> "This UI is quite simply one of the deepest and most interesting redesigns of the desktop > user interface ever produced. It makes MacOS look like what it is -- boring and unoriginal."
Wrong answer.
If something is good, it *is*, of its own accord. There is no need to assert *something else is bad* - unless you're feeling insecure.
Who cares? Print journalism is bunk because of television. There's no award for "best investigative sentence" - which is what modern newspapers have been reduced to, with a very, very few exceptions (IHT and The Economist).
Modern print journalism, like television, is a source of disinformation.
Disinformation is information which leads you to *think* you are informed but actually leads you away from being *truly informed*.
News is defined as *functional information*. Almost everything in a newspaper is NOT news. It fills up your time, fills up your brain, and leads you to think you're being informed when actually you're being filled up with irrelevent, contextless, useless knowledge.
Most of the major issues in our lives are not news-worthy - in the sense of being *newspaper* news worthy; and those which are *cannot* be dealt with in the space and attention span commanded by a newspaper column. The very attempt to do so entirely distorts the reality of the problem and this itself is part of the disinformation.
We need to loose television. We won't, and that's why we're screwed.
> How is this theft? When these artists recorded their songs 50 years ago, copyright was even shorter! They knew exactly how long > their works would stay out of public domain.
That fact something is a law does not mean it is right.
Segregation was law.
> The offspring are not royalty, and as such are not entitled to live forever off of their parents via extensions.
They were given something by their parents. We come along and take it. Isn't that theft? do you envy their success or luck so much you justify theft by it?
Have your parents given you anything? how would you feel if the State came along and took it from you? I think you would be deeply outraged, and rightly so.
> OTOH if property rights exist it's legal to draw a circle and live off lawsuits against everyone who tries to create a car, a > clockwork or any of thousands of things that use a wheel. And while you do nothing with your drawing of a circle, nobody else is > allowed to do anything with it either.
If you draw a circle, property rights mean that you own that circle that you've drawn.
You put in the time and effort to make the drawing; it belongs to you.
It's a bit like having a calculator or a sheet of paper and a pen.
It's much easier to do math - and so you're more likely to do it - when you have a calculator in your hand.
If, on the other hand, you have to dig out the paper, the pen, and engage brain, you're less likely to do it.
So, we have a situation now where many people - especially in violent inner city areas - have in their hands a device which with the pull of a trigger can immediately kill at ranges from point blank to a few hundred meters.
Compare this to a situation where people don't have such a device - but have much less efficient devices, like cars (bulky, hard to maneover), knives (not much of a ranged attack, much less lethal, very messy) and Wii controllers (weak straps, could fail in use).
> The crux of this problem is that you're treating ideas and creativity as property -- intangible ethereal things as tangible > physical things. Please try to ignore the fact that lawyers and the media are hung up on this terminology of "intellectual > property". No one owns an idea - it's not possible, just as owning a thought isn't possible and I'll prove it to you:
This all sounds good and well until consideration is given to the economics of the matter.
If I have 30k USD in my bank account, and I spend that money over the course of a year, paying for my rent, food, heating and clothes, and I spent that time developing a wonderful new idea - a fantastic math theorum, say a new data compression method - then if that idea does *not* belong to me and anyone else can use it for free, I've been robbed blind; because I paid for that new method and other people are using it for free.
Now, so far, so good. I might even risk to say that we are in agreement so far. I think the disagreement comes next; in that I say this method - and the revenue derived thereof - belongs permanently to this person, and you say it should, after a while, this method and so the revenue derived thereof - should be taken from this person, so that no one has to pay for it any more.
> Doesn't 'ownership' usually imply that there are people who aren't allowed to use it?
Not per se, I think.
Ownership means that an individual has provided the resources required to obtain a service or good.
Having done so gives that individual the right to do what they wish with that item.
The thing is of course that typically, we buy things because we want to use them and since we, culturally, like to own our own items, it tends to be that everyone buys their own, so we each have an individual copy which we use just for ourselves.
For example, I could buy a toaster and share it with my neighbours, but I don't. I like to use it myself, just as they like their own. Similarly, we could share a car, but it would be awkward, because we want to be in different places at the same time (since we work in different jobs).
So it appears, superficially, that ownership means other people can't use it. Actually, I think that's much more a personal choice which is made seperately from ownership.
> And anyways, ownership of intellectual property is a tricky beast because it copies itself into memory > whenever it's accessed.
That's irrelevant. If I create a song, and you hear it and reproduce it from memory, it's just the same as having walked off with my sheet music.
The mass ownership of guns is one of the leading causes of terror and misery in our society.
It's a sign of how backwards we are in non-technological matters that our society considers it right and proper for everyone to be able to carry a device designed to kill other people.
The only society which would need such a right would be one which has already armed all its people, so that it becomes necessary to possess a killing device merely to deter those who would mis-used their killing device.
> Of course it does; if anyone can make a copy of the item for free, how can you recapture the time and > money you invested in creating it?
> By that argument, laws against slavery is "judicial theft" too then, as it prevents me from exploiting > my property in ways I can't afford if I have to hire people to do it.
No, because people are not property. Contracts must be voluntary and well-informed. Slavery is not such a contract, since it is not voluntary.
> That is the only thing that prevents copyright from being a massive infringement of the right to free > speech - it is a voluntary trade off.
> That artificial monopoly is ONLY there as a temporary incentive to promote the arts and sciences. It is > a monopoly granted by the public to get something back, and it is the peoples full right to decide what > rights are to be given and for how long. That is the only thing that prevents copyright from being a > massive infringement of the right to free speech - it is a voluntary trade off.
So, if I spent ten years making a massive work of art, I pay for my rent, clothes and food during that whole time, it belongs to "the people"?
And if I keep it - which is to say, I have permanant copyright - I'm infringing their right to free speech?
Explain how, please. *I* spent the money making it. On what basis does ANYONE else say it belongs to them? how can my retention of that violate their ability to say what's they want to say?
> This is what I'm talking about. You can't seem to discern the difference between the physical product and > the actual physical one. They can't literally get your physical house out of their heads? How can they > stand the weight?
Having something "stuck in your mind" is a metaphor for not being able to stop thinking about something. You mean it literally in the sense of a song repeating, I mean it in the sense of being obsessed with something.
> Oh, you mean they can't get over the design of your house. You've shown it to them, so that part of it > is now theirs.
No, it isn't. It's theft. You might have spent six months designing a new form of buttress and they've just gone and made their own, having seen your copy.
> They still haven't taken anything from you that you didn't voluntarily give to them.
Showing someone a design is NOT the same as *giving them* the design.
Hearing a song is NOT the same as giving someone the right to own a copy.
> But let's imagine my house could be copied as easily as a digital song...If I actually made my living by > creating beautiful houses and then selling copies, and people, through the State, passed a law saying > they could have copies for free - I've just been robbed blind.
> No, it means you chose a piss-poor method of making your living.
If I spend my time and money making a song, the fact it *can* be copied for free means I've chosen a stupid way to make a living?
What about the fact that I spent my time and money creating the song? doesn't that mean it belongs to me?
Does the fact this work *can* be copied mean it is acceptable *for* it to be copied, when doing so violates the ownership of the author?
Moreover, if this IS taken to be so, absolutely NO ONE will produce ANY form of work which can be copied for free, because they could never recapture what it cost them to produce it.
So - no more films, no more songs, no more plays... excepting in so much as there might be other ways to still make money from them (cinema showing, theatrical performances) which permit money still to be made.
> Anything you use in your life was only built because someone copied an idea from someone else, millions of > times over. As Newton said, "if I have seen farther than others, it is because I stood on the shoulders of > giants". You want to make it illegal to stand on their shoulders.
No.
I want to make it illegal to take from others what belongs to them.
If you want to use something someone else made or developed, go talk to them and buy a license.
If you spend a year, funding yourself, paying your rent, bills, etc, doing maths research and develop a fabulous new theorum - that theorum *belongs to you*. If someone else wants to use it, they pay for it - which is to say, they are contributing to the cost that was needed to develop it.
If it's asserted this shouldn't be paid, no one is going to do any form of work which can be copied for free. That would devestate our economy.
> I (and you) should be paying to lease a patent to the inventors of language, the wheel, writing, > textiles, as well as the inventors of the millions or billions of improvements to those fundamental > ideas to bring them to where they are today. Your point of view is very clearly crazy.
None of those inventions would have been MADE in the first place if people had known they would never be compensated for what it cost them to invent.
We have got used to the fact we have already stolen so much from so many that we consider it the normal state of affairs and indeed consider that we would not be where we are now had we not.
> BTW, you have an opinion that is not popular here on/. You got modded down because you didn't lace the > comment with provisions, niceties, and "I know the reason for this, but..." clauses. Basically, tread > carefully in future.
Certainly not! why should I be all nice-nice because I hold view A and other people hold view B? it makes no sense. If people holding view B are nasty to people holding view A *because* they hold view A, they're a bunch of tossers and deserve all the directness they get.
Anyways, I don't think this is the reason. I think people mod down because there is a human instinct to be unpleasent, suppressive, towards that which is considered different and wrong. Unfortunately, a lot of people aren't really capable of thought and instead hold a unreasoned, learned belief system, and anything different to that is by definition wrong - and they are then unpleasent and suppressive towards that difference.
People mod annoymously, so any superficial pressure to behave reasonably because other people are watching is removed. Only people who genuinely think for themselves, rather than merely reacting emotionally, are capable of modding reasonably (or indeed of being functioning adults).
As far as I can see, you've argued that since there is no God and everything is fundamentally meaningless, that the issue of ownership is meaningless.
In abstract, I agree. In practical terms, the issue of ownership is obviously meaningful.
> In fact, in Darwinist terms, if someone can take your idea and spin millions with it, we should applaud > them, and not you, because you are obviously too dense to recognize a good thing.
Do you mean me as in *me*, personally, e.g. was this an insult?
Well, all the stuff you just talked about had nothing to do with the issue in hand, which could be why you don't see where the issue is.
> Did you notice the house doesn't make you any money as long as you keep handing it down to your > children? Not even a cent? Sure it goes up in value, but that's just a price tag, it really hasn't made > YOU any money.
The money you made from it is the rent you didn't pay because you owned the house.
> You wanted to make a lot of money, I suppose, then? Well, you could build another house and sell it.
You couldn't do this if your house, like a song, could be copied for free and this was legally permitted.
> Frankly, I am greatly in favor of far more aggressive inheritance tax. Why should you be given benefits > over other people because your ancestor built a house? Why exactly does your blood line have anything to > do with your rights as a human?
Because we love our children.
We work hard to pay for their upbringing and education and then, when we die, we hand to them what we have created with the sweat of our brow. Coming between a parent and their children is something we - rightly - reject on an emotional level.
Speaking more intellectually; one of my rights as a human is to do what I wish with what I own.
Here's a question; if it is considered acceptable to set aside this right when someone dies, why is not acceptable to set aside that right while someone is alive?
Something you said;
> Why should you be given benefits over other people because your ancestor built a house?
Can I not equally ask then; why should you be given benefits over other people because you have more money than they do?
Why does being dead or alive have anything do this with this?
If it is acceptable to take from a man because he dies on the basis that others need it more, surely it is acceptable to take from a man while he is alive, because others need it more.
If that is held to be true, then we have in practical terms obliterated private property and any incentive to work; because any work we do will be taken from us until we are all equal wealthy.
It seems to me violation of property rights always ultimately leads to asserting there should be full redistribution of wealth.
So all the people who make films and songs are idiots?
If you feel this way, you need to throw away all your movies and songs, because they couldn't exist.
> I want to sit around in my pajamas all day and make macaroni necklaces; where's my god-given right to > get paid for that? Huh? To get paid for something, I have to do something that someone else is willing > to give me money for.
If property rights exist, then it is possible to make things which can be copied easily and sell them.
If property rights do not exist, then it only possible to make large, complex, heavy things which cannot be copied (which is in effect an enforcement of property rights).
> Music is pretty much the same way. If you don't want to share it with the world at large, you can write > it and keep it a secret.
Okay, so lets imagine I build a lovely house. Beautiful. Big, couple of wings, Victorian style, set in acres of lovely land.
> Record it, play it to yourself when no one else is at home. No one is going to > "steal it" from you. However, you want other people to listen don't you? You want to make money off of > it? Well, once they listen, it becomes part of their culture. They might get it stuck in their heads. > They might be whistling it while they work. They might like to sing along with it when they hear it on > the radio. They'll reference the lyrics when they think they would bring something to the conversation. > The music is now theirs. It's part of them. By letting them hear it, you gave it to them.
I have some friends over. They love my house. In fact, they keep talking about it. They can't get it out of their heads. It's become part of them. By letting them come over, I've given my house to them.
Clearly, this is rubbish. It's my house, not theirs. I spent a bucket load of money building it.
But let's imagine my house could be copied as easily as a digital song.
Would we mind then that other people made copies?
Well, not really - because the cost to me is clearly so low; I still *have* my house, even if they have identical copies.
But this is the rub; it still cost me a *bucket load* of money to make that house. If I actually made my living by creating beautiful houses and then selling copies, and people, through the State, passed a law saying they could have copies for free - I've just been robbed blind.
As far as I can see, what your argument (which I think well describes the majority view) comes down to is that it seems so harmless to copy a song or a film, that it's impossible to feel that it's wrong.
> Copyright is basically a trade whereby a person doesn't keep their story/song/etc locked up in their head, > and instead releases it to the public. In return, the artist is allowed a monopoly over the reproduction > of said story/song/etc for a limited period.
I think a lot of people have a lot of *different* ideas about what copyright is, or should be.
I take the libertarian point of view; what you make belongs to you.
The artist invested the time and money to make the song; it belongs to him.
He then sells copies at n USD/each.
It's entirely straightforward. No monopoly, no limited period, no public ownership.
It's just like owning a factory making coke and you sell to the public at 50c a can.
There's *no difference* because it happens to be that songs can be copied for free. All that means is a transaction cost has been eliminated.
Slashdot Mirror
Sounds like he's trying to cover things up.
Oracle enters Linux - "not a big deal".
Microsoft enters Linux - "nothing to worry about".
Sure thing dude. No problems. And that isn't an iceberg on the horizon.
I can't stand Macs.
I have a W2K box at home. I can't stand XP, either.
> "This UI is quite simply one of the deepest and most interesting redesigns of the desktop
> user interface ever produced. It makes MacOS look like what it is -- boring and unoriginal."
Wrong answer.
If something is good, it *is*, of its own accord. There is no need to assert *something else is bad* - unless you're feeling insecure.
> a rootkit that eliminates other rootkits
Well, there goes kernel stability.
I'm really not sure I want a future Norton RootKit Protector installing itself, bugs and all, into my kernel.
Who cares? Print journalism is bunk because of television. There's no award for "best investigative sentence" - which is what modern newspapers have been reduced to, with a very, very few exceptions (IHT and The Economist).
Modern print journalism, like television, is a source of disinformation.
Disinformation is information which leads you to *think* you are informed but actually leads you away from being *truly informed*.
News is defined as *functional information*. Almost everything in a newspaper is NOT news. It fills up your time, fills up your brain, and leads you to think you're being informed when actually you're being filled up with irrelevent, contextless, useless knowledge.
Most of the major issues in our lives are not news-worthy - in the sense of being *newspaper* news worthy; and those which are *cannot* be dealt with in the space and attention span commanded by a newspaper column. The very attempt to do so entirely distorts the reality of the problem and this itself is part of the disinformation.
We need to loose television. We won't, and that's why we're screwed.
> How is this theft? When these artists recorded their songs 50 years ago, copyright was even shorter! They knew exactly how long
> their works would stay out of public domain.
That fact something is a law does not mean it is right.
Segregation was law.
> The offspring are not royalty, and as such are not entitled to live forever off of their parents via extensions.
They were given something by their parents. We come along and take it. Isn't that theft? do you envy their success or luck so much you justify theft by it?
Have your parents given you anything? how would you feel if the State came along and took it from you? I think you would be deeply outraged, and rightly so.
> OTOH if property rights exist it's legal to draw a circle and live off lawsuits against everyone who tries to create a car, a
> clockwork or any of thousands of things that use a wheel. And while you do nothing with your drawing of a circle, nobody else is
> allowed to do anything with it either.
If you draw a circle, property rights mean that you own that circle that you've drawn.
You put in the time and effort to make the drawing; it belongs to you.
It does not mean you own ALL circles.
Nothing at all.
However, that wasn't the issue.
The point I made was about a society where it's legally permitted to carry killing devices.
One particular issue involved in that is crime and self-defence, but it's not *the* issue.
> Really? How do you come to this conclusion?
By the count of the dead and wounded and the suffering of those who survive and those who saw the violence and lost those who they love.
It's a bit like having a calculator or a sheet of paper and a pen.
It's much easier to do math - and so you're more likely to do it - when you have a calculator in your hand.
If, on the other hand, you have to dig out the paper, the pen, and engage brain, you're less likely to do it.
So, we have a situation now where many people - especially in violent inner city areas - have in their hands a device which with the pull of a trigger can immediately kill at ranges from point blank to a few hundred meters.
Compare this to a situation where people don't have such a device - but have much less efficient devices, like cars (bulky, hard to maneover), knives (not much of a ranged attack, much less lethal, very messy) and Wii controllers (weak straps, could fail in use).
> The crux of this problem is that you're treating ideas and creativity as property -- intangible ethereal things as tangible
> physical things. Please try to ignore the fact that lawyers and the media are hung up on this terminology of "intellectual
> property". No one owns an idea - it's not possible, just as owning a thought isn't possible and I'll prove it to you:
This all sounds good and well until consideration is given to the economics of the matter.
If I have 30k USD in my bank account, and I spend that money over the course of a year, paying for my rent, food, heating and clothes, and I spent that time developing a wonderful new idea - a fantastic math theorum, say a new data compression method - then if that idea does *not* belong to me and anyone else can use it for free, I've been robbed blind; because I paid for that new method and other people are using it for free.
Now, so far, so good. I might even risk to say that we are in agreement so far. I think the disagreement comes next; in that I say this method - and the revenue derived thereof - belongs permanently to this person, and you say it should, after a while, this method and so the revenue derived thereof - should be taken from this person, so that no one has to pay for it any more.
> Doesn't 'ownership' usually imply that there are people who aren't allowed to use it?
Not per se, I think.
Ownership means that an individual has provided the resources required to obtain a service or good.
Having done so gives that individual the right to do what they wish with that item.
The thing is of course that typically, we buy things because we want to use them and since we, culturally, like to own our own items, it tends to be that everyone buys their own, so we each have an individual copy which we use just for ourselves.
For example, I could buy a toaster and share it with my neighbours, but I don't. I like to use it myself, just as they like their own. Similarly, we could share a car, but it would be awkward, because we want to be in different places at the same time (since we work in different jobs).
So it appears, superficially, that ownership means other people can't use it. Actually, I think that's much more a personal choice which is made seperately from ownership.
> And anyways, ownership of intellectual property is a tricky beast because it copies itself into memory
> whenever it's accessed.
That's irrelevant. If I create a song, and you hear it and reproduce it from memory, it's just the same as having walked off with my sheet music.
> Tangable property should be taxed on death (possibly up to 100%).
/. holds some quite contradictory views.
It struck me earlier that
A great many people here despise President Bush...and yet here we are, saying we ought to give him everything we own when we die?
To do what with it? pay for another war? more Medicare? put off social security reform for another ten years?
The State is incompetent, because everything it does is a political football. The less money they have, the less harm they do.
The mass ownership of guns is one of the leading causes of terror and misery in our society.
It's a sign of how backwards we are in non-technological matters that our society considers it right and proper for everyone to be able to carry a device designed to kill other people.
The only society which would need such a right would be one which has already armed all its people, so that it becomes necessary to possess a killing device merely to deter those who would mis-used their killing device.
And how fucked up is that?
> Of course it does; if anyone can make a copy of the item for free, how can you recapture the time and
> money you invested in creating it?
> By that argument, laws against slavery is "judicial theft" too then, as it prevents me from exploiting
> my property in ways I can't afford if I have to hire people to do it.
No, because people are not property. Contracts must be voluntary and well-informed. Slavery is not such a contract, since it is not voluntary.
> That is the only thing that prevents copyright from being a massive infringement of the right to free
> speech - it is a voluntary trade off.
> That artificial monopoly is ONLY there as a temporary incentive to promote the arts and sciences. It is
> a monopoly granted by the public to get something back, and it is the peoples full right to decide what
> rights are to be given and for how long. That is the only thing that prevents copyright from being a
> massive infringement of the right to free speech - it is a voluntary trade off.
So, if I spent ten years making a massive work of art, I pay for my rent, clothes and food during that whole time, it belongs to "the people"?
And if I keep it - which is to say, I have permanant copyright - I'm infringing their right to free speech?
Explain how, please. *I* spent the money making it. On what basis does ANYONE else say it belongs to them? how can my retention of that violate their ability to say what's they want to say?
> This is what I'm talking about. You can't seem to discern the difference between the physical product and
> the actual physical one. They can't literally get your physical house out of their heads? How can they
> stand the weight?
Having something "stuck in your mind" is a metaphor for not being able to stop thinking about something. You mean it literally in the sense of a song repeating, I mean it in the sense of being obsessed with something.
> Oh, you mean they can't get over the design of your house. You've shown it to them, so that part of it
> is now theirs.
No, it isn't. It's theft. You might have spent six months designing a new form of buttress and they've just gone and made their own, having seen your copy.
> They still haven't taken anything from you that you didn't voluntarily give to them.
Showing someone a design is NOT the same as *giving them* the design.
Hearing a song is NOT the same as giving someone the right to own a copy.
> But let's imagine my house could be copied as easily as a digital song...If I actually made my living by
> creating beautiful houses and then selling copies, and people, through the State, passed a law saying
> they could have copies for free - I've just been robbed blind.
> No, it means you chose a piss-poor method of making your living.
If I spend my time and money making a song, the fact it *can* be copied for free means I've chosen a stupid way to make a living?
What about the fact that I spent my time and money creating the song? doesn't that mean it belongs to me?
Does the fact this work *can* be copied mean it is acceptable *for* it to be copied, when doing so violates the ownership of the author?
Moreover, if this IS taken to be so, absolutely NO ONE will produce ANY form of work which can be copied for free, because they could never recapture what it cost them to produce it.
So - no more films, no more songs, no more plays... excepting in so much as there might be other ways to still make money from them (cinema showing, theatrical performances) which permit money still to be made.
> Anything you use in your life was only built because someone copied an idea from someone else, millions of
> times over. As Newton said, "if I have seen farther than others, it is because I stood on the shoulders of
> giants". You want to make it illegal to stand on their shoulders.
No.
I want to make it illegal to take from others what belongs to them.
If you want to use something someone else made or developed, go talk to them and buy a license.
If you spend a year, funding yourself, paying your rent, bills, etc, doing maths research and develop a fabulous new theorum - that theorum *belongs to you*. If someone else wants to use it, they pay for it - which is to say, they are contributing to the cost that was needed to develop it.
If it's asserted this shouldn't be paid, no one is going to do any form of work which can be copied for free. That would devestate our economy.
> I (and you) should be paying to lease a patent to the inventors of language, the wheel, writing,
> textiles, as well as the inventors of the millions or billions of improvements to those fundamental
> ideas to bring them to where they are today. Your point of view is very clearly crazy.
None of those inventions would have been MADE in the first place if people had known they would never be compensated for what it cost them to invent.
We have got used to the fact we have already stolen so much from so many that we consider it the normal state of affairs and indeed consider that we would not be where we are now had we not.
> BTW, you have an opinion that is not popular here on /. You got modded down because you didn't lace the
> comment with provisions, niceties, and "I know the reason for this, but..." clauses. Basically, tread
> carefully in future.
Certainly not! why should I be all nice-nice because I hold view A and other people hold view B? it makes no sense. If people holding view B are nasty to people holding view A *because* they hold view A, they're a bunch of tossers and deserve all the directness they get.
Anyways, I don't think this is the reason. I think people mod down because there is a human instinct to be unpleasent, suppressive, towards that which is considered different and wrong. Unfortunately, a lot of people aren't really capable of thought and instead hold a unreasoned, learned belief system, and anything different to that is by definition wrong - and they are then unpleasent and suppressive towards that difference.
People mod annoymously, so any superficial pressure to behave reasonably because other people are watching is removed. Only people who genuinely think for themselves, rather than merely reacting emotionally, are capable of modding reasonably (or indeed of being functioning adults).
As far as I can see, you've argued that since there is no God and everything is fundamentally meaningless, that the issue of ownership is meaningless.
In abstract, I agree. In practical terms, the issue of ownership is obviously meaningful.
> In fact, in Darwinist terms, if someone can take your idea and spin millions with it, we should applaud
> them, and not you, because you are obviously too dense to recognize a good thing.
Do you mean me as in *me*, personally, e.g. was this an insult?
> So, I'm not getting you. Where's the issue?
Well, all the stuff you just talked about had nothing to do with the issue in hand, which could be why you don't see where the issue is.
> Did you notice the house doesn't make you any money as long as you keep handing it down to your
> children? Not even a cent? Sure it goes up in value, but that's just a price tag, it really hasn't made
> YOU any money.
The money you made from it is the rent you didn't pay because you owned the house.
> You wanted to make a lot of money, I suppose, then? Well, you could build another house and sell it.
You couldn't do this if your house, like a song, could be copied for free and this was legally permitted.
That is the issue here.
> Frankly, I am greatly in favor of far more aggressive inheritance tax. Why should you be given benefits
> over other people because your ancestor built a house? Why exactly does your blood line have anything to
> do with your rights as a human?
Because we love our children.
We work hard to pay for their upbringing and education and then, when we die, we hand to them what we have created with the sweat of our brow. Coming between a parent and their children is something we - rightly - reject on an emotional level.
Speaking more intellectually; one of my rights as a human is to do what I wish with what I own.
Here's a question; if it is considered acceptable to set aside this right when someone dies, why is not acceptable to set aside that right while someone is alive?
Something you said;
> Why should you be given benefits over other people because your ancestor built a house?
Can I not equally ask then; why should you be given benefits over other people because you have more money than they do?
Why does being dead or alive have anything do this with this?
If it is acceptable to take from a man because he dies on the basis that others need it more, surely it is acceptable to take from a man while he is alive, because others need it more.
If that is held to be true, then we have in practical terms obliterated private property and any incentive to work; because any work we do will be taken from us until we are all equal wealthy.
It seems to me violation of property rights always ultimately leads to asserting there should be full redistribution of wealth.
> Well then this person is an idiot, isn't he?
So all the people who make films and songs are idiots?
If you feel this way, you need to throw away all your movies and songs, because they couldn't exist.
> I want to sit around in my pajamas all day and make macaroni necklaces; where's my god-given right to
> get paid for that? Huh? To get paid for something, I have to do something that someone else is willing
> to give me money for.
If property rights exist, then it is possible to make things which can be copied easily and sell them.
If property rights do not exist, then it only possible to make large, complex, heavy things which cannot be copied (which is in effect an enforcement of property rights).
> Music is pretty much the same way. If you don't want to share it with the world at large, you can write
> it and keep it a secret.
Okay, so lets imagine I build a lovely house. Beautiful. Big, couple of wings, Victorian style, set in acres of lovely land.
> Record it, play it to yourself when no one else is at home. No one is going to
> "steal it" from you. However, you want other people to listen don't you? You want to make money off of
> it? Well, once they listen, it becomes part of their culture. They might get it stuck in their heads.
> They might be whistling it while they work. They might like to sing along with it when they hear it on
> the radio. They'll reference the lyrics when they think they would bring something to the conversation.
> The music is now theirs. It's part of them. By letting them hear it, you gave it to them.
I have some friends over. They love my house. In fact, they keep talking about it. They can't get it out of their heads. It's become part of them. By letting them come over, I've given my house to them.
Clearly, this is rubbish. It's my house, not theirs. I spent a bucket load of money building it.
But let's imagine my house could be copied as easily as a digital song.
Would we mind then that other people made copies?
Well, not really - because the cost to me is clearly so low; I still *have* my house, even if they have identical copies.
But this is the rub; it still cost me a *bucket load* of money to make that house. If I actually made my living by creating beautiful houses and then selling copies, and people, through the State, passed a law saying they could have copies for free - I've just been robbed blind.
As far as I can see, what your argument (which I think well describes the majority view) comes down to is that it seems so harmless to copy a song or a film, that it's impossible to feel that it's wrong.
> Copyright is basically a trade whereby a person doesn't keep their story/song/etc locked up in their head,
> and instead releases it to the public. In return, the artist is allowed a monopoly over the reproduction
> of said story/song/etc for a limited period.
I think a lot of people have a lot of *different* ideas about what copyright is, or should be.
I take the libertarian point of view; what you make belongs to you.
The artist invested the time and money to make the song; it belongs to him.
He then sells copies at n USD/each.
It's entirely straightforward. No monopoly, no limited period, no public ownership.
It's just like owning a factory making coke and you sell to the public at 50c a can.
There's *no difference* because it happens to be that songs can be copied for free. All that means is a transaction cost has been eliminated.
You still have your table; but you no longer can sell it.
You need to sell it, because you spent the last year doing nothing else but make it and now you have to pay your rent and buy food and clothes.
Owning the original table is no use at all if it cost you money to make and you need to recapture that investment.