Yes, and so was the challenger disaster, and the New Orleans flooding, and so on. Rather than declare war, we should have just picked up the pieces, secured the border the same way you install a more-solid door on your house after a breakin, and continued to live in peace.
Unfortunately, this wouldn't really work. The US can't afford to turn a blind eye to attacks on its own soil. International relations can be ruthless. Simultaneously controlling much of the world's power and other assets, while appearing weak and refusing to retaliate to direct attacks, is a suicidal combination. You're just opening yourself up for other attacks and threats of attacks.
I know that war was (is and always has been) an ugly option, but it was far less ugly than not retaliating at all.
Say what you like, but one person acting lethally on their own one-eyed interpretation of the law is still murder. And yes, despite your sig, it would make you a crackpot.
Assuming you and the GP are correct and the Attorney General is indeed breaking the law, he is still entitled to a fair trial in which to tell his side of the story to a jury of his peers.
That is interesting. Slashdot hasn't exactly been a champion for artists' rights over the past couple of years, yet, when push comes to shove, there's some recognition of their existence.
Mind you, I'm not 100% convinced that there's a solid inconsistency their approach. It is possible to be consistently anti-plagiarism but pro-piracy at the same time. However, it would be a shame if you were down-modded into oblivion for your insights.
So, asking reasonable questions is baiting flames? Oops, I think I did it again!
It's a reasonable question because someone needs to provide the infinite music. So what's the deal? Are we planning to ask artists nicely, clap them in irons, wait until they get the money and time spare between jobs to put together an album, or just trust and hope that they'll throw their current careers away and begin touring full time? They seem to be the ideas du jour.
It turns out that the accumulation of many tiny, insignificant-sounding details can sometimes be quite significant in the aggregate.
I, for example, could theoretically steal 5 cent from you every second. And while you probably wouldn't sweat someone stealing 5 cents from you, you probably would prefer to look at it in terms of $180 per hour, $4320 per day, or even $1.5 million per year.
Who really cares what some frigtarded academic thinks anyway?
If they're right, well, let's just say you were forewarned.
Final thought - how often is it that we look back on these studies five or ten years later to find out they were somewhere around, oh, dead wrong. if these guys are such friggin' geniuses at predicting the future they should go make $Billions in the stock market.
Yeah, and if you're so great at science, then you would have invented a time machine by now. *cough* Bullshit fallacy! */cough*
I'm not so much talking about pay, as I am about employment. We may not personally sign our names on their cheques, but without us, they wouldn't have their jobs. And without their jobs, they wouldn't receive any benefits from corporations.
At the absolute minimum at least in the music industry, piracy with Napster woke the industry up to the large demand for digital music.
We'll probably never know for sure. It certainly encapsulated the demand for downloadable music. Of course, it simultaneously encapsulated the ever present demand for free music, so it's hard to say how much of a wake up call it really was.
And since the digital stores like Itunes and Amazon are competing with free, I believe that has actually lowered the price.
You can't compete with free. That's the point. What you get is either higher price, or worse quality. Either way, the value is decreased.
Would we still have digital options to purchase music if it weren't for the pirates? Sure but something tells me we sure as hell wouldn't be seeing songs for.50 or full new albums for $5.00. Pricing would be the same as it is now or would more closely resemble traditional CD pricing.
I don't see why. Music is a competitive industry, and internet distribution and advertising lowers prices considerably.
Do you honestly think that if CD's were still not able to be copied and the music industry had complete control over how/when/where and how much it cost to do so that digital music or CD's in general would be any cheaper? There'd probably be HD-Audio CD's that cost $30 like movies.
Yes! The problem is that you are somehow stuck in this false dichotomy between piracy and absolute control of Big Music. Consumers can have leverage without stealing, just like people can protest without firebombing.
I'm not trying to say piracy is good and do see that in a way it is stealing. But there are many times that I feel it's completely moral/justified to pirate something. Any music I've bought before whether on CD, tape or 8 track I would have no problems downloading. Actually anything I have payed for I have no problem downloading.
There's no doubt about it; it's a less damaging form of piracy. I still have some reservations about though. If the product's changed (e.g. remastering, b-sides, etc), then I would either just stick with what I have, or, very occasionally, I'd buy again. But, I certainly see where you're coming from.
Now I'm a pretty hardcore gamer and have bought in just the last 2 weeks, Uncharted 2, Brutal Legend, & Borderlands. All new release $60 games. On Nov 3'rd I'll be buying another one Dragon Age. I will be buying for the PS3 but I will be downloading it for the PC. I've also bought both of the prequel books at $15 each. Now am I a filthy thief for "stealing" the PC version?
Probably not. I still have these reservations though. Not that this necessarily applies to you, but there's this tremendous air of entitlement from pirates. You have to remember that you have absolutely no right to these extra versions that you don't pay for. Downloading and using them is a privilege.
Entitlement doesn't sound like a huge problem on its own, but you see, it can grow. Time and again, I've seen people claiming that they were forced into piracy over the tiniest complaints.
I've also downloaded software that I haven't purchased but never would of.
I've said it before, I'll say it again: If copyright holders wanted any of the supposed benefits of such "free" advertising, they would ask for it. If you can't afford a piece of software, don't use it! I don't care how fun it is. If more people did this instead of pirating, then at least it would be clear to the publishers that their software is too expensive, and it's not just a case of it being cheaper for free.
So basically I've pirated a lot of software. But I buy a lot as well. I have over 200 CD,s over 200 DVD's. at least a dozen blu-rays. I've pirated Windows but use Ubuntu.
We have the opposite of a free market today; we have large companies that effectively use congress as a tool to maximize profit.
But... that's exactly what a free market setup is! Companies maximise profits, consumers maximise value. Copyright is a tool that gives us the options required to do so. It allows us to work towards a sweet spot, where we get decent value, and the company gets decent profits.
Piracy forces the system to tend towards a $0 price, and hence the companies into 0 production, which is bad for both us and companies. It would be like if companies could force us to buy their products, and decide their own price (that would be, in all fairness, be the symmetric situation). That would be an equally destructive situation, and is further from a free market setup, even though the laws preventing companies from accessing our bank accounts are really just government intervention.
I respect your position, but I think you're hearkening back to a day that cannot be brought back. Copying is trivial now and always will be trivial. You can put in all sorts of laws to punish people, but you can't stop people from copying a movie or music for their buddies. That bargain that used to exist before all media was digital is gone, never to return.
Well, I'm not convinced. Copying may be trivial, but that doesn't necessarily mean that we can't enforce copyright. Theft is trivial (just pick it up and walk out the door), but we can still enforce it. Granted, the fact that we're dealing with digital data and not physical object inevitably poses unique challenges, but I think we're far from the point of giving up hope.
Do I want to repeal copyright? Goodness no.
Yeah, I kinda picked that up already.;)
But the bargain of Copyrights between producer and purchaser needs to change from the current model to one that's more equitable and enforces broader fair use rights for the public, shorter copyright time limits (less than 17 years certainly), compulsory licensing, and perhaps government enforcement only for commercial infringement.
That's it? Well, in that case, yeah I agree with you. I've been referring to copyright as a principle (i.e. including term limits and fair use exceptions, without specifying rights or numbers), and I've been arguing not to weaken copyright (i.e. not tamper with the core principle), but I do support shorter terms, clearly defined fair use rights, and government enforcement. I think compulsory licenses is also a good idea, but we should beware of attaching responsibilities to copyrights that are automatically granted to private works.
Essentially, my main point is that making sharing, even (especially) non-commercial sharing is a critical mistake. I think private sharing is an acceptable loss, but public sharing is the main problem facing our culture today.
Piracy does not raise the cost of anything for the consumer, but it does reduce the profitability of particular items per unit.
What makes you think that they aren't linked? As profitability decreases, the natural and correct response for a company is to either raise prices, or decrease expenditure. Either way, legitimate customers get less value.
Piracy may increase demand and create a market for some items or the complete opposite (where exclusivity sets the price).
No, actually, piracy unlocks more potential demand. It only has use under the assumption that the work isn't marketed properly. And the side effect of simultaneously fulfilling demand while discovering makes it far, far, far more of a burden than a blessing.
Piracy can have positive local effects reducing imports or flow of cash outside the economy.
That's bullshit. Reducing cash outflow is only positive if it's redirected towards inside the economy. The idea is not to prevent spending; it's to encourage spending locally.
You could see positive effects if you stopped buying international artists and only buying local ones, but on the same token, it assumes that people don't do the same in their neighbourhood. It's not quite mutually assured destruction, but it's mutually assured detriment.
Piracy can often increase the exposure and popularity of a product.
It can, but it's hardly the business of you or any other consumer. It's the prerogative of the copyright holder, who is perfectly capable of deciding how to market their own product (even if it means allowing copying). Couple that with the significant detrimental effects of piracy, and it becomes borderline insulting to suppose you know what's best.
Even in commercial situations with draconian oversight where piracy isn't an option FOSS can replace some commercial software and keep the price down.
That isn't piracy, and actually has positive effects, specifically that it creates an independent competitor to a product. One that can survive without the other existing. Thus, if one goes out of business, it will be through legitimate competition, and the other will be still be there. This promotes quality and lower prices.
Compare this to piracy, which leeches of the work of others, and contributes nothing back. You can try (and fail) to make economic arguments to support piracy, but essentially the same inherent fault runs through its very foundations: piracy rewards the act of not rewarding. Economically, it makes any profits highly unstable, and severely jeopardises whatever market it applies to. In reality, it makes art run on charity. Compare a third world country to a first world country, or a high-class suburb to a slum, and you'll get an idea of what we're heading to.
Piracy may well be a factor in setting the price but that price is lower not higher.
Yeah, but it's always coupled with a decrease in quality. I consider it a higher price, even though it's technically a higher price for a standard product.
You think we'd have Itunes and.99 songs on Amazon if the labels could still get away with only selling CD's for $20? The only reason we now have these cheaper digital purchase option is because of the pirates.
Except that you're wrong. You're seeing a correlation and interpreting it as causation. What is it about piracy that causes media companies to start using the internet? Absolutely nothing; the internet was there, the capacity for cheaper distribution was there, and the demand was there without the influence of piracy. What piracy does is make it necessary for companies to charge more to keep acceptable profit margins. So, in effect, we are paying for what the pirates use.
But unless the bargain is fair it will never stick. I don't think you can get around that.
Fairness is relative. Some people believe that enjoying the fruits of someone's labour, against their will, without paying them for the trouble, is unfair. Others seem to believe that preventing people from doing the above is unfair.
You see, the public's perception of fairness can change. What can't, is the outcome of destroying copyright.
No offense, your position on copyrights seems to be a bit like King Canute; you think that all that need to be done is educate and prosecute and that nothing else needs to be changed and that the law will be observed. But the king cannot command the sea.
You may well be right. But if there's a tiny chance of successfully commanding the sea, I'd rather try, rather than let the sea flood everything I hold dear.
At a certain point, you've got to acknowledge that it's not working and take a different approach to copyright and change the current bargain the people have made with people who want copyright protection.
Wait, and just think about it for a moment. What we have here is a classic free market setup. We have the producers and the consumers. The producers have all the freedom they like to provide whatever product they like, and consumers have the choice of what to buy.
Artists have their choice in how they deliver their works. Does this grant them unlimited freedom? No. They still have to appease their customers. Somewhere, hopefully, there's a balance between the price and/or rights the consumers demand, and the profits of the artist. This is how the free market determines what's fair and what isn't, balancing the needs of both parties.
Do we want shareable media? Perhaps. We would probably have to endure higher prices. It's possible if people are willing to pay the true cost of sharing. We could easily force artists to make media shareable by refusing to buy any other kinds of media. Artists would be forced to sink or swim with the new tide in entertainment. There's no need to change legislature; it can become common practice by force of will. And best of all, if we discover that it's not what we want, we can seamlessly transition back to the old system.
If we start changing the laws, then we haven't enabled anything new. We are simply locking the system into fewer, possibly inferior, options. We may be dooming ourselves to pay higher prices for considerably less range and variety, and the only way to go back to the old system is through the slow and clunky process of changing the laws.
Is that really what we want? The fantasy is that our culture is naturally this vibrant, but in truth, it took years of commercialising to get this far. Copyright brought more people into the game, encouraged them to keep creating, and even better, to distribute their creations as wide as possible. Now, any aspiring artist has a huge source of inspiration that diverse and readily available, and now with the internet, some can even distribute their works themselves.
Copyright is the backbone of our culture. Just consider this notion of celebrity. Sure it's pretty vacuous, but it serves an important function. It basically advertises the career of a successful artist. We idolise such artists, and consequently, many children of becoming an artist, so we're not short of incoming wannabes, and from there, we can usually derive plenty of talent. Celebrity didn't exist in any meaningful form before copyright.
What piracy does is make the system, by its very nature, unfair. It delivers all the power to the people. Now, suddenly, people can get whatever they like on their own terms. It seems fairer only because it's so completely unfair in your favour. But, like all completely unfair arrangements between two codependent parties, it's all going to end in tears.
Naturally, going back to the more stable arrangement will ruffle a few feathers. Some people are really profiting from this new arrangement, but for their own good, they need to listen to reason. As do we.
Well, that's exactly what's happening. Everyone who pays for works end up paying for the people who don't. The problem is that some people aren't happy paying such high prices for the sake of pirates.
No, I knew what he was referring to. I just wanted to point out that, firstly, copyright has been different many, many years, and secondly, that his point had absolutely no bearing on my own.
So I should just listen to different artists because those I like receive peanuts for each album? That's stupid. I like *those* artists, not some artists per label. If I can't buy that specific albums, I'm not buying "cheaper" ones, albums are not like blenders.
Well, unfortunately, there's no country on Earth who recognises the right to acquire the albums of a specific artist on your terms. The labels have something that you want, and it's up to you to decide whether you want it on their terms or not at all.
Show some free will and find some different artists to listen to. Hopefully some that will satisfy your needs. Otherwise, just pay them already! Without them, you wouldn't have access to the albums in the first place!
Giving most of my money to the labels and retailers isn't helping the artists (and hence helping produce new music), which was the problem with pirating in the first place (killing music).
It's not helping those artists because they made the stupid decision to go with a label. If you concentrated on other music, then you would be reinforcing other business models, and promoting culture, rather than leeching off it. That's the difference between piracy and healthy competition.
If we need to give most of my cash to labels profit to keep music alive
That's the thing; we don't. And even if we do, then there's absolutely no reason why you need to spoil it for the rest of us. You can just not buy or download any of their offering, and the rest of us can enjoy it ourselves.
Pirates are so quick to accuse their fellow man. For some reason, it seems to ease their consciences.
The idea is that they already willingly made themselves liable for massive damages. We're just scaling that back to the lesser status of criminal. And, of course, they have option of, y'know, just not doing it anymore.
Great, my tax dollars go making sure the MPAA and RIAA members meet their quarterly revenue goals.
Right now, it's their right to make sure they're not being financially raped by a fair portion of the population, but they happen to be fairly loose about it, and do all sorts of back room deals to cover up their shady tactics. Oversight is sorely needed, and yes, protecting people's rights is worth money.
When I first read the cautionary essay "The Right to Read" back in 1997, I thought it was silly, but I think folks like yourself read it and agree with it.
When I read it, I shook my head in disbelief. I couldn't believe that anyone was taken in by such a fallacious strawman argument.
Society shouldn't revolve around copyright, copyright should revolve around society. You've got things very backwards.
I'll realise this when you realise that music pirates should revolve around artists, not the other way around. Artists aren't just slaves creating works for your amusement.
You can't "educate" people to accept a bad bargain
Watch me:
Piracy only hurts the labels, and they kill puppies, and have absolutely no negative long-term effects on us or good artists.
See? It's not that hard.
I think the problem is one of fairness; you view the copyright holder's right as absolute, and they're not. I think big media companies feel they're entitled to a government monopoly on distribution forever. I don't think they are, and I'm guessing if we held a vote on it (i.e. Democracy, my views would be closer to the mainstream than yours.
OK, enough cheap snarks.
I don't actually view copyright as a matter of fairness, but I find that it's in terms of fairness that most people can identify with copyright. The reasons why I support copyright are purely practical; that is copyright is the only system we have so far experienced that will achieve what the general public expect from their culture.
That's why this isn't a political problem, and it can't be solved through democracy. The fact that many people agree doesn't make them right, and doesn't make their solutions work.
Oh, and I don't think copyright needs to be absolute, but I do think it should exist. That is, it should be able to prevent people from copying a work for people without copies.
But, as in the case of copyright infringement, when so many people across political, social, cultural, economic and national boundaries have all simultaneously reached the same conclusion with regard to filesharing, this tells us at least that our current copyright laws are in need of modernisation and reform.
I see what you're saying, but I disagree. I think laws should be based on what people want, not what they say they want. If the only evidence that they can come up with against copyright are scapegoat arguments against publishers, that they feel good breaking it, or emotional appeals about the universal nature of art, then they shouldn't be in charge of lawmaking.
That's not to say that their input isn't important, but the current state of play is that a majority of people don't truly grasp copyright. Reform should be taken delicately, with trials in the free market.
There's no law against artists permitting file sharing of their works. Willing artists have had these tools at their fingertips, yet there hasn't been a great number of successful artists who have DIY distributed, which tells us either that it doesn't work, that few artists are willing to work like that, or that there's something about the end product which doesn't satisfy consumers. If we rush headlong into reform that forces artists to abide by such a model, then we run the very large risk of scaring off most of the commercial artists, and we would suffer.
But people don't realise this. In fact, if they just stuck to downloading free artworks, then that would advance reform by leaps and bounds, and would truly hurt those big bad media companies.
That's your prerogative; you may choose whichever artist you like based on their label. That still doesn't justify piracy. In that case, the artist's royalties would be less $1.60 per album.
As a side note, part of being with a label is that you have the highest chance of getting good sales, and the label takes half (or more) as insurance. If the artist didn't like it, they shouldn't have signed with them.
Slashdot Mirror
Unfortunately, this wouldn't really work. The US can't afford to turn a blind eye to attacks on its own soil. International relations can be ruthless. Simultaneously controlling much of the world's power and other assets, while appearing weak and refusing to retaliate to direct attacks, is a suicidal combination. You're just opening yourself up for other attacks and threats of attacks.
I know that war was (is and always has been) an ugly option, but it was far less ugly than not retaliating at all.
Say what you like, but one person acting lethally on their own one-eyed interpretation of the law is still murder. And yes, despite your sig, it would make you a crackpot.
Assuming you and the GP are correct and the Attorney General is indeed breaking the law, he is still entitled to a fair trial in which to tell his side of the story to a jury of his peers.
Well, now I know where to go for a believable meal!
That is interesting. Slashdot hasn't exactly been a champion for artists' rights over the past couple of years, yet, when push comes to shove, there's some recognition of their existence.
Mind you, I'm not 100% convinced that there's a solid inconsistency their approach. It is possible to be consistently anti-plagiarism but pro-piracy at the same time. However, it would be a shame if you were down-modded into oblivion for your insights.
Exactly. I'm sure they have nothing to hide.
*rolls eyes*
So, asking reasonable questions is baiting flames? Oops, I think I did it again!
It's a reasonable question because someone needs to provide the infinite music. So what's the deal? Are we planning to ask artists nicely, clap them in irons, wait until they get the money and time spare between jobs to put together an album, or just trust and hope that they'll throw their current careers away and begin touring full time? They seem to be the ideas du jour.
Infinite music? Great! Who's paying?
Not if the copyright holder gives permission.
It turns out that the accumulation of many tiny, insignificant-sounding details can sometimes be quite significant in the aggregate.
I, for example, could theoretically steal 5 cent from you every second. And while you probably wouldn't sweat someone stealing 5 cents from you, you probably would prefer to look at it in terms of $180 per hour, $4320 per day, or even $1.5 million per year.
If they're right, well, let's just say you were forewarned.
Yeah, and if you're so great at science, then you would have invented a time machine by now. *cough* Bullshit fallacy! */cough*
Was I being too subtle?
I'm not so much talking about pay, as I am about employment. We may not personally sign our names on their cheques, but without us, they wouldn't have their jobs. And without their jobs, they wouldn't receive any benefits from corporations.
Yes! We sign their cheques!
How friendly do you think that business interests would be if we put them out of a job?
... so I have to wait 111 years before getting laid?
Better stock up on the Viagra.
Because 2217 is the year of Indie Movies on the Desktop!
We'll probably never know for sure. It certainly encapsulated the demand for downloadable music. Of course, it simultaneously encapsulated the ever present demand for free music, so it's hard to say how much of a wake up call it really was.
You can't compete with free. That's the point. What you get is either higher price, or worse quality. Either way, the value is decreased.
I don't see why. Music is a competitive industry, and internet distribution and advertising lowers prices considerably.
Yes! The problem is that you are somehow stuck in this false dichotomy between piracy and absolute control of Big Music. Consumers can have leverage without stealing, just like people can protest without firebombing.
There's no doubt about it; it's a less damaging form of piracy. I still have some reservations about though. If the product's changed (e.g. remastering, b-sides, etc), then I would either just stick with what I have, or, very occasionally, I'd buy again. But, I certainly see where you're coming from.
Probably not. I still have these reservations though. Not that this necessarily applies to you, but there's this tremendous air of entitlement from pirates. You have to remember that you have absolutely no right to these extra versions that you don't pay for. Downloading and using them is a privilege.
Entitlement doesn't sound like a huge problem on its own, but you see, it can grow. Time and again, I've seen people claiming that they were forced into piracy over the tiniest complaints.
I've said it before, I'll say it again: If copyright holders wanted any of the supposed benefits of such "free" advertising, they would ask for it. If you can't afford a piece of software, don't use it! I don't care how fun it is. If more people did this instead of pirating, then at least it would be clear to the publishers that their software is too expensive, and it's not just a case of it being cheaper for free.
But... that's exactly what a free market setup is! Companies maximise profits, consumers maximise value. Copyright is a tool that gives us the options required to do so. It allows us to work towards a sweet spot, where we get decent value, and the company gets decent profits.
Piracy forces the system to tend towards a $0 price, and hence the companies into 0 production, which is bad for both us and companies. It would be like if companies could force us to buy their products, and decide their own price (that would be, in all fairness, be the symmetric situation). That would be an equally destructive situation, and is further from a free market setup, even though the laws preventing companies from accessing our bank accounts are really just government intervention.
Well, I'm not convinced. Copying may be trivial, but that doesn't necessarily mean that we can't enforce copyright. Theft is trivial (just pick it up and walk out the door), but we can still enforce it. Granted, the fact that we're dealing with digital data and not physical object inevitably poses unique challenges, but I think we're far from the point of giving up hope.
Yeah, I kinda picked that up already. ;)
That's it? Well, in that case, yeah I agree with you. I've been referring to copyright as a principle (i.e. including term limits and fair use exceptions, without specifying rights or numbers), and I've been arguing not to weaken copyright (i.e. not tamper with the core principle), but I do support shorter terms, clearly defined fair use rights, and government enforcement. I think compulsory licenses is also a good idea, but we should beware of attaching responsibilities to copyrights that are automatically granted to private works.
Essentially, my main point is that making sharing, even (especially) non-commercial sharing is a critical mistake. I think private sharing is an acceptable loss, but public sharing is the main problem facing our culture today.
What makes you think that they aren't linked? As profitability decreases, the natural and correct response for a company is to either raise prices, or decrease expenditure. Either way, legitimate customers get less value.
No, actually, piracy unlocks more potential demand. It only has use under the assumption that the work isn't marketed properly. And the side effect of simultaneously fulfilling demand while discovering makes it far, far, far more of a burden than a blessing.
That's bullshit. Reducing cash outflow is only positive if it's redirected towards inside the economy. The idea is not to prevent spending; it's to encourage spending locally.
You could see positive effects if you stopped buying international artists and only buying local ones, but on the same token, it assumes that people don't do the same in their neighbourhood. It's not quite mutually assured destruction, but it's mutually assured detriment.
It can, but it's hardly the business of you or any other consumer. It's the prerogative of the copyright holder, who is perfectly capable of deciding how to market their own product (even if it means allowing copying). Couple that with the significant detrimental effects of piracy, and it becomes borderline insulting to suppose you know what's best.
That isn't piracy, and actually has positive effects, specifically that it creates an independent competitor to a product. One that can survive without the other existing. Thus, if one goes out of business, it will be through legitimate competition, and the other will be still be there. This promotes quality and lower prices.
Compare this to piracy, which leeches of the work of others, and contributes nothing back. You can try (and fail) to make economic arguments to support piracy, but essentially the same inherent fault runs through its very foundations: piracy rewards the act of not rewarding. Economically, it makes any profits highly unstable, and severely jeopardises whatever market it applies to. In reality, it makes art run on charity. Compare a third world country to a first world country, or a high-class suburb to a slum, and you'll get an idea of what we're heading to.
Yeah, but it's always coupled with a decrease in quality. I consider it a higher price, even though it's technically a higher price for a standard product.
Except that you're wrong. You're seeing a correlation and interpreting it as causation. What is it about piracy that causes media companies to start using the internet? Absolutely nothing; the internet was there, the capacity for cheaper distribution was there, and the demand was there without the influence of piracy. What piracy does is make it necessary for companies to charge more to keep acceptable profit margins. So, in effect, we are paying for what the pirates use.
Fairness is relative. Some people believe that enjoying the fruits of someone's labour, against their will, without paying them for the trouble, is unfair. Others seem to believe that preventing people from doing the above is unfair.
You see, the public's perception of fairness can change. What can't, is the outcome of destroying copyright.
You may well be right. But if there's a tiny chance of successfully commanding the sea, I'd rather try, rather than let the sea flood everything I hold dear.
Wait, and just think about it for a moment. What we have here is a classic free market setup. We have the producers and the consumers. The producers have all the freedom they like to provide whatever product they like, and consumers have the choice of what to buy.
Artists have their choice in how they deliver their works. Does this grant them unlimited freedom? No. They still have to appease their customers. Somewhere, hopefully, there's a balance between the price and/or rights the consumers demand, and the profits of the artist. This is how the free market determines what's fair and what isn't, balancing the needs of both parties.
Do we want shareable media? Perhaps. We would probably have to endure higher prices. It's possible if people are willing to pay the true cost of sharing. We could easily force artists to make media shareable by refusing to buy any other kinds of media. Artists would be forced to sink or swim with the new tide in entertainment. There's no need to change legislature; it can become common practice by force of will. And best of all, if we discover that it's not what we want, we can seamlessly transition back to the old system.
If we start changing the laws, then we haven't enabled anything new. We are simply locking the system into fewer, possibly inferior, options. We may be dooming ourselves to pay higher prices for considerably less range and variety, and the only way to go back to the old system is through the slow and clunky process of changing the laws.
Is that really what we want? The fantasy is that our culture is naturally this vibrant, but in truth, it took years of commercialising to get this far. Copyright brought more people into the game, encouraged them to keep creating, and even better, to distribute their creations as wide as possible. Now, any aspiring artist has a huge source of inspiration that diverse and readily available, and now with the internet, some can even distribute their works themselves.
Copyright is the backbone of our culture. Just consider this notion of celebrity. Sure it's pretty vacuous, but it serves an important function. It basically advertises the career of a successful artist. We idolise such artists, and consequently, many children of becoming an artist, so we're not short of incoming wannabes, and from there, we can usually derive plenty of talent. Celebrity didn't exist in any meaningful form before copyright.
What piracy does is make the system, by its very nature, unfair. It delivers all the power to the people. Now, suddenly, people can get whatever they like on their own terms. It seems fairer only because it's so completely unfair in your favour. But, like all completely unfair arrangements between two codependent parties, it's all going to end in tears.
Naturally, going back to the more stable arrangement will ruffle a few feathers. Some people are really profiting from this new arrangement, but for their own good, they need to listen to reason. As do we.
Well, that's exactly what's happening. Everyone who pays for works end up paying for the people who don't. The problem is that some people aren't happy paying such high prices for the sake of pirates.
No, I knew what he was referring to. I just wanted to point out that, firstly, copyright has been different many, many years, and secondly, that his point had absolutely no bearing on my own.
Well, unfortunately, there's no country on Earth who recognises the right to acquire the albums of a specific artist on your terms. The labels have something that you want, and it's up to you to decide whether you want it on their terms or not at all.
Show some free will and find some different artists to listen to. Hopefully some that will satisfy your needs. Otherwise, just pay them already! Without them, you wouldn't have access to the albums in the first place!
It's not helping those artists because they made the stupid decision to go with a label. If you concentrated on other music, then you would be reinforcing other business models, and promoting culture, rather than leeching off it. That's the difference between piracy and healthy competition.
That's the thing; we don't. And even if we do, then there's absolutely no reason why you need to spoil it for the rest of us. You can just not buy or download any of their offering, and the rest of us can enjoy it ourselves.
Pirates are so quick to accuse their fellow man. For some reason, it seems to ease their consciences.
The idea is that they already willingly made themselves liable for massive damages. We're just scaling that back to the lesser status of criminal. And, of course, they have option of, y'know, just not doing it anymore.
Right now, it's their right to make sure they're not being financially raped by a fair portion of the population, but they happen to be fairly loose about it, and do all sorts of back room deals to cover up their shady tactics. Oversight is sorely needed, and yes, protecting people's rights is worth money.
When I read it, I shook my head in disbelief. I couldn't believe that anyone was taken in by such a fallacious strawman argument.
I'll realise this when you realise that music pirates should revolve around artists, not the other way around. Artists aren't just slaves creating works for your amusement.
Watch me:
Piracy only hurts the labels, and they kill puppies, and have absolutely no negative long-term effects on us or good artists.
See? It's not that hard.
OK, enough cheap snarks.
I don't actually view copyright as a matter of fairness, but I find that it's in terms of fairness that most people can identify with copyright. The reasons why I support copyright are purely practical; that is copyright is the only system we have so far experienced that will achieve what the general public expect from their culture.
That's why this isn't a political problem, and it can't be solved through democracy. The fact that many people agree doesn't make them right, and doesn't make their solutions work.
Oh, and I don't think copyright needs to be absolute, but I do think it should exist. That is, it should be able to prevent people from copying a work for people without copies.
I see what you're saying, but I disagree. I think laws should be based on what people want, not what they say they want. If the only evidence that they can come up with against copyright are scapegoat arguments against publishers, that they feel good breaking it, or emotional appeals about the universal nature of art, then they shouldn't be in charge of lawmaking.
That's not to say that their input isn't important, but the current state of play is that a majority of people don't truly grasp copyright. Reform should be taken delicately, with trials in the free market.
There's no law against artists permitting file sharing of their works. Willing artists have had these tools at their fingertips, yet there hasn't been a great number of successful artists who have DIY distributed, which tells us either that it doesn't work, that few artists are willing to work like that, or that there's something about the end product which doesn't satisfy consumers. If we rush headlong into reform that forces artists to abide by such a model, then we run the very large risk of scaring off most of the commercial artists, and we would suffer.
But people don't realise this. In fact, if they just stuck to downloading free artworks, then that would advance reform by leaps and bounds, and would truly hurt those big bad media companies.
That's your prerogative; you may choose whichever artist you like based on their label. That still doesn't justify piracy. In that case, the artist's royalties would be less $1.60 per album.
As a side note, part of being with a label is that you have the highest chance of getting good sales, and the label takes half (or more) as insurance. If the artist didn't like it, they shouldn't have signed with them.