"Nice rationalization. You most definitely are removing something from someone. The work is copyrighted....not the medium. Walking into a Virgin store and stealing the cd is stealing twice....the medium and the work. If you download an mp3 file that you don't own the cd for you are stealing. Pure and simple. That form of copying isn't covered under fair use."
With the greatest respect, that's utter tosh.
If I copy a cd for my friend, he hasn't stolen anything from me, and I have been deprived of nothing.
If I hum a catchy tune, and someone else starts humming it, the world is enriched, not depleted.
If I offer an insight, here on/., I have not had that idea stolen from me, if someone else thinks about it, reiterates it, or expands on it.
The confusion, I would suggest, that people such as yourself are in, to utter such nonesense, is due to the commercial element in all this, and the copyright law itself, which introduces an artificial, element into the situation.
Before copyright, the idea that playing the same tune in a pub, on your banjo, was stealing from the busker in the street that you heard it from, would be idiotic.
Copyright changes the situation, but it does so for a medium that is itself not subject to the same fundemental laws (rather than legal laws) as physical property, which can resolutely be stolen, and have the owner deprived of it.
Copyright infringement is the breaking of a law, not theft. It's like the breaking of a licensce that says that you can only use your toaster, but no-one else can (and thus have to buy their own if they want a convenient way to make (or more frequently burn) toast.)
If you let someone use your toaster, under such a license, it wouldn't be theft or any other, (what I would characterise as) deliberately over-blown parallel; it would be license breaking.
The toaster making companies wouldn't have a sale, but they also wouldn't be down one stock item either: so it wouldn't be stealing.
The situation is the same with (and here's the word that clues you into it all) unathorised copying of copyright material.
If p2p is damaging the copyright cartels and artists and whoever, and I have yet to read, see or hear of any convincing independent and trustworthy evidence that it is then it would need to be addressed. It would.
But there is no real evidence that it's having any effect.
"Atheist: prove to me that God exists.
Believer: prove to me that he doesn't exist.
Ahh... the eternal argument of who has to prove to whom. An excellent way to make your point without actually making a point."
You can't prove a negative, but you can, a positive, or the presence of something. It's called "having a case." Otherwise one could claim any crazy thing, and insist people believe it on your say-so.
Y'know, like "Hey kids, home taping is killing the music industry!" and the like. [stifles incredulity]
"You have your interpretation of the data and they have theirs."
Well that's why I would want several independent assesments of their case that they are being harmed, so we don't have to rely on my interpretation, or god help us, yours.:D
The question is not whether such copyright infringement is illegal or not, it's whether the situation, ie. the damage to a respectful industry (chortles into sleeve, but shows concern to the artists, natch) merits the implementation of such horrendous laws.
There are good argumnets, and proven cases, of the record industry deliberately over-pricing their wares, and engaging in all sorts of deception, fraud, and scamming.
Their word is worth doo-doo, as is that of their trained hounds.
A little objective assesment of their claims, would show whethjer their case had any merit, or whether they're, yet again, doing their impression of Chicken Little.
You do know their track record, regarding video taping, compact cassette taping, and the like, don't you?
"I bet he was teased in high school and wants to get back at all the bullies."
That's something I'll never understand about people who do that sort of thing; if they want to "gat back at the bullies" why don't they go after the people who bullied them?
It would only take a moment of thought to realise they're persuing innocents, instead of their persecutors.
Yeah, I know, offtopic. Rate it as such if you like.
But you don't have to have a mouse with extra buttons or move your pointer all the way to the back button on the toolbar, in IE.
I just right-click in a space on the page and click "back" that's right at the top of the menu.
Unless you're on a page whose creator thinks he's making all his content secure by disabling right-clicking, that is.
Why do people bother to do that???
The fact of the matter is that the **AA, the copyright cartels, have not proved that their incomes, or the artists which they rip o.. er, represent, have been damaged by Kazaa et al.
Their shrieks and cries of doom, and destruction, on the contrary, echo their histrionic historical wailings, about every new media development under the sun, decimating their livelihoods.
None of that has come to pass.
Let a few truly independent investigations be run, on the claim that the copyright cartels have suffered loss that warrants such draconian laws, and then maybe, we can talk to them, and treat them as deserving of our "concern" (for want of a better term.)
At the moment, all we have is a bunch melodramatic control freaks, in a behaviour-loop, with no proven basis for their "concerns."
As such, people who know their track record (no pun intended) choose to treat them with the contempt they deserve, and will continue to deserve, until they stop lying, distorting, dissembling and duping, and come up with some independently verified, hard facts that merit that anything is done.
(I always forget the details, but never the point, so don't ask me where or when, exactly.)
There was some small civilization in the Pacific, I think. It acquired, unfortunately for them, a foreign dictatorship, which decided it would rule over it.
The people weren't much fussed, and carried on their lives.
The dictatorship, decided it didn't like their subjects' sounds and banned the people's music.
The people weren't much fussed, accepted the ban and carried on with their lives.
The dictatorship, decided it didn't like their religious ceremonies, and banned them.
The people weren't much fussed, accepted the ban and carried on with their lives.
The dictatorship banned their traditional ways of fishing, and all other aspects of their culture; and the people accepted it and carried on.
The dictatorship banned the people's favourite home-brew, and there was a revolution, and they rid themselves of their dictators.
No word of a lie, this actually happened.
The moral of this story?
Don't underestimate people's tolerance for abuse (or their compacency.) It might be a long while, and a lot of freedom lost, before the general public gets up off it's arse.
It's also exactly the same as a serial number that you get on any houshold electrical device.
Putting it on media, is hardly revolutionary, unique, or inventive.
Nor is the use to which you then put it.
I think some people would patent wiping their arse.
I agree totally with your point.
Then, a better law would be, say 20 years from it being copyrighted, regardless of the author's state of being.
My point was and is, largely, that giving a copyright for the length of time an author/artist is alive, is something that manifestly does not advance creativity.
"... there has always been a quid-pro-quo in copyright: the author benefits from being given a temporary monopoly (this is his incentive to create)..."(emphasis mine)
If copyright exists for life plus x number of years, then just how is this an incentive for the artist to create?????
If copyright existed for 15-20 years during the artist's lifetime, this would be an incentive for the artist to create more work: to pay his bills, instead of coasting on the royalties of one successful work of art, for a lifetime!
(I can't figure out why no one seems to have argued this point.)
(I also say this as an artist.)
Yeah, I know what you mean. Lets have personal nukes for everyone, and just hope they use them responsibly!
Since human beings are diverse in character, giving out dangerous guns to pretty-much anyone who wants one, is, IMHO, complicity to the act of murder in itself.
I, mean, otherwise, it's ok to give, say, chemical weapons to an oppressive dictator, and resolve yourself from any responsibility when he commits an act of mass-murder.
Chemical weapons don't kill people, psychotic dictators kill people!
last I heard, the films were going through some sort of legal wranglings over ownership and money, that meant that dvds of the first two might never be released.
They are two of the greatest films in the history of cinema, IMHO, and the news of the release of a new film, and the dvds, has made my day.
The problem with intellectual property is in the length of time that works are protected for.
With that famous anti-depressant, whose name illudes me just as I need it (as usual,) it's payent is already up, and people can produce it generically, for cheaper.
What the tech industry needs is a similar, or comparable, time-limit on software and hardware.
Copyright is fine. It encourages people to create, and gives them a limited protection for the exploitation of their idea, a reward for bringing it forth into the open. Nothing wrong with that.
The problem lies with things like the extension of the copyright monopoly, from temporary and limited, to expanding, and seemingly never-ending.
Shorten the protection to something more reasonable and fitting to the arena the ip is part of, and the balance will be restored.
Kevin wasn't being paid by HP, so why should he owe them anything?
He didn't have to tell them their product had a flaw.
If I buy a microwave and discover that it'll leak radiation, say, if the user does something out of the usual, I could tell the maker, or I could tell the press.
Why do I owe the maker anything? Why do I owe it to them to help them out? They don't pay me.
If it's my civic duty to inform someone about the product flaw, so people don't get hurt, why should I be forced to only tell the manufacturer?
I say a blacklist is created of all the companies who threaten people who disclose the faults in their products, with the intention that those who care about their own legal safety, know who not to help.
They leave them to their own devices, let the bugs build up and let the truth out, through black-hat hackers, exploiting the flaws.
Much greater negative publicity for the company involved, (if that's what they're scared of) then we'll see them change their stupid attitudes.
Maybe what is needed is a positive enviroment where a security weakness revelation can be seen clearly to be a good thing, by the people who use the product, and the people who make it.
I see plenty of "negative" reports of "this, that or whatever," discovered to have another security flaw, as if that revelation were a bad thing. Every tech news source seems to portray them as such
If you could present these disclosures in an intellectually/philosphically "positive" light, I think the fears of these law-suit happy people might go away.
I can't think of a way to do it, but maybe some advertising people could (they've got to have some use.)
"If people are coming into my country, I sure as hell want to know that they aren't going to be a danger to anyone."
Yeah, I know what you mean.
If I'm walking past someone in the street, I wanna know they aren't going to be a danger to me.
Or if someone moves into the neighbourhood.
Or a work-colleague.
Or that person in the pub.
What do you mean this thing doesn't check them out?
"...but that's what is commonly known as a good employee."
Maybe they'll pat him on the head and toss him a few choccy-drops, if he's lucky, too!
Or a nice plaque to hang on his wall, saying how much the company values his service.
Seriously, though, this guy was an inventor, he was on a quest. And that means he's not going to be producing 98% of the time; he's exploring, searching for the mother-lode.
He found it, and they were lucky to back the right horse.
Another way of describing "he...made the company alot more money than they were paying him" is exploitation.
And this is a lot more, that they're making.
With respect, you're missing the point.
Such a relationship is symbiotic: he needs to live; if he can't feed himself etc. he can't research and invent. If he can't do that, the company can't make loads of money from his invention.
But when he finally comes up with a hugely profitable invention, it would seem morally wrong to me, for his "sponsor" to keep all the spoils for themselves.
IMO, it's power, and the abuse of that power. Business, like everything else takes place in the moral world.
Slashdot Mirror
"Nice rationalization. You most definitely are removing something from someone. The work is copyrighted....not the medium. Walking into a Virgin store and stealing the cd is stealing twice....the medium and the work. If you download an mp3 file that you don't own the cd for you are stealing. Pure and simple. That form of copying isn't covered under fair use."
/., I have not had that idea stolen from me, if someone else thinks about it, reiterates it, or expands on it.
With the greatest respect, that's utter tosh.
If I copy a cd for my friend, he hasn't stolen anything from me, and I have been deprived of nothing.
If I hum a catchy tune, and someone else starts humming it, the world is enriched, not depleted.
If I offer an insight, here on
The confusion, I would suggest, that people such as yourself are in, to utter such nonesense, is due to the commercial element in all this, and the copyright law itself, which introduces an artificial, element into the situation.
Before copyright, the idea that playing the same tune in a pub, on your banjo, was stealing from the busker in the street that you heard it from, would be idiotic.
Copyright changes the situation, but it does so for a medium that is itself not subject to the same fundemental laws (rather than legal laws) as physical property, which can resolutely be stolen, and have the owner deprived of it.
Copyright infringement is the breaking of a law, not theft. It's like the breaking of a licensce that says that you can only use your toaster, but no-one else can (and thus have to buy their own if they want a convenient way to make (or more frequently burn) toast.)
If you let someone use your toaster, under such a license, it wouldn't be theft or any other, (what I would characterise as) deliberately over-blown parallel; it would be license breaking.
The toaster making companies wouldn't have a sale, but they also wouldn't be down one stock item either: so it wouldn't be stealing.
The situation is the same with (and here's the word that clues you into it all) unathorised copying of copyright material.
If p2p is damaging the copyright cartels and artists and whoever, and I have yet to read, see or hear of any convincing independent and trustworthy evidence that it is then it would need to be addressed. It would.
But there is no real evidence that it's having any effect.
"Atheist: prove to me that God exists.
:D
Believer: prove to me that he doesn't exist.
Ahh... the eternal argument of who has to prove to whom. An excellent way to make your point without actually making a point."
You can't prove a negative, but you can, a positive, or the presence of something. It's called "having a case." Otherwise one could claim any crazy thing, and insist people believe it on your say-so.
Y'know, like "Hey kids, home taping is killing the music industry!" and the like. [stifles incredulity]
"You have your interpretation of the data and they have theirs."
Well that's why I would want several independent assesments of their case that they are being harmed, so we don't have to rely on my interpretation, or god help us, yours.
The question is not whether such copyright infringement is illegal or not, it's whether the situation, ie. the damage to a respectful industry (chortles into sleeve, but shows concern to the artists, natch) merits the implementation of such horrendous laws.
There are good argumnets, and proven cases, of the record industry deliberately over-pricing their wares, and engaging in all sorts of deception, fraud, and scamming.
Their word is worth doo-doo, as is that of their trained hounds.
A little objective assesment of their claims, would show whethjer their case had any merit, or whether they're, yet again, doing their impression of Chicken Little.
You do know their track record, regarding video taping, compact cassette taping, and the like, don't you?
"I bet he was teased in high school and wants to get back at all the bullies."
That's something I'll never understand about people who do that sort of thing; if they want to "gat back at the bullies" why don't they go after the people who bullied them?
It would only take a moment of thought to realise they're persuing innocents, instead of their persecutors.
Yeah, I know, offtopic. Rate it as such if you like.
But you don't have to have a mouse with extra buttons or move your pointer all the way to the back button on the toolbar, in IE.
I just right-click in a space on the page and click "back" that's right at the top of the menu.
Unless you're on a page whose creator thinks he's making all his content secure by disabling right-clicking, that is.
Why do people bother to do that???
The fact of the matter is that the **AA, the copyright cartels, have not proved that their incomes, or the artists which they rip o.. er, represent, have been damaged by Kazaa et al.
Their shrieks and cries of doom, and destruction, on the contrary, echo their histrionic historical wailings, about every new media development under the sun, decimating their livelihoods.
None of that has come to pass.
Let a few truly independent investigations be run, on the claim that the copyright cartels have suffered loss that warrants such draconian laws, and then maybe, we can talk to them, and treat them as deserving of our "concern" (for want of a better term.)
At the moment, all we have is a bunch melodramatic control freaks, in a behaviour-loop, with no proven basis for their "concerns."
As such, people who know their track record (no pun intended) choose to treat them with the contempt they deserve, and will continue to deserve, until they stop lying, distorting, dissembling and duping, and come up with some independently verified, hard facts that merit that anything is done.
In my humble opinion.
Maybe they'll make an Itchy & Scratchy short.
That would be cool.
(I always forget the details, but never the point, so don't ask me where or when, exactly.)
There was some small civilization in the Pacific, I think. It acquired, unfortunately for them, a foreign dictatorship, which decided it would rule over it.
The people weren't much fussed, and carried on their lives.
The dictatorship, decided it didn't like their subjects' sounds and banned the people's music.
The people weren't much fussed, accepted the ban and carried on with their lives.
The dictatorship, decided it didn't like their religious ceremonies, and banned them.
The people weren't much fussed, accepted the ban and carried on with their lives.
The dictatorship banned their traditional ways of fishing, and all other aspects of their culture; and the people accepted it and carried on.
The dictatorship banned the people's favourite home-brew, and there was a revolution, and they rid themselves of their dictators.
No word of a lie, this actually happened.
The moral of this story?
Don't underestimate people's tolerance for abuse (or their compacency.) It might be a long while, and a lot of freedom lost, before the general public gets up off it's arse.
Respectfully.
It's simple, say this:
"Daer Sir, the Klez virus forges e-mail headders. Look it up.
Now fuck off."
In my opinion, nothing more should be needed.
That's what I would do.
It's also exactly the same as a serial number that you get on any houshold electrical device.
Putting it on media, is hardly revolutionary, unique, or inventive.
Nor is the use to which you then put it.
I think some people would patent wiping their arse.
I agree totally with your point.
Then, a better law would be, say 20 years from it being copyrighted, regardless of the author's state of being.
My point was and is, largely, that giving a copyright for the length of time an author/artist is alive, is something that manifestly does not advance creativity.
"... there has always been a quid-pro-quo in copyright: the author benefits from being given a temporary monopoly (this is his incentive to create)..." (emphasis mine)
If copyright exists for life plus x number of years, then just how is this an incentive for the artist to create?????
If copyright existed for 15-20 years during the artist's lifetime, this would be an incentive for the artist to create more work: to pay his bills, instead of coasting on the royalties of one successful work of art, for a lifetime!
(I can't figure out why no one seems to have argued this point.)
(I also say this as an artist.)
Yeah, I know what you mean. Lets have personal nukes for everyone, and just hope they use them responsibly!
Since human beings are diverse in character, giving out dangerous guns to pretty-much anyone who wants one, is, IMHO, complicity to the act of murder in itself.
I, mean, otherwise, it's ok to give, say, chemical weapons to an oppressive dictator, and resolve yourself from any responsibility when he commits an act of mass-murder.
Chemical weapons don't kill people, psychotic dictators kill people!
last I heard, the films were going through some sort of legal wranglings over ownership and money, that meant that dvds of the first two might never be released.
They are two of the greatest films in the history of cinema, IMHO, and the news of the release of a new film, and the dvds, has made my day.
Hurray for CowboyNeal.
...they'll have anything of the Twin Towers in the film?
The problem with intellectual property is in the length of time that works are protected for.
With that famous anti-depressant, whose name illudes me just as I need it (as usual,) it's payent is already up, and people can produce it generically, for cheaper.
What the tech industry needs is a similar, or comparable, time-limit on software and hardware.
Copyright is fine. It encourages people to create, and gives them a limited protection for the exploitation of their idea, a reward for bringing it forth into the open. Nothing wrong with that.
The problem lies with things like the extension of the copyright monopoly, from temporary and limited, to expanding, and seemingly never-ending.
Shorten the protection to something more reasonable and fitting to the arena the ip is part of, and the balance will be restored.
Kevin wasn't being paid by HP, so why should he owe them anything?
He didn't have to tell them their product had a flaw.
If I buy a microwave and discover that it'll leak radiation, say, if the user does something out of the usual, I could tell the maker, or I could tell the press.
Why do I owe the maker anything? Why do I owe it to them to help them out? They don't pay me.
If it's my civic duty to inform someone about the product flaw, so people don't get hurt, why should I be forced to only tell the manufacturer?
I say a blacklist is created of all the companies who threaten people who disclose the faults in their products, with the intention that those who care about their own legal safety, know who not to help.
They leave them to their own devices, let the bugs build up and let the truth out, through black-hat hackers, exploiting the flaws.
Much greater negative publicity for the company involved, (if that's what they're scared of) then we'll see them change their stupid attitudes.
Maybe what is needed is a positive enviroment where a security weakness revelation can be seen clearly to be a good thing, by the people who use the product, and the people who make it.
I see plenty of "negative" reports of "this, that or whatever," discovered to have another security flaw, as if that revelation were a bad thing. Every tech news source seems to portray them as such
If you could present these disclosures in an intellectually/philosphically "positive" light, I think the fears of these law-suit happy people might go away.
I can't think of a way to do it, but maybe some advertising people could (they've got to have some use.)
I downloaded and installed Limewire long before I tried Kazaa. It didn't work for me. Nothing I did seemed to help. Downloads just didn't happen.
I installed Kazaa (Lite, natch) and I was downloading straight away.
Besides anyone who knows how to tie their shoes, uses Kazaa Lite, with no adverts (or spyware) for free.
I don't agree with this post, but it is so not off-topic.
"If people are coming into my country, I sure as hell want to know that they aren't going to be a danger to anyone."
Yeah, I know what you mean.
If I'm walking past someone in the street, I wanna know they aren't going to be a danger to me.
Or if someone moves into the neighbourhood.
Or a work-colleague.
Or that person in the pub.
What do you mean this thing doesn't check them out?
"...but that's what is commonly known as a good employee."
Maybe they'll pat him on the head and toss him a few choccy-drops, if he's lucky, too!
Or a nice plaque to hang on his wall, saying how much the company values his service.
Seriously, though, this guy was an inventor, he was on a quest. And that means he's not going to be producing 98% of the time; he's exploring, searching for the mother-lode.
He found it, and they were lucky to back the right horse.
Another way of describing "he...made the company alot more money than they were paying him" is exploitation.
And this is a lot more, that they're making.
With respect, you're missing the point.
Such a relationship is symbiotic: he needs to live; if he can't feed himself etc. he can't research and invent. If he can't do that, the company can't make loads of money from his invention.
But when he finally comes up with a hugely profitable invention, it would seem morally wrong to me, for his "sponsor" to keep all the spoils for themselves.
IMO, it's power, and the abuse of that power. Business, like everything else takes place in the moral world.
"...I mean that was what they were paying you for in the first place."
Yeah, but considering the enormous financial gains they stand to make out of such an invention, are they paying him a fair rate for his work?
It is all a bit "Lawnmower Man."
Nah, I paint and draw.... y'know like a real artist. >:)