Actually, he's been known to do totally inside-audience industrial training videos, too. Stuff we'll never get to see. I think he just likes Being John Cleese, Explaining Stuff. I we love him when he does, so what's not to like.
Is it just me, or is that just a wee bit breathless, from an analytical point of view? I doubt that even "misuse" really even has the right connotation, here. More like, misuse of math.
I'm sorry I wasn't clearer. I'm not disputing (or even really talking about) the corp's obligation to its investors. Rather, my point (taking into context the overall thread, and the GP in particular) was that there's nothing at all stopping a corporation from explicitly telling its investors that part of its management (or sales, or manufacturing, etc) strategy is to keep in mind Social Issue X. That, and rewarding the investors, are not mutually exclusive. And, the post to which I originally responded implied, I think, that there can't be a sense of any purpose, beyond profits, in a corporation. I don't find that to be true, certainly not enough to account for the tone of the comment in question.
Are you living in a world where corporations on the whole tend to value social responsibility above profit-taking?
Ah, the old canard of "social responsibility." I find that actually to be a bit of a platitude, really, in how it's used. Because that means whatever anyone wants it to mean, and never (especially in the context of a semi-debate, such as on slashdot) what your audience thinks it means. For some people that means only setting up offices in cities with laws on the books mandating multilingual street signs. For other people it means only setting up offices in states with serious stances on illegal immigrants. Social? In what circles? Responsible? To what people, with which set of values?
They are not real persons, and by definitions have no interests except profits.
This is considered insightful?
Firstly, there are all sorts of non-profit corporations that conduct their entire operations around, and are chartered specifically because of "social" issues. Secondly, there's no reason in the world that a coporation can't expressly get started, and attract investment, under the banner of seeking growth and profit while supporting a particular set of values. For example, defense contractors are pretty clear that they consider supporting national defense to be a worthy engagement. Or an advertising agency may be incorporated, and even publicly held, while doing things like choosing not to advertise tobacco products or market fast cars to teenagers.
Those are value judgements, not made in a vacuum, and the landscape against which those decisions are weighed is called "society."
Your trolling repetition of the lefty notion that all businesses will take a profit no matter what, with no thought to any other factor, is either insulting to the intelligence of your audience here (though some twits did mod it up), or reflects serious gullibility and lack of information on your part.
There are no corporations without the people that operate them. These are people with their own money and careers at stake, investors with things to lose, and employees with jobs at stake. No people, no corporation. No corporation, no employment of those people or worthwhile investment for grandma's 401k mutual funds, either. But those corporately chartered groups of investors and their employees can and do conduct their affairs with the whole spectrum of motivations, and societal viewpoints. Just like there are plenty of individuals who are abusive idiots (say campus-newspaper-stealing "free speech activists"), and who think that their own actions are appropriate, never mind what "society" says. There are idiots that wait tables, and idiots that sit on corporate boards. That doesn't mean that forming a corporation in any way dictates what the dozen people on a board of directors will do about steering the company's ethics.
A corporation is a legal and accounting tool, just like a will, a marriage license, a trust fund, or the charter of a student grant program. They are as they do, and you can't make sweeping general statements about what they are "by definitions," as you put it, any more than you can about what all marriages are, or all grants. Corporations are made of up people, as is society. That makes them a subset of society, and intimately bound to it.
+5 insightful. Yeesh, we have a long way to go, here, don't we.
Actually, no. This is about a device that extends the functionality of the basic service. It's a luxury. A convenience. Only people that want it should pay for it.
I'm actually less concerned about this particular commissioner - certainly residents of Europe are going to be a lot more familiar with him than I am. I think I'm reacting more to the general tone of the comments on this topic: Politicians Who Hang Out With Rich People Are Evil. That sort of sweeping generalization (and you've seen it here, I'm sure) is just silly. And more to the point, it seems to come more from the idealogical camp that gets really upset with it, but not when it's say, George Soros they're making friends with. Know what I mean?
Would we have had all this fuss if he'd had a nice lunch with Linus? A guy as powerful as this isn't going to be "bought" by the experience of staying on a nice boat for the weekend, or by the experience of Paul Allen's (no doubt stimulating - I'd like to meet him myself) company. The question is, can you point to the means by which the company in which Allen owns a lot of stock is going to have a "strangle hold" over the commission? In actual, practical, detailed, terms, what strangling mechanism is at play here? How does socializing among rich people induce force, etc., into the picture? If the guy's taking money from Allen or via Allen, don't you think that would stick out like a sore thumb?
I don't seem to recall the same reaction, say, in the US, when 99% of the entertainment industry's rich people invite elected officials to their yachts/homes/islands/etc for a week away. Or when European heads of state or key politicians are sitting down to extravagent meals together with the rich and famous throughout Europe. Let's face it: the only reason this is being shouted about as shocking here on slashdot is because the rich person in question has ties to Microsoft. If it was someone who owned a pile of stock in DaimlerChrysler, or Software AG, or BP, or Honda, no one would even have said a word.
Oh, and why exactly would you want a trade commissioner who doesn't have the ear, and doesn't hear from the people who back the largest companies, move around the biggest piles of money, and who are involved personally in the very trading activities that you're supposed to be understanding? A commissioner with no industry connections, or who only hangs out with the people running, say, labor unions, is going to be seriously naive, only have half the story, and definately be at odds with industry. Without those industries, there would be no point in talking about trade at all, let alone convening a commission to deal with it.
Good call. I'm always amazed at how people will bandy about that word ("selfless") without really thinking it through. The whole point of working with a large group of users to perfect something you couldn't possibly have the time to do by yourself is: to feel comfortable that you're not simply a sponge on everyone else's efforts, and because, presumably, you'd like to see a little of your own thinking, preferences, and expertise wrapped up in the evolving project. That's the opposite of "selflessness." Rather, it's entirely, and sensibly selfish to invest some of your time in building tools you personally want to use, and thereby influence their development and the quality thereof.
The folks that just suck down the output of these people, without pitching in, are the ones with no sense of self, or of the value of time and brains.
Quebecor (using Videotron) wants to raise up the profits in its music division
Any chance that they simply want the profits not to erode do to the copyrighted material of their artists being ripped off? If I run a business to earn a living, and someone figures out how to get my product or services without paying the price I'm asking, and to massively redistribute the same to even more non-paying users, is it "raising up my profits" to find a way to stop them? Or is "not losing my profits?"
So what if they're owned by the same people? How does that make not paying for your entertainment somehow OK? And if the point (so often made) is that their stable of entertainers is no good, then why would anyone want to rip off that music? As long as people are bothering to find someone who's spreading around copyrighted work, you have to assume that they want that material, that they value it. If they value it, and thus the artists that produce it, why are they cool with making those artists entertain them for free? No amount of splitting hairs over what's legal or not in Canada changes the basic issue of people wanting to be entertained, but being too cheap and ethically challenged to pay for what they say they like and respect. What a bunch of hypocrisy.
Let's get the conversation back on the root of the topic: an artists wants to sell their work, and plenty of people would rather go to some trouble to avoid paying for it. And the business organizations that are set up expressly to handle the artists' business issues for them (sales, distribution, and their royalty checks) are handling one more part of the artists' business: keeping them from getting ripped off. It's their job. They get paid for it. And with that paycheck, they do things like actually pay for the consumer goods they want. Sure there are probably a few shoplifters and people who duck out on restaurant checks working for recording companies, but let's just call all of this what it is: one great big sense of entitlement to free stuff on the part of music "fans" who, if you think it through, are no fans at all (at least, not of the artists they're willing to screw over for a free song).
Oh, come on, now. Deliberatly saying something's bad just so that the downloaders can claim they're sticking it to The Man for making bad movies... that's so, well, earlier this morning.
Ok, so property law is the foundation of society then?
Of course you're aware that I didn't say that, so please don't put words in my mouth. That being said, the expectation that your property can't be taken from you by a thief without consequences certainly is a piece of our society's foundation. Otherwise, we'd have to operate as a bunch of fuedal, viglante collectives. Not conducive to a thriving, productive society.
In this case, if you see a child drowning in a swimming pool in a PRIVATE PROPERTY, you should let the child drown lest you be seen as violating property law?
Well, now you're just being sophomoric for the sake of it. Needless to say, the whole point of a trial by your peers is that it allows citizens accused of a crime, but acting in good faith, to have their charges waived by a reasonable examination of the facts. Most likely the same jury that absolutely would find a child-saving passer-by not guilty of trespass, would also find a film critic that knowingly lies on a signed contract and damages a film maker's business by distributing a pirated DVD to be guilty of just that: deliberately damaging that artist's livelihood. These things are not mutually exclusive.
What lawmakers are building is a nation where theft, misappropriation, or improper use of property, real or intellectual, is considered a crime so great that it supercedes human beings' duty to one another as a specie[s]
So... in what way is it a film critic's duty to his species to lie, break a contract, and rip off an artist's work? Isn't that same artist that's being ripped off part of the species? What's not clear about this?
I tell you, property rights are always enforced through physical force. Always.
Just like depriving someone of their property (i.e., theft) is done by force. And before you say that "sharing" a stolen pre-release DVD doesn't involve force, then remember that many financial consquences for crimes (like having your assets frozen) don't involve force either. But when you choose, though fraudulant or contract violating means, to deprive someone of something that's theirs, that is certainly a variation on force. There's nothing wrong with police, and ultimately the military being brought to bear on someone (or a group of someones) who are themselves breaking the social contract and stealing something from someone. Making a chef your slave by eating the output of his labor, and then not paying for dinner - that's a form of force, and the diner who decides to defraud the chef out of an hour's work is gambling whether or not someone will indeed resort to force (apprehending the cheapskate, for example) to finalize the deal.
And the citizens have rights according to the Bill of Rights of the US Constitution. And all armed forces personnel great and small have taken an oath to uphold the US Constitution.
OK, and how does this make it OK for a film critic to break a contract and damage someone's business? Please address that issue specifically.
When lawmakers abridge the rights of some US citizens in order to financially benefit others
Except you keep avoiding the central topic of this entire thread. What the lawmakers are doing is specifically defending the righs of everyone, by making stealing from people more clearly punishable. Surely you're not saying that the founding fathers were happy with a situation where the great composers, artists, or writers of the day should have to be slaves to anyone who simply doesn't feel like honoring their commitment to pay for their services? I don't think there's any debate about whether or not we're constitutionally clear on the "right" of someone to steal something from someone else.
And what for? Money.
And what is money? It's just a tool, used to represent the value of time, effort, and materials. If we scrapped that, and just went with bartering, would it be any more OK with you if someone
So... if I invest every dime I can scrape together to buy a house, or to start my own business, are laws used to prosecute people that get a kick out of burning down my house or restaurant (and thus risking my investment) also inappropriate? Do you have a checking account? How about laws that reduce the risk of my simply cleaning it out because I've found a way to do that? It's only money, after all. In fact, if someone cleaned out your checking account every time you got paid - that'd be cool, since if you work for your paycheck, it's "commercial?"
How is being able to prosecute someone who steals something from you in any way at odds with justice? Or with freedom of speech? In fact, one of the rights that our forefathers (to use your example) fought so hard for was the right to own and dictate the use of their own property. Laws that protect property are guarding our fundamental rights, just as people that steal our property and damage our family incomes are attacks on those rights. I'm just sensing that you're rather selective about which of our "fundamental rights" you like, or like to see backed up by law. Something tells me that if you heard about a large business stealing intellectual property from a small business (or person) and releasing it to damaging effects, that you'd be all for prosecuting the people that are employed by that big business. Why, then, would you not want the exact same options when a small business (or person) does the exact same thing to the people working for the larger business? That (equality under the law) is exactly at the heart of what our forefathers fought for. Except, companies generally don't steal pre-released movies and spread them out on the internet, damaging the income of people like producers - that's something mostly that individual people do, and it's got nothing to do with freedom of speech, and everything to do with not feeling like paying for expensively produced entertainment.
So, no, I have no pity for the corporations. Corporations don't fix bayonets and charge at dawn.
They just provide jobs, products we all need and use, and are the backbone of the economy. Of course, lots of corporate employees (some good friends of mine) do indeed risk their lives in places like Afghanistan, trying to bring to that part of the world the same things have here: the expectation of democracy, equal rule of law, and freedom (among other things, the freedom from having people steal what you produce because they don't feel like paying for it).
By the way, I work for two corporations. One has about 250 employees, and the other has 3. The smaller group produces web content and proprietary code that we just make a living by selling and deploying under careful circumstances. I'm guessing that you'd have no problem with someone taking that specialized material, into which we've poured thousands of hours, and just distributing for free to anyone who wants it, thus preventing me from being able to recoup what I spent developing it, let alone pay rent, eat, and so on? I sure as hell would want to be able to prosecute someone who took a demo of what we've built, and despite agreements to the contrary, spread it all over the internet for anyone to use. That could be devastating to our future. But that's "commercial," so not a big deal to you? Why would anyone produce anything that you consume every day - food, fuel, medicine, electricity, clothing, computer hardware - if there was no expectation that someone able to damage those businesses could be prosecuted for doing so?
So, the law applies to people that break a contract and steal something they're not supposed to distribute (and which they've agreed they're not going to distribute). This can cost a business at the very least thousands and thousands of dollars. People who damage a business to that degree by other means are subject to other laws, and certainly pay fines and do jail time if a jury thinks it was deliberate enough. What's your take on it? I mean, if you signed an NDA or similar document promising not to spread around a pre-release DVD (because, say, you're a film critic, and you're on the list of people that are offered a preview, under very specific conditions), but then you take the DVD and dump it on thousands of people before the movie has even started to take in box office receipts... is that cool with you? It's outright deceipt and theft, and for sure damaging to the people that have just spent a fortune making the movie.
You said you're looking forward to the ROTK extended version (it's good - I bought it). Does it bug you at all that someone else is thinking they'd rather not see Peter Jackon get paid for all that work and risk, and just pirate a copy? I'm not talking about good movies vs. bad movies, I'm talking about whether Peter Jackson can even get investors to help pay for his next film if the moment a critic gets his hands on a DVD, you've got everyone in Korea watching cheesy $1 burns of it the next day. The person who acts to distribute that DVD is deliberately doing something to harm Peter Jackon and his company, to the tune of many thousands of dollars, possibly millions. Just no big deal to you?
Try a different industry. Say that someone spends a couple million dollars designing a new grain that resists mold rot, and that will allow people in tropical areas to have better long term food storage, and thus do less slash-and-burn rain forest farming. The company that risks the millions of dollars to develop and test this grain certainly did it because they've told the people that invested/risked all that money that they'd get their money back, hopefully with a profit, and keep the company's people in jobs. Now: they send a sample of the grain to a scientist for review, and he decides that he's just going to give it to is buddies, or sell it to China, etc., thus depriving the people who just spent all that money and time producing it from the chance to benefit from their work. That sort of theft isn't a bit different from damaging the box office sales of Peter Jackson's next movie by sliding copies of it around the world before he's even released it. Should Jackson have no recourse against someone who acts that way? If you steal a car from a dealership, causing a $20,000 loss to the dealership, you're definately in for some jail time. But if you cost some start-up film company $20,000 by putting their brand new movie out on the black market before they've even sold their first ticket... we should just let that slide?
911 is a public service. It should be run like a utility (like water, power --in many places-- garbage pickup, street paving...).
Where I live, we pay a privately help company for tap water. Trash collection is contracted with a private company. Power is provided by a private company (though they work under considerable regulations). My phone company is a private company. They (the dialtone provider) does have to provide 911 service as part of their license to operate in the county. But if I don't pay them, I get no dial tone, and then I have no 911 service. Why should I get the convenience of that for free? Or, why should tax payers cover it for people that don't pay for it?
If my mobile phone account goes unpaid, the phone will still work, but only to call the service provider, or 911. Now, if some company produces something similar to the MS thing that was patented, or MS does, it still has to burn up somebody's resources to work. A family with multiple phone lines has more access to the 911 system now, and usually pays extra surcharges for it. So... what's wrong with this whole picture? Seems like it's a good recipe, and every time that someone adds on a new 911-type widget, the people that buy them can pay for access through whatever service wants to support them.
Actually, he'd probably go along with you on that one. Sounds like quite the dogmatic traditionalist. You'd think he'd at least get a head-worn mic so that his assistant can quit wobbling that late-1980's handheld-on-a-gooseneck in his face. I mean, let's put the A/V back into into Ave Maria!
Read the news more often, probably the business section. The only stuff you seem to be hearing about is either that which is truly bad, or that which stimulates noise from an idealogical arena that has your ear.
We've got all sorts of large corporations that manage to do what they do without drawing the sort of criticism that you level. Think Starbucks, or Amazon, or Google, or a whole lot of other firms that you never hear about because they just keep doing business every day, serving their customers, paying their employees, and rewarding their investors. It's the old "no news is good news" scenario, and it's why you don't hear about them unless you look for them. The reactionary chatter areas (like slashdot, or most mainstream media) only really pay attention to businesses that they think will make a nice, bloody story. So the few questionable ones float to the top of your attention, and the good ones just go about being the economy in the background.
You might also ask yourself who else does things like "buy bills in congress." Say, the AARP? Or labor unions? Not everyone that looks to influence elections or legislation happens to be a large corporation. Think, say, of the Trial Lawyer Association, or the NEA.
And frivalous lawsuits? More of those are aimed at large companies than are issued by them. Like suing McDonalds because you've spilled your coffee in your lap, or meaningless class action lawsuits that only enrich the law firms handling the suit, but which gets the supposed plaintiffs a $1 coupon. You get the idea. There are stupid people, unethical people, and decent people in and out of large corporations. It's just fashionable right now to blame corporations for everything, even as we use their products and services, own their stocks in our retirement plans, and all benefit from the tax base created by the millions of people that they employ.
So, why do you have a problem with an artist (or the artist's studio and related folks) being able to prosecute someone who specifically takes a piece of content that they've asserted they will not in any way distribute (such as the pre-release "screener" DVDs in question, here), but who then does exactly that, potentially causing significant damage to the revenue that work would have otherwise produced? You pay for your entertainment - great (and how refreshing!), but you've got a problem with people who deliberately lie to get their hands on unreleased creative material, and their many "friends" with whom they "share" it? I'm just trying to reconcile these two positions.
there's plenty of legally free content out there to download
Right! And that's not what this thread is about. We're talking about stuff that's prematurely, and without authorization, lifted from industry "screener" distributions, and pumped out over p2p networks so that people can be cheap bastards and avoid paying for their entertainment. The person I'm responding to was not championing material meant to be free, or celebrating his access to it - he's "grinning," as he puts it, at the fact that he can keep downloading non-free material because the legislation in question doesn't address that side of the two-party action of distributing the pirated goods.
gee there's a concept, paying for *live* music, the way music was heard originally
Great idea! I see you're also a fan of hand-writing paper letters, just like the good old days. None of this typing on a computer and using the internet for you, no sir!
Gosh, you're right! I've never thought of it that way! Certainly there's nothing but cynical depression at work when I voice my opinion about artists having a right to dictate the way in which their work is purchased. The person I replied to, who takes glee in symbolically giving the finger while leveraging what he sees as the "it's only about distribution, not downloading" loophole in the legislation being discussed - he's the picture of rational, cheery mental wholesomeness! Oh, and a cheap bastard. We're not talking about material that's intended to be free - the thread is about material that is distributed prematurely and without permission, and he's just grinning (as he puts it) that the legislation addressing the issue doesn't go after the people downloading it, only the ones distributing it. Endorsing piracy is not the equivalent of mental health. Of course, your parody of those mental health ads is actually pretty funny.
he'd rather stick with content that is free, unencumbered by copyright
Read his post. You know that's not what he's talking about. He refers to the current (original post's) topic's discussion of a penalty for distributing the copyrighted material, while not mentioning downloading it. And thus, he considers himself comfortable giving the finger to the owner of the copyright, the movie producers, the actors, the musicians, and everyone else that assumes their work is going to fetch a price when they set out to do it.
You're a lost cause with way too much time on your hands
Nah, I just type quickly. I fit this stuff in between 60+ hours of IT work a week, much of which is writing.
Let's harken back to what I'd consider to be the tone-setting comment, from you:
We just don't let people suffer because they can't afford healthcare, that line is purely American.
That particular little swipe is what merited the terse response that you're quoting back to me. At the time, it didn't seem worthy of a lot of explanation, since you'd already jumped ahead to the "Americans let people suffer" position.
there is no direct economic subsidy
Obviously. We'll leave that for arrangements like NATO, etc. But the lack of a formal subsidy doesn't change the revenue components of a drug company's bottom line. Prices that are held low by a government in one market are going to impact the pricing decisions those companies make in other markets.
So you're not implying we owe our "artificially low prices" from "(your) most advanced drug companies" at the expense of "heavily subsidized (by US consumers)"?
Again, you're taking the word "owe" out of context. I don't think you owe anything, at all. I think that the pricing scenario is as I have described it, and there is a causal link between what's charged there, and what's charged elsewhere. Read that as "due in part to" if it helps.
you still said what you did, it wasn't a vague statement
And you still said what you did, and I should know better than to feed the "Americans like it when people suffer" trolls, even if a rhetorical quip felt right at the time. Doesn't change the math, and this sure hasn't changed what I used to hope was an incorrect understanding about Canadians loathing the US as a national hobby (although patronizing, passive-aggressive remarks like "You sound like you may be educated" aren't helping dispell that impression). Oh well. I'll maintain my earlier point: I pay more for a bottle of antibiotics than you do, but far less in taxes. Part of that deal is a more competitive economic climate, which I cherish, and from which I definately benefit. Just think what I could do with it if only I had an edu-ma-cation!
You can make a profit from selling a police car. You can not make a profit from selling the _idea_ of a police car. See the difference?
How about selling a package of hardware that includes the functionally expressed idea of a GPS and WiFi integrated, voice-activated, thermally sensitive self-pointing cruiser dashboard video camera tied into the overhead tracking lights of a network-enabled rescue helicopter, blah blah blah. See? There are going to be people coming up with key pieces of puzzles like that, and some of their solutions will be very expensive to develop, and they have every reason to be "the" company from whom you can buy that technology (or license it) in order for them to recoup their costs, and make their investors glad they risked the money. See the difference?
I'd rather just continue to download the free content
How succinctly you make your opponents' case for them! It's not free content. That you have found a way to avoid paying for it only means that you're a cheap bastard that doesn't want to pay for entertainment, and are risking some legal action at some point, and feeling comfortable that the odds are in your favor. It doesn't mean the entertainers are asking to be your slaves. It just means you're causing them to be.
Do you actually know anybody that creates and entertains a large audience for a living? Try to persuade them to do it for free, while giving them that finger you're so smug about. Be sure to do it to their faces so you can get the full effect.
The problem arrises that one man's fair price is another man's extortion. Keep in mind that this is microsoft we're talking about.
And...? Are you feeling extorted into using Windows XP? Or are you feeling "extorted" into having to otherwise buy a too-expensive Mac, or invest a huge, huge amount of time into living as easily on a roll-your-own Linux box?
I don't find anything extortive about paying a couple hundred bucks for an OS that will run on more hardware than anything else will, or in paying for suites like Office, especially since there are other options if I have more time and learning curve capacity than I do cash.
That's not the same as extortion, which implies force. And the great thing about a market economy, rather than government mandates, is that we can vote with our wallets. If your take on this something I'd worry about, I'd also worry about that Microsoft iPod having a monopoly... oh, wait.
There is no penalty for losing customer data other than bad press
How about losing the customers, trust of business partners, and the huge, disruptive cost of having to play catch-up and deal with issues that should have been evolving over time, instead?
Those are very real, potentially company-killing "penalties" - whether handed out by a regulatory agency or not.
Slashdot Mirror
Actually, he's been known to do totally inside-audience industrial training videos, too. Stuff we'll never get to see. I think he just likes Being John Cleese, Explaining Stuff. I we love him when he does, so what's not to like.
abuse of spreadsheets
Is it just me, or is that just a wee bit breathless, from an analytical point of view? I doubt that even "misuse" really even has the right connotation, here. More like, misuse of math.
I'm sorry I wasn't clearer. I'm not disputing (or even really talking about) the corp's obligation to its investors. Rather, my point (taking into context the overall thread, and the GP in particular) was that there's nothing at all stopping a corporation from explicitly telling its investors that part of its management (or sales, or manufacturing, etc) strategy is to keep in mind Social Issue X. That, and rewarding the investors, are not mutually exclusive. And, the post to which I originally responded implied, I think, that there can't be a sense of any purpose, beyond profits, in a corporation. I don't find that to be true, certainly not enough to account for the tone of the comment in question.
Are you living in a world where corporations on the whole tend to value social responsibility above profit-taking?
Ah, the old canard of "social responsibility." I find that actually to be a bit of a platitude, really, in how it's used. Because that means whatever anyone wants it to mean, and never (especially in the context of a semi-debate, such as on slashdot) what your audience thinks it means. For some people that means only setting up offices in cities with laws on the books mandating multilingual street signs. For other people it means only setting up offices in states with serious stances on illegal immigrants. Social? In what circles? Responsible? To what people, with which set of values?
They are not real persons, and by definitions have no interests except profits.
This is considered insightful?
Firstly, there are all sorts of non-profit corporations that conduct their entire operations around, and are chartered specifically because of "social" issues. Secondly, there's no reason in the world that a coporation can't expressly get started, and attract investment, under the banner of seeking growth and profit while supporting a particular set of values. For example, defense contractors are pretty clear that they consider supporting national defense to be a worthy engagement. Or an advertising agency may be incorporated, and even publicly held, while doing things like choosing not to advertise tobacco products or market fast cars to teenagers.
Those are value judgements, not made in a vacuum, and the landscape against which those decisions are weighed is called "society."
Your trolling repetition of the lefty notion that all businesses will take a profit no matter what, with no thought to any other factor, is either insulting to the intelligence of your audience here (though some twits did mod it up), or reflects serious gullibility and lack of information on your part.
There are no corporations without the people that operate them. These are people with their own money and careers at stake, investors with things to lose, and employees with jobs at stake. No people, no corporation. No corporation, no employment of those people or worthwhile investment for grandma's 401k mutual funds, either. But those corporately chartered groups of investors and their employees can and do conduct their affairs with the whole spectrum of motivations, and societal viewpoints. Just like there are plenty of individuals who are abusive idiots (say campus-newspaper-stealing "free speech activists"), and who think that their own actions are appropriate, never mind what "society" says. There are idiots that wait tables, and idiots that sit on corporate boards. That doesn't mean that forming a corporation in any way dictates what the dozen people on a board of directors will do about steering the company's ethics.
A corporation is a legal and accounting tool, just like a will, a marriage license, a trust fund, or the charter of a student grant program. They are as they do, and you can't make sweeping general statements about what they are "by definitions," as you put it, any more than you can about what all marriages are, or all grants. Corporations are made of up people, as is society. That makes them a subset of society, and intimately bound to it.
+5 insightful. Yeesh, we have a long way to go, here, don't we.
Actually, no. This is about a device that extends the functionality of the basic service. It's a luxury. A convenience. Only people that want it should pay for it.
I'm actually less concerned about this particular commissioner - certainly residents of Europe are going to be a lot more familiar with him than I am. I think I'm reacting more to the general tone of the comments on this topic: Politicians Who Hang Out With Rich People Are Evil. That sort of sweeping generalization (and you've seen it here, I'm sure) is just silly. And more to the point, it seems to come more from the idealogical camp that gets really upset with it, but not when it's say, George Soros they're making friends with. Know what I mean?
Would we have had all this fuss if he'd had a nice lunch with Linus? A guy as powerful as this isn't going to be "bought" by the experience of staying on a nice boat for the weekend, or by the experience of Paul Allen's (no doubt stimulating - I'd like to meet him myself) company. The question is, can you point to the means by which the company in which Allen owns a lot of stock is going to have a "strangle hold" over the commission? In actual, practical, detailed, terms, what strangling mechanism is at play here? How does socializing among rich people induce force, etc., into the picture? If the guy's taking money from Allen or via Allen, don't you think that would stick out like a sore thumb?
I don't seem to recall the same reaction, say, in the US, when 99% of the entertainment industry's rich people invite elected officials to their yachts/homes/islands/etc for a week away. Or when European heads of state or key politicians are sitting down to extravagent meals together with the rich and famous throughout Europe. Let's face it: the only reason this is being shouted about as shocking here on slashdot is because the rich person in question has ties to Microsoft. If it was someone who owned a pile of stock in DaimlerChrysler, or Software AG, or BP, or Honda, no one would even have said a word.
Oh, and why exactly would you want a trade commissioner who doesn't have the ear, and doesn't hear from the people who back the largest companies, move around the biggest piles of money, and who are involved personally in the very trading activities that you're supposed to be understanding? A commissioner with no industry connections, or who only hangs out with the people running, say, labor unions, is going to be seriously naive, only have half the story, and definately be at odds with industry. Without those industries, there would be no point in talking about trade at all, let alone convening a commission to deal with it.
Good call. I'm always amazed at how people will bandy about that word ("selfless") without really thinking it through. The whole point of working with a large group of users to perfect something you couldn't possibly have the time to do by yourself is: to feel comfortable that you're not simply a sponge on everyone else's efforts, and because, presumably, you'd like to see a little of your own thinking, preferences, and expertise wrapped up in the evolving project. That's the opposite of "selflessness." Rather, it's entirely, and sensibly selfish to invest some of your time in building tools you personally want to use, and thereby influence their development and the quality thereof.
The folks that just suck down the output of these people, without pitching in, are the ones with no sense of self, or of the value of time and brains.
Quebecor (using Videotron) wants to raise up the profits in its music division
Any chance that they simply want the profits not to erode do to the copyrighted material of their artists being ripped off? If I run a business to earn a living, and someone figures out how to get my product or services without paying the price I'm asking, and to massively redistribute the same to even more non-paying users, is it "raising up my profits" to find a way to stop them? Or is "not losing my profits?"
So what if they're owned by the same people? How does that make not paying for your entertainment somehow OK? And if the point (so often made) is that their stable of entertainers is no good, then why would anyone want to rip off that music? As long as people are bothering to find someone who's spreading around copyrighted work, you have to assume that they want that material, that they value it. If they value it, and thus the artists that produce it, why are they cool with making those artists entertain them for free? No amount of splitting hairs over what's legal or not in Canada changes the basic issue of people wanting to be entertained, but being too cheap and ethically challenged to pay for what they say they like and respect. What a bunch of hypocrisy.
Let's get the conversation back on the root of the topic: an artists wants to sell their work, and plenty of people would rather go to some trouble to avoid paying for it. And the business organizations that are set up expressly to handle the artists' business issues for them (sales, distribution, and their royalty checks) are handling one more part of the artists' business: keeping them from getting ripped off. It's their job. They get paid for it. And with that paycheck, they do things like actually pay for the consumer goods they want. Sure there are probably a few shoplifters and people who duck out on restaurant checks working for recording companies, but let's just call all of this what it is: one great big sense of entitlement to free stuff on the part of music "fans" who, if you think it through, are no fans at all (at least, not of the artists they're willing to screw over for a free song).
I could not believe how awful this film was
Oh, come on, now. Deliberatly saying something's bad just so that the downloaders can claim they're sticking it to The Man for making bad movies... that's so, well, earlier this morning.
Ok, so property law is the foundation of society then?
Of course you're aware that I didn't say that, so please don't put words in my mouth. That being said, the expectation that your property can't be taken from you by a thief without consequences certainly is a piece of our society's foundation. Otherwise, we'd have to operate as a bunch of fuedal, viglante collectives. Not conducive to a thriving, productive society.
In this case, if you see a child drowning in a swimming pool in a PRIVATE PROPERTY, you should let the child drown lest you be seen as violating property law?
Well, now you're just being sophomoric for the sake of it. Needless to say, the whole point of a trial by your peers is that it allows citizens accused of a crime, but acting in good faith, to have their charges waived by a reasonable examination of the facts. Most likely the same jury that absolutely would find a child-saving passer-by not guilty of trespass, would also find a film critic that knowingly lies on a signed contract and damages a film maker's business by distributing a pirated DVD to be guilty of just that: deliberately damaging that artist's livelihood. These things are not mutually exclusive.
What lawmakers are building is a nation where theft, misappropriation, or improper use of property, real or intellectual, is considered a crime so great that it supercedes human beings' duty to one another as a specie[s]
So... in what way is it a film critic's duty to his species to lie, break a contract, and rip off an artist's work? Isn't that same artist that's being ripped off part of the species? What's not clear about this?
I tell you, property rights are always enforced through physical force. Always.
Just like depriving someone of their property (i.e., theft) is done by force. And before you say that "sharing" a stolen pre-release DVD doesn't involve force, then remember that many financial consquences for crimes (like having your assets frozen) don't involve force either. But when you choose, though fraudulant or contract violating means, to deprive someone of something that's theirs, that is certainly a variation on force. There's nothing wrong with police, and ultimately the military being brought to bear on someone (or a group of someones) who are themselves breaking the social contract and stealing something from someone. Making a chef your slave by eating the output of his labor, and then not paying for dinner - that's a form of force, and the diner who decides to defraud the chef out of an hour's work is gambling whether or not someone will indeed resort to force (apprehending the cheapskate, for example) to finalize the deal.
And the citizens have rights according to the Bill of Rights of the US Constitution. And all armed forces personnel great and small have taken an oath to uphold the US Constitution.
OK, and how does this make it OK for a film critic to break a contract and damage someone's business? Please address that issue specifically.
When lawmakers abridge the rights of some US citizens in order to financially benefit others
Except you keep avoiding the central topic of this entire thread. What the lawmakers are doing is specifically defending the righs of everyone, by making stealing from people more clearly punishable. Surely you're not saying that the founding fathers were happy with a situation where the great composers, artists, or writers of the day should have to be slaves to anyone who simply doesn't feel like honoring their commitment to pay for their services? I don't think there's any debate about whether or not we're constitutionally clear on the "right" of someone to steal something from someone else.
And what for? Money.
And what is money? It's just a tool, used to represent the value of time, effort, and materials. If we scrapped that, and just went with bartering, would it be any more OK with you if someone
So... if I invest every dime I can scrape together to buy a house, or to start my own business, are laws used to prosecute people that get a kick out of burning down my house or restaurant (and thus risking my investment) also inappropriate? Do you have a checking account? How about laws that reduce the risk of my simply cleaning it out because I've found a way to do that? It's only money, after all. In fact, if someone cleaned out your checking account every time you got paid - that'd be cool, since if you work for your paycheck, it's "commercial?"
How is being able to prosecute someone who steals something from you in any way at odds with justice? Or with freedom of speech? In fact, one of the rights that our forefathers (to use your example) fought so hard for was the right to own and dictate the use of their own property. Laws that protect property are guarding our fundamental rights, just as people that steal our property and damage our family incomes are attacks on those rights. I'm just sensing that you're rather selective about which of our "fundamental rights" you like, or like to see backed up by law. Something tells me that if you heard about a large business stealing intellectual property from a small business (or person) and releasing it to damaging effects, that you'd be all for prosecuting the people that are employed by that big business. Why, then, would you not want the exact same options when a small business (or person) does the exact same thing to the people working for the larger business? That (equality under the law) is exactly at the heart of what our forefathers fought for. Except, companies generally don't steal pre-released movies and spread them out on the internet, damaging the income of people like producers - that's something mostly that individual people do, and it's got nothing to do with freedom of speech, and everything to do with not feeling like paying for expensively produced entertainment.
So, no, I have no pity for the corporations. Corporations don't fix bayonets and charge at dawn.
They just provide jobs, products we all need and use, and are the backbone of the economy. Of course, lots of corporate employees (some good friends of mine) do indeed risk their lives in places like Afghanistan, trying to bring to that part of the world the same things have here: the expectation of democracy, equal rule of law, and freedom (among other things, the freedom from having people steal what you produce because they don't feel like paying for it).
By the way, I work for two corporations. One has about 250 employees, and the other has 3. The smaller group produces web content and proprietary code that we just make a living by selling and deploying under careful circumstances. I'm guessing that you'd have no problem with someone taking that specialized material, into which we've poured thousands of hours, and just distributing for free to anyone who wants it, thus preventing me from being able to recoup what I spent developing it, let alone pay rent, eat, and so on? I sure as hell would want to be able to prosecute someone who took a demo of what we've built, and despite agreements to the contrary, spread it all over the internet for anyone to use. That could be devastating to our future. But that's "commercial," so not a big deal to you? Why would anyone produce anything that you consume every day - food, fuel, medicine, electricity, clothing, computer hardware - if there was no expectation that someone able to damage those businesses could be prosecuted for doing so?
and is going to be used
So, the law applies to people that break a contract and steal something they're not supposed to distribute (and which they've agreed they're not going to distribute). This can cost a business at the very least thousands and thousands of dollars. People who damage a business to that degree by other means are subject to other laws, and certainly pay fines and do jail time if a jury thinks it was deliberate enough. What's your take on it? I mean, if you signed an NDA or similar document promising not to spread around a pre-release DVD (because, say, you're a film critic, and you're on the list of people that are offered a preview, under very specific conditions), but then you take the DVD and dump it on thousands of people before the movie has even started to take in box office receipts... is that cool with you? It's outright deceipt and theft, and for sure damaging to the people that have just spent a fortune making the movie.
You said you're looking forward to the ROTK extended version (it's good - I bought it). Does it bug you at all that someone else is thinking they'd rather not see Peter Jackon get paid for all that work and risk, and just pirate a copy? I'm not talking about good movies vs. bad movies, I'm talking about whether Peter Jackson can even get investors to help pay for his next film if the moment a critic gets his hands on a DVD, you've got everyone in Korea watching cheesy $1 burns of it the next day. The person who acts to distribute that DVD is deliberately doing something to harm Peter Jackon and his company, to the tune of many thousands of dollars, possibly millions. Just no big deal to you?
Try a different industry. Say that someone spends a couple million dollars designing a new grain that resists mold rot, and that will allow people in tropical areas to have better long term food storage, and thus do less slash-and-burn rain forest farming. The company that risks the millions of dollars to develop and test this grain certainly did it because they've told the people that invested/risked all that money that they'd get their money back, hopefully with a profit, and keep the company's people in jobs. Now: they send a sample of the grain to a scientist for review, and he decides that he's just going to give it to is buddies, or sell it to China, etc., thus depriving the people who just spent all that money and time producing it from the chance to benefit from their work. That sort of theft isn't a bit different from damaging the box office sales of Peter Jackson's next movie by sliding copies of it around the world before he's even released it. Should Jackson have no recourse against someone who acts that way? If you steal a car from a dealership, causing a $20,000 loss to the dealership, you're definately in for some jail time. But if you cost some start-up film company $20,000 by putting their brand new movie out on the black market before they've even sold their first ticket... we should just let that slide?
911 is a public service. It should be run like a utility (like water, power --in many places-- garbage pickup, street paving...).
Where I live, we pay a privately help company for tap water. Trash collection is contracted with a private company. Power is provided by a private company (though they work under considerable regulations). My phone company is a private company. They (the dialtone provider) does have to provide 911 service as part of their license to operate in the county. But if I don't pay them, I get no dial tone, and then I have no 911 service. Why should I get the convenience of that for free? Or, why should tax payers cover it for people that don't pay for it?
If my mobile phone account goes unpaid, the phone will still work, but only to call the service provider, or 911. Now, if some company produces something similar to the MS thing that was patented, or MS does, it still has to burn up somebody's resources to work. A family with multiple phone lines has more access to the 911 system now, and usually pays extra surcharges for it. So... what's wrong with this whole picture? Seems like it's a good recipe, and every time that someone adds on a new 911-type widget, the people that buy them can pay for access through whatever service wants to support them.
And the Pope says: "Classic Info-what's-it now?"
Actually, he'd probably go along with you on that one. Sounds like quite the dogmatic traditionalist. You'd think he'd at least get a head-worn mic so that his assistant can quit wobbling that late-1980's handheld-on-a-gooseneck in his face. I mean, let's put the A/V back into into Ave Maria!
What is one to do?
Read the news more often, probably the business section. The only stuff you seem to be hearing about is either that which is truly bad, or that which stimulates noise from an idealogical arena that has your ear.
We've got all sorts of large corporations that manage to do what they do without drawing the sort of criticism that you level. Think Starbucks, or Amazon, or Google, or a whole lot of other firms that you never hear about because they just keep doing business every day, serving their customers, paying their employees, and rewarding their investors. It's the old "no news is good news" scenario, and it's why you don't hear about them unless you look for them. The reactionary chatter areas (like slashdot, or most mainstream media) only really pay attention to businesses that they think will make a nice, bloody story. So the few questionable ones float to the top of your attention, and the good ones just go about being the economy in the background.
You might also ask yourself who else does things like "buy bills in congress." Say, the AARP? Or labor unions? Not everyone that looks to influence elections or legislation happens to be a large corporation. Think, say, of the Trial Lawyer Association, or the NEA.
And frivalous lawsuits? More of those are aimed at large companies than are issued by them. Like suing McDonalds because you've spilled your coffee in your lap, or meaningless class action lawsuits that only enrich the law firms handling the suit, but which gets the supposed plaintiffs a $1 coupon. You get the idea. There are stupid people, unethical people, and decent people in and out of large corporations. It's just fashionable right now to blame corporations for everything, even as we use their products and services, own their stocks in our retirement plans, and all benefit from the tax base created by the millions of people that they employ.
all bought thank you very much
So, why do you have a problem with an artist (or the artist's studio and related folks) being able to prosecute someone who specifically takes a piece of content that they've asserted they will not in any way distribute (such as the pre-release "screener" DVDs in question, here), but who then does exactly that, potentially causing significant damage to the revenue that work would have otherwise produced? You pay for your entertainment - great (and how refreshing!), but you've got a problem with people who deliberately lie to get their hands on unreleased creative material, and their many "friends" with whom they "share" it? I'm just trying to reconcile these two positions.
there's plenty of legally free content out there to download
Right! And that's not what this thread is about. We're talking about stuff that's prematurely, and without authorization, lifted from industry "screener" distributions, and pumped out over p2p networks so that people can be cheap bastards and avoid paying for their entertainment. The person I'm responding to was not championing material meant to be free, or celebrating his access to it - he's "grinning," as he puts it, at the fact that he can keep downloading non-free material because the legislation in question doesn't address that side of the two-party action of distributing the pirated goods.
gee there's a concept, paying for *live* music, the way music was heard originally
Great idea! I see you're also a fan of hand-writing paper letters, just like the good old days. None of this typing on a computer and using the internet for you, no sir!
Gosh, you're right! I've never thought of it that way! Certainly there's nothing but cynical depression at work when I voice my opinion about artists having a right to dictate the way in which their work is purchased. The person I replied to, who takes glee in symbolically giving the finger while leveraging what he sees as the "it's only about distribution, not downloading" loophole in the legislation being discussed - he's the picture of rational, cheery mental wholesomeness! Oh, and a cheap bastard. We're not talking about material that's intended to be free - the thread is about material that is distributed prematurely and without permission, and he's just grinning (as he puts it) that the legislation addressing the issue doesn't go after the people downloading it, only the ones distributing it. Endorsing piracy is not the equivalent of mental health. Of course, your parody of those mental health ads is actually pretty funny.
he'd rather stick with content that is free, unencumbered by copyright
Read his post. You know that's not what he's talking about. He refers to the current (original post's) topic's discussion of a penalty for distributing the copyrighted material, while not mentioning downloading it. And thus, he considers himself comfortable giving the finger to the owner of the copyright, the movie producers, the actors, the musicians, and everyone else that assumes their work is going to fetch a price when they set out to do it.
Despite your scorn, such content does exist.
Sure! But that's not what he's talking about.
You're a lost cause with way too much time on your hands
Nah, I just type quickly. I fit this stuff in between 60+ hours of IT work a week, much of which is writing.
Let's harken back to what I'd consider to be the tone-setting comment, from you:
We just don't let people suffer because they can't afford healthcare, that line is purely American.
That particular little swipe is what merited the terse response that you're quoting back to me. At the time, it didn't seem worthy of a lot of explanation, since you'd already jumped ahead to the "Americans let people suffer" position.
there is no direct economic subsidy
Obviously. We'll leave that for arrangements like NATO, etc. But the lack of a formal subsidy doesn't change the revenue components of a drug company's bottom line. Prices that are held low by a government in one market are going to impact the pricing decisions those companies make in other markets.
So you're not implying we owe our "artificially low prices" from "(your) most advanced drug companies" at the expense of "heavily subsidized (by US consumers)"?
Again, you're taking the word "owe" out of context. I don't think you owe anything, at all. I think that the pricing scenario is as I have described it, and there is a causal link between what's charged there, and what's charged elsewhere. Read that as "due in part to" if it helps.
you still said what you did, it wasn't a vague statement
And you still said what you did, and I should know better than to feed the "Americans like it when people suffer" trolls, even if a rhetorical quip felt right at the time. Doesn't change the math, and this sure hasn't changed what I used to hope was an incorrect understanding about Canadians loathing the US as a national hobby (although patronizing, passive-aggressive remarks like "You sound like you may be educated" aren't helping dispell that impression). Oh well. I'll maintain my earlier point: I pay more for a bottle of antibiotics than you do, but far less in taxes. Part of that deal is a more competitive economic climate, which I cherish, and from which I definately benefit. Just think what I could do with it if only I had an edu-ma-cation!
You can make a profit from selling a police car. You can not make a profit from selling the _idea_ of a police car. See the difference?
How about selling a package of hardware that includes the functionally expressed idea of a GPS and WiFi integrated, voice-activated, thermally sensitive self-pointing cruiser dashboard video camera tied into the overhead tracking lights of a network-enabled rescue helicopter, blah blah blah. See? There are going to be people coming up with key pieces of puzzles like that, and some of their solutions will be very expensive to develop, and they have every reason to be "the" company from whom you can buy that technology (or license it) in order for them to recoup their costs, and make their investors glad they risked the money. See the difference?
I'd rather just continue to download the free content
How succinctly you make your opponents' case for them! It's not free content. That you have found a way to avoid paying for it only means that you're a cheap bastard that doesn't want to pay for entertainment, and are risking some legal action at some point, and feeling comfortable that the odds are in your favor. It doesn't mean the entertainers are asking to be your slaves. It just means you're causing them to be.
Do you actually know anybody that creates and entertains a large audience for a living? Try to persuade them to do it for free, while giving them that finger you're so smug about. Be sure to do it to their faces so you can get the full effect.
The problem arrises that one man's fair price is another man's extortion. Keep in mind that this is microsoft we're talking about.
And...? Are you feeling extorted into using Windows XP? Or are you feeling "extorted" into having to otherwise buy a too-expensive Mac, or invest a huge, huge amount of time into living as easily on a roll-your-own Linux box?
I don't find anything extortive about paying a couple hundred bucks for an OS that will run on more hardware than anything else will, or in paying for suites like Office, especially since there are other options if I have more time and learning curve capacity than I do cash.
That's not the same as extortion, which implies force. And the great thing about a market economy, rather than government mandates, is that we can vote with our wallets. If your take on this something I'd worry about, I'd also worry about that Microsoft iPod having a monopoly... oh, wait.
There is no penalty for losing customer data other than bad press
How about losing the customers, trust of business partners, and the huge, disruptive cost of having to play catch-up and deal with issues that should have been evolving over time, instead?
Those are very real, potentially company-killing "penalties" - whether handed out by a regulatory agency or not.