Bad HTML design, K-Meleon and older Opera render the site completely unreadable (total mess) can't even line buttons well or see the text... have to launch Safari to reveal the page.
What the hell is K-Meleon!
Actually, I googled it. And installed it. And it failed the Acid2 test miserably, which even IE has been able to pass since version 8. 8! And what is "older Opera?" They're on, like, version 11 now!
Come on, man, you can't expect them to support every legacy browser. If everyone did that we'd still be stuck using tables for layout. They have to draw the line somewhere.
YouTube is owned by Google, and they're going to be making everything WebM soon. I wouldn't be surprised if they only made the low-quality versions H.264 in the future and required WebM for the higher-quality encodings. This would let them keep iPhone users happy (low quality encoding isn't such a problem on a tiny screen), while forcing desktop users to install a WebM plugin.
Three things wrong/silly that I can see with that statement.
Few iPhone users use the YouTube website, as there is a native YouTube app preinstalled on each device.
Plugins? Argh! That's what we're trying to get away from in the first place!
That wouldn't do anything for desktop users anyway, unless they get rid of Flash as well. And as Flash can be used to wrap H.264 video, the path of least resistance to content providers is to just continue to serve H.264 wrapped in Flash, rather than re-encode everything in another, widely unsupported format.
"VP8's intra prediction is basically ripped off wholesale from H.264," he wrote. "This is a patent time-bomb waiting to happen. H.264's spatial intra prediction is covered in patents and I don't think that On2 will be able to just get away with changing the rounding in the prediction modes."
If HTML and CSS were to follow normal standardization procedures, for example, Firefox, Opera, Chrome, Safari and even IE would be free to extend HTML however they want, and then every couple of years the best extensions from all would be combined and rolled into the next version of HTML.
That's pretty much what happens with HTML and CSS. The canvas element in HTML5 and the transform property in CSS3 were initially created and implemented by Apple in WebKit, and later adopted by the W3C.
H.264 infringes on a patent I own. When adoption is sufficient, I will sue everyone who uses it (MPEG-LA doesn't indemnify its users against outside patent claims either).
(sure, I'm probably lying, but can you prove it?)
That's ridiculous. You can use that to argue against the adoption of anything. "HTML infringes on a patent I own, don't use it or I'll sue you!" "Keyboards infringe on a patent I own, don't use them or I'll sue you!" "You can't prove me wrong, so I win!"
Remember there are other competitors than just the "monopoly/duopoly".
Wow. Just... wow.
Remember there are competitors other than the only company that's providing service in your area!
If there is a monopoly/duopoly/oligopoly, then by definition there are no competitors. (I suppose technically in the cases of a duopoly/oligopoly there are "competitors," but they're acting in concert). The vast majority of Americans don't have the choice you're preaching.
Mod the parent up, it's a great assessment of everything that Palm and HP did wrong with webOS.
As an early Pre adopter, I was ecstatic when HP bought Palm, because they have deep enough pockets to splurge on the desperately-needed R&D that Palm couldn't afford. Instead one of their executives said that their goal "wasn't to enter the smartphone game" and that they bought Palm for the IP and to put webOS on printers. True enough, since then there have been zero compelling developments in the webOS world.
HP and Palm need to come up with something crazy if they want to keep me (and the parent, and probably many others) from switching to other platforms.
It's not competition when Amazon pays the carriers tens or hundreds of millions of dollars to bundle their appstore with the carrier's phones (possibly to the exclusion of the official Android market). That's actually the opposite of competition. Amazon's market would be doomed to failure if the enduser had the choice between it and Android's.
Has there been any indication at all that that will happen?
In fact there is a regression here as now we have a monopoly store as opposed to all sorts of vendors fighting it out using all sorts of sales channels. Apple, Inc now dictates prices, margins, selections, censorship, etc.
However, in the comment to which I'm replying (relevant portion reproduced below) you complain about the Amazon App Store with regard to fragmentation and lock-in.
These stupid stores will lead to lock-in and fragmentation.
First, there's no indication that this could lead to lock-in. Amazon has not expressed any interest in pursuing exclusivity deals with carriers/device makers.
Second, what the hell! If there's only one store it's a monopoly, but if there are more than one the platform is fragmented? You can't have it both ways!
Wouldn't it be great if Amazon could open a competing Apple app store, and then people could have free choice to buy wherever they please, just like in the real world?
Yes, that would be awesome.
On a related note, it's interesting how when it comes to Apple, people argue that only having one store is anti-competitive, over-controlling and locked down. On Android, when someone actually tries to make another store, people complain about lockdown (???) and fragmentation.
Incorrect. Nintendo actually pioneered the idea of selling the consoles at a loss and making the money back on games. The Wii is the first console since the NES to be sold at a profit.
Not sure why everyone assumes that Android is a better choice for HP than webOS. Who cares if it's "open" - HP now owns the codebase to webOS, so while there may be an advantage to going with Android over Windows 7, there isn't one to going with Android over webOS.
sexconker, you are making it remarkably hard for me to defend you.
Stop (gratuitously) cursing, lose the derogatory names, and stop saying stuff like "everything you said is completely illogical and wrong." It doesn't help your argument, it just makes you seem like a douchebag.
You DO have some good points, but most people won't get them because they'll just write you off as a troll. And, if you'll look at some of your comments on this article, you'll notice you HAVE been modded down to troll.
Step back, cool off, and write without any of the insults. If your argument is strong it'll stand on its own.
Right there, you've just destroyed your own argument. Having "exclusive use" of your code is not a "real, tangible product". The instant you sell or supply your code to anyone else, you necessarily lose the ability to have "exclusive use" of that code.
The "copying code necessarily destroys code uniqueness" argument and the "slavery and killing are not 'real, tangible products' argument were actually completely separate arguments. The former cited an example of something that is literally *taken away* from you (stolen) if someone copies your code; the latter was trying to disqualify his maxwells demon's examples for why "I can make a living off this" isn't a good barometer for something that should be legal—a point he was correct in making, but let's not get off track here.
Having "exclusive use" of your code (let's say "uniqueness"; totally bogus dude said that in his response to me and I think that's a better way of putting it) is not a "real, tangible product." The code itself is a "real, tangible product"; the uniqueness is a byproduct of having created something original. And yes, when you sell or supply your code to anyone else, your code is no longer unique. To create a website, however, you must place at least some code online where it is accessible by anyone. You could argue that this equates to "supplying" others with your code, I suppose, but most people do it with the reasonable expectation that it will not be copied. In this case, Plurk hadn't "sold or supplied" Microsoft with the code, Microsoft just took it. And in the case of software products like Photoshop, what is being sold is the compiled binary, not the code itself.
What copyright gives you is the exclusive right to control the copying and distribution of your code.
Yes, that's exactly what it gives you, and as a result of that you are legally guaranteed code uniqueness, unless you choose to surrender that right.
Now, what you almost touch on is that theft concerns "real, tangible products", not abstract concepts like software. Regardless of what all the armchair lawyers on Slashdot think, you cannot steal an idea. How many copyright cases do you think include the word theft? I'll give you a hint - it's probably zero. No, they use words like infringement and violation. The simple reason is, despite what they want you to believe, there is no such thing as stealing non-tangible concepts. The copyright owners know it, the courts know it, everybody knows it except the people who are taken in by Big Content's rhetoric.
I've said this before, and I'll say it again: this just semantics. Whether you "steal" an idea, "copy" an idea, or "plagiarize" an idea, it all equates to the same thing. Furthermore, just because a classical definition of "theft" requires that something is physically taken doesn't mean that more recent definitions can't be expanded to include the plagiarism of ideas. For all intents and purposes, the word "theft" conveys the intended meaning effectively, even if a more specific word might be (slightly) more appropriate.
I don't think either of us have any idea what terminology is used in copyright cases—you yourself stated that they "probably" don't say the word theft—so I'll just leave that part of the argument alone.
Copyright infringement may or may not be immoral. It may or may not be unethical. One thing it is not, however, is theft.
Ah, but 200 years ago, slavery was legal in the US and much of the rest of the world. It didn't violate the slaves' rights, because by the laws at the time, the slaves had no rights recognized by the legal system.
When I said "another human being's rights", I meant it more in the sense of moral, inalienable rights, not legal rights. We all believe people have the right to life, and to live a *free* life, which is why the application of sexconker's argument to slavery and killing was a good move, and clearly he needs to come up with a more specific (or just plain different) barometer for what professions should be legal if he wants to argue that point here.
Technically, one *could* try to redeem sexconker's exact argument as he stated it by saying that they believe slavery and killing should be legal. If one believes that, then maxwells demon hasn't come up with a suitable rebuttal for why something shouldn't be legal just because you can make a living from it. Of course, if someone believes that, we all know they're just a fucked-up person:)
I think you're missing the point of pedantic argumentation. Basically: if you're going to make an analogy, make sure it actually fits. Having people point out mismatches between your analogy and the actual thing you're discussing may be annoying, but can also be constructive in helping to refine your own thinking.
No, I realize the advantage of pedantic argumentation (although that's the first time I've heard the term), and I agree that the original analogy comparing stealing someone's physical belongings to stealing code is flawed, but there was no reason to compare the analogy to something else when he pointed out its flaws in the next sentence. I was just nitpicking because maxwell demon came across as really obnoxious:)
The point was that it's not monetary loss that was the issue. The harm done is of an entirely different nature, so comparing it to breaking into someone else's house and taking whatever you want is illogical and irrelevant. Analogies are supposed to help us to understand things more clearly, but using an analogy that doesn't actually fit only muddies things. Is sexconker pissed off only at the potential financial damages that could result from having his code "stolen", or is it something else?
This a fair assessment, since we can all agree (well, except maybe sexconker) that the analogy wasn't apt in the first place.
This one I'm interested in, because I'm not able to think of a scenario where someone still has their "stuff" that I would be willing to call "theft". This is probably just semantics though; "theft" is often used as a shortcut for "copyright violation" or whatever would be more technically correct. Still, some people do get hung up on it, so if you're going to have these kinds of discussions it's probably good to have a response that doesn't rely on people agreeing with your casual usage of the term. Using terms like "theft" and "stealing" in cases like this is essentially slang: it's fine if the people you're talking to happen to share your understanding of what a "jive ho" is, for example; but if you don't know they do, you might be better off using less ambiguous terms.
This issue *is* just semantics, as far as I'm concerned, which was what I was trying to point out, although that may not have come across clearly. A classical definition of "theft" may only cover something which was removed from its owner's possession, whereas more recent definitions may cover the copying of intellectual property and other such things. Dictionary.com lists both. Clearly there are more specific words or phrases for what occurred here, but for all intents and purposes I think "theft" or "stealing" conveys the meaning pretty effectively.
No, there's not, not if the code is being copied. If they delete your copy and you no longer have it, then yes, you've lost the money that was invested in it; in the same way if you buy a new stereo and someone steals it, the money you spent on the stereo is gone, along with the stereo.
Arguably, what you've lost is your code's uniqueness. Suppose the stereo is a one-of-a-kind custom model, the only one in the world. A large part of its value to you, as its owner, is the fact that it is unique. This could be converted into a monetary gain in the future by selling it: presumably its uniqueness is attractive to other people as well. But even if someone comes from the future with a matter duplicator and makes an identical copy of your "unique" stereo, you haven't suffered an actual monetary loss, any more than you suffer a monetary loss if you buy a stereo at full price a week before the store has it on special for 50% off.
For example, say he has naked photos of his girl friend in his house. Do you think he (or his girl friend) would be happy if a total stranger sees them? And I'm pretty sure the answer to this question has zero relation to the work he put into those photos.
Really? All it takes to make something immoral is that it makes someone unhappy? Well, shit, how happy do you think our hypothetical programmer would be if someone used his code without asking permission, paying him or giving him credit?
Great argument;-) Especially since I haven't talked about words. I talked about effects. Namely the effect of something not being there any more.
You actually didn't address his argument, which was that scarcity isn't necessary for theft. As in, "copying code is still theft, even though nothing is technically *taken away* from someone". You are the one arguing semantics here, sir.
No. Not any more than by simply not using their damned code at all. They don't have a loss, they only do not get a profit. There is no basic right to get a profit from whatever you do.
Actually, if any money went into the code being written, then there IS a monetary loss. Not to mention time and hard work.
No, I didn't. I applied your argument to slavery and homicide, to show that the argument isn't valid. If you don't get the difference, you should take a course in basic logic.
Okay, this part is true. Since you seem to be so well versed in logic, let's apply YOUR argument to another topic to show that it's not valid.
Plagiarism should be legal! Why? Well, you're not "stealing" something, since the person from whom you plagiarized still has it after you plagiarize it. And there's no loss, there's only not a profit!
First: Your house usually contains private stuff. Going to someone's house is more like breaking into his computer.
Since we're making an analogy about stealing code, not breaking into someone's house, it doesn't really matter what breaking into someone's house is like.
Second: If you take something away, it's not there any more.
Something like having exclusive use of that code?
And the argument that some people do something for a living doesn't tell you anything about if that should be legal. In the times of slavery, some people were trading slaves for a living. Professional killers kill for a living. By your logic, slavery and killing should be legal.
Well, technically that's a matter of opinion. But since (I hope) we're all of the opinion that slavery and killing SHOULD be illegal, I'll disqualify slavery and killing from the category of "real, tangible products" due to the fact that they necessarily violate another human being's rights.
Slashdot Mirror
Bad HTML design, K-Meleon and older Opera render the site completely unreadable (total mess) can't even line buttons well or see the text... have to launch Safari to reveal the page.
What the hell is K-Meleon!
Actually, I googled it. And installed it. And it failed the Acid2 test miserably, which even IE has been able to pass since version 8. 8! And what is "older Opera?" They're on, like, version 11 now!
Come on, man, you can't expect them to support every legacy browser. If everyone did that we'd still be stuck using tables for layout. They have to draw the line somewhere.
I have. There have been independent analyses that call the patent status of VP8 into question.
http://arstechnica.com/open-source/news/2010/05/google-support-aside-webm-carries-patent-risks-from-mpeg-la.ars
YouTube is owned by Google, and they're going to be making everything WebM soon. I wouldn't be surprised if they only made the low-quality versions H.264 in the future and required WebM for the higher-quality encodings. This would let them keep iPhone users happy (low quality encoding isn't such a problem on a tiny screen), while forcing desktop users to install a WebM plugin.
Three things wrong/silly that I can see with that statement.
Here you go.
From the article:
"VP8's intra prediction is basically ripped off wholesale from H.264," he wrote. "This is a patent time-bomb waiting to happen. H.264's spatial intra prediction is covered in patents and I don't think that On2 will be able to just get away with changing the rounding in the prediction modes."
If HTML and CSS were to follow normal standardization procedures, for example, Firefox, Opera, Chrome, Safari and even IE would be free to extend HTML however they want, and then every couple of years the best extensions from all would be combined and rolled into the next version of HTML.
That's pretty much what happens with HTML and CSS. The canvas element in HTML5 and the transform property in CSS3 were initially created and implemented by Apple in WebKit, and later adopted by the W3C.
H.264 infringes on a patent I own. When adoption is sufficient, I will sue everyone who uses it (MPEG-LA doesn't indemnify its users against outside patent claims either).
(sure, I'm probably lying, but can you prove it?)
That's ridiculous. You can use that to argue against the adoption of anything. "HTML infringes on a patent I own, don't use it or I'll sue you!" "Keyboards infringe on a patent I own, don't use them or I'll sue you!" "You can't prove me wrong, so I win!"
The burden of proof is on you.
Remember there are competitors other than the only company that's providing service in your area!
Yes. DirectTV and cable, for example.
Neither of which provide Internet access, which is the issue here.
Remember there are other competitors than just the "monopoly/duopoly".
Wow. Just... wow.
Remember there are competitors other than the only company that's providing service in your area!
If there is a monopoly/duopoly/oligopoly, then by definition there are no competitors. (I suppose technically in the cases of a duopoly/oligopoly there are "competitors," but they're acting in concert). The vast majority of Americans don't have the choice you're preaching.
Mod the parent up, it's a great assessment of everything that Palm and HP did wrong with webOS.
As an early Pre adopter, I was ecstatic when HP bought Palm, because they have deep enough pockets to splurge on the desperately-needed R&D that Palm couldn't afford. Instead one of their executives said that their goal "wasn't to enter the smartphone game" and that they bought Palm for the IP and to put webOS on printers. True enough, since then there have been zero compelling developments in the webOS world.
HP and Palm need to come up with something crazy if they want to keep me (and the parent, and probably many others) from switching to other platforms.
Sure it all involves a good dose of self-delusion, but a lot of people have improved their lives greatly with a little self-delusion
We are at war with Eurasia. We have always been at war with Eurasia.
It's not competition when Amazon pays the carriers tens or hundreds of millions of dollars to bundle their appstore with the carrier's phones (possibly to the exclusion of the official Android market). That's actually the opposite of competition. Amazon's market would be doomed to failure if the enduser had the choice between it and Android's.
Has there been any indication at all that that will happen?
Stop talking.
In this comment in a different thread (http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1936596&cid=34765090, relevant portion reproduced below) you complain about the Mac App Store with regard to it being a "monopoly store."
In fact there is a regression here as now we have a monopoly store as opposed to all sorts of vendors fighting it out using all sorts of sales channels. Apple, Inc now dictates prices, margins, selections, censorship, etc.
However, in the comment to which I'm replying (relevant portion reproduced below) you complain about the Amazon App Store with regard to fragmentation and lock-in.
These stupid stores will lead to lock-in and fragmentation.
First, there's no indication that this could lead to lock-in. Amazon has not expressed any interest in pursuing exclusivity deals with carriers/device makers.
Second, what the hell! If there's only one store it's a monopoly, but if there are more than one the platform is fragmented? You can't have it both ways!
Wouldn't it be great if Amazon could open a competing Apple app store, and then people could have free choice to buy wherever they please, just like in the real world?
Yes, that would be awesome.
On a related note, it's interesting how when it comes to Apple, people argue that only having one store is anti-competitive, over-controlling and locked down. On Android, when someone actually tries to make another store, people complain about lockdown (???) and fragmentation.
There's just no pleasing some people.
Android *is* open. Open for the carriers.
The users, not so much.
Rockstar and Eidos just didn't like the reviews, though. Gizmodo actually committed a felony.
It's not that Apple didn't like the press, it's that Gizmodo stole their property.
Incorrect. Nintendo actually pioneered the idea of selling the consoles at a loss and making the money back on games. The Wii is the first console since the NES to be sold at a profit.
Not sure why everyone assumes that Android is a better choice for HP than webOS. Who cares if it's "open" - HP now owns the codebase to webOS, so while there may be an advantage to going with Android over Windows 7, there isn't one to going with Android over webOS.
Good thing police take all laws 100% seriously in every single instance.
Because the chance that the police might not take the law seriously is a perfectly good reason to completely break it!
sexconker, you are making it remarkably hard for me to defend you.
Stop (gratuitously) cursing, lose the derogatory names, and stop saying stuff like "everything you said is completely illogical and wrong." It doesn't help your argument, it just makes you seem like a douchebag.
You DO have some good points, but most people won't get them because they'll just write you off as a troll. And, if you'll look at some of your comments on this article, you'll notice you HAVE been modded down to troll.
Step back, cool off, and write without any of the insults. If your argument is strong it'll stand on its own.
Right there, you've just destroyed your own argument. Having "exclusive use" of your code is not a "real, tangible product". The instant you sell or supply your code to anyone else, you necessarily lose the ability to have "exclusive use" of that code.
The "copying code necessarily destroys code uniqueness" argument and the "slavery and killing are not 'real, tangible products' argument were actually completely separate arguments. The former cited an example of something that is literally *taken away* from you (stolen) if someone copies your code; the latter was trying to disqualify his maxwells demon's examples for why "I can make a living off this" isn't a good barometer for something that should be legal—a point he was correct in making, but let's not get off track here.
Having "exclusive use" of your code (let's say "uniqueness"; totally bogus dude said that in his response to me and I think that's a better way of putting it) is not a "real, tangible product." The code itself is a "real, tangible product"; the uniqueness is a byproduct of having created something original. And yes, when you sell or supply your code to anyone else, your code is no longer unique. To create a website, however, you must place at least some code online where it is accessible by anyone. You could argue that this equates to "supplying" others with your code, I suppose, but most people do it with the reasonable expectation that it will not be copied. In this case, Plurk hadn't "sold or supplied" Microsoft with the code, Microsoft just took it. And in the case of software products like Photoshop, what is being sold is the compiled binary, not the code itself.
What copyright gives you is the exclusive right to control the copying and distribution of your code.
Yes, that's exactly what it gives you, and as a result of that you are legally guaranteed code uniqueness, unless you choose to surrender that right.
Now, what you almost touch on is that theft concerns "real, tangible products", not abstract concepts like software. Regardless of what all the armchair lawyers on Slashdot think, you cannot steal an idea. How many copyright cases do you think include the word theft? I'll give you a hint - it's probably zero. No, they use words like infringement and violation. The simple reason is, despite what they want you to believe, there is no such thing as stealing non-tangible concepts. The copyright owners know it, the courts know it, everybody knows it except the people who are taken in by Big Content's rhetoric.
I've said this before, and I'll say it again: this just semantics. Whether you "steal" an idea, "copy" an idea, or "plagiarize" an idea, it all equates to the same thing. Furthermore, just because a classical definition of "theft" requires that something is physically taken doesn't mean that more recent definitions can't be expanded to include the plagiarism of ideas. For all intents and purposes, the word "theft" conveys the intended meaning effectively, even if a more specific word might be (slightly) more appropriate.
I don't think either of us have any idea what terminology is used in copyright cases—you yourself stated that they "probably" don't say the word theft—so I'll just leave that part of the argument alone.
Copyright infringement may or may not be immoral. It may or may not be unethical. One thing it is not, however, is theft.
Actually, according to Dictionary.com *and* Merriam-Webster, it is. But again, this is engaging in semantics.
Ah, but 200 years ago, slavery was legal in the US and much of the rest of the world. It didn't violate the slaves' rights, because by the laws at the time, the slaves had no rights recognized by the legal system.
When I said "another human being's rights", I meant it more in the sense of moral, inalienable rights, not legal rights. We all believe people have the right to life, and to live a *free* life, which is why the application of sexconker's argument to slavery and killing was a good move, and clearly he needs to come up with a more specific (or just plain different) barometer for what professions should be legal if he wants to argue that point here.
Technically, one *could* try to redeem sexconker's exact argument as he stated it by saying that they believe slavery and killing should be legal. If one believes that, then maxwells demon hasn't come up with a suitable rebuttal for why something shouldn't be legal just because you can make a living from it. Of course, if someone believes that, we all know they're just a fucked-up person :)
I think you're missing the point of pedantic argumentation. Basically: if you're going to make an analogy, make sure it actually fits. Having people point out mismatches between your analogy and the actual thing you're discussing may be annoying, but can also be constructive in helping to refine your own thinking.
No, I realize the advantage of pedantic argumentation (although that's the first time I've heard the term), and I agree that the original analogy comparing stealing someone's physical belongings to stealing code is flawed, but there was no reason to compare the analogy to something else when he pointed out its flaws in the next sentence. I was just nitpicking because maxwell demon came across as really obnoxious :)
The point was that it's not monetary loss that was the issue. The harm done is of an entirely different nature, so comparing it to breaking into someone else's house and taking whatever you want is illogical and irrelevant. Analogies are supposed to help us to understand things more clearly, but using an analogy that doesn't actually fit only muddies things. Is sexconker pissed off only at the potential financial damages that could result from having his code "stolen", or is it something else?
This a fair assessment, since we can all agree (well, except maybe sexconker) that the analogy wasn't apt in the first place.
This one I'm interested in, because I'm not able to think of a scenario where someone still has their "stuff" that I would be willing to call "theft". This is probably just semantics though; "theft" is often used as a shortcut for "copyright violation" or whatever would be more technically correct. Still, some people do get hung up on it, so if you're going to have these kinds of discussions it's probably good to have a response that doesn't rely on people agreeing with your casual usage of the term. Using terms like "theft" and "stealing" in cases like this is essentially slang: it's fine if the people you're talking to happen to share your understanding of what a "jive ho" is, for example; but if you don't know they do, you might be better off using less ambiguous terms.
This issue *is* just semantics, as far as I'm concerned, which was what I was trying to point out, although that may not have come across clearly. A classical definition of "theft" may only cover something which was removed from its owner's possession, whereas more recent definitions may cover the copying of intellectual property and other such things. Dictionary.com lists both. Clearly there are more specific words or phrases for what occurred here, but for all intents and purposes I think "theft" or "stealing" conveys the meaning pretty effectively.
No, there's not, not if the code is being copied. If they delete your copy and you no longer have it, then yes, you've lost the money that was invested in it; in the same way if you buy a new stereo and someone steals it, the money you spent on the stereo is gone, along with the stereo. Arguably, what you've lost is your code's uniqueness. Suppose the stereo is a one-of-a-kind custom model, the only one in the world. A large part of its value to you, as its owner, is the fact that it is unique. This could be converted into a monetary gain in the future by selling it: presumably its uniqueness is attractive to other people as well. But even if someone comes from the future with a matter duplicator and makes an identical copy of your "unique" stereo, you haven't suffered an actual monetary loss, any more than you suffer a monetary loss if you buy a stereo at full price a week before the store has it on special for 50% off.
I did point out the uniqueness issue in my response to maxwell demon's other post, and it's not hard to see how the loss of that uniquene
For example, say he has naked photos of his girl friend in his house. Do you think he (or his girl friend) would be happy if a total stranger sees them? And I'm pretty sure the answer to this question has zero relation to the work he put into those photos.
Really? All it takes to make something immoral is that it makes someone unhappy? Well, shit, how happy do you think our hypothetical programmer would be if someone used his code without asking permission, paying him or giving him credit?
Great argument ;-) Especially since I haven't talked about words. I talked about effects. Namely the effect of something not being there any more.
You actually didn't address his argument, which was that scarcity isn't necessary for theft. As in, "copying code is still theft, even though nothing is technically *taken away* from someone". You are the one arguing semantics here, sir.
No. Not any more than by simply not using their damned code at all. They don't have a loss, they only do not get a profit. There is no basic right to get a profit from whatever you do.
Actually, if any money went into the code being written, then there IS a monetary loss. Not to mention time and hard work.
No, I didn't. I applied your argument to slavery and homicide, to show that the argument isn't valid. If you don't get the difference, you should take a course in basic logic.
Okay, this part is true. Since you seem to be so well versed in logic, let's apply YOUR argument to another topic to show that it's not valid.
Plagiarism should be legal! Why? Well, you're not "stealing" something, since the person from whom you plagiarized still has it after you plagiarize it. And there's no loss, there's only not a profit!
The analogy fails in several ways.
Your RESPONSE fails in several ways.
First: Your house usually contains private stuff. Going to someone's house is more like breaking into his computer.
Since we're making an analogy about stealing code, not breaking into someone's house, it doesn't really matter what breaking into someone's house is like.
Second: If you take something away, it's not there any more.
Something like having exclusive use of that code?
And the argument that some people do something for a living doesn't tell you anything about if that should be legal. In the times of slavery, some people were trading slaves for a living. Professional killers kill for a living. By your logic, slavery and killing should be legal.
Well, technically that's a matter of opinion. But since (I hope) we're all of the opinion that slavery and killing SHOULD be illegal, I'll disqualify slavery and killing from the category of "real, tangible products" due to the fact that they necessarily violate another human being's rights.
The HitlerHitler
Really? Godwin's Law already? It's the FIRST POST.