You're one of them witches! I know! Using your wicked magic to trick us while stealing away most of our music! Trickery! Treachery! Compression is the work of the devil!
I don't understand. What's not insightful about it? It accuses the government and a big corporation of corruption! What more could you want from a comment?
Rather than making employees criminally liable for orders from employers, and employers liable for criminal actions taken by employees, why not bring in the death sentence for corporations who repeatedly misbehave? After three strikes, we could revoke their charter, sell of their assets, and refund the shareholders their share of the sold assets. Unfortunately, this leaves all constituents jobless, but as tragic as that is, they would receive some warning (two previous crimes recently publicly acknowledged), and would possibly work to keep the corporation honest.
Just like everybody who posts to this site is "forced" (false dichotomy, as by definition it is always voluntary), to "pay" out of their own time, out of their own opportunity cost, as they could have done something else than what they did at the time they did that. Yet people still talk. How do you explain that? Blah blah blah good enough money and musical careers are above and beyond fundamental choice, and the luxury free time provided by the excess wealth of society, above and beyond nutrition, to allow the division of labor support of "art".
When examining the practical financial side of art creation, you'll find that certain things are inequivalent. You need to take into account startup and maintenance of equipment costs. It's easier and cheaper, for example, to start painting than it is to start making music. It's even costlier to make movies. Posting on slashdot either requires a PC and an internet connection (which most people have already, with other established purposes in mind), or access to a cyber-cafe. Music at least requires some open-source software and the know-how to work them, but having only that severely limits the kinds of music that you can make. To play music designed for instruments (as most musicians do), you need those instruments. There's no way around it. There isn't some convenient, free or inexpensive service for loaning instruments. Even instrument-loaning services (and I've seen one or two) are costly, since the owners know how hard to maintain an instrument is, let alone multiple instruments needed in ensembles. The point is, we chat on slashdot for peanuts. You can't do that with music.
Music is just one example. Movies, for decent production values, require much larger sums, much larger organisation (try organising a cast of 50 or so on everyone's free time, without paying them), and much more time investment. Of course, there are exceptions, like software and visual art that can easily be produced (only from a financial perspective) on the artist's free time, but that doesn't guarantee that they are willing to. People do lead hectic lives, and reading the paper, going out for dinner, seeing a movie, posting on slashdot during their free moments, etc, etc are about as time consuming and committing that activities can get for the average person. It truly doesn't matter how talented or passionate those people are. If the effort of committing to a long-term, time and effort consuming activity outweighs the "good feeling" that comes with creating art, they aren't going to do it.
Total *unproved* B.S. statement sneaked into the middle of a paragraph.
I don't know whether it's unproved or not, but it certainly isn't B.S. I honestly don't think we need a study to prove that work improves when people are paid. More people do it, they do it better (because their work relies on their performance). Why, in a materialistic, capitalist society, would you expect an industry to improve its performance by starving it of funds?
But of course, if copyright is banned, the incentive to produce copyrighted works, won't just be a hurdle, but a Greek mythological impassible barrier. But people still talk, even though they can't "copyright" their talk. *Why*?
Well that's easy. All you need to talk is a mouth. We happen to be issued with one at birth, so there's absolutely no financial burden. Talking (and otherwise communicating) happens to have potent effects on our living in society, giving you access to society's benefits. Talking is practically vital for our survival. Not so with other forms of art. You can't get a job by walking into an interview silently with a boombox, and playing some music to your potential employer.
And if a linguist had access to all words and combinations of words, would they not talk?
An interesting question. He certainly wouldn't talk for his own benefit, rather as a means to com
Read that over a few times. If it doesn't make your skin crawl, then you really need to read up on your Constitution and maybe a few articles by some Founding Fathers.
Must you Americans run to your founding fathers for every little constitutional rights violation? Sheesh!
You're coming dangerously close to strawman here. The "abolish copyright" crowd is not a large percentage of the population, or even of slashdotters. On the whole,/. wants shorter copyright terms and some fair use rights.
You're right, and I apologise. The problem I see is that/. seems to be completely unsympathetic to the RIAA/MPAA's problems, and seem to be deriding copyrights more and more each day. It's not just complaining that the copyrights are too long, and that fair use is not being observed, people are complaining that the RIAA/MPAA are defending their property (as if copyright should exist, but should be made completely toothless), and downplaying the damage of piracy, saying that it isn't stealing, that copyrighted materials are just bits on a computer. I fear that with this complete lack of respect for copyrights will come more anti-copyright fanatics. As far as I can tell, the trend is holding true so far, for now I'm starting to see increasingly more comments that are flatly against all forms of IP, and some are being moderated up.
Copyrights and Patents exist *solely* to promote the advancement of the sciences and arts. That is the sole constitutional justification for IP. All I've said is it's a simple proof that copyrights and patents always, without exception, hinder the advancement of the sciences and arts.
Again, you've used that word "proof". I guess it is a proof, but it's based on false, hypothetical assumptions. You assume, and correct me if I'm wrong, that because all IP is built on previous works, the more liberal the copying, the more works to be created. Fair enough.
You seem to, for example, completely overlook the fact that people like to be paid for their artistic works. They would be forced to pay for their music production out of their own pocket (since there would be no corporate interest), and to take the time out of their free time, which is rather limited for those earning good enough money to sustain a music career on the side. This makes for a large financial hurdle that will discourage the creation of copyrighted works. In fact, the anti-copyright argument seems to be that less artistic works is better, because the financial hurdle will somehow weed out the crap and usher in the good. But even if artist could be magically paid from a free sharing model, could you guarantee that if an artist had unlimited access to all art known to man, they would still feel the need to create their own artwork? Would the passion and the purpose for creating such art be lost between the multitudes of similar artworks? These are practical factors that need addressing before we make plans.
These are not "ideals", but simple results of unbiased economic analysis fact. Free trade is not an "ideal". Free trade always and only occurs because that which is received in exchange is valued more than that which is given away in exchange. It's a voluntary transaction which only occurs because both parties are better off, wealthier, profit, from the trade. If that wasn't the case, nobody would voluntarily trade for anything.
Again, you've confused me. What free trade are you talking about? Surely you aren't referring to the trade between artist and consumers, because in your model, the artist trades their music for nothing economic. Perhaps you refer to the trade of ideas? Then you are applying economic principles to something that has nothing to do with economics, which would explain why your theories don't seem to apply in practise.
"Ideals without moderation", like no taxation without representation? Would no rape without representation be satisfactory to you also? People are always either/or voluntarily cooperating or they are violently abusing. There's no in between "moderation". To suggest there is, is an abuse of truth. Violence is violence, even if it occurs less frequently.
As a moral relativist, I've had the lot thrown at me, and all I can say is that it's all relative. Rape, for example, is good for promoting natural selection, where the mightiest males procreate with the most attractive, and thus healthiest females, and the human race becomes stronger as a result. If we as a race cared about our biological state, we would permit violence and rape, but we decided long ago that in order for us to pursue a successful society, we needed everyone to feel safe. However, we could have gone down the road of biological evolution, and the idea of letting the weak survive would be positively evil to you.
Anyway, I could go on like this all day, but I won't since it gets repetitive and it's offtopic. Suffice to say, you're trying to compare intellectual property with rape, and without moderation, you seem to see no difference between them. That's the thing about moderation: you can't disprove its value by taking things to the extreme.
No new ideas are created in a vacuum; they build upon previously existing ideas. Copyright law unconstitutionally hinders the advancement of the arts. It's a simple economic proof.
I'm confused. How exactly does copyright law prevent people from building upon previously existing ideas? The implication of your "simple economic proof" is that current copyright law is limiting production of copyrighted materials to a very tiny amount (say one every 500 or so years) of completely original works. The opposite is currently happening, with an overproduction of music that is all derivative of previous copyrighted works. Some proof indeed.
Prohibitions on copying only inhibit artistic and scientific advancement.
I think I see where you're getting confused. You are looking at IP not as restrictions on copying, rather as the prohibition of copying. As most sensible people will tell you, ideals without moderation is usually detrimental to society. We have a compromise between copyright holders and the public, with a limited copyright term, and limited powers for the copyright holders (fair use). If it were an unlimited prohibition of any sort of copying, in any part no matter how small, then it would be very detrimental to society. Just like an unmoderated adherence to the information wants to be free ideology would be similarly disastrous for our culture.
Oh it's very capitalist. In fact it's a little too capitalist for some societies, especially those who temper the raw capitalism with things like patents. I guess the distinction that needs to be made is that capitalism is not necessarily good.
You kids have no idea how to complain about declining standards! Why back in my day, luddites would write 50 page essays on why everything was better when they were young. They were articulate, well written, and full of substance, not like the "posts" you softies from the internet generation generate every day.
you people think you have reason, science, fairness, morality, justice, and freedom on your side
The RIAA seem to have morality, justice, fairness (not that there's much difference between them), reason, and the law on their side. Y'know, they risk their bucks on artists, they reap a portion of the rewards. What have pirates got going for them? Well, they do have freedom, and I guess it's reasonable if you put the short term gain of a large library of culture over the long term health of said culture. Other than that, they've got nothing.
in fact, the entirety of human technological progress, in the form of the internet ruining our business model, means nothing. we can stop progress itself by just suing people
The RIAA are fine with technology. It's not like they're calling for the end of the internet. I'm sure that they'd even be fine with P2P if it could be guaranteed that nothing of theirs would be shared. It also should be stated that abolishing copyrights, or forcing copyright law to be unenforceable is NOT progress, rather the opposite. We really don't need a cultural dark ages to move forward as a society.
I'm sorry, but I find that opinion hard to respect.
If you want to discredit a study, why not look at its methodology, or at the very least who who profits from it, rather than dismissing it as popular science. The fact that a particular study may be contradicted by some other study next week is neither here nor there. What is problematic is the holes in the scientific method of the study that lead to it being contradicted by next week's study. If you can find those holes, great! You can warn others about it! If not, well, your whining isn't really helpful then, is it?
Is anyone else as amazed as I that the traumatic conception of the USA has even managed to paint the government as untrustworthy? I mean, it's elected by the people, each part has little actual power, it gets changed every few years, and is hampered by a number of checks and balances. Yet, despite all that, distrust for anyone with authority overcomes all common sense, and people still believe that the government is out to get them. I guess with the media focussing on and hyping stories like these, there's really no chance it will change.
Nice. I think you've stitched up all the major avenues of discussion with the first post.
Not quite. The other possibility is that the universe is intelligently designed, and Earth is the only planet with life on it. I don't personally believe it, but it's worth mentioning.
(I can't quite shake the feeling that I'm about to be down-modded into oblivion)
From what I can tell, there's a slim threat of terrorism. It's not particularly great, but it's there. It can be made slightly thinner by sacrificing some civil liberties (a point that some slashdotters fail to grasp). Instituting a national ID system would cut the danger of terrorism, but the threat was so small to begin with, and the benefits are so meagre that it wouldn't be worth the privacy violation. All this doesn't matter to some people. They don't care about their privacy nearly as much as they care that they are completely 100% safe from the bad guys (a silly notion). I also can't say that I'm surprised that people aren't looking at the terrorism issue from a probability versus potential damage angle. This is a society that plays lottery after all.
Besides, all of this is completely beside my point: that people are spreading FUD about FUD-spreading politicians.
You'd be surprised. I've seen (at least here on Slashdot) so many posts dismissing the threat of terrorism entirely as FUD from power-hungry politicians, which is ironic given that in the process they are spreading FUD themselves about the threat of power-hungry politicians.
Slashdot Mirror
You're one of them witches! I know! Using your wicked magic to trick us while stealing away most of our music! Trickery! Treachery! Compression is the work of the devil!
This issue doesn't need an analogy. This issue will be cited as an analogy for other (less clear) issues.
Can we please leave "evil" out of this? Evil belongs in religious texts and fanatical dogmas, not in software.
I don't understand. What's not insightful about it? It accuses the government and a big corporation of corruption! What more could you want from a comment?
... why this is tagged as censorship? I always thought censorship required some avenue of expression to be limited.
Rather than making employees criminally liable for orders from employers, and employers liable for criminal actions taken by employees, why not bring in the death sentence for corporations who repeatedly misbehave? After three strikes, we could revoke their charter, sell of their assets, and refund the shareholders their share of the sold assets. Unfortunately, this leaves all constituents jobless, but as tragic as that is, they would receive some warning (two previous crimes recently publicly acknowledged), and would possibly work to keep the corporation honest.
When examining the practical financial side of art creation, you'll find that certain things are inequivalent. You need to take into account startup and maintenance of equipment costs. It's easier and cheaper, for example, to start painting than it is to start making music. It's even costlier to make movies. Posting on slashdot either requires a PC and an internet connection (which most people have already, with other established purposes in mind), or access to a cyber-cafe. Music at least requires some open-source software and the know-how to work them, but having only that severely limits the kinds of music that you can make. To play music designed for instruments (as most musicians do), you need those instruments. There's no way around it. There isn't some convenient, free or inexpensive service for loaning instruments. Even instrument-loaning services (and I've seen one or two) are costly, since the owners know how hard to maintain an instrument is, let alone multiple instruments needed in ensembles. The point is, we chat on slashdot for peanuts. You can't do that with music.
Music is just one example. Movies, for decent production values, require much larger sums, much larger organisation (try organising a cast of 50 or so on everyone's free time, without paying them), and much more time investment. Of course, there are exceptions, like software and visual art that can easily be produced (only from a financial perspective) on the artist's free time, but that doesn't guarantee that they are willing to. People do lead hectic lives, and reading the paper, going out for dinner, seeing a movie, posting on slashdot during their free moments, etc, etc are about as time consuming and committing that activities can get for the average person. It truly doesn't matter how talented or passionate those people are. If the effort of committing to a long-term, time and effort consuming activity outweighs the "good feeling" that comes with creating art, they aren't going to do it.
I don't know whether it's unproved or not, but it certainly isn't B.S. I honestly don't think we need a study to prove that work improves when people are paid. More people do it, they do it better (because their work relies on their performance). Why, in a materialistic, capitalist society, would you expect an industry to improve its performance by starving it of funds?
Well that's easy. All you need to talk is a mouth. We happen to be issued with one at birth, so there's absolutely no financial burden. Talking (and otherwise communicating) happens to have potent effects on our living in society, giving you access to society's benefits. Talking is practically vital for our survival. Not so with other forms of art. You can't get a job by walking into an interview silently with a boombox, and playing some music to your potential employer.
An interesting question. He certainly wouldn't talk for his own benefit, rather as a means to com
(I kid! I kid!)
You seem to, for example, completely overlook the fact that people like to be paid for their artistic works. They would be forced to pay for their music production out of their own pocket (since there would be no corporate interest), and to take the time out of their free time, which is rather limited for those earning good enough money to sustain a music career on the side. This makes for a large financial hurdle that will discourage the creation of copyrighted works. In fact, the anti-copyright argument seems to be that less artistic works is better, because the financial hurdle will somehow weed out the crap and usher in the good. But even if artist could be magically paid from a free sharing model, could you guarantee that if an artist had unlimited access to all art known to man, they would still feel the need to create their own artwork? Would the passion and the purpose for creating such art be lost between the multitudes of similar artworks? These are practical factors that need addressing before we make plans.Again, you've confused me. What free trade are you talking about? Surely you aren't referring to the trade between artist and consumers, because in your model, the artist trades their music for nothing economic. Perhaps you refer to the trade of ideas? Then you are applying economic principles to something that has nothing to do with economics, which would explain why your theories don't seem to apply in practise.As a moral relativist, I've had the lot thrown at me, and all I can say is that it's all relative. Rape, for example, is good for promoting natural selection, where the mightiest males procreate with the most attractive, and thus healthiest females, and the human race becomes stronger as a result. If we as a race cared about our biological state, we would permit violence and rape, but we decided long ago that in order for us to pursue a successful society, we needed everyone to feel safe. However, we could have gone down the road of biological evolution, and the idea of letting the weak survive would be positively evil to you.
Anyway, I could go on like this all day, but I won't since it gets repetitive and it's offtopic. Suffice to say, you're trying to compare intellectual property with rape, and without moderation, you seem to see no difference between them. That's the thing about moderation: you can't disprove its value by taking things to the extreme.
Oh it's very capitalist. In fact it's a little too capitalist for some societies, especially those who temper the raw capitalism with things like patents. I guess the distinction that needs to be made is that capitalism is not necessarily good.
Being slashdot, animal rights ranks right up there with "think of the children" arguments.
You kids have no idea how to complain about declining standards! Why back in my day, luddites would write 50 page essays on why everything was better when they were young. They were articulate, well written, and full of substance, not like the "posts" you softies from the internet generation generate every day.
I'm sorry, but I find that opinion hard to respect.
If you want to discredit a study, why not look at its methodology, or at the very least who who profits from it, rather than dismissing it as popular science. The fact that a particular study may be contradicted by some other study next week is neither here nor there. What is problematic is the holes in the scientific method of the study that lead to it being contradicted by next week's study. If you can find those holes, great! You can warn others about it! If not, well, your whining isn't really helpful then, is it?
Who? ;)
Is anyone else as amazed as I that the traumatic conception of the USA has even managed to paint the government as untrustworthy? I mean, it's elected by the people, each part has little actual power, it gets changed every few years, and is hampered by a number of checks and balances. Yet, despite all that, distrust for anyone with authority overcomes all common sense, and people still believe that the government is out to get them. I guess with the media focussing on and hyping stories like these, there's really no chance it will change.
(I can't quite shake the feeling that I'm about to be down-modded into oblivion)
And here's me thinking their study was going to show the printers weren't safe.
From what I can tell, there's a slim threat of terrorism. It's not particularly great, but it's there. It can be made slightly thinner by sacrificing some civil liberties (a point that some slashdotters fail to grasp). Instituting a national ID system would cut the danger of terrorism, but the threat was so small to begin with, and the benefits are so meagre that it wouldn't be worth the privacy violation. All this doesn't matter to some people. They don't care about their privacy nearly as much as they care that they are completely 100% safe from the bad guys (a silly notion). I also can't say that I'm surprised that people aren't looking at the terrorism issue from a probability versus potential damage angle. This is a society that plays lottery after all.
Besides, all of this is completely beside my point: that people are spreading FUD about FUD-spreading politicians.
Forcing us to read evidence contrary to our convenient conclusions! A troll mod for you!
You'd be surprised. I've seen (at least here on Slashdot) so many posts dismissing the threat of terrorism entirely as FUD from power-hungry politicians, which is ironic given that in the process they are spreading FUD themselves about the threat of power-hungry politicians.
Let's bitch and whine a lot on online forums about the internet we so clearly loathe!