about business more is of massive importance. Profit for a product you make means you have happy customers who want your product. They're exchanging their store-of-time ("money") for your time, and if they're happy, they'll happily pay. En masse.
We need to make games that people care about so much that people can't not play them.
Yes! We gamers want not just to play a game, we want to be able to have a desire to play it. Most games today look cool, sound cool and have all the jazz but I want to not play them because they don't offer me the experience I desire. Have you seen the drive to return to table-top D&D gaming? That is an RPG. A keyboard and a mouse are not RPG-efficient in my mind, because my mind is not part of the interface.
Maybe we need to become fossil fuel for the next generation to come along and show us how it's done.
They will, but I think it will be taking a step backwards. The more hardware that is needed to play a "coolness-factor" game, the more bugs I find, the more difficult it is to play and the more it works to create disbelief and take me out of the picture.
I have to tell ya, there's nothing better that can be done because the games industry is d.e.a.d.
GIGO - Garbage In, Garbage Out.
We put food in, shit comes out.
See previous 2 points.
The second I'll just mention that I'm going down the corridor to the maternity room where there's an infant that has a better future than the games business and it's called interactive storytelling.
For me a big part of interactivity is letting my brain create the image I believe I will soon see. That is part of fear, part of desire. If I am fed everything, I won't be hungry for what is ahead. Games have to create a hunger and a thirst every step of the way.
Your number one beef with the industry or your job. And tomorrow.. no,, Saturday.. hahah.. do something about it!
Actually, the market will cause you to do something about it. Your paycheck might be great, so that means there are customers. But the big part of a job is also being satisfied in your work, and that might mean taking a paycut in order to find new markets.
but I realise that the people in the audience are actually very intelligent here and only stupid people think that patents is a good idea, so that'd be a waste of time.
Whoa, did your friendly neighborhood anarcho-capitalist just say that? I don't think I did!
I didn't wanna rant, I wanted to rave. Games are really totally amazing.
Yet when I complete a game, I am only happy when I realize that my mind is truly am
I always have something to say but loading up this app left me speechless. For years I've been researching a better interface to remote applications. In the BBS days we had ASCII and then ANSI and then a variety of ANSI knockoffs which all sucked. Then RipTerm came along and I thought it was amazing, until the net came by and destroyed all that hard work (and no more cool ANSI animated files).
Yet the web has always been lacking in the interface. This application is an amazing glimpse of things to come.
The bigger news is what can Microsoft do to control the desktop now? A basic computer running Firefox with the most limited operating system could likely dominate when AJAX applications start being released. Very scary for those in the IT field if someone finds a way to encapsulate a very solid browser into a very solid mini-OS. Why worry about the end user when everything runs on the server?
Eh, it happens. I'd love to see a slashdot feature to track a post's moderation over the first few hours, that would be fun :)
I actually have a copy of Bracken's book in my library but haven't had time to read it. Maybe I'll make the time.
Your thoughts on UC are accurate, but I still love the book. Ross seems to be a bit of a weirdo in real life and his site hasn't been updated in almost a year -- I'm interested in why he hasn't continued writing.
A supermarket's margins are notoriously cut-throat.
:)
Actually, this isn't quite true -- supermarkets have very thin margins on certain items, but they have many items with very good margins. I've consulted in the past on some POS systems for smaller supermarkets and was always very surprised at the gross margins of the average sale.
For the discount card, I use the phone number of a friend of mine at check-out. It's always funny when the clerk says "Thank you Mr. Martin" even though my last name is Dada
I'm not a huge fan of advertising because I hate paying increased prices for products -- I tend to buy generic if the quality is close (or I just make dinner from scratch). Yet advertising is a huge portion of the economy, and if the old media formats don't work, the companies have to evolve.
I actually like this form of advertising IF it gives me some interesting information. If it is the same 4 minute segment run over months, I'll ignore it and it will likely fail. If they give me something interesting to do with produce, I can actually see it working.
"Buying onions? Try them with Hamburger Helper for a delicious meal for the family!" isn't going to get me to buy packaged junk. But if they combine it with an interesting recipe (or fact) about the onion, I may just stick around to watch it.
For those anti-advertising in general, remember that much of the old media that you might have loved (think: Firefly, Futurama, etc) may have died because advertisers wouldn't pay for it -- and we never had the chance to ourselves. Don't knock advertising until you understand how forcing millions to pay a nickel more for a product might be better than asking a few tens of thousands of media users to pay $5 each.
Then again, the iTunes format may destroy TV and radio anyway. I guess CBS is seeing the forest for the trees.
It isn't a threat. It's a "cold, dead hands" comment. I would never shoot anyone offensively nor defensively unless I felt my life was in danger. The 2nd amendment allusion is a joke on the "I plead the 5th" Enron mockery of the Constitution :)
As for the FAA, the FAA is stuck in the 60s and always will be. We're seeing privatization and partial privatization of various "FAA" style organizations throughout the world and we're seeing them overcome many of the problems with the FAA. Canada did it in 1996 with great results, although now it looks like they may take it back (if they haven't already).
The airline industry is in a very unique position -- many of the airlines are living on subsidies and loan grants, so they have to stick with the FAA. On top of that, the FAA is part of the problem with the airlines in many ways.
I believe solutions to the problem you mentioned are available. I don't have all the answers, I just know that over-regulation and coercion is not it.
Best. Book. Ever.
A bit long, but one of the funniest pieces of fiction I've ever read. I've been thinking of investing in some pigs for the yard, actually.
I did.
This is not true, actually. First of all, transmitters sending more than a minimal signal are costly -- a 50,000 watt transmitter on one frequency would costs thousands a day in power. To broadcast over a wide range of frequencies would cost millions.
Secondly, I promote the idea of freq-hopping software radios that utilize technology designed to avoid interference. In my own neighborhood there are about 20 WiFi access points I can see, and I still get great wireless networking at my home. We're sharing bandwidth here, and while there may be some problems, the situation is getting better in an minimally regulated spectrum. Open up the entire spectrum the FCC monopolizes and you'll see much less interference, not more.
Thirdly, I believe in the power of the market -- the current need to design better freq-hopping transceivers is not very high due to the regulations out there. Over time, though, I believe we'll see more deregulation of various frequencies as the need for more wireless transmissions goes up. I can only hope it happens sooner rather than later.
Look at all the wasted bandwidth right now. We have digital and analog TV, digital and analog radio, cell phones, FRS, and dozens of other "regulated" bandwidths. This is all data -- and digital data is more efficient -- so why not work to slowly deregulate more and more bandwidth so more and more people can take advantage of it?
Do we NEED analog and digital TV frequencies anymore? Cable and satellite have replaced MOST people's needs for broadcast media, yet BitTorrent is starting to hurt the old media companies, too. Why not use it all for whatever data the user and the sender both need?
I have a solution to fixing the FCC and it has to do with my subject line. Figure it out.
I believe the FCC is one of the most unconstitutional departments in the Federal government and completely destroys the reason why it was set up in the first place. If the airwaves are public property, why are they regulated to the point that no one but the elite can access them? How is the Internet considered public airwaves if it is run over mostly private lines?
It is time for a second Internet to come into action -- one that is voluntarily connected, one that is run over cabling (or satellite) connections that are not subsidized by any government regime. If we want it, it will happen, we just have to support the initial costs. These costs might be higher but in the long run they're lower because we won't be taxed to subsidize the costs.
I don't care much for the idea of regulating any speech -- broadcast or face-to-face. I don't see the Constitution giving the Federal government any power to regulate the airwaves (the interstate commerce clause was not meant to give the Feds power to tariff and tax, it was meant to give the Feds the power to prevent the individual states from tariffing and taxing interstate commerce).
The reason for this FCC mention is because the distribution cartels who have used copyright, airwaves regulation and subsidies for decades are now scared that their cartel will fall apart. Copyright has been antiquated by the Internet -- creating opportunities for millions of artists to distribute their artwork themselves (not needing the cartels). The subsidies for the phone companies and the old media companies have proved to be worthless as almost anyone can now afford to be not just a receiver on the mediacast network, but a sender as well. The regulations that were used to keep others from entering the market are now working against the big media companies.
This means that they want blood. They want control. They want their cartel to stay together, and the only way they can do it is through the use of force and coercion -- which is basically what the FCC is about. Maybe Google will come up with a free GoogleNet and let anyone (including competitors) connect to it. Maybe some kid in a garage will figure out a way to get a secondary network structure built, I have no idea, nor do I care, there are billions of people out there, I have faith in humanity.
The future will not be able frequencies or bandwidth or censorship or control. The future will be about freedom; I am just waiting for the day that software radios with reasonable frequency hopping methods can be used to give everyone high bandwidth at low costs without worrying about what monopoly their village lets run cable or worry about paying for someone out in Montana who can't afford their own wires run. For this, though, the FCC will need to completely vacate the airwaves. The day will come, we just have to find a solution to the FCC who keeps it all down.
I have a solution. I plead the second.
I prefer to use the term Jacobin over neo-conservative.
I was using the term "libertarian" since the term "liberal" was stolen by the progressives. Classic liberals are today's libertarians. I use the term anarcho-capitalist (for my own views) rather than market anarchist since anarchist was stolen by today's left-fascists and nihilists. The neo-conservatives stole the term conservatives in order to try to convert the Republic to an Empire (as Lincoln had desired, the first true Republican). The current-day Republicans are closer to Whigs than conservatives, but Jacobin tends to be the best choice word.
The manufacturer shouldn't have to -- it is the purveyor/buyer that has to accept responsibility that the item they're buying is legal in their area. Some states allow fireworks, but they make out-of-staters sign a waiver that they're not going to take them to places where they are illegal. The same is true of porn or any information, in my opinion.
Most people believe the interstate commerce clause was written to "promote the general welfare" of the people -- giving the Feds incredible control over "sinful" items.
Yet we have to think of the general welfare of the people very clearly. When drugs are federally criminalized, does banning drugs promote the general welfare of everyone? I don't think so. Some drugs that are illegal (most, I'd say) can greatly help a minority of people -- so criminalizing them is NOT helping everyone. Porn can be similarly looked at: what is art to one community might be horrific to another. This means that even porn being banned does not promote the general welfare. The federal government was to promote the general welfare by making sure that opportunities were not destroyed by the individual states -- through tariffs and taxes. The general welfare was also to be kept by defending the borders, protecting against piracy and watching out for counterfeiting (which the Federal Reserve now does openly and legally).
I don't think you've thought this through at all. What happens when the people of my community decide that your website, published by you from your community, is obscene and worthy of prosecution? What happens when my community issues a warrant for your arrest?
I think this is a very important discussion to bring up, actually.
My view is that the manufacturer of any marketable product (including information) should not be held liable for their product as long as the product is legal within their community. If someone wants to transfer it out of the community, they take the responsibility for it.
With data, we normally think of the ISP as the transporter, yet we shouldn't The ISP to me is the equivalent of a roadway -- sure they're driving the truck, but it is the end purveyor of the goods that is requesting the transfer. Just as UPS shouldn't be held liable for what they transport, I don't think the ISP should be either.
In the end, the person bringing porn into a community that criminalizes it has to make the decision to move or change the local law.