Yes but if you stop arguing effectiveness, it looks an awful lot like putting your fingers and saying loudly "I know they're bad! I'm not listening to you! Lalalalala!"
In other words, don't stop arguing effectiveness. Simply ignoring evidence is a recipe for getting trampled over.
Empathy is the key. That was my whole point; empathy is the ability to care about others and their plights because of the unique and under-used human ability to simulate what it might feel like to be the person that is suffering. People lacking empathy don't care, and so don't act to minimize the suffering of others, saying it is not their business or it doesn't affect them, among the more popular rationalizations.
On the other hand, who exactly is empathetic to those who do suffer guilt, but find themselves unable to do anything? Or to those who don't agree with you and have to deal with the venom that you and others like you dish out? I personally reject the notion that I have to help my fellow man, and that being what seems to be a minority opinion on Slashdot (as are many of my opinions), I cop a lot of shit. I respect where you're coming from, but please, cut down on the vitriol and perhaps I'll take you a little more seriously.
People trying to sound important by using it to mean anything they think belongs to them (ISBN numbers), or anything they want shareholders to believe belongs to them.
I don't think they're using the term "intellectual property" to claim ownership of anything they want, more that they are incorrectly claiming that ISBNs are IP. It'd be like saying physical property is a buzzword because people randomly claim ownership of things that quite clearly aren't theirs.
Us big boys sit at home posting on Slashdot about how everyone except us is corrupt, and how everyone is out to get us, how the Man is only there to oppress us, how democracy is broken, and how we live in a fascist police state. I guess you must be too immature to understand such things, and you probably still cling to the thought that there are shades of grey in the world. Ha! You probably also think that elected officials are more indicative of the wants and needs of the people than the opinion of a random Slashdotter! How foolish.
... if by "FUD term" you mean "category". Patents, copyrights, and trademarks are all subsets of intellectual property. It's a perfectly valid phrase, it has meaning that would be more difficult to express without it, and it's intuitively phrased. What exactly makes it a "buzz word"?
And you're one of those "I know what's evil and what's not" folks.
You know all that conflict in the world? It's your fault. The only reason why such unproductive conflict is present in all forms and scales of society is because everyone seems to knows what's best for everyone else and few have any empathy.
This is the fundamental twisted knot economic flaw in the argument of copyright proponents. Think about what else we could do to "provide more incentives for more investment" in any 'X' whatsoever (not just culture). We could "curtail" farmers from growing "pirated" (completely irrelevant from an economic analysis perspective) copyrighted seed corn. That means one thing only: less corn to feed people, and higher prices for that corn. Of course, there would be "more" of an incentive to produce corn precisely because government interference curtailed the production of corn in the first place; created an artificial shortage of corn! Exactly the same thing happens with copyright.
Yes, but in the case of corn, the supply of corn from one vendor would be able to completely replace the supply of corn from the other. Because the competitor's corn is a viable alternative completely separate from your corn, we let the free market decide which is superior. In the case of piracy however, piracy relies on the very thing it competes with. It's a self-destructive trend, where it puts itself out of business. If the music/movie/software supply all dry up, what exactly are people going to share? Previously created artworks will only satisfy a culture for so long, since tastes and fashions change. I know that supply is next to infinite and that distribution is also down, but there's simply no room for R&D costs (which form most of the time/effort put into art). I'm sorry, but the free market simply doesn't work here.
Just as if corn could be duplicated as easy as any and all creative works could be duplicated, the price of corn would be near zero!
If you can stand your creative works to be as varied as your corn, then sure, the price would be near zero.
And no doubt how many people of dubious talent waste their lives "trying to make it" as artists? Government copyright subsidization only encourages more people to waste their lives creating near worthless "art"
You make the assumption that there is some universal, absolute measure of art's quality. Different people like different things, and it really isn't for you to say that any portion of the wide variety of different artworks that have been encouraged by copyright are "worthless" or not. And copyright doesn't actively discourage works: you can just release your art into the public domain, or one of the many copyleft licenses if you think you can live without copyright. All the talent that you could expect from a copyright-less world (plus much, much more) is out there, it just requires you to look for it.
It's the difference between a potentially violent crime and shifting some numbers from one table in a database to another.
Or to place bias evenly...
It's the difference between a crime of the possibility of slightly disrupting the function of some organic matter and shifting numbers from one table in a database to another.
Hmm. The point of copyright is to promote science and useful arts (or whatever) by making them profitable. The benefit doesn't just extend to the publishers or the artists, but to the entire community. The copyright holders get their money (assuming people like their work), and the people get their culture. Certain measures, like the DMCA, which strengthen the copyright holder's grip on their work aren't necessarily bad for the people. While they can curtail certain fair use rights, they can also help slow piracy, thus providing more incentives for more investment in culture. Also, buy stimulating the industry, there are economic benefits which also help the entire population. It's a case of weighing up the advantages and disadvantages to the entire population. Perhaps we weren't making enough use of our fair-use rights as an entire population to make them worth keeping?
It's more like $1B dollars in fraud is not passed on to the advertiser
... who will be less inclined to deal with Google in the future. Advertisers lose and Google loses.
Oh but wait, I forgot. Losses in probability and losses in investment aren't really losses at all, and even somehow help the party in question. *cough* RIAA trolls *cough*
Congratulations. You have just fallen for an amateur and rather obvious publicity stunt. The guy was trying to prove your fears of authoritarianism, but all he managed to do was prove that police will not just stand idly by while you make a complete dick of yourself at other's expense.
Maybe we just need more liberalism. Liberalism will save us all! Yea liberalism! Because if we're more liberal, no-one will do anything we don't want them to do! We just need to be more liberal!
These scumbag know that what they are doing is worthless, it doesn't stop piracy, but they both piss off users and rip off their own clients.
Why is a measure to curb piracy always "worthless"? Just because piracy won't stop tomorrow doesn't mean the approach is bad, or that it isn't making a difference. We still haven't eliminated crime, yet we still pour government funding into police. We can't cure a plethora of diseases, yet we still try to treat them. Why is it always so black and white?
It's a shame that that's a problem for you, because it really is reasonable. It's not freedom or liberty, but it's still reasonable. From what I can tell, he isn't downplaying anything too much (perhaps the punishments could be a little harsher, but I doubt it). It's not fascism just because it would be more convenient from a rhetorical perspective to call it fascism.
BTW...
People throw around the word fascist to describe any policy they don't like (that core observation is the heart of Godwin's law). Excepting the geographical accident that places both of them in Germany, there is NOTHING analagous between Nazism and the actions of the government in this case.
So what? Was Mussolini German?
... I think you missed the point. All the GP was saying was that the fact that it's in Germany is not really relevant, and is not really an excuse to break Godwin's law.
I don't think the problem lies with Germans so much as it does (in varying degrees) throughout all people. Let's face it, people are a sucker for some well-delivered rhetoric. Thankfully, we've now passed Hitler, and we are more aware of what extremes Nationalism can get to, as well as the charisma of a person doesn't necessarily correspond with their leadership skills (or their sanity). I know some would argue that this is a sign that we haven't learnt from Nazi Germany, but I disagree. Any curtailing of rights != fascism. There's a long way between banning certain software tools and an isolated arrest and fascism like Nazi Germany had. I guess that's why we have (had?) Godwin's law.
That said: anonymous speech is pretty darn essential. I hope we can agree that free speech is essential, and in the face of governments that happily restrict it, anonymity is a necessary tool to exercise that right without getting imprisoned or killed.
For a democracy, free speech is very essential. Right up there with the right to vote. That said, truly free speech can very well be detrimental to democracy, specifically fraudulent and libellous speech. Also, free speech relies wholly on the freedom and ability of others to exercise free speech back, and competent judgement. For example, child porn is restricted because children are deemed unable to make such a big decision as appearing in porn, and thus child porn is not considered protected free speech.
And the security we would gain is temporary - if the ter'ists, pedophiles, Holocaust deniers, or pirates are using Tor, and we shut it down, they'll just switch to something else.
By the same logic, we should stop enforcing any crime because people will just find another way to do it. Yet we still bother with enforcement, and we still pay for police. I wonder why that is?
Slashdot Mirror
Yes but if you stop arguing effectiveness, it looks an awful lot like putting your fingers and saying loudly "I know they're bad! I'm not listening to you! Lalalalala!"
In other words, don't stop arguing effectiveness. Simply ignoring evidence is a recipe for getting trampled over.
... the people simply ignore the facts, and politicians cash in on their fears about crime on the streets.
Ah well, fair enough. Ignorance is a little too blissful I suppose.
Us big boys sit at home posting on Slashdot about how everyone except us is corrupt, and how everyone is out to get us, how the Man is only there to oppress us, how democracy is broken, and how we live in a fascist police state. I guess you must be too immature to understand such things, and you probably still cling to the thought that there are shades of grey in the world. Ha! You probably also think that elected officials are more indicative of the wants and needs of the people than the opinion of a random Slashdotter! How foolish.
... if by "FUD term" you mean "category". Patents, copyrights, and trademarks are all subsets of intellectual property. It's a perfectly valid phrase, it has meaning that would be more difficult to express without it, and it's intuitively phrased. What exactly makes it a "buzz word"?
And you're one of those "I know what's evil and what's not" folks.
You know all that conflict in the world? It's your fault. The only reason why such unproductive conflict is present in all forms and scales of society is because everyone seems to knows what's best for everyone else and few have any empathy.
Too harsh now?
Jealous much?
Come on mods, have a sense of humour!
Even better: legalise cybercrime and put the crime-fighting resources into tax rebates.
It's the difference between a potentially violent crime and shifting some numbers from one table in a database to another.
Or to place bias evenly...
It's the difference between a crime of the possibility of slightly disrupting the function of some organic matter and shifting numbers from one table in a database to another.
What? How do you justify your Nickname, ThinkingInBinary?
Oh but wait, I forgot. Losses in probability and losses in investment aren't really losses at all, and even somehow help the party in question. *cough* RIAA trolls *cough*
Congratulations. You have just fallen for an amateur and rather obvious publicity stunt. The guy was trying to prove your fears of authoritarianism, but all he managed to do was prove that police will not just stand idly by while you make a complete dick of yourself at other's expense.
Try the arrow keys ;)
Maybe we just need more liberalism. Liberalism will save us all! Yea liberalism! Because if we're more liberal, no-one will do anything we don't want them to do! We just need to be more liberal!
... why are you reading Slashdot if you don't like nerds play-acting like lawyers?
BTW...... I think you missed the point. All the GP was saying was that the fact that it's in Germany is not really relevant, and is not really an excuse to break Godwin's law.
I don't think the problem lies with Germans so much as it does (in varying degrees) throughout all people. Let's face it, people are a sucker for some well-delivered rhetoric. Thankfully, we've now passed Hitler, and we are more aware of what extremes Nationalism can get to, as well as the charisma of a person doesn't necessarily correspond with their leadership skills (or their sanity). I know some would argue that this is a sign that we haven't learnt from Nazi Germany, but I disagree. Any curtailing of rights != fascism. There's a long way between banning certain software tools and an isolated arrest and fascism like Nazi Germany had. I guess that's why we have (had?) Godwin's law.