always shouldered your share in the past yes. now your country is too busy with naval gazing nihilism and euro-weasel worship to step up as you have in the past.
You shouldnt give up so easily. The industry you are talking about is run by people. Just like any other industry. Some of us even have a foot in both the tech and the creative media worlds. There is no reason other than money that creative pro-tech minded guerilla marketing savvy activists/lobbyists cant get airtime on tv and in movie theatres before the show starts. The only needs are money and an even more important form of raw capital - the people to support it.
We can build and grow what we need to do this just as we build and grow our communities and the architecture they run on. Dont underestimate the american public... they like their music and movies how they want them when they want them. I dont think theyd take too kindly to what Disney and the rest have been pushing into law if they knew more of how it connects to them.
Yes. So who here wants to do something real, right now, here? We talk about all this work, but informing others, continuing to do what we do in our own lives, and donating money are not the only ways in which we can fight the good fight here. We have to keep in mind why we are even having these discussions in the first place...
If we want to actually change these laws we are so concerned with then we must do what we can on all fronts. Not enough to feel good or to respond to a flash presentation by lessig.... Enough to WIN.
I realize thats an odd concept when we are used to thinking in terms of all the good that the EFF has honestly done. But these laws that remain are still threatening our very livelyhoods and the freedoms we enjoy in our own lives.
That is something i dont doubt Lessig understands very well, and in fact i think it is the reason he has shown so much frustration with those that comment but do not act.
So why not take up this challenge and go and tell the EFF that it needs to open up discussion lists, developers forums, community driven donations, dynamic site content including blogs, and project/issue/action management tools all on its website *without* spending a dime on it... open the damn thing up to the open source community for design and coding volunteers...
Lessig and all of the other board members can go make flash presentations and speeches calling for direct involvement in the work of the EFF. That way the community they serve can see the bang they get for their buck and get their own hands dirty right there and then...
Never said they werent doing anything. They are actually doing a hell of a lot. They just arent doing the simplist things they could do to gain a whole lot more support. Why go up against "the man" on your own when you can have a few thousand of your closest allies backing you up?
The question we still have to answer is "when and how?".
We are each reading these comments and talking about how much more effective one or another course of action could be. What we need now is a trigger... a tipping point. Lessig asked very directly "What have you done?". But we can also ask what the EFF has done to apply to itself all that Lessig is rightly calling for.
Its very surprising and more than a little frustrating that the EFF, this organization that fights for free and dynamic tech, isnt using some of the most common and effective tools available to them.
I dont mind the Tinsel Town vid, but i do think the entire process could be done better. (more on that another time)
I have already written to the webmaster of the EFF asking why they didnt even have something as basic as a discussion list (and not just the announcement lists they currently have). I didnt get much of a response... (just told me to sign up for the announcments - which i had already done).
Im writting to Lessig instead right now.
If you want slashdot to be a breeding ground for change and not just comments, one way to start that would be to help persuade the EFF that it is well past time to make their site and their organization much more dynamic. Creative, issue-action, and other discussion lists would be a very good place to start.
Obviously writing emails to the EFF isnt much in the way of slashdot action and change, but its a small bit in that direction. Any suggestions for bigger ways in which a real slashdot effect can be encouraged would be much appreciated...
Dont we have a right to make a backup copy for our own personaly use, of *any* content we buy?
Obviously the companies we are talking about want to do everything possible to stop us from being able to make a copy of any kind at all, and they have put laws on the books which enforce that.
Maybe all of us who are looking for technical solutions to these violations of our fair use and unregulated rights should be opening up a second front in this war of self defense... responses to bad technology like this shouldnt only take the form of code, as wonderful as that is.
Hacking better code to get around these copy protection schemes is good. Hacking the law to get around the idiocy in washington is also good. Taking real action by coding around bad technology *and* by actively supporting sane copyright and tech laws is much much better.
Where are the laws and candidates for office we are supporting that would require all media of any kind (software, movies, music, etc) to be physically readable *and* easy to make a backup copy of?
CD's and DVD's are perishable. We have paid for the physical media. We have a right, enshrined in the fair use doctrine, to continue being able to access our own purchased media indefinately. Which in this case means we have the right to transfer that media from one place to another if we so choose - at least for our own use. (Filesharing and such is a whole 'nother argument and has nothing to do with this directly).
Why are we letting these companies, that are actually less influential and smaller than we would be if we bothered getting up off our asses, continue to cram bad legislation and bad technology down our throats?
Lets make copy protection methods like this illegal, instead of letting them continue to make every little important thing in our lives restricted and controlled.
One court case does not an end to a battle make. For a random example of how courts arent always right i would refer you to Dred Scott vs. John F. A. Sandford (1857). My point wasnt that the courts have ruled extensively in favor of file sharing, it was that the courts havent handled the issue extensively at all... the case you have mentioned isnt finished yet. What you are talking about is the injunction before trial against Napster, which had the unpleasant effect of shutting it down. The case itself has been overshadowed by that injunction and by the subsequent bankrupcy and aquisition of Napster by one of the record labels.
I just dont think its appropriate for you to role over and play dead whether this one case has so far been decided in our favor or not (remember, the same judge allowed for exploration of whether the big media labels engaged in copyright abuse - which if found to be true would have lead to the charges against napster being thrown out). It may create a single legal precedant but our laws dont work by decree, there is a process that involves argument in court involving many precedants, and in lawmaking bodies, and ultimately by the public itself over whether something is acceptable or not. That process is far from over. It has in fact hardly even begun.
Im sorry, but it isnt clear that sharing copyrighted music in a non-commercial way is illegal. Regardless of how you personally feel about it, it is something that is highly debatable. Besides, this is a free country (in some ways at least), where laws can be argued and *changed*. Whether file-sharing is or should be illegal is in no way a settled matter. The reality of whether it is or not can change from one day to the next, from one year to the next, from one sway of the courts and of public opinion to the next. If you personally feel file-sharing should be illegal that is fine as long as you can back it up and dont just try to pre-empt discussion by asserting that you are right and everyone else is doomed to failure because of some undeniable fact of your choosing before any discussion even begins.
As far as im concerned, the fights over the legality of filesharing, the nature of copyright and free/fair use, the growth of technology and the internet, and all the rest of the assorted battles that are related to these are in no way over yet.
Considering that file sharing is one the biggest/only things driving the growth in numbers of high speed internet customers, along with how big a deal AOL and TimeWarner made of the importance of "broadband" to its marketing strategy at the time of their merger, and not to mention the fact that the new AOL-TimeWarner has lost at least a third of its total value as a company since the merger, i would say alienating current and potential internet users is highly relevant to the companies bottom line interests.
If they are losing money on the customers it isnt because of technical fundamentals. As a former customer i can say from first hand experience that their technicians and sys admins arent as skilled as one would hope.
My concern is more about what other options there will be if this becomes an accepted method of enforcement for misguided laws and for the response by a majority of ISPs to the smallest threat of litigation by a big media label. Im not saying that if we dont do something now all hell will break loose... all hell has already broken loose - who cares if it can and continues to get worse. It isnt the end of the world if i dont have my high speed file sharing, but i dont want my MTV anymore and havent for a very long time... i want to take whatever steps can be taken, no matter how small they may be, to push back against these restrictions from the labels and from those ISPs cooperating with them and those lawmakers who happen to be in their pockets. My question is how can any of us do that effectively? How can we increase our options in choosing an ISP and how can we increase our freedom to use those connections?
This has nothing to do with murder. I have an actual, inherent right to live... they only have a limited grant of copyright as an incentive to create. This isnt just for the judicial system to handle. This relates to our lives and in a democracy or even a pseudo-democracy it is incumbent on the population itself to be active in its own defense. If there is something like this that large numbers of people like you or me have a very large problem with then the courts are only one area of battle for it. We can also challenge the labels and their mismanagement/abuse of that limited grant more directly through public debate, coordinated countersuits, political means, and financial means... They dont have a right to be exempted from competition or from having to justify their continued grant of "copyright".
This is exactly what is needed. Just need some deep pocketed legal defense/legal action fund to back up those that are taking the fight right back at the RIAA.
One countersuit wont do anything much, but a few thousand could do some damage.
you all still assume incorrectly that file sharing is theft. the DMCA and other illconcieved laws may sway the courts, but even laws can be wrong. they can also be changed. one question should be what exactly the harm is from file sharing, when the industry itself engages in illegal activity through price fixing, cares not one bit about its own artists and extorts ownership of copyrights from them in return for what amounts to a lottery ticket, engages in payola which wipes out any serious claim that royalties should be collected from radio stations (why keep up the sham when the same money is just going in an accounting shell game), and has actively used any means necessary to stamp out existing and emerging competition (net radio, p2p).
non-commerical sharing gives music an immensly wider exposure than anything else that has come before and is a form of free advertising that the labels could be taking much better advantage of. It also turns out that it wasnt just bullshit when the labels largest customer demographic says consitently that they would by more music rather than less because of file swapping if it wasnt for CD prices being artificially twice what they should be. we want to buy more because we are listening to new things. what a strange concept.
it also turns out that the industry is facing more of a problem from its own mismanagement, its refusal to adapt, and from the enourmous success of DVD's and video games. (why spend so much money on 1 song you like packaged with 10 or 12 or 15 you dont like in a jewel case that is going to break at the slightest stress, when you can buy a DVD or a video game instead?)
some of you might talk about how these businesses have a right to charge what they want for their product.. except they arent engaging in free market economics.... they are practicing captive market, litigate and intimidate, mob rule economics. they enforce control over a product they themselves didnt even create. they are given that opportunity only because of the limited monopoly protection and advantage given to them by our own government. of course copyright is supposed to be a limited incentive to create, not a license to supress. it is not an inherent right. it is not property in any sense other than with the subtlety with which lawyers understand how the word "property" can be used.
im sure many of you are very convinced that the only option is to roll over in the face of the big bad riaa "rightfully protecting" its copyrights and its legions of lawyers threatening to make the lives of individual gnutella and fasttrack and winmx users an unending hell, just to make an example of them. but forgive me if some of us dont see it that way...
it could be said that im just being naive. but then again it could just as easily be said that those who would say so are just being cynical.
(yeah ive got a bit of an attitude in this post... i just was kinda dissapointed with the level of discussion and the rampant smugness here -- expected better from/.)
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It also spreads the pain to the point where if the RIAA wants to sue then it is taking on its customers directly. It takes us another step towards the RIAA pissing off too many people, just enough so that the backlash starts in a big way. Connect a system like this with a donation network, a PAC, a legal defense fund, and more forms of action/advocacy... you might start to see congress understanding common sense just a bit more (or at least pretending to under threat of losing campaign dollars and votes).
You assume that slashdot readers actually want to take action about something they care about rather than just talk about it... when it comes to something like linking to NPR then they will write, write, write away... but with something "political", they will stay as far away from it as possible... or at least that is what has happened in the past... i couldnt be happier if it started to change and slashdot readers began to prove me wrong.
That is such bullshit. Im not paying 50 bucks a month for someone to give me trickleband. I want a big phat pipe and thats what i pay for. What i do with it is up to me. Seperating people into "normal" use and "abnormal" use just doesnt cut it. We are supposed to be encouraging the growth of broadband and emergence of new things being done with it... whether that is Video Instant Messaging, Real Time P2P Gaming, Voice Over IP, being able to download/transfer a multi-megabyte file in a short amount of time, or even (as unlikely as you may think it is) *something we havent thought of yet*. The growth of real broadband where all thse that have it actually use it to its fullest is about the only thing that has any chance of hell in re-ignighting the home computer and tech market... along with handhelds and wireless. Whats the point of paying for a new computer with all the bottlenecks finally being worked out if you have to pay through the nose for anything you want to do over the internet. Thankfully the technolgy is sound and that means there are other real alternatives that can make Time Warner regret making stupid business moves that restrict their own consumers... I personally doubt there are many *loyal* time warner subscribers that wouldnt jump at a chance for a better service.... the market is ripe for a company that doesnt have its head stuck up its ass to walk right in.
Thats because no one is talking about the positive effects of unrestricted file sharing anymore. Those that see only the *damage* being done to big media are failing to notice the incredible impact of millions of people communicating directly with each other and sharing creative works of all types that they may have otherwise never had access to. This is *exactly* what the copyright clause of the constitution is about... inspiration and exposure to new ideas (ie. innovation).
How many other people besides me, of so many different backgrounds and in so many different locations, are getting so much more serious about music and movie creation in ways ranging from song writing to dj'ing and audio production to screenwriting or anything else having to do with creative arts, because we are exposing each other to all these wonderful movies and music and the rest?
The networking revolution (I know revolution is a cliched word) that is taking place currently is planting the seeds for a creative explosion we have never seen before... similar to the harlem renaissance or the growth of rock and roll (why is it all these labels that made their millions on the backs of artists rebelling against all rules and authrity are no running to congress to protect their own desire for authority?) or even the industrial revolution and the rennaissance itself.
All it took for world changing explosions of creativity like the rennaissance and the age of reason were advances like the printing press and the cultural influence of the islamic world on southern europe.
Have we all failed to understand the impact of the little things we ourselves do that are exactly the same? Have we just decided to remove ourselves from our own lives because we think that what we do no longer has any relation to our own history or our own lives?
I can tell anyone point blank that the movies i am downloading are inspiring me to be more involved in a field i already had some connection to (if you doubt that we can talk about what movies ive downloaded and why and what inspiration ive taken from them). The music im downloading is only feeding into my love of parties, desire to throw myself much more into turntables and guitar and get back to piano after many many years (which im sure many of you can appreciate even if you dont share my particular taste in music)... exposing me to influences that i cant get by only going to shows and parties and watching m2 or listening to corporate radio or having a cd lent to me by a friend. And yes even the games that ive gotten have helped feed into my lifetime as a gamer and real desire to develop games (which just recently became more of a real possiblity thanks to a new friend who is a bit older than me and has been programming for the past 20 years.
I strongly doubt i am alone in the world, even if many people are just benefiting from the good brought to their own lives by *listening* and *watching* all this art they couldnt have otherwise had access to, and not wanting to throw themselves headlong into the creative end of things.
I dont suggest that artists starve or no one profits. *I am* an artist (at least in the sense we are using the word) an i dont want to starve. But there is no reason for artists to starve because of these new emerging changes, and we all know artists are already treated like shit so all the claims by the big labels of having a RIGHT to protection for themselves but not the artists who create the work are just complete bullshit.
If we are really going to discuss how to navigate these changes instead of how to shut them down we need to bring the right people to the table. Lock out the Big Media compainies and Congress, and bring in all the Hardware companies, all Consumers, and all Artists directly (not just propped up superstars who are just pawns of their oppresive contracts).
youre right that it doesnt make any sense to hand over all things to government control but while you exagerate about what is happening by calling it socialism you leave out the damage done by so much corporate control and incompetence, which could just as easily be described as a form of feudalism...
as usual, we get so caught up in government vs business that freedom gets lost in the mix.
also a very good point. if anything what should be done both for better business pratices and for better appearances is for there to be more of a division between the osdn stuff and the for-profit va software stuff.... then we can also see if anything else from va is worth anything and the osdn can support itself from sources like the fund i mentioined earlier and better advertising methods like the self serve advertising thing i just saw a *gasp* banner ad for and more tv/print like non-clickthrouhg based advertising models like weve been talking so much about this morning...
i dont mind the marketing ploy though cause it relates right back to how no matter who owns the domain and the servers slashdot and osdn are still community developed and maintained sites... those that do so much work running slashdot and osdn are a critical part of that community but are not the entire community... so as long as all of us are contributing to this thing anyway why not be a part of marketing research to further it along.
this is a really good point thats been made a few times already. a lot of advertising is actually useful and i like what is advertised on slashdot for the most part as long as it doesnt start to take up more space than the actual content.
except that there is no need for even a minimal fee system. the commodity being traded here (internet access and website running costs) are becoming so dirt cheap that the competition is to intense (or will be) from those providing a better service for free that significant numbers of people would have to be just plain dumb to pay for crapier services.
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always shouldered your share in the past yes. now your country is too busy with naval gazing nihilism and euro-weasel worship to step up as you have in the past.
here is a silly thought: end the war on drugs. it will do more for our freedom than even outlawing ashcroft would.
This is *not* what the action center is about. I use the action center. It could be much more that it is with something as easy as a discussion list.
You shouldnt give up so easily. The industry you are talking about is run by people. Just like any other industry. Some of us even have a foot in both the tech and the creative media worlds. There is no reason other than money that creative pro-tech minded guerilla marketing savvy activists/lobbyists cant get airtime on tv and in movie theatres before the show starts. The only needs are money and an even more important form of raw capital - the people to support it.
We can build and grow what we need to do this just as we build and grow our communities and the architecture they run on. Dont underestimate the american public... they like their music and movies how they want them when they want them. I dont think theyd take too kindly to what Disney and the rest have been pushing into law if they knew more of how it connects to them.
Yes. So who here wants to do something real, right now, here? We talk about all this work, but informing others, continuing to do what we do in our own lives, and donating money are not the only ways in which we can fight the good fight here. We have to keep in mind why we are even having these discussions in the first place...
If we want to actually change these laws we are so concerned with then we must do what we can on all fronts. Not enough to feel good or to respond to a flash presentation by lessig.... Enough to WIN.
I realize thats an odd concept when we are used to thinking in terms of all the good that the EFF has honestly done. But these laws that remain are still threatening our very livelyhoods and the freedoms we enjoy in our own lives.
That is something i dont doubt Lessig understands very well, and in fact i think it is the reason he has shown so much frustration with those that comment but do not act.
So why not take up this challenge and go and tell the EFF that it needs to open up discussion lists, developers forums, community driven donations, dynamic site content including blogs, and project/issue/action management tools all on its website *without* spending a dime on it... open the damn thing up to the open source community for design and coding volunteers...
Lessig and all of the other board members can go make flash presentations and speeches calling for direct involvement in the work of the EFF. That way the community they serve can see the bang they get for their buck and get their own hands dirty right there and then...
What could possibly be a better fit?
Or you could be going into business against these companies like some of us are doing... but im not supposed to talk about that. :)
Never said they werent doing anything. They are actually doing a hell of a lot. They just arent doing the simplist things they could do to gain a whole lot more support. Why go up against "the man" on your own when you can have a few thousand of your closest allies backing you up?
yes, i have, where do i sign up?
they dont exactly make it very easy to do so.
ive contacted them before and havent gotten much of a response.
The question we still have to answer is "when and how?".
We are each reading these comments and talking about how much more effective one or another course of action could be. What we need now is a trigger... a tipping point. Lessig asked very directly "What have you done?". But we can also ask what the EFF has done to apply to itself all that Lessig is rightly calling for.
Its very surprising and more than a little frustrating that the EFF, this organization that fights for free and dynamic tech, isnt using some of the most common and effective tools available to them.
I dont mind the Tinsel Town vid, but i do think the entire process could be done better. (more on that another time)
I have already written to the webmaster of the EFF asking why they didnt even have something as basic as a discussion list (and not just the announcement lists they currently have). I didnt get much of a response... (just told me to sign up for the announcments - which i had already done).
Im writting to Lessig instead right now.
If you want slashdot to be a breeding ground for change and not just comments, one way to start that would be to help persuade the EFF that it is well past time to make their site and their organization much more dynamic. Creative, issue-action, and other discussion lists would be a very good place to start.
Obviously writing emails to the EFF isnt much in the way of slashdot action and change, but its a small bit in that direction. Any suggestions for bigger ways in which a real slashdot effect can be encouraged would be much appreciated...
Dont we have a right to make a backup copy for our own personaly use, of *any* content we buy?
Obviously the companies we are talking about want to do everything possible to stop us from being able to make a copy of any kind at all, and they have put laws on the books which enforce that.
Maybe all of us who are looking for technical solutions to these violations of our fair use and unregulated rights should be opening up a second front in this war of self defense... responses to bad technology like this shouldnt only take the form of code, as wonderful as that is.
Hacking better code to get around these copy protection schemes is good. Hacking the law to get around the idiocy in washington is also good. Taking real action by coding around bad technology *and* by actively supporting sane copyright and tech laws is much much better.
Where are the laws and candidates for office we are supporting that would require all media of any kind (software, movies, music, etc) to be physically readable *and* easy to make a backup copy of?
CD's and DVD's are perishable. We have paid for the physical media. We have a right, enshrined in the fair use doctrine, to continue being able to access our own purchased media indefinately. Which in this case means we have the right to transfer that media from one place to another if we so choose - at least for our own use. (Filesharing and such is a whole 'nother argument and has nothing to do with this directly).
Why are we letting these companies, that are actually less influential and smaller than we would be if we bothered getting up off our asses, continue to cram bad legislation and bad technology down our throats?
Lets make copy protection methods like this illegal, instead of letting them continue to make every little important thing in our lives restricted and controlled.
One court case does not an end to a battle make. For a random example of how courts arent always right i would refer you to Dred Scott vs. John F. A. Sandford (1857). My point wasnt that the courts have ruled extensively in favor of file sharing, it was that the courts havent handled the issue extensively at all... the case you have mentioned isnt finished yet. What you are talking about is the injunction before trial against Napster, which had the unpleasant effect of shutting it down. The case itself has been overshadowed by that injunction and by the subsequent bankrupcy and aquisition of Napster by one of the record labels.
I just dont think its appropriate for you to role over and play dead whether this one case has so far been decided in our favor or not (remember, the same judge allowed for exploration of whether the big media labels engaged in copyright abuse - which if found to be true would have lead to the charges against napster being thrown out). It may create a single legal precedant but our laws dont work by decree, there is a process that involves argument in court involving many precedants, and in lawmaking bodies, and ultimately by the public itself over whether something is acceptable or not. That process is far from over. It has in fact hardly even begun.
Im sorry, but it isnt clear that sharing copyrighted music in a non-commercial way is illegal. Regardless of how you personally feel about it, it is something that is highly debatable. Besides, this is a free country (in some ways at least), where laws can be argued and *changed*. Whether file-sharing is or should be illegal is in no way a settled matter. The reality of whether it is or not can change from one day to the next, from one year to the next, from one sway of the courts and of public opinion to the next. If you personally feel file-sharing should be illegal that is fine as long as you can back it up and dont just try to pre-empt discussion by asserting that you are right and everyone else is doomed to failure because of some undeniable fact of your choosing before any discussion even begins.
As far as im concerned, the fights over the legality of filesharing, the nature of copyright and free/fair use, the growth of technology and the internet, and all the rest of the assorted battles that are related to these are in no way over yet.
Considering that file sharing is one the biggest/only things driving the growth in numbers of high speed internet customers, along with how big a deal AOL and TimeWarner made of the importance of "broadband" to its marketing strategy at the time of their merger, and not to mention the fact that the new AOL-TimeWarner has lost at least a third of its total value as a company since the merger, i would say alienating current and potential internet users is highly relevant to the companies bottom line interests.
/. community?
If they are losing money on the customers it isnt because of technical fundamentals. As a former customer i can say from first hand experience that their technicians and sys admins arent as skilled as one would hope.
My concern is more about what other options there will be if this becomes an accepted method of enforcement for misguided laws and for the response by a majority of ISPs to the smallest threat of litigation by a big media label. Im not saying that if we dont do something now all hell will break loose... all hell has already broken loose - who cares if it can and continues to get worse. It isnt the end of the world if i dont have my high speed file sharing, but i dont want my MTV anymore and havent for a very long time... i want to take whatever steps can be taken, no matter how small they may be, to push back against these restrictions from the labels and from those ISPs cooperating with them and those lawmakers who happen to be in their pockets. My question is how can any of us do that effectively? How can we increase our options in choosing an ISP and how can we increase our freedom to use those connections?
Any ideas from the
This has nothing to do with murder. I have an actual, inherent right to live... they only have a limited grant of copyright as an incentive to create. This isnt just for the judicial system to handle. This relates to our lives and in a democracy or even a pseudo-democracy it is incumbent on the population itself to be active in its own defense. If there is something like this that large numbers of people like you or me have a very large problem with then the courts are only one area of battle for it. We can also challenge the labels and their mismanagement/abuse of that limited grant more directly through public debate, coordinated countersuits, political means, and financial means... They dont have a right to be exempted from competition or from having to justify their continued grant of "copyright".
This is exactly what is needed. Just need some deep pocketed legal defense/legal action fund to back up those that are taking the fight right back at the RIAA.
One countersuit wont do anything much, but a few thousand could do some damage.
you all still assume incorrectly that file sharing is theft. the DMCA and other illconcieved laws may sway the courts, but even laws can be wrong. they can also be changed. one question should be what exactly the harm is from file sharing, when the industry itself engages in illegal activity through price fixing, cares not one bit about its own artists and extorts ownership of copyrights from them in return for what amounts to a lottery ticket, engages in payola which wipes out any serious claim that royalties should be collected from radio stations (why keep up the sham when the same money is just going in an accounting shell game), and has actively used any means necessary to stamp out existing and emerging competition (net radio, p2p).
/.)
non-commerical sharing gives music an immensly wider exposure than anything else that has come before and is a form of free advertising that the labels could be taking much better advantage of. It also turns out that it wasnt just bullshit when the labels largest customer demographic says consitently that they would by more music rather than less because of file swapping if it wasnt for CD prices being artificially twice what they should be. we want to buy more because we are listening to new things. what a strange concept.
it also turns out that the industry is facing more of a problem from its own mismanagement, its refusal to adapt, and from the enourmous success of DVD's and video games. (why spend so much money on 1 song you like packaged with 10 or 12 or 15 you dont like in a jewel case that is going to break at the slightest stress, when you can buy a DVD or a video game instead?)
some of you might talk about how these businesses have a right to charge what they want for their product.. except they arent engaging in free market economics.... they are practicing captive market, litigate and intimidate, mob rule economics. they enforce control over a product they themselves didnt even create. they are given that opportunity only because of the limited monopoly protection and advantage given to them by our own government. of course copyright is supposed to be a limited incentive to create, not a license to supress. it is not an inherent right. it is not property in any sense other than with the subtlety with which lawyers understand how the word "property" can be used.
im sure many of you are very convinced that the only option is to roll over in the face of the big bad riaa "rightfully protecting" its copyrights and its legions of lawyers threatening to make the lives of individual gnutella and fasttrack and winmx users an unending hell, just to make an example of them. but forgive me if some of us dont see it that way...
it could be said that im just being naive. but then again it could just as easily be said that those who would say so are just being cynical.
(yeah ive got a bit of an attitude in this post... i just was kinda dissapointed with the level of discussion and the rampant smugness here -- expected better from
It also spreads the pain to the point where if the RIAA wants to sue then it is taking on its customers directly. It takes us another step towards the RIAA pissing off too many people, just enough so that the backlash starts in a big way. Connect a system like this with a donation network, a PAC, a legal defense fund, and more forms of action/advocacy... you might start to see congress understanding common sense just a bit more (or at least pretending to under threat of losing campaign dollars and votes).
You assume that slashdot readers actually want to take action about something they care about rather than just talk about it... when it comes to something like linking to NPR then they will write, write, write away... but with something "political", they will stay as far away from it as possible... or at least that is what has happened in the past... i couldnt be happier if it started to change and slashdot readers began to prove me wrong.
That is such bullshit. Im not paying 50 bucks a month for someone to give me trickleband. I want a big phat pipe and thats what i pay for. What i do with it is up to me. Seperating people into "normal" use and "abnormal" use just doesnt cut it. We are supposed to be encouraging the growth of broadband and emergence of new things being done with it... whether that is Video Instant Messaging, Real Time P2P Gaming, Voice Over IP, being able to download/transfer a multi-megabyte file in a short amount of time, or even (as unlikely as you may think it is) *something we havent thought of yet*. The growth of real broadband where all thse that have it actually use it to its fullest is about the only thing that has any chance of hell in re-ignighting the home computer and tech market... along with handhelds and wireless. Whats the point of paying for a new computer with all the bottlenecks finally being worked out if you have to pay through the nose for anything you want to do over the internet. Thankfully the technolgy is sound and that means there are other real alternatives that can make Time Warner regret making stupid business moves that restrict their own consumers... I personally doubt there are many *loyal* time warner subscribers that wouldnt jump at a chance for a better service.... the market is ripe for a company that doesnt have its head stuck up its ass to walk right in.
What id like to see is the convergance of pc and console gaming... Its already happening but id love to see it speed up.
Thats because no one is talking about the positive effects of unrestricted file sharing anymore. Those that see only the *damage* being done to big media are failing to notice the incredible impact of millions of people communicating directly with each other and sharing creative works of all types that they may have otherwise never had access to. This is *exactly* what the copyright clause of the constitution is about... inspiration and exposure to new ideas (ie. innovation).
How many other people besides me, of so many different backgrounds and in so many different locations, are getting so much more serious about music and movie creation in ways ranging from song writing to dj'ing and audio production to screenwriting or anything else having to do with creative arts, because we are exposing each other to all these wonderful movies and music and the rest?
The networking revolution (I know revolution is a cliched word) that is taking place currently is planting the seeds for a creative explosion we have never seen before... similar to the harlem renaissance or the growth of rock and roll (why is it all these labels that made their millions on the backs of artists rebelling against all rules and authrity are no running to congress to protect their own desire for authority?) or even the industrial revolution and the rennaissance itself.
All it took for world changing explosions of creativity like the rennaissance and the age of reason were advances like the printing press and the cultural influence of the islamic world on southern europe.
Have we all failed to understand the impact of the little things we ourselves do that are exactly the same? Have we just decided to remove ourselves from our own lives because we think that what we do no longer has any relation to our own history or our own lives?
I can tell anyone point blank that the movies i am downloading are inspiring me to be more involved in a field i already had some connection to (if you doubt that we can talk about what movies ive downloaded and why and what inspiration ive taken from them). The music im downloading is only feeding into my love of parties, desire to throw myself much more into turntables and guitar and get back to piano after many many years (which im sure many of you can appreciate even if you dont share my particular taste in music)... exposing me to influences that i cant get by only going to shows and parties and watching m2 or listening to corporate radio or having a cd lent to me by a friend. And yes even the games that ive gotten have helped feed into my lifetime as a gamer and real desire to develop games (which just recently became more of a real possiblity thanks to a new friend who is a bit older than me and has been programming for the past 20 years.
I strongly doubt i am alone in the world, even if many people are just benefiting from the good brought to their own lives by *listening* and *watching* all this art they couldnt have otherwise had access to, and not wanting to throw themselves headlong into the creative end of things.
I dont suggest that artists starve or no one profits. *I am* an artist (at least in the sense we are using the word) an i dont want to starve. But there is no reason for artists to starve because of these new emerging changes, and we all know artists are already treated like shit so all the claims by the big labels of having a RIGHT to protection for themselves but not the artists who create the work are just complete bullshit.
If we are really going to discuss how to navigate these changes instead of how to shut them down we need to bring the right people to the table. Lock out the Big Media compainies and Congress, and bring in all the Hardware companies, all Consumers, and all Artists directly (not just propped up superstars who are just pawns of their oppresive contracts).
youre right that it doesnt make any sense to hand over all things to government control but while you exagerate about what is happening by calling it socialism you leave out the damage done by so much corporate control and incompetence, which could just as easily be described as a form of feudalism...
as usual, we get so caught up in government vs business that freedom gets lost in the mix.
also a very good point. if anything what should be done both for better business pratices and for better appearances is for there to be more of a division between the osdn stuff and the for-profit va software stuff.... then we can also see if anything else from va is worth anything and the osdn can support itself from sources like the fund i mentioined earlier and better advertising methods like the self serve advertising thing i just saw a *gasp* banner ad for and more tv/print like non-clickthrouhg based advertising models like weve been talking so much about this morning...
i dont mind the marketing ploy though cause it relates right back to how no matter who owns the domain and the servers slashdot and osdn are still community developed and maintained sites... those that do so much work running slashdot and osdn are a critical part of that community but are not the entire community... so as long as all of us are contributing to this thing anyway why not be a part of marketing research to further it along.
this is a really good point thats been made a few times already. a lot of advertising is actually useful and i like what is advertised on slashdot for the most part as long as it doesnt start to take up more space than the actual content.
except that there is no need for even a minimal fee system. the commodity being traded here (internet access and website running costs) are becoming so dirt cheap that the competition is to intense (or will be) from those providing a better service for free that significant numbers of people would have to be just plain dumb to pay for crapier services.