I thought the copyright owner could only sue you if you tried to distribute the work? What right does copyright give you in terms, not of distribution, but the act of "having"?
Interesting that you say $80,000/copy. Isn't that what P2P "pirates" are supposed to pay? Why not Amazon? Its not like $80,000/copy sold would really hurt them, and it would be fair.
Your statement, "solution to balance the various interests", is in itself flawed. There are no intrinsic rights to IP, merely a social experiment that hopes that by giving away some of our Public Rights, the Public will be purchasing something of equal or greater value. Only insofar as the public benefits does any "balance" come in to play.
Does (Public - some of their Rights) => (content authors + Public Rights ) result in more benefit to the public? If so, the purchase was a bargain. If not, the experiment needs to be revoked or reformulated.
I've often enjoyed upsetting both men of faith and atheists by stating, "It takes as much faith to be an atheist as it does to be a Christian because both are taking a stand in an area where nothing can be proven." It seems to me that agnosticism is the only intellectually honest perspective.
You seem to want to side step this criticism by redefining terms. However, if what you say is true, "it's a lack of affirmation", then what that really means it that most "atheists" today have abandoned atheism for (at least half of ) agnosticism. A lack of affirmation doesn't deny or disbelieve. Lacking an affirmation that God exists, all you need do is lack an affirmation that God doesn't exist.
atheist (noun)
a person who denies or disbelieves the existence of a supreme being or beings.
compare this to
agnostic (noun)
1. a person who holds that the existence of the ultimate cause, as God, and the essential nature of things are unknown and unknowable, or that human knowledge is limited to experience.
2. a person who denies or doubts the possibility of ultimate knowledge in some area of study.
Words are interesting, and fun. They have definitions. However, just because a group of people who've labeled themselves with a word (which means "denies or disbelieves" in God) have come to change their views ("lack of affirmation" rather than deny or disbelieve), doesn't mean the word's meaning changes also. Rather, the group's label is no longer appropriate.
"you grant us a non-exclusive, transferable, sub-licensable, royalty-free, worldwide license to use any IP content that you post on or in connection with Facebook"
Oh, and by the way, who gets the copyright to your facebook content? Your yahoo email content? Social site content copyright is part of the use agreement, by the way, so its worth checking those out occasionally. Hint: it doesn't give the creators sole distribution rights.
But despite this fact, I'd have to take issue. If you replaced "property", with "content", then we'd probably agree. It is content, content is real, it does exist, it just isn't really property. Thats all.
Ideas really exist, but ideas aren't material. Copying an idea isn't categorically the same thing as taking a material object. Borrowing a book from a library and hand copying it before you return doesn't deprives the other patrons of use.
Agreed that property is a right. Totally agreed that property is a right. You can own a house, or land, or a car, or any number of other things. But you can't own ideas. You can't own patterns. You can't even own the songs or books you write. We use copyright, for instance, to issue sole distribution rights for a limited time. If this were a house you built on your own land, no one would talk about "distribution", or "limited time". If the content actually were property, it would be yours, forever. To deprive you of it would be theft or conversion. Instead, after the limited time it goes into the public domain, were it actually belongs, and belonged to begin with. This temporary time is not the natural state of things, but a legal fiction (perhaps) useful to society. The public domain is the natural state of things for content. And if it turns out not to be useful, then the temporary time can be legislated away as simply as it was introduced.
My real point is that today people seem to forget, or perhaps never learned, this distinction. Much effort has gone into making it seem that copyright is about property (its not), and that its a right (its not). Thats what I'm getting at.
They really do exist. Of course they do. To suggest my point of view denies that they exist is a straw man fallacy. But ideas also exist, yet they aren't granted the status of "we'll treat it though were property for a period of time." Existence is obvious enough but that doesn't mean they belong to someone like property belongs to someone. Its not the bit and bytes, though, so much as the pattern that they form. Information can be encoded many many ways, even via analog:-) The question is this: in the social experiment in which we extend to information temporarily the rights inherent to property (in order to promote discovery) do we do it with open eyes? Mindful of the fact that its not an inherent right, that such can't really be owned as property is owned?
"no guarantee of your right to access the art, either", but if it is for instance broadcast on the radio, do I have the right to take note of the changes in my property ( a hunk of metal ) that your broadcast is forcing to make happen? If I look close enough, I perceive the music playing there. I didn't ask you to trespass with this signal, and I doubt I retain the authority to make you stop. OK, fine. But to suggest I shouldn't record it seems wrong. Limit access, and charge to see the two-headed woman, fine. But don't parade her around the downtown square and then want to charge.
First, one quick counter example to disprove your over reaching claim. If you plant a rose bush in your front yard next to the sidewalk, don't be surprised that people walking down the sidewalk don't want to pay a "rose tax" regardless of how hard you worked nurturing that rose. You could build a fence so they can't see it, but you can't charge them because its viewable. Thus, just because you invest time doesn't mean the end result is necessarily something that meets the criteria to be property. Its your rose bush, for sure. No one is suggesting otherwise. But its a public sidewalk. I'm walking down that sidewalk for free no matter how many roses you plant along the side of it.
Second, you are putting the cart before the horse. If you have property, you can surely try to sell or trade it. If you are performing a service, you can charge for the performance of the service. The two both produce revenue, but buying a house is a transfer of property, whereas buying a blowjob is not. So the ability or lack thereof to generate revenue doesn't necessarily depend something having the status of property. It might be property, but you can't charge for it as a service (the enjoyment of your rose bush, if its publicly viewable). Or it might not be property, per say (sp?), but still you can generate revenue.
Now when one tries to categorize these sorts of things, there are properties of property that non-property won't display. If you have a rose bush, and I come onto your land and dig it up and take it away, I deprive you of the right to your rose bush. If someone takes a picture of it then you aren't deprived of your rose bush, its still there. However, the ability to make perfect (or even just good enough) copies for almost no cost is altering the social dynamic. The ability to make recordings, originally, when such was a new technology and expensive, monetized music and created an industry. Its not surprising that the wide spread availability of such technology at the price it is available today is also creating sweeping changes. These things happen. Its all over history.
What I think is more interesting is the phenomena whereby people are trying to attribute to books, and songs, and paintings, etc..., (and by which I don't mean a physical book, or a music CD, or an actual painting you could hang on a wall, but instead the "content" of the book, the "content" of the music CD, the "content" of the painting), the same sort of rights we used to reserve for property. The real question is, while its useful to pretend that "content" is property so long as the results are in the public good, isn't it a problem if we forget we are pretending?
First, beautiful definition: "taking advantage of someone's enjoyment of their work by not paying them is called exploitation".
However, just because someone works hard doesn't mean they deserve to be paid. "Artists work. They deserve to be paid for what they do." A fool who works hard first digging holes, then the next day burying them, doesn't deserve to demand a paycheck "because he works hard all day." Who was he working for?
If an artist is hired to do work, he deserves to paid for the work he does as per the agreement. If an artist choses to produce art, there is no guarantee of payment. None. Why should there be?
Agreed: "The question isn't whether, for example, Paul McCartney made a billion dollars off of his music."
But then, disagreed, because the question is *not*: "is a Paul McCartney song worth a $1 to you".
A sweet smelling rose bush is worth a $1 to me, for sure. But do you have the right to ask me for $1 to enjoy that rose bush?
The real question is should we continue to pretend that nonmaterial productions should count as property? Does the societal benefit of such an artifical and arbitrary distinction outweigh the cost? That is the real question.
Beef ranching in the western US does not work the way you think it does. Much of the basic logistics of it have not changed much since the 19th century.
You have the right to try to make a living in any legal fashion you can. Just don't whine for exemptions or other unfair advantages when your methodology turns out to be non-completive. In a free market (if there were still such things possible) these people would have long ago become productive. Don't try to hide behind the Red White & Blue. If anything, the farm welfare program has been going on way too long.
Large farms have more people, many of whom probably do not work as much as the few people per small farm. They have economies of scale on larger farms, which means that if there is another administrative hurdle to cross, they already have a person on staff to deal with it, and it is probably their job. On a small farm, administration is time taken out of the other work time of the operational staff of the farm. Even a small amount of additional administration and regulation can turn into an issue.
Now I am not saying that the tagging idea is impossible, but somehow you will have to account for the extra adminstrative (sic) time required out of people who already work from dawn to dusk and beyond every day just staying afloat. On a small farn that same percentage might be a significant portion of whatever small profits that they eke out. Small farms are *not* efficient, anyone who understands economics should know that. They provide some advantages... intangibles that no one really factors in. Many people here would be shocked by what I saw in terms of the sacrifices that these people have to make to simply do what their families have been doing for centuries. Some of you are effectively calling some of the hardest working people on Earth "lazy" or "greedy".
Actually if what you say is true, then wouldn't closing down the small farms and ranches be doing them a kindness? I doubt anyone is calling them "lazy", or "greedy", but I do hear the words "stubborn", "stupid", and "idiots" bandied about.
I suspect it isn't so much the technical feasibility, but the responsibility (and liability) associated with accountability that has so many running so fast for cover.
Since everyone is talking about sustainability, I'd like to point out that it takes much more water to grow the feed to make a steak than if we ate other things. In terms of the nutritional value/acre, and the impact of the raw materials needed external to that acre, we are way over producing meat. We also eat way too much meat. I'm not suggesting that we just suddenly dump the industry, but it doesn't make any strategic sense. Its really stupid for such a rich, educated nation to act like this. In terms of your slippery slope first domino analogy, there are useful things those people could be doing instead of raising way too much meat. If the change occurred too fast it would be problematic, but no one expects Americans to eat healthier immediately. Lets at least admit its a problem right now, today, and the sort of problem that will become more noticeable in the future as fresh water continues to become less abundant.
While I can understand how some might think the preceding comment was a troll, I know many educated and knowledgeable people who are similarly disgusted with our modern meat industry. Just because you disagree doesn't mean the Anon Cowardon was trolling.
Of course this is also a democratic republic. If enough people feel that the beef industry has gotten too dangerous to be accepted as a responsible industry, don't be surprised if it is regulated. If ranchers sense which way the wind is blowing, and regulate themselves, then it won't be necessary to enact legislation to regulate them. But if enough people want there to be more controls in place, then soon there will be controls, one way or the other. Personally I support the idea. The only real reason to hide the history of a pound of hamburger is to try to sell it even if it is probably contaminated. Against that sort of motivation, its not hard to take a stand. In terms of cost and "one lone rancher off in a truck" unable to deal with the cattle, I just have to ask: "are these cows branded?" If you can manage to brand them, you can tag them too.
Slashdot Mirror
I thought the copyright owner could only sue you if you tried to distribute the work? What right does copyright give you in terms, not of distribution, but the act of "having"?
Interesting that you say $80,000/copy. Isn't that what P2P "pirates" are supposed to pay? Why not Amazon? Its not like $80,000/copy sold would really hurt them, and it would be fair.
Your statement, "solution to balance the various interests", is in itself flawed. There are no intrinsic rights to IP, merely a social experiment that hopes that by giving away some of our Public Rights, the Public will be purchasing something of equal or greater value. Only insofar as the public benefits does any "balance" come in to play.
Does (Public - some of their Rights) => (content authors + Public Rights ) result in more benefit to the public? If so, the purchase was a bargain. If not, the experiment needs to be revoked or reformulated.
I thought solipsists would define reality in terms of localhost.
You seem to want to side step this criticism by redefining terms. However, if what you say is true, "it's a lack of affirmation", then what that really means it that most "atheists" today have abandoned atheism for (at least half of ) agnosticism. A lack of affirmation doesn't deny or disbelieve. Lacking an affirmation that God exists, all you need do is lack an affirmation that God doesn't exist.
compare this to
Words are interesting, and fun. They have definitions. However, just because a group of people who've labeled themselves with a word (which means "denies or disbelieves" in God) have come to change their views ("lack of affirmation" rather than deny or disbelieve), doesn't mean the word's meaning changes also. Rather, the group's label is no longer appropriate.
functional (x server) server side javascript! soon it'll all be javascript, hehehe ;-)
"sudo make me a sandwich" -XKCD
"X11 protocol is already in place" has me confused. Isn't this an X server replacement?
"you grant us a non-exclusive, transferable, sub-licensable, royalty-free, worldwide license to use any IP content that you post on or in connection with Facebook"
Oh, and by the way, who gets the copyright to your facebook content? Your yahoo email content? Social site content copyright is part of the use agreement, by the way, so its worth checking those out occasionally. Hint: it doesn't give the creators sole distribution rights.
But despite this fact, I'd have to take issue. If you replaced "property", with "content", then we'd probably agree. It is content, content is real, it does exist, it just isn't really property. Thats all.
Ideas really exist, but ideas aren't material. Copying an idea isn't categorically the same thing as taking a material object. Borrowing a book from a library and hand copying it before you return doesn't deprives the other patrons of use.
Agreed that property is a right. Totally agreed that property is a right. You can own a house, or land, or a car, or any number of other things. But you can't own ideas. You can't own patterns. You can't even own the songs or books you write. We use copyright, for instance, to issue sole distribution rights for a limited time. If this were a house you built on your own land, no one would talk about "distribution", or "limited time". If the content actually were property, it would be yours, forever. To deprive you of it would be theft or conversion. Instead, after the limited time it goes into the public domain, were it actually belongs, and belonged to begin with. This temporary time is not the natural state of things, but a legal fiction (perhaps) useful to society. The public domain is the natural state of things for content. And if it turns out not to be useful, then the temporary time can be legislated away as simply as it was introduced.
My real point is that today people seem to forget, or perhaps never learned, this distinction. Much effort has gone into making it seem that copyright is about property (its not), and that its a right (its not). Thats what I'm getting at.
They really do exist. Of course they do. To suggest my point of view denies that they exist is a straw man fallacy. But ideas also exist, yet they aren't granted the status of "we'll treat it though were property for a period of time." Existence is obvious enough but that doesn't mean they belong to someone like property belongs to someone. Its not the bit and bytes, though, so much as the pattern that they form. Information can be encoded many many ways, even via analog :-) The question is this: in the social experiment in which we extend to information temporarily the rights inherent to property (in order to promote discovery) do we do it with open eyes? Mindful of the fact that its not an inherent right, that such can't really be owned as property is owned?
"no guarantee of your right to access the art, either", but if it is for instance broadcast on the radio, do I have the right to take note of the changes in my property ( a hunk of metal ) that your broadcast is forcing to make happen? If I look close enough, I perceive the music playing there. I didn't ask you to trespass with this signal, and I doubt I retain the authority to make you stop. OK, fine. But to suggest I shouldn't record it seems wrong. Limit access, and charge to see the two-headed woman, fine. But don't parade her around the downtown square and then want to charge.
You must have lost my argument along the way.
First, one quick counter example to disprove your over reaching claim. If you plant a rose bush in your front yard next to the sidewalk, don't be surprised that people walking down the sidewalk don't want to pay a "rose tax" regardless of how hard you worked nurturing that rose. You could build a fence so they can't see it, but you can't charge them because its viewable. Thus, just because you invest time doesn't mean the end result is necessarily something that meets the criteria to be property. Its your rose bush, for sure. No one is suggesting otherwise. But its a public sidewalk. I'm walking down that sidewalk for free no matter how many roses you plant along the side of it.
Second, you are putting the cart before the horse. If you have property, you can surely try to sell or trade it. If you are performing a service, you can charge for the performance of the service. The two both produce revenue, but buying a house is a transfer of property, whereas buying a blowjob is not. So the ability or lack thereof to generate revenue doesn't necessarily depend something having the status of property. It might be property, but you can't charge for it as a service (the enjoyment of your rose bush, if its publicly viewable). Or it might not be property, per say (sp?), but still you can generate revenue.
Now when one tries to categorize these sorts of things, there are properties of property that non-property won't display. If you have a rose bush, and I come onto your land and dig it up and take it away, I deprive you of the right to your rose bush. If someone takes a picture of it then you aren't deprived of your rose bush, its still there. However, the ability to make perfect (or even just good enough) copies for almost no cost is altering the social dynamic. The ability to make recordings, originally, when such was a new technology and expensive, monetized music and created an industry. Its not surprising that the wide spread availability of such technology at the price it is available today is also creating sweeping changes. These things happen. Its all over history.
What I think is more interesting is the phenomena whereby people are trying to attribute to books, and songs, and paintings, etc..., (and by which I don't mean a physical book, or a music CD, or an actual painting you could hang on a wall, but instead the "content" of the book, the "content" of the music CD, the "content" of the painting), the same sort of rights we used to reserve for property. The real question is, while its useful to pretend that "content" is property so long as the results are in the public good, isn't it a problem if we forget we are pretending?
First, beautiful definition: "taking advantage of someone's enjoyment of their work by not paying them is called exploitation".
However, just because someone works hard doesn't mean they deserve to be paid. "Artists work. They deserve to be paid for what they do." A fool who works hard first digging holes, then the next day burying them, doesn't deserve to demand a paycheck "because he works hard all day." Who was he working for?
If an artist is hired to do work, he deserves to paid for the work he does as per the agreement. If an artist choses to produce art, there is no guarantee of payment. None. Why should there be?
Agreed: "The question isn't whether, for example, Paul McCartney made a billion dollars off of his music."
But then, disagreed, because the question is *not*: "is a Paul McCartney song worth a $1 to you".
A sweet smelling rose bush is worth a $1 to me, for sure. But do you have the right to ask me for $1 to enjoy that rose bush?
The real question is should we continue to pretend that nonmaterial productions should count as property? Does the societal benefit of such an artifical and arbitrary distinction outweigh the cost? That is the real question.
"I create for my own profit, not your entertainment."
Seems obvious to me that you can't achieve the former until *after* you've achieved the latter.
Try a literature search for Upton Sinclair.
Beef ranching in the western US does not work the way you think it does. Much of the basic logistics of it have not changed much since the 19th century.
So then maybe its about time?
You have the right to try to make a living in any legal fashion you can. Just don't whine for exemptions or other unfair advantages when your methodology turns out to be non-completive. In a free market (if there were still such things possible) these people would have long ago become productive. Don't try to hide behind the Red White & Blue. If anything, the farm welfare program has been going on way too long.
Large farms have more people, many of whom probably do not work as much as the few people per small farm. They have economies of scale on larger farms, which means that if there is another administrative hurdle to cross, they already have a person on staff to deal with it, and it is probably their job. On a small farm, administration is time taken out of the other work time of the operational staff of the farm. Even a small amount of additional administration and regulation can turn into an issue.
Now I am not saying that the tagging idea is impossible, but somehow you will have to account for the extra adminstrative (sic) time required out of people who already work from dawn to dusk and beyond every day just staying afloat. On a small farn that same percentage might be a significant portion of whatever small profits that they eke out. Small farms are *not* efficient, anyone who understands economics should know that. They provide some advantages... intangibles that no one really factors in. Many people here would be shocked by what I saw in terms of the sacrifices that these people have to make to simply do what their families have been doing for centuries. Some of you are effectively calling some of the hardest working people on Earth "lazy" or "greedy".
Actually if what you say is true, then wouldn't closing down the small farms and ranches be doing them a kindness? I doubt anyone is calling them "lazy", or "greedy", but I do hear the words "stubborn", "stupid", and "idiots" bandied about.
I suspect it isn't so much the technical feasibility, but the responsibility (and liability) associated with accountability that has so many running so fast for cover.
So you are actively promoting tax evasion?
Since everyone is talking about sustainability, I'd like to point out that it takes much more water to grow the feed to make a steak than if we ate other things. In terms of the nutritional value/acre, and the impact of the raw materials needed external to that acre, we are way over producing meat. We also eat way too much meat. I'm not suggesting that we just suddenly dump the industry, but it doesn't make any strategic sense. Its really stupid for such a rich, educated nation to act like this. In terms of your slippery slope first domino analogy, there are useful things those people could be doing instead of raising way too much meat. If the change occurred too fast it would be problematic, but no one expects Americans to eat healthier immediately. Lets at least admit its a problem right now, today, and the sort of problem that will become more noticeable in the future as fresh water continues to become less abundant.
While I can understand how some might think the preceding comment was a troll, I know many educated and knowledgeable people who are similarly disgusted with our modern meat industry. Just because you disagree doesn't mean the Anon Cowardon was trolling.
Of course this is also a democratic republic. If enough people feel that the beef industry has gotten too dangerous to be accepted as a responsible industry, don't be surprised if it is regulated. If ranchers sense which way the wind is blowing, and regulate themselves, then it won't be necessary to enact legislation to regulate them. But if enough people want there to be more controls in place, then soon there will be controls, one way or the other. Personally I support the idea. The only real reason to hide the history of a pound of hamburger is to try to sell it even if it is probably contaminated. Against that sort of motivation, its not hard to take a stand. In terms of cost and "one lone rancher off in a truck" unable to deal with the cattle, I just have to ask: "are these cows branded?" If you can manage to brand them, you can tag them too.