Interesting. It's your conjecture that the law was passed for the sole purpose of making money from other people's work, but then subsequently admitted that the proposal for the law (not even the law itself) was radically changed prior to the law coming into effect. You also admitted that it's the artists with the rights, but then, for reasons unknown, you also claim that now is somehow different.
You also, most paradoxically, claim that this somehow contradicts my point, which is that copyright is designed to prevent the abuse of copying technology, not to instantly fold to any that come along.
Well, now I can verify that, without a doubt, you had absolutely nothing worth reading. Thanks for the complete waste of time.
Modern proscriptions on the copying and redistribution of data in the digital age resemble, if anything, proscriptions on the distribution of translations of the Bible in the 1500's at the advent of the printing press. In both cases the technology exists that enables people to transmit information freely and cheaply. In both cases, this new ability threatens the monopoly of an established order. In both cases, that order goes to extreme and unreasonable lengths to defend a status quo that has become farcical.
Freely and cheaply? Freely and cheaply is an illusion buddy. Sure, you don't pay much to copy the bits, but there are deeper costs, namely the supply of data copy. Your analogy conveniently fails to draw that parallel, the issue at the heart of this dispute.
Also, the "monopoly" you refer to isn't a monopoly, rather a series of miniature monopolies with a single product each, many of which can compete with each other. So, yeah, monopolies without the ability to price-gouge, and with plenty of independent competition.
So, like the bishops of old, the copyright industry is forced to extreme measures. Attack anyone, at any time, anywhere who seeks to defend or aid or in any way comfort those who break their canon, and do so with the utmost ferocity possible. Our modern legal system enables them to be as vindictive as they like with all the power of the courts behind the. Youtube is and always will be a prime target of their ire, being as it is, the bazaar of modern user content generation and distribution.
So, out of all the thousands (millions?) of user-created videos, exactly how many user-generated videos have been deleted, or who's logs have been turned over? Probably a few, due to over-zealous enforcement, but in proportion to the whole? A drop in the ocean. These efforts are not making a dent in the legitimate side of YouTube, and content companies know it. It should also be mentioned that there are official YouTube channels where music videos for singles are released (for free), so it's not like they're launching an all-out offensive against YouTube. It's just convenient for their opponents to believe so. It helps so much to have an evil villain to hate after all.
As the supply becomes infinite, what happens to the price?
It drops. Wake me up when the supply of fresh works is anywhere close to infinite.
Attempt as you like to construct sophistic or legal or moral arguments around this. But you have sidesteped this main issue, and its fundamental and central issue is aptly demonstrated by the stampede of ordinary people from all walks of life crashing through it and filesharing as they see fit.
There are very good logical, utilitarian arguments for copyright. We don't need to fall back on legal or moral arguments (although they don't hurt). And copyright doesn't sidestep this "main issue" (also known as enforcement). Content companies are enforcing their copyrights, and hopefully, if we can make copyright infringement criminal, we can simultaneously improve enforcement, and get some government oversight into the process.
Sure, we can't police private transactions, but then again, nobody really wants to. The damage of a particular copyright infringement is proportional to the number of people involved, which is proportional with the number of people you have to trust. If you share with a few close friends, then you're not worth it. If you're on a file-sharing network, sharing with thousands of strangers, then your of interest. That's thousands of potential sales lost, which will have an expected loss thousands of times more than a handful of friends sharing privately.
Now, one of the many things that anti-copyright arguments sidestep is that "everybody is doing it" does not equate with "you can't stop it", and especially "it is good". Another is that "big bad companies don't like it" does not equate with "it's
There's no law against receiving or observing copyrighted material. In that case, the liable party would indeed be the distributing party. If you seek it out, or copy it yourself, then you may be liable yourself.
So, how many games have you produced with publishers, and how many without, and what was the difference in profits? Did you self-publish only later works, perhaps when you were a bit more confident/competent/respected and known? Were all your projects small (i.e. 1-3 person team)? Did you ever have to organise a team of developers? Did you ever pay them for their time up front? Did you do many large-scope games; i.e. ones that you could charge 20-30 dollars or more for?
It seems to me that for small projects, you can get away with organising everything yourself, if you have a bit of loose money and time to blow around. When the project grows that next step in size, when you and a friend or two isn't enough to finish the game in a reasonable time-frame, and you have to look for paid outside help, publishers start to become very valuable.
If they're castrating the multiplayer experience, that much less reason to buy.
True, but it there any more reason to pirate? The GP made the choice not to buy and the choice to pirate. The castrated multiplayer experience relates mainly to the former.
It saddens me that some people can't tell the difference anymore.
We're pretty much boned, too late to change anything, guess I'll download it from that piratebay thingie.
which will accomplish... what exactly?
Will it fix the problem of no dedicated servers? Nope.
Will it send the message that gamers want dedicated servers? Not really. It more sends the message that PC gamers will take any unrelated excuse to pirate, and by extension, lessen the chances that the developers will bother with the PC platform in the future.
Will it stand up for our freedoms and help prevent oppression by multimillion megacorps? Hardly; dedicated game servers aren't exactly a human right.
Well, I'm beat. Surely they're the only reasons that people pirate?
One could argue such thing, but the fact still remains that nobody would listen. In each case, unless the crime committed is actually used as a means to facilitate theft (e.g. fraud), then equating the crimes with theft requires there to be a shared and measurable sense of value being transferred from one party to the other. Now, I get what you're saying (AFAICT), that in each of these examples, there's something of value being desecrated, for the benefit of someone else, but I think you're engaging in some hyperbole here.
A commercial copyright is a finite resource worth finite money. It's a means of producing several copies of a work, with values decreasing with successive copies in such a way that the total value is finite. Downloading an illegal copy is very closely akin to taking a CD off a production line, just less tangible. There's no need to compare personal values of something like virginity or sexual pleasure in order to compare it to theft, it's just a straight transfer of a valuable (intangible) object from one to another. I think it's pretty fair to call it theft.
(BTW, I just wanted to say how nice it is to actually have an interesting, intelligent, and mature discussion on this topic - seemingly a rarity here on slashdot)
Yeah, but when is it ever really zero? Having a free supply of entertainment really lowers the perception of the probability scores. You look at one downloaded file and you think that you can live without it, but that's mostly because you've got so much else enjoy. If you remove the source of entertainment, then the amount you buy starts to feel quite anaemic.
No, there's the important component of the pirate receiving something of value; something that previously belonged to the copyright holder. It's just a less tangible form of stealing.
However, I wouldn't be unhappy if everyone else compared piracy to destruction of property, breach of contract, insider trading, and monopoly abuse. There's a growing number of pirates who can't see the fault in their actions, and instead, blame the consequences on the artists and the publishers.
What? Sigh. Once again, all together now: Piracy is not stealing.
Yes it is. Think about it.
Copyright has value, specifically derived from demand, which is people who want something but who don't have it. The value is finite, since demand is finite. When you pirate, you strip away a piece of demand and thus value (mathematically equal to the price of the item multiplied by the probability that you would have bought it anyway), and this value is transferred straight to the pirate. The copyright holder is left with something worth slightly less, and the life of the pirate is slightly better. This is, of course, assuming you don't keep the chain of piracy going...
Well, yes and no. I know that here in Australia, reasonable telephone access is (or, at least, was) a legal right, be it a phone in your home, or the payphone down the street. Telephone access doesn't grow on trees, yet it forms the basis for our communications, including our contact with emergency services.
Now, it is possible for someone to remove that right, but being a legal right, whoever did could be liable for the repercussions of such actions.
Besides, being from Australia, I don't really believe in rights being "inalienable". I think these rights can always be removed through intimidation, physical surgery, or even just a good old-fashioned murder. Sure there are some rights more fundamental than others, but it always seemed like an artificial distinction to me.
I have found that no rating or ruling agency (whether Government or Private) can replace the effects of parents who get involved with their children and actually attempt to understand what their kids are doing and who they're interacting with.
However, on the other hand, they can help. For one, it gives you a rough idea of the kind of entertainment your child enjoys right off the bat.
Oh, you mean where there was no such thing as recordings, artists couldn't play beyond their very immediate area, and only the obscenely wealthy could actually influence art? Oh yeah, that was a cultural renaissance.
Of course, it was a cultural renaissance, just like a single flower poking out of a huge pile of dung is renaissance compared to what came before.
It completely escapes me why people assume that then and now are at all equivalent, or even why then was, in any respect, comparable to what we have now. Remember those innovations, the effects of which that the RIAA resisted? Well, they have effects (surprise)! Equivalence is far from guaranteed.
Damn straight! And when those "software vulnerabilities" are uncovered, it's always a SOFTWARE DEVELOPER! A normal person would never have found such a vulnerability. Clearly the world would be better off with much less software developers!
Unfortunately, common knowledge is not always correct, particularly when there's some uncommon prerequisite knowledge involved (e.g. slightly more advanced economics). Sometimes, you simply have to swallow information you don't understand. For example, I don't let the fact that I don't really know how a internal combustion engine works stop me from driving to uni.
Slashdot Mirror
Interesting. It's your conjecture that the law was passed for the sole purpose of making money from other people's work, but then subsequently admitted that the proposal for the law (not even the law itself) was radically changed prior to the law coming into effect. You also admitted that it's the artists with the rights, but then, for reasons unknown, you also claim that now is somehow different.
You also, most paradoxically, claim that this somehow contradicts my point, which is that copyright is designed to prevent the abuse of copying technology, not to instantly fold to any that come along.
Well, now I can verify that, without a doubt, you had absolutely nothing worth reading. Thanks for the complete waste of time.
Freely and cheaply? Freely and cheaply is an illusion buddy. Sure, you don't pay much to copy the bits, but there are deeper costs, namely the supply of data copy. Your analogy conveniently fails to draw that parallel, the issue at the heart of this dispute.
Also, the "monopoly" you refer to isn't a monopoly, rather a series of miniature monopolies with a single product each, many of which can compete with each other. So, yeah, monopolies without the ability to price-gouge, and with plenty of independent competition.
So, out of all the thousands (millions?) of user-created videos, exactly how many user-generated videos have been deleted, or who's logs have been turned over? Probably a few, due to over-zealous enforcement, but in proportion to the whole? A drop in the ocean. These efforts are not making a dent in the legitimate side of YouTube, and content companies know it. It should also be mentioned that there are official YouTube channels where music videos for singles are released (for free), so it's not like they're launching an all-out offensive against YouTube. It's just convenient for their opponents to believe so. It helps so much to have an evil villain to hate after all.
It drops. Wake me up when the supply of fresh works is anywhere close to infinite.
There are very good logical, utilitarian arguments for copyright. We don't need to fall back on legal or moral arguments (although they don't hurt). And copyright doesn't sidestep this "main issue" (also known as enforcement). Content companies are enforcing their copyrights, and hopefully, if we can make copyright infringement criminal, we can simultaneously improve enforcement, and get some government oversight into the process.
Sure, we can't police private transactions, but then again, nobody really wants to. The damage of a particular copyright infringement is proportional to the number of people involved, which is proportional with the number of people you have to trust. If you share with a few close friends, then you're not worth it. If you're on a file-sharing network, sharing with thousands of strangers, then your of interest. That's thousands of potential sales lost, which will have an expected loss thousands of times more than a handful of friends sharing privately.
Now, one of the many things that anti-copyright arguments sidestep is that "everybody is doing it" does not equate with "you can't stop it", and especially "it is good". Another is that "big bad companies don't like it" does not equate with "it's
There's no law against receiving or observing copyrighted material. In that case, the liable party would indeed be the distributing party. If you seek it out, or copy it yourself, then you may be liable yourself.
So, how many games have you produced with publishers, and how many without, and what was the difference in profits? Did you self-publish only later works, perhaps when you were a bit more confident/competent/respected and known? Were all your projects small (i.e. 1-3 person team)? Did you ever have to organise a team of developers? Did you ever pay them for their time up front? Did you do many large-scope games; i.e. ones that you could charge 20-30 dollars or more for?
It seems to me that for small projects, you can get away with organising everything yourself, if you have a bit of loose money and time to blow around. When the project grows that next step in size, when you and a friend or two isn't enough to finish the game in a reasonable time-frame, and you have to look for paid outside help, publishers start to become very valuable.
That's the funny thing about options. "Just Evil" sounds like an option (as does "Neither" for that matter), but for most people, it really isn't.
Kissing a different girl?
Sorry, but we are still on Slashdot, aren't we?
True, but it there any more reason to pirate? The GP made the choice not to buy and the choice to pirate. The castrated multiplayer experience relates mainly to the former.
It saddens me that some people can't tell the difference anymore.
You forgot the last, most important step: delete what you don't buy.
which will accomplish... what exactly?
Will it fix the problem of no dedicated servers? Nope.
Will it send the message that gamers want dedicated servers? Not really. It more sends the message that PC gamers will take any unrelated excuse to pirate, and by extension, lessen the chances that the developers will bother with the PC platform in the future.
Will it stand up for our freedoms and help prevent oppression by multimillion megacorps? Hardly; dedicated game servers aren't exactly a human right.
Well, I'm beat. Surely they're the only reasons that people pirate?
Notice that they asked "which sounds better", not "which sounds more faithful to the original recording", so maybe some prefer ultra-compressed audio.
Hmm...
Does this mean we should lock up most of hollywood on paedophilia charges?
Ah, now that would make for a fun political platform!
One could argue such thing, but the fact still remains that nobody would listen. In each case, unless the crime committed is actually used as a means to facilitate theft (e.g. fraud), then equating the crimes with theft requires there to be a shared and measurable sense of value being transferred from one party to the other. Now, I get what you're saying (AFAICT), that in each of these examples, there's something of value being desecrated, for the benefit of someone else, but I think you're engaging in some hyperbole here.
A commercial copyright is a finite resource worth finite money. It's a means of producing several copies of a work, with values decreasing with successive copies in such a way that the total value is finite. Downloading an illegal copy is very closely akin to taking a CD off a production line, just less tangible. There's no need to compare personal values of something like virginity or sexual pleasure in order to compare it to theft, it's just a straight transfer of a valuable (intangible) object from one to another. I think it's pretty fair to call it theft.
(BTW, I just wanted to say how nice it is to actually have an interesting, intelligent, and mature discussion on this topic - seemingly a rarity here on slashdot)
Yeah, but when is it ever really zero? Having a free supply of entertainment really lowers the perception of the probability scores. You look at one downloaded file and you think that you can live without it, but that's mostly because you've got so much else enjoy. If you remove the source of entertainment, then the amount you buy starts to feel quite anaemic.
No, there's the important component of the pirate receiving something of value; something that previously belonged to the copyright holder. It's just a less tangible form of stealing.
However, I wouldn't be unhappy if everyone else compared piracy to destruction of property, breach of contract, insider trading, and monopoly abuse. There's a growing number of pirates who can't see the fault in their actions, and instead, blame the consequences on the artists and the publishers.
Yes it is. Think about it.
Copyright has value, specifically derived from demand, which is people who want something but who don't have it. The value is finite, since demand is finite. When you pirate, you strip away a piece of demand and thus value (mathematically equal to the price of the item multiplied by the probability that you would have bought it anyway), and this value is transferred straight to the pirate. The copyright holder is left with something worth slightly less, and the life of the pirate is slightly better. This is, of course, assuming you don't keep the chain of piracy going...
So, yeah, it's stealing. Stealing by degrees.
Gee, thanks a lot. I now feel dirty every time I type "sudo".
Well, yes and no. I know that here in Australia, reasonable telephone access is (or, at least, was) a legal right, be it a phone in your home, or the payphone down the street. Telephone access doesn't grow on trees, yet it forms the basis for our communications, including our contact with emergency services.
Now, it is possible for someone to remove that right, but being a legal right, whoever did could be liable for the repercussions of such actions.
Besides, being from Australia, I don't really believe in rights being "inalienable". I think these rights can always be removed through intimidation, physical surgery, or even just a good old-fashioned murder. Sure there are some rights more fundamental than others, but it always seemed like an artificial distinction to me.
However, on the other hand, they can help. For one, it gives you a rough idea of the kind of entertainment your child enjoys right off the bat.
Oh yeah, voluntary agreements and trades should never be easy, that would just be unimaginably evil.
Even more fortunately, you can just ignore it without having to ruin it for everyone else.
By offering them voluntary contracts and trades respectively to help distribute between the two groups. How terribly evil of them.
Oh, you mean where there was no such thing as recordings, artists couldn't play beyond their very immediate area, and only the obscenely wealthy could actually influence art? Oh yeah, that was a cultural renaissance.
Of course, it was a cultural renaissance, just like a single flower poking out of a huge pile of dung is renaissance compared to what came before.
It completely escapes me why people assume that then and now are at all equivalent, or even why then was, in any respect, comparable to what we have now. Remember those innovations, the effects of which that the RIAA resisted? Well, they have effects (surprise)! Equivalence is far from guaranteed.
Damn straight! And when those "software vulnerabilities" are uncovered, it's always a SOFTWARE DEVELOPER! A normal person would never have found such a vulnerability. Clearly the world would be better off with much less software developers!
Unfortunately, common knowledge is not always correct, particularly when there's some uncommon prerequisite knowledge involved (e.g. slightly more advanced economics). Sometimes, you simply have to swallow information you don't understand. For example, I don't let the fact that I don't really know how a internal combustion engine works stop me from driving to uni.