I can't believe that this witless cack has been modded up.
The reason that no-one has remarked on the minority status of men is not, as you suppose, that only you have noticed this sinister development. It is because everyone has known it for years and years and years. Women make up a majority of the population in most countries. Over the last three decades, the population of the UK has fluctuated very little from a 48.7:51.3 male-to-female ratio. This is entirely due to women's greater life expectancy. In fact, the population under the age of 65 has a majority of males (52.4%). Although I don't have the age-based numbers to hand, the USA and Canada both have largely female populations (about 50.9% in the USA, 50.5% in Canada). I think you'll find similar numbers elsewhere.
"It would be more like someone taught you how to fish, and helped you for a long time, let you use their gear and all, and now says that you can't fish at all, even using your own tackle."
No, it is not like that at all. What it is like is this:
"It would be more like someone taught you how to fish, and helped you for a long time, let you use their gear and all, and now says that you can't use their gear any more without paying for it".
But that would mean that Microsoft isn't the Devil, so that can't be right, can it?
And even when you get through to their home page, it's still incoherent rubbish:
"Aggressive pricing clubbed with superior quality of services, has seen Olagam Software Solutions build strong relationships with its customers. Furthermore, our flexible pricing models including the fixed price model, time & material contracts, retainer-ship and the virtual office concept or the retainer-ship model has resulting in many Software Developers to transfer most of their development with us."
I'm sure that the "offshore model" is just great, but perhaps they should have got someone fluent in English to write their copy for them.
Several years ago I worked as a Customs officer at an airfield (now closed) on the outskirts of London. Most of the traffic was business jets with, typically, one or two passengers. Business aviation into London was (and probably still is, as it probably is around most major business centres) a very competitive market; and both the flight handling companies and the aircraft operators would often be onto you in an attempt to ease the passage of their clients through the frontier controls.
Anyway, on one occasion I was on duty for the arrival of a flight with a single passenger, a Russian ballet dancer (I think - certainly an entertainer of some sort). He arrived without much baggage but what he did have was cases full of make-up and cosmetics. Not long before, I'd watched a training video about concealments for contraband goods which had focussed on the use of false-bottomed aerosol canisters, make-up pots etc., so I decided to have a look at this guy's stuff. It didn't take all that long - five minutes at most, I'd say - but after he'd gone the pilot came to complain about the delay to his passenger. His key point, which he was very insistent about, was: "the man's paid three thousand pounds to hire a plane. He's not likely to be the sort of person who would be smuggling anything into the country, is he?"
I pointed out to him that high-ranking members of drug cartels, for instance, probably wouldn't find three thousand pounds out their reach if it meant that they didn't have to go through Customs, but I'm not sure whether he really got the point.
Well, haven't you ever been late to a critical meeting and gone 10mph above the limit?
Of course I have; and so has everybody else who's ever driven a car. But if you do that and then lose control of the car and plough into oncoming traffic, or mow down a passing pedestrian, I can only suggest that you don't make: "but don't you understand? It was a critical meeting" the cornerstone of your legal defence. Nor should you have an inviolable right to suppress evidence which undermines your own case.
People are indeed accustomed to seeing VAT included in the price of goods because, as you rightly say, it's a legal requirement that it's shown.
There's no restriction, though, on showing both the VAT-inclusive and VAT-exclusive price of goods alongside one another. In the UK, at least, the only retail goods which I can think of where that's done as a matter of course are computers and related gear. In most cases the VAT-exclusive price is given greater prominence, but the inclusive price is always shown too. The situation for goods sold between businesses is slightly different: in those cases it's usual to show the VAT-exclusive price and show the VAT as a separate item (because VAT-registered buyers can claim back the VAT they've paid on their own purchases later. And no, you can't simply register yourself and escape VAT altogether: this is a simplified description, there's a ton of other rules about registration and liability.
I think that the philosophical underpinning for all this is rooted in historic attitudes to tax. The EU way has the advantage that you can see exactly what you're going to pay. The US approach is like a declaration that "this is what I'm charging you. Don't blame me when the cost turns out to be more, blame the politicians!"
I know that this was the thing that I found most difficult to get used to the first time I was in the USA. It was okay for the big things, but it just got a bit wearing having to think about it for every single purchase, no matter how trivial.
Yes, we paid for it through the licence fee; but most of this programming has paid for itself through export sales several times over - or at least the programming that's likely to attract really high levels of international interest has. What's more it will quite likely continue to do so.
Besides, the BBC's archive should be a source of national pride (well, maybe not Terry and June, but you get the idea). It's a globally-important collection which makes a powerful statement about our cultural values. I'm not blind to the commercial value of this material, but "we're smart, we're classy, we're worthy of respect" certainly seems like a more potent message to be sending than "we're so desperate for money that we've always got our hand down the back of the couch on the off-chance that we'll find 50p".
Firstly, I rather doubt that the RIAA is on your personal case, because you're in the UK aren't you? So while I respect the success of your karma whoring (oooh! 4 "Insightful"! well done!) I don't think we need to get too stressed out about your own relations with the evil **AA.
Secondly, how is it that you can discern the technical difference between theft and copyright infringement (even though that difference in no way legitimises your appropriation of music to which they have no legal or moral entitlement); yet you seem to be unable to grasp the fact that the RIAA doesn't have "an effective policy for sale and promotion on the Internet" because it doesn't release, distribute or sell music and it never has.
The RIAA is a trade organisation. One of its functions is to present a public relations front for its member corporations. Another is to lobby for certain legal measures which would work in the interests of its members (this is the one known as "buying politicians" to/. folk who have convinced themselves that the reason copyright laws get passed is that Government is in the pockets of the corporations; and not that copyright holders actually have a more powerful case than "I want it. I want it now and if I can't have it then it's not fair!" - which is the best that many of the d/l crowd have to offer). What they don't do is sell music.
I registered with the NYT about a year ago and I've had little or no spam as a result. I say "little or no" because I did get an e-mailed bulletin about the world fine-art market twice a week or so for several months. I assumed that this was a result of registering with NYT because it seemed to fit the "NYT demographic" rather better than any of the other things I've ever registered for.
Is there any easy (spam isn't such a problem for me - touch wood - that I'm willing to spend ages looking into where it comes from) way of telling where this stuff originates from?
Ask the Canadians about hard wood lumber or the Europeans about bananas or Detroit about selling cars in Japan
Or the Americans about steel?
And any tax rate times $0 is still zero. You already pay duty, sales or value added taxes when you buy a distro now but that is not on the free software. What happens if other countries put a tariff on proprietary U.S. software
FWIW, the basis on which import charges are assessed on software imported to the EU is that the duty is charged on the value of the carrier media alone (i.e. the disk, or whatever); at present the rate for software is 0%, but even if this went up the basis of the value is so low that the actual duty due would be negligible. This is identical to the current US rate (US customs tariff, section 85 - sorry, but it's a.pdf). The fact is that most countries impose very similar tariffs on all kinds of goods. The US and EU tariffs are almost identical in most respects. The US is not the poor, put upon victim of some wicked global trade plot.
If they want to strangle their own economy then so be it. It will make their raw materials and goods cheaper for us to import.
Well this is the real point, isn't it? Goods and services produced in third world countries are generally cheap because the workers who provide them are VERY, VERY, VERY POOR. While it would be naive to suppose that government-sponsored dumping doesn't go on, the biggest reason why Chinese (for example) steel is much cheaper than US steel is that Chinese workers earn a fraction of what their US counterparts do and work in conditions which would never be tolerated in the West.
If you find the export of US tech jobs to India offensive (and the same process is happening in Europe, Japan and just about every other developed economy) then fine, make a moral stand. Hell, I won't be the one to argue with you. But bear in mind that the reason you can buy clothes, for instance, as cheaply as you can is that the jobs producing those things have been exported, too.
The percentage of U.S. citizens who make a living in Agriculture is at an all time low
...and this is in spite of exactly the same kind of protectionism which you advocate for the tech sector.
What if the imbalance between supply and demand is sufficiently great that removal of one (for example) magazine doesn't effect the ability of the owner to realise his maximum possible sales?
Many, many magazines are returned to the publishers and subsequently pulped. AFAIK it's rare for a magazine to completely sell out its print run. What if I go into a shop, tear a couple of pages out of a magazine and walk out? Is it a satisfactory argument to say that the retailer still has more copies than he can sell, so all I've done is to reduce the amount of paper he'll be sending back to the publisher?
What about if I wait until the end of that particular issue's currency and then just take the whole magazine (it's quite usual - in the UK, at least - to see bundles of magazines and newspapers stacked in the corners of shops prior to being collected for return to the publisher)? Is that okay. because the retailer's already sold all that he was going to and I probably wouldn't have bought the magazine anyway?
Why is this "intellectually unwholesome"? Presumably because (to restate the justification often posted on/.) "the owner is not deprived of anything by the act of copying".
Well, I'm always reading posts about the failure of the law to keep pace with technology, usually with the subtext (expressed or otherwise) that what's needed is for government basically just to butt out of the entire area of information transmission, content protection etc. (apart from dumping on Bill Gates' head, obviously: that seems to be okay). Maybe, though, the lawmakers should "keep up" by redrawing the theft / copyright violation distinction in the other direction.
In the past, property - including stuff which might now be described as Intellectual Property - was pretty much all physical, or at least had a physical manifestation (a book, for instance, or an artwork). Copying that property essentially entailed manufacturing it from scratch, with all the associated costs of production and distribution. While you could produce a cheap version of copyrighted material and market it in competition with the "official" product, the relative quality of the two would be evident to the buyer (all those bootleg "live" cassettes I bought back when I was a student, for example).
Nowadays there are companies who produce, in essence, nothing but information. That may be music or software or analysis of some kind; but whatever it is, it has no physical manifestation. Easily available technology allows this information to be replicated exactly, with no differentiation in quality from the "official" version. Yet that information clearly cost something to produce. Real money was spent in the creative or production process (and it doesn't matter how much went to each of the parties involved, so long as everybody got what they were entitled to on the basis of agreements freely entered into; so don't be whining about the RIAA and the artists' share) and the producer can only hope to secure a return on that investment if he can control distribution of the product. Creation of perfect copies from which the producer derives no benefit clearly represents a loss to him. Perhaps we should start recognising this as theft rather than as copyright violation, because the alternative is to say, in effect, that it is impossible to steal from these companies.
...a news website which charges subscription is simply the same as a newspaper subscription, and that is VAT free in the UK
Yes newspapers are VAT free, but the law refers specifically to "printed matter". Although the philosophical justification for zero-rating books etc. is that VAT would represent a "tax on learning", the law doesn't extend the same consideration to websites. Customs and Excise notice 701/10 (which is available online here, but I don't know the exact url) states that "Any non-printed matter, such as audio or video cassettes or CD Rom is standard-rated. This includes the storage and distribution of textual information by fax, e-mail, microfiche, or any similar process" (section 1.17).
"If someone emigrates to the UK they do not pay VAT or any tax on the possessions"
True, but not because the goods are second hand. There's a general relief from VAT and duty for "Transfer of Residence", but it is subject to some rules. The relief only applies to goods which you've owned for a certain period and there used to be (and maybe still are, I don't know) restrictions on how long you had to wait before disposing of them, too.
"no VAT should be chargeable for auctioned items that are not new (being sold by retail via auction)"
This is irrelevant in the context of the article, since it relates to the services provided in connection with the sale, rather than the sale itself. That said, second-hand goods are, in fact, liable to duty and VAT at import. You would generally expect to pay less than for new items, but only because their second-handness would presumably be reflected in their value.
"Within the EU, a person pays VAT to the member state that the item purchased is purchased from"
In general terms, private purchasers and businesses which aren't registered for VAT pay in the state where the sale occurs i.e. where the vendor is located. VAT-registered businesses account for their purchases in the state they're registered in.
A lot depends on what you're buying. Nearly everything that I've ever bought from the USA has been books / magazines, which are zero-rated for VAT (in the UK, at least) and import duty. The shipper sticks the green form on the package, the postman delivers the goods to my door, end of story.
If you buy goods which aren't zero-rated, though, it's more complicated. In general terms, Customs duty is added on the basis of the value of the goods including the cost of shipping and insurance. VAT is then added (17.5% in the UK) on the value of the goods including the duty (yes, you do pay VAT on the customs duty!). The fee from the handling company is between you, the shipper and the vendor, but I think it's part of the terms of service (using the word "service" loosely). You don't get it with goods shipped by post.
There are thresholds below which value duty and VAT aren't charged: on postal imports the limits are £18; or £36 (actually 45 Euro) for gifts (there are rules defining the meaning of "gift"). Just to complicate things, these limits apply to the intrinsic value of the goods, which is the price paid for the goods exclusive of shipping etc.
The effect of that is that the costs associated with buying from abroad cut in quite suddenly and dramatically. I can buy something for, say $25 (about £15.50) plus $11 (£6.80) shipping and handling and pay no import charges at all, but goods costing $30 (£18.75-ish) +s/h will cost me £25.55 (goods + shipping) plus, say £2.55 in duty (depending on the exact nature of the goods, obviously) plus £4.91 VAT (17.5% on £28.10). That's a total of £7.46 in charges, as opposed to nil for goods only slightly cheaper.
Of course, all this applies to physical goods. The article refers to digital goods and services. No-one is going to be paying one penny, or Euro extra in VAT for goods bought from outside the EU because of this.
Disclaimer: I work for HM Customs and Excise, who collect these charges. Until quite recently I specialised in the valuation of imported goods.
Fair enough, if that's the case then I apologise for misjudging you.
I won't buy copy protected CDs for the same reason that you evidently won't; but I believe that the music industry has the right to market their wares in a way which unnecessarily limits their sales if that's what they choose to do.
Even if you don't do it, there's never a shortage of people posting about how they d/l music because CDs are too expensive or because they only want a couple of songs off the album or because they don't want to give money to the record companies. Hell, I've never downloaded a song in my life, but I agree with the first two points myself.
My point was that if that's how they feel, then it's their right to choose not to patronise those companies. But the exercise of that right implies making certain sacrifices in the pursuit of what they consider to be a righteous cause (i.e. the eventual downfall of the record companies). In this particular case that sacrifice is that they limit their own access to RIAA member-produced material. The record companies, remember, have paid the artists for the right to market that music. If they then limit their own return on that investment by choosing a sales model which restricts sales, that's their affair; but the material is theirs to sell, just the same.
Boycotting the products of the big-label music industry in protest at their profiteering, mistreatment of artists or whatever other behaviour you don't like is an entirely justified exercise of your power as a consumer in a free market and is ethically unimpeachable.
On the other hand, shouting "boycott the RIAA" and availing yourself of their intellectual property (for which they paid the actual producers - the musicians - in accordance with a contract freely entered into by both parties) anyway through P2P is a simple refusal to accept the consequences of your own actions (e.g. that your assault on the RIAA may have certain costs associated with it, such as lack of access to their products) and is chickenshit.
Slashdot Mirror
The reason that no-one has remarked on the minority status of men is not, as you suppose, that only you have noticed this sinister development. It is because everyone has known it for years and years and years. Women make up a majority of the population in most countries. Over the last three decades, the population of the UK has fluctuated very little from a 48.7:51.3 male-to-female ratio. This is entirely due to women's greater life expectancy. In fact, the population under the age of 65 has a majority of males (52.4%). Although I don't have the age-based numbers to hand, the USA and Canada both have largely female populations (about 50.9% in the USA, 50.5% in Canada). I think you'll find similar numbers elsewhere.
So I did; and what I found there was:
"What you should look out for: Warning Signs"
And clicking on that I found this, from which I quote:
"Users should exercise caution in the following circumstances:
If the bottom of the browser window is intentionally hidden."
Now try clicking on the thumbnails at the bottom and see how many of their examples appear to be from evil spammers, based on Symantech's own advice.
No, it is not like that at all. What it is like is this:
"It would be more like someone taught you how to fish, and helped you for a long time, let you use their gear and all, and now says that you can't use their gear any more without paying for it".
But that would mean that Microsoft isn't the Devil, so that can't be right, can it?
"Aggressive pricing clubbed with superior quality of services, has seen Olagam Software Solutions build strong relationships with its customers. Furthermore, our flexible pricing models including the fixed price model, time & material contracts, retainer-ship and the virtual office concept or the retainer-ship model has resulting in many Software Developers to transfer most of their development with us."
I'm sure that the "offshore model" is just great, but perhaps they should have got someone fluent in English to write their copy for them.
Anyway, on one occasion I was on duty for the arrival of a flight with a single passenger, a Russian ballet dancer (I think - certainly an entertainer of some sort). He arrived without much baggage but what he did have was cases full of make-up and cosmetics. Not long before, I'd watched a training video about concealments for contraband goods which had focussed on the use of false-bottomed aerosol canisters, make-up pots etc., so I decided to have a look at this guy's stuff. It didn't take all that long - five minutes at most, I'd say - but after he'd gone the pilot came to complain about the delay to his passenger. His key point, which he was very insistent about, was: "the man's paid three thousand pounds to hire a plane. He's not likely to be the sort of person who would be smuggling anything into the country, is he?"
I pointed out to him that high-ranking members of drug cartels, for instance, probably wouldn't find three thousand pounds out their reach if it meant that they didn't have to go through Customs, but I'm not sure whether he really got the point.
There's no restriction, though, on showing both the VAT-inclusive and VAT-exclusive price of goods alongside one another. In the UK, at least, the only retail goods which I can think of where that's done as a matter of course are computers and related gear. In most cases the VAT-exclusive price is given greater prominence, but the inclusive price is always shown too. The situation for goods sold between businesses is slightly different: in those cases it's usual to show the VAT-exclusive price and show the VAT as a separate item (because VAT-registered buyers can claim back the VAT they've paid on their own purchases later. And no, you can't simply register yourself and escape VAT altogether: this is a simplified description, there's a ton of other rules about registration and liability.
I think that the philosophical underpinning for all this is rooted in historic attitudes to tax. The EU way has the advantage that you can see exactly what you're going to pay. The US approach is like a declaration that "this is what I'm charging you. Don't blame me when the cost turns out to be more, blame the politicians!"
I know that this was the thing that I found most difficult to get used to the first time I was in the USA. It was okay for the big things, but it just got a bit wearing having to think about it for every single purchase, no matter how trivial.
Yes, we paid for it through the licence fee; but most of this programming has paid for itself through export sales several times over - or at least the programming that's likely to attract really high levels of international interest has. What's more it will quite likely continue to do so.
Besides, the BBC's archive should be a source of national pride (well, maybe not Terry and June, but you get the idea). It's a globally-important collection which makes a powerful statement about our cultural values. I'm not blind to the commercial value of this material, but "we're smart, we're classy, we're worthy of respect" certainly seems like a more potent message to be sending than "we're so desperate for money that we've always got our hand down the back of the couch on the off-chance that we'll find 50p".
Secondly, how is it that you can discern the technical difference between theft and copyright infringement (even though that difference in no way legitimises your appropriation of music to which they have no legal or moral entitlement); yet you seem to be unable to grasp the fact that the RIAA doesn't have "an effective policy for sale and promotion on the Internet" because it doesn't release, distribute or sell music and it never has.
The RIAA is a trade organisation. One of its functions is to present a public relations front for its member corporations. Another is to lobby for certain legal measures which would work in the interests of its members (this is the one known as "buying politicians" to /. folk who have convinced themselves that the reason copyright laws get passed is that Government is in the pockets of the corporations; and not that copyright holders actually have a more powerful case than "I want it. I want it now and if I can't have it then it's not fair!" - which is the best that many of the d/l crowd have to offer). What they don't do is sell music.
Indeed they did
Mind you, I'll have to unpack the three Mondrians, the Picasso and the Van Gogh I've bought this week first. :)
Is there any easy (spam isn't such a problem for me - touch wood - that I'm willing to spend ages looking into where it comes from) way of telling where this stuff originates from?
If you find the export of US tech jobs to India offensive (and the same process is happening in Europe, Japan and just about every other developed economy) then fine, make a moral stand. Hell, I won't be the one to argue with you. But bear in mind that the reason you can buy clothes, for instance, as cheaply as you can is that the jobs producing those things have been exported, too.
Just a few observations.
Many, many magazines are returned to the publishers and subsequently pulped. AFAIK it's rare for a magazine to completely sell out its print run. What if I go into a shop, tear a couple of pages out of a magazine and walk out? Is it a satisfactory argument to say that the retailer still has more copies than he can sell, so all I've done is to reduce the amount of paper he'll be sending back to the publisher?
What about if I wait until the end of that particular issue's currency and then just take the whole magazine (it's quite usual - in the UK, at least - to see bundles of magazines and newspapers stacked in the corners of shops prior to being collected for return to the publisher)? Is that okay. because the retailer's already sold all that he was going to and I probably wouldn't have bought the magazine anyway?
Well, I'm always reading posts about the failure of the law to keep pace with technology, usually with the subtext (expressed or otherwise) that what's needed is for government basically just to butt out of the entire area of information transmission, content protection etc. (apart from dumping on Bill Gates' head, obviously: that seems to be okay). Maybe, though, the lawmakers should "keep up" by redrawing the theft / copyright violation distinction in the other direction.
In the past, property - including stuff which might now be described as Intellectual Property - was pretty much all physical, or at least had a physical manifestation (a book, for instance, or an artwork). Copying that property essentially entailed manufacturing it from scratch, with all the associated costs of production and distribution. While you could produce a cheap version of copyrighted material and market it in competition with the "official" product, the relative quality of the two would be evident to the buyer (all those bootleg "live" cassettes I bought back when I was a student, for example).
Nowadays there are companies who produce, in essence, nothing but information. That may be music or software or analysis of some kind; but whatever it is, it has no physical manifestation. Easily available technology allows this information to be replicated exactly, with no differentiation in quality from the "official" version. Yet that information clearly cost something to produce. Real money was spent in the creative or production process (and it doesn't matter how much went to each of the parties involved, so long as everybody got what they were entitled to on the basis of agreements freely entered into; so don't be whining about the RIAA and the artists' share) and the producer can only hope to secure a return on that investment if he can control distribution of the product. Creation of perfect copies from which the producer derives no benefit clearly represents a loss to him. Perhaps we should start recognising this as theft rather than as copyright violation, because the alternative is to say, in effect, that it is impossible to steal from these companies.
Yes newspapers are VAT free, but the law refers specifically to "printed matter". Although the philosophical justification for zero-rating books etc. is that VAT would represent a "tax on learning", the law doesn't extend the same consideration to websites. Customs and Excise notice 701/10 (which is available online here, but I don't know the exact url) states that "Any non-printed matter, such as audio or video cassettes or CD Rom is standard-rated. This includes the storage and distribution of textual information by fax, e-mail, microfiche, or any similar process" (section 1.17).
"If someone emigrates to the UK they do not pay VAT or any tax on the possessions"
True, but not because the goods are second hand. There's a general relief from VAT and duty for "Transfer of Residence", but it is subject to some rules. The relief only applies to goods which you've owned for a certain period and there used to be (and maybe still are, I don't know) restrictions on how long you had to wait before disposing of them, too.
"no VAT should be chargeable for auctioned items that are not new (being sold by retail via auction)"
This is irrelevant in the context of the article, since it relates to the services provided in connection with the sale, rather than the sale itself. That said, second-hand goods are, in fact, liable to duty and VAT at import. You would generally expect to pay less than for new items, but only because their second-handness would presumably be reflected in their value.
"Within the EU, a person pays VAT to the member state that the item purchased is purchased from"
In general terms, private purchasers and businesses which aren't registered for VAT pay in the state where the sale occurs i.e. where the vendor is located. VAT-registered businesses account for their purchases in the state they're registered in.
If you buy goods which aren't zero-rated, though, it's more complicated. In general terms, Customs duty is added on the basis of the value of the goods including the cost of shipping and insurance. VAT is then added (17.5% in the UK) on the value of the goods including the duty (yes, you do pay VAT on the customs duty!). The fee from the handling company is between you, the shipper and the vendor, but I think it's part of the terms of service (using the word "service" loosely). You don't get it with goods shipped by post.
There are thresholds below which value duty and VAT aren't charged: on postal imports the limits are £18; or £36 (actually 45 Euro) for gifts (there are rules defining the meaning of "gift"). Just to complicate things, these limits apply to the intrinsic value of the goods, which is the price paid for the goods exclusive of shipping etc.
The effect of that is that the costs associated with buying from abroad cut in quite suddenly and dramatically. I can buy something for, say $25 (about £15.50) plus $11 (£6.80) shipping and handling and pay no import charges at all, but goods costing $30 (£18.75-ish) +s/h will cost me £25.55 (goods + shipping) plus, say £2.55 in duty (depending on the exact nature of the goods, obviously) plus £4.91 VAT (17.5% on £28.10). That's a total of £7.46 in charges, as opposed to nil for goods only slightly cheaper.
Of course, all this applies to physical goods. The article refers to digital goods and services. No-one is going to be paying one penny, or Euro extra in VAT for goods bought from outside the EU because of this.
Disclaimer: I work for HM Customs and Excise, who collect these charges. Until quite recently I specialised in the valuation of imported goods.
More interesting Panopticon stuff here and here
Fair enough, if that's the case then I apologise for misjudging you.
I won't buy copy protected CDs for the same reason that you evidently won't; but I believe that the music industry has the right to market their wares in a way which unnecessarily limits their sales if that's what they choose to do.
Even if you don't do it, there's never a shortage of people posting about how they d/l music because CDs are too expensive or because they only want a couple of songs off the album or because they don't want to give money to the record companies. Hell, I've never downloaded a song in my life, but I agree with the first two points myself.
My point was that if that's how they feel, then it's their right to choose not to patronise those companies. But the exercise of that right implies making certain sacrifices in the pursuit of what they consider to be a righteous cause (i.e. the eventual downfall of the record companies). In this particular case that sacrifice is that they limit their own access to RIAA member-produced material. The record companies, remember, have paid the artists for the right to market that music. If they then limit their own return on that investment by choosing a sales model which restricts sales, that's their affair; but the material is theirs to sell, just the same.
Good idea, you do that.
Boycotting the products of the big-label music industry in protest at their profiteering, mistreatment of artists or whatever other behaviour you don't like is an entirely justified exercise of your power as a consumer in a free market and is ethically unimpeachable.
On the other hand, shouting "boycott the RIAA" and availing yourself of their intellectual property (for which they paid the actual producers - the musicians - in accordance with a contract freely entered into by both parties) anyway through P2P is a simple refusal to accept the consequences of your own actions (e.g. that your assault on the RIAA may have certain costs associated with it, such as lack of access to their products) and is chickenshit.