Agreed. Clue-stick for the clueless -- no matter who is in the White House, no matter who is on Capitol Hill, change happens in Washington very, very slowly.
Exactly.
The government is a big bureaucracy, run by bureaucrats.
Absolutely.
The more things change, the more they stay the same.
Err... I guess you could put it like that.
Oh, and as a result -- the changes are usually for the worse, not the better.
Wait... what? Just because we're experiencing a swing away from libertarianism?
Only one thing will fix our broken democracy at this point -- revolution.
Presumably, they'll only let copyright holders make the accusations (which makes a lot of sense). I could also imagine that there'll be some clause regarding basic plausibility, e.g. whether or not you have a copyrighted work on the market (which would also make a lot of sense).
Still, the system would be laughably easy to corrupt.
"We have Ph.D.'s here, and we don't believe it's possible to protect digital content."-- Jobs on DRM
What do you think prompted him to say that? Was it:
a) Careful reasoning, soundly eliminating possibilities for protecting digital content, or b) because that's what his customer base wants him to think?
Do you always construct your arguments entirely from snide remarks?
Too bad for you. I'm in too much of a good mood today for a crotchety old slashdotter to bring me down. I do have one more thing to say, though.
And they say the slippery slope is a fallacy.
The slippery slope was always technically a fallacy, but then again so are many other useful arguments. When used properly, it's no worse than the rest of them. The problem is that slippery slopes are applied to just about everything that a person doesn't like, with little thought about whether or not it is a slippery slope. You really have to show that once the pendulum starts swinging, it's not going to stop and go the other way. You have to show that people truly won't be offended by the extremes towards which you are heading.
I'd also like to point out that what I was describing was not a sliding down a slippery slope, but sliding towards a happy medium.
I believe that no-one has a right to decide what I can and cannot read. Convince me otherwise.
I'll give it a shot.
Rights are whatever we define them to be. In an atheist's world of matter and energy, there are no rights inherent to human beings. There are only the rights we grant ourselves. That leaves the question: how do we choose what rights to grant for ourselves? We grant rights for a purpose. We grant them for our enjoyment, and for our survival. Everyone's needs must be weighed up when granting those rights, and granting exceptions to those rights. We have freedom of speech because we have concluded that flow of information is vital to the well-being of the majority of people out there. We have also concluded that there must be certain restrictions on free speech, or else it can be detrimental to us (example: libel). So too, despite any "beliefs" you may have on the subject, the right to decide what you can or cannot read is subject to the needs/wants of society around you.
Now I need to formulate what restrictions need to be placed on that right, and why they should exist. As an example, you don't have the right to read other people's private information. If an envelope is dropped on the ground saying "private and confidential", you don't have the right to read it, whether or not you personally agree. The reason? The information contained in that envelope could prove to be quite damaging to certain people, certainly more damaging than depriving you of reading it. You didn't decide that directly; you decided that implicitly, when you didn't demand that exception be lifted by your government.
And we don't have to stop at privacy. What about child pornography, where the child is raped in front of the camera? It's small comfort to the child in later years, if we acknowledged that the video should never have been made, yet don't do anything to prevent the image of their naked body being distributed freely. You would not be allowed to decide for yourself, on a case-by-case basis, what you view, because in doing so, you are already violating a child's right for a private body. (Just so you know, I know the issue is far more complex than that; this was an example.)
These exceptions open up the concept of censorship. If we have no right to view certain materials, surely we could be allowed to use some enforcement? Ignoring the multiple problems with censorship for now, the theoretical concept of blocking materials that a vast majority of people have deemed to be harmful if kept in the public eye doesn't seem too bad. It seems like a cheaper, more effective way of stopping the spread of certain information, than prosecuting, one by one, people who viewed the information. It could also help prevent the accidental viewing of such information. All in all, it sounds like a solid concept, that is, until you use it.
So there you go. My argument for the theoretical concept of censorship. Whether anyone can show me an implementation that meets my expectations is another matter.
I anticipate not necessarily a massive increase in users updating to Firefox 3.0, but more likely a massive increase in phishing targetting 2.0 users who still think they're protected (they didn't pay attention to the update release notes).
They do have your permission. By living in the country, you basically agree to be taxed. If you're going to live in the same place as the people around you, you have to pitch in. Think about it as a large rent-sharing agreement. If you don't like the rent, then live somewhere else. If you can't find a place that can survive without "rent", blame cruel reality, rather than the government, or the people around you who elected the government in.
Compare this with a thief. A thief steals something he has no right to. He contributes nothing to you, but gains some of your riches, without permission, explicit or implied. The government doesn't usually have explicit permission, but you get plenty of fair warning, plus you get returns like general maintenance of the country that supports you. The two only have an extremely superficial resemblance, but nothing a little intellectual slight-of-hand can't fix (as I can see you are aware).
This will undo some of my moderation points, but your opinion is just so egocentric, I couldn't leave it standing.
Tell me which law or statue I'm violating by doing something that isn't allowed by an EULA.
I thought I heard that, in some jurisdictions, an EULA was considered an implied contract, and thus breaking it would be a breach in contract (but I really have no idea).
They're rhetorical questions, not strawmen. The idea is that you answer an emphatic "no" to the both questions (obviously), and then the last ties it back copyright infringement. He's not misrepresenting someone else's argument, he's merely creating his own.
Whiskey. Tango. Foxtrot.
Sure it's technically fallacious, but he's most of the way there to a decent argument. What he missed was the premise that if you want to be paid for your work, then you want the same for everyone else. It's true that you may well be an asshole, and want just yourself to be paid, and you could give a flying Foxtrot if anyone else gets paid for their work.
I have zero sympathy for those untalented hacks who spent a whole week in a recording studio and now want me to feed them, their whores, and their children for the rest of their pathetic lives. If they want to eat, they need to go out and win bread like the rest of us!
OK, fair enough. What about the other 99% of artists, who do spend more than a week in the recording studio (or on location at a film, or in their studio painting, etc), or who some consider to be talented, or who can't get anywhere near the equivalent income from selling their art as any other skilled person? Do you have sympathy for them? Or do you lump all artists into that extremely tiny subcategory just to make yourself feel better when you rip them off?
Seriously? You really think there's some master conspiracy to take away free speech using the internet? You think that human beings are coordinated and evil enough to "get us hooked" on the internet, without any concrete evidence slipping into the public eye, without anyone having an attack of moral conscience, and without any precedent for this kind thing?
There's nothing to say you can't buy it, not install it, and then torrent it (besides, possibly, the DMCA). You get your game without securom, the developers get their money.
Meetings arranged and pamphlets published? Dude, it's the 21st century. That can be done online, quickly, easily, and cheaply. There's no reason the contributors couldn't have constant access to the artists they're funding.
That was my first thought too, but I believe there are reasons why they don't contact over the internet. For one, not everyone has internet, and even though most people (if not everyone) who sponsored online has at least semi-regular access to the internet, I think companies are required to contact them by mail for important meetings like that, in case people don't have internet access. Maybe not explicitly by law, but perhaps in fear of lawsuits for misleading investors, or something like that.
In other words, it's not a myth at all. You agree that it is, as I wrote, illegal for us to repeat certain sequences of words due to a choice someone else has made.
It's a myth because its highly misleading. There is the condition, which you failed to mention, that you must have seen that string of words before, as they are exactly, in another work. There's also the fact that you have to form extremely large strings of words to qualify - far too large for there to be any measurable chance of it happening by accident. Suddenly, your phrasing, which suggests that forming strings of words is like treading in a minefield doesn't sound nearly so ludicrous. That is the myth.
If I purchase a copy of that book, there are certain facts about my property that I'm required to keep secret, because if I divulge too many of them, I will have given someone else the means to reproduce the book (or a large part of it). That's not an unintended consequence, it's exactly how copyright is meant to operate.
"Certain facts" is another misleading statement. That suggests that, say, summarising the book is not OK (it is), or that lending it to a friend is not OK (it is), or any of the other many activities that you seem to be suggesting are not allowed.
I have a better idea than coming up with these "certain facts", or "sequences of words". Why don't you call them like they are? "Large portions of the work", for example. Yes, I know it tends to poke holes in your argument, but that's what you get when you base your argument entirely on the incorrect innuendo of the words that you chose to use in the first place! Copyright isn't as single-minded as you seem to be suggesting. It does support the sharing of ideas and inspiration, just not large verbatim portions of the work! That's it!
So again, in other words, it is true. That's an odd tactic you've deployed here, starting off a paragraph by asserting a claim that you then disprove by the end of the paragraph.
Yes it is odd, this concept of moderation, and pointing out exceptions upfront. I suggest you try it sometime. Who knows, your argument might reflect reality some time.
If I experience a copyrighted work, which we agree is effectively impossible to avoid, then whether I like it or not, I'm subject to restrictions on my speech in order to prevent me from sharing that experience with someone else. I have no choice in the matter.
If you don't actively seek it out, then the courts would have a hard time showing that copyright infringement took place. Let's look at the reality of the situation. If you walk into a shopping centre, you hear a copyrighted song playing in the speakers, and you have no recording equipment (as you would mot commonly do), then nothing you could do could be considered copyright infringement. You would have to actively seek out a recording of the song and copy it. If you did have recording equipment, then your audio/video would be considered to have its own "artistic merit" and that tinny sound, barely recognisable over the background noise, would not enter into it at all.
All of this can be flipped around, though. You might get money from people who like the sound of the idea at first, but end up not liking the finished product.
Which all contributes to the opinion that this system is not ideal. The wrong people end up paying for your entertainment.
And for every "what if people don't want to pay up front", there's a "what if people don't want to pay for copies (since illicit copying is ultimately unpreventable)".
Naturally, which is why I don't object to running this side-by-side with copyright business models. That way, both groups can be satisfied. If one group ends up shrinking in the long term, then their preferred business model will also shrink.
Under the current system, it could also constitute fraud - against the investors.
OK, I assume you are referring to publishers, right? It's different in the case of publishers. They are primarily concerned with making money, not the specific content. Whether it's a comedy or a thriller is neither here nor there if it sells. Plus, if they do have those kinds of objections, they have constant access to the artists involved, and can negotiate with them. Large groups of investors (under your system) can do that, but only if meetings are arranged, and pamphlets published, all costing a lot of money. Cutting corners on the cost might not even be an option, since, naturally, the artist will be obliged to make is intentions sufficiently clear, or else face the consequences. Finally, imagine what Joe Quick-fix will do. Will he read his pamphlets, should they be afforded, find any changes he doesn't like, attend the meetings, and vote against them? No, of course not. He'll just resent the process and stop paying money in future, possibly adjusting his tastes to more mainstream affairs that other people will fund for him.
But that's irrelevant. A candidate doesn't need every voter to contribute, and an artist doesn't need everyone who enjoys his work to pay. He only needs to collect enough money in total to fund the production of that work.
I think you missed my point. Lets say for argument's sake (since I don't know any exact figures) that 1% of people who support a party donate. For a large party, like the democrats and republicans, that's a lot of dough, and they can survive on it. For a smaller party, it's not so much, but even though it isn't enough for a campaign in its full splendour, they can spend their money trying to get their message across, even if they don't get elected. Entertainment isn't nearly so consolidated as politics. The 1% ends up being a lot less, even for mainstream works. It ends up being insufficient for less mainstream works. That's my point.
You get your money back, so what's the problem?
No problem financially. We do miss out on the culture though.
But we don't really get a choice, other than to buy or not buy a product.
... or start doing it better yourself, which is what I suggested you choose.
It's illegal for us to repeat certain sequences of words due to a choice someone else has made.
That's another myth. It's only illegal (at least, here in Australia) if you reproduce 10% of the work or more, and I'm sure there are similar provisions in the US under the fair use doctrine. Not only that, it doesn't prevent you from coming up with those words on your own, only if you actually copy them. If you choose to read a copyrighted work, then be prepared to see (really, really large - pages even) strings of words that you can't copy verbatim.
We're forced to participate in the copyright business model whether we want to or not.
No, that's not true. You can avoid experiencing any copyrighted work. Sure, you can't avoid certain public arenas where
Of course, that only holds true for your hypothetical corner case.
Oh, you are so wrong!
In the real world, people share tastes. $40 from one person isn't enough to make a movie, but $40 from a million people is.
OK, but what if there aren't a million people willing to put up cash up front? If the work is released, you don't just get money from the early adopters (for lack of a better term), you get money from people who pick it up and like it, you get money from people who withhold their judgement and then buy. You might even get money from people determined to hate it, but love it after they experience it. It's true: people share tastes, but it's more difficult than providing a framework. You have to convince them to pay significantly before they get any real indication of the quality of the work, or any benefits from it, and that's tough, especially from the large group of people who are looking for instant-fix entertainment.
Sure you do. You have exactly the same guarantee as with any other service: if you pay but the service isn't provided, or is substantially different from what was agreed upon, the provider has failed to hold up his end of the contract and you can take him to court.
Hmm. The problem with that solution is that artistry is a trial and error operation. What started out as a serious nuclear doomsday thriller could easily turn out to become a comedy classic. Under that system, that could constitute fraud. Turning artists into contract workers will turn a lot of artists away from their art. Most of them, I predict, would want to avoid the legal issues.
It's only a disincentive to the extent that the project is likely to be funded without your help. If it's a popular project, then sure, keep your money and someone else will probably fund it instead. If not, then you have a clear choice: if you want to see the work completed and released, you'll pay; if you don't really care whether it's ever made, then keep your money and maybe it won't be.
That's true to an extent. I thought of that while writing it, but I was more referring to the assumption that someone else will do it, which isn't so rational. It's laziness more than anything, and I predict it won't just affect the popular works.
In any case, I don't think these are realistic criticisms. Look at political campaigns again: no one has any guarantee that their money will be used for any particular thing (much less any guarantee that their candidate will win if he raises $X), and everyone knows that there are other contributors out there. And yet every time someone puts up a contribution button with a monetary goal and a shiny thermometer graph indicating progress, they meet that goal.
The argument never was that no-one would contribute, the argument was that the amount contributed is considerably less than the demand. Out of all the voters who vote for a specific party, how many of them contribute? Not many comparatively. Many of them who don't will think (correctly) exactly that: someone else will do it for them. Of course, those numbers are inflated compared to entertainment, because one is politics, and the other is, well, entertainment. People are going to be a lot more interested in politics.
In fact, every dollar spent on politics counts, even if the person doesn't get elected. It represents an ideology being spread through advertising. It amounts to people's voices being heard by proxy, whether or not the figurehead rises to power. With music, you get nothing if the project fails. Nothing.
As I already mentioned, I don't think artists will have much incentive to try a new system as long as they can still use copyright as a crutch. This isn't about making a system that's more appealing to artists and winning their allegiance, it'
You seem to be asserting that artists can't sell their labor, which is obviously false. No one forces them to write, paint, or sing for free; they can hold out their hands and say "I won't sing until you give me some money", just like a farmer, a house painter, or anyone else can -- and does -- refuse to do their job until they've been paid (or at least promised some money). Since there is demand for the production of new works, and since that production depends on artistic labor, the money will be there.
That's a myth. There's more than demand that affects availability (Dagnabbit, where's my time machine?). The fact that people want it doesn't mean that they will cough up the cash, or that coughing up cash is enough. For example, say I have a completely unique taste for a particular type of movie, one that I don't have the capacity to make myself. I want to buy it, but, of course, I don't want to pay more than about $40. That won't cover the cost of making it, unfortunately. There it is: demand, willingness to buy does not necessarily imply availability.
That's an unlikely example, but the same principle applies in more common situations. If we want to pay for creation, it won't be uncommon for amounts of $200 or more to be required from each person. That's not even to say the demand isn't there; most people who would enjoy the work would either not know it yet, or be too lazy/financially prudent to donate money for something they will probably get anyway (well, that's the way they'll see it).
Or maybe it means that since artistic works don't behave like other goods, we shouldn't pretend to treat them like other goods. The system we have for trading goods depends on scarcity; a good that isn't scarce belongs under an entirely different system.
Could be, but the market hasn't produced any superior alternatives, and our current system works fine.
I don't think that would work. Copyright is so slanted toward copyright holders, and so ingrained in the common conception of How Art Is Made, that I wouldn't expect many people to choose an alternative.
I think that's bullshit. Look at you, look at sites like questioncopyright.com, and look at FOSS. People are questioning copyrights, and trying to come up with business models that, if not replace copyright, then use it in alternative ways (GPL, I'm looking at you). There's plenty of effort being poured into new business models. But it seems, with the exception of FOSS, there aren't any viable alternatives emerging from the think tank. It's becoming increasingly unlikely that we'll find a better system, but there's no harm in trying. Even most FOSS-licensed software have licenses that are reliant on copyright.
artists aren't the only ones with a stake in this decision, so it shouldn't be left entirely up to them
Agreed, but artists are our one and only gateway to culture, and making a living off art is, on average, very tough, even with copyright as it is, so expect any system weighing up the needs of both parties to be highly skewed towards the artist.
I'm not sure why you think this is such a tough question. People pay for services all the time without knowing exactly what they're going to get, based on gathering what information they can about the service provider (e.g. reading reviews) and discussing their expectations with the provider beforehand.
This is not like other services that you pay for beforehand. Unlike these services, you have no guarantee that your money will produce anything, and you may get what you want without paying, which is a big disincentive to invest.
Naturally, there are other problems, like the extinction of non-mainstream tastes and no-name artists to deal with as well. Still, limitations in the business model don't necessarily have to bring it down. It could and, unless I'm mistaken, it currently does, op
Please do. I'd love to hear how this philosophy applies to, say, a house painter who spends the sweat of his brow putting paint on someone else's house, yet ends up owning neither the paint, nor the house, nor the abstract fact that the house is now that color. Or a hired farm hand who spends the sweat of his brow planting and harvesting crops, yet owns neither the seeds, nor the plants, nor the harvested crops.
I contend that we are not entitled to "the sweat of our brow". Expending effort on some process is not sufficient to grant ownership of whatever happens to come out of that process, and real-world examples bear this out.
"Sweat from our brow" doesn't refer to ownership per se; it refers to payment and incentive. The house painter provides a service, which he sells by choice for a profit. The farmer, again by choice, owns his crops until he sells them. He is entitled to the sweat from his brow, right up until the point he trades it for the sweat from another person's brow. An artist, without copyright, has little choice but to trade. The farmer and house painter are free to choose to sell their "sweat" for as little or as much as they want. An artist, if he chooses to trade, is forced to trade for zero value. His sweat is effectively stolen. His work is for nothing he can use or subsist off of.
The "sweat of the brow" thing describes the general concept running capitalism: hard work is rewarded with riches. Just like it works for farmers and house-painters, it should also be applied artists, lest they feel strongly compelled to actually work at something they get a reward from. The problem is that this doesn't work automatically, thanks to a relatively unprecedented situation. We have intangible goods which can be copied by anyone, but they can't be created originally by anyone. New works are in demand and scarce, but as soon as they hit the shelves, they lose all their commercial value. The fact that this situation is relatively unprecedented means that we need to go back to first principles in order to find a solution. Our first, and, IMHO, best solution to date was to extend property to a limited extent to accommodate for those intangible goods. The solution managed not only to reward art, but to make formal an informal notion of intangible property that many people recognised artists held over their works (even if you don't).
No, that doesn't follow; that's like asking you to stop doing web searches altogether if you don't want to pay me to do them for you.
It actually does follow. If they are unnecessary, you don't need them. Period. By definition. That means, assuming you're right, there is no need to rely on any of the fruit of their work. You can acceptably ignore any and all contributions to the world. Whether you do that or not is your prerogative, but I must warn you, people (me included) are not going to think much of your argument if you can't be bothered to do a trivial demonstration, like not seek out any copyrighted work ever created. It's trivial, of course, because you don't need them.
Oh, and by the way, there's no asking involved. If I find them unnecessary, then naturally that won't guarantee you that I'll stop. If they are unnecessary (i.e. no-one finds them necessary), then I will close up shop (unless I prop my business up with a night job). That's right: you have to convince others that they don't need their favourite commercial bands, or commercial movies, or commercial games, else they are not unnecessary. You could speed up that process by providing an alternative that truly replaces the current system, that makes people buy exclusively from you, but people have been trying that since the current system's conception.
In order to prove that artists are an unnecessary component of the artistic work distribution system, I don't have to abstain from enjoying artistic works: I just have to find another distribution channel. If I download a torren
Slashdot Mirror
Exactly.
Absolutely.
Err... I guess you could put it like that.
Wait... what? Just because we're experiencing a swing away from libertarianism?
Dude, you're a nutjob.
Presumably, they'll only let copyright holders make the accusations (which makes a lot of sense). I could also imagine that there'll be some clause regarding basic plausibility, e.g. whether or not you have a copyrighted work on the market (which would also make a lot of sense).
Still, the system would be laughably easy to corrupt.
I'll keep that in mind when I create my documentary on people who pan movies they've never seen on the internet.
What do you think prompted him to say that? Was it:
a) Careful reasoning, soundly eliminating possibilities for protecting digital content, or
b) because that's what his customer base wants him to think?
As opposed to shiny new graphics, which is never a passing fancy, and always adds immeasurably to gameplay.
Laugh. It's funny.
Do you always construct your arguments entirely from snide remarks?
Too bad for you. I'm in too much of a good mood today for a crotchety old slashdotter to bring me down. I do have one more thing to say, though.
The slippery slope was always technically a fallacy, but then again so are many other useful arguments. When used properly, it's no worse than the rest of them. The problem is that slippery slopes are applied to just about everything that a person doesn't like, with little thought about whether or not it is a slippery slope. You really have to show that once the pendulum starts swinging, it's not going to stop and go the other way. You have to show that people truly won't be offended by the extremes towards which you are heading.
I'd also like to point out that what I was describing was not a sliding down a slippery slope, but sliding towards a happy medium.
I'll give it a shot.
Rights are whatever we define them to be. In an atheist's world of matter and energy, there are no rights inherent to human beings. There are only the rights we grant ourselves. That leaves the question: how do we choose what rights to grant for ourselves? We grant rights for a purpose. We grant them for our enjoyment, and for our survival. Everyone's needs must be weighed up when granting those rights, and granting exceptions to those rights. We have freedom of speech because we have concluded that flow of information is vital to the well-being of the majority of people out there. We have also concluded that there must be certain restrictions on free speech, or else it can be detrimental to us (example: libel). So too, despite any "beliefs" you may have on the subject, the right to decide what you can or cannot read is subject to the needs/wants of society around you.
Now I need to formulate what restrictions need to be placed on that right, and why they should exist. As an example, you don't have the right to read other people's private information. If an envelope is dropped on the ground saying "private and confidential", you don't have the right to read it, whether or not you personally agree. The reason? The information contained in that envelope could prove to be quite damaging to certain people, certainly more damaging than depriving you of reading it. You didn't decide that directly; you decided that implicitly, when you didn't demand that exception be lifted by your government.
And we don't have to stop at privacy. What about child pornography, where the child is raped in front of the camera? It's small comfort to the child in later years, if we acknowledged that the video should never have been made, yet don't do anything to prevent the image of their naked body being distributed freely. You would not be allowed to decide for yourself, on a case-by-case basis, what you view, because in doing so, you are already violating a child's right for a private body. (Just so you know, I know the issue is far more complex than that; this was an example.)
These exceptions open up the concept of censorship. If we have no right to view certain materials, surely we could be allowed to use some enforcement? Ignoring the multiple problems with censorship for now, the theoretical concept of blocking materials that a vast majority of people have deemed to be harmful if kept in the public eye doesn't seem too bad. It seems like a cheaper, more effective way of stopping the spread of certain information, than prosecuting, one by one, people who viewed the information. It could also help prevent the accidental viewing of such information. All in all, it sounds like a solid concept, that is, until you use it.
So there you go. My argument for the theoretical concept of censorship. Whether anyone can show me an implementation that meets my expectations is another matter.
Ah, you obviously don't get it. Look at the link again ;)
That's OK, they can just check this link:
http://www.mozi11a-europe.org/en/products/firefox/2.0.0.19/releasenotes/
Sure, drug prohibition is a nanny state affair. Can anyone here honestly tell me that a majority of illegal drug users don't need nannies?
They do have your permission. By living in the country, you basically agree to be taxed. If you're going to live in the same place as the people around you, you have to pitch in. Think about it as a large rent-sharing agreement. If you don't like the rent, then live somewhere else. If you can't find a place that can survive without "rent", blame cruel reality, rather than the government, or the people around you who elected the government in.
Compare this with a thief. A thief steals something he has no right to. He contributes nothing to you, but gains some of your riches, without permission, explicit or implied. The government doesn't usually have explicit permission, but you get plenty of fair warning, plus you get returns like general maintenance of the country that supports you. The two only have an extremely superficial resemblance, but nothing a little intellectual slight-of-hand can't fix (as I can see you are aware).
This will undo some of my moderation points, but your opinion is just so egocentric, I couldn't leave it standing.
I thought I heard that, in some jurisdictions, an EULA was considered an implied contract, and thus breaking it would be a breach in contract (but I really have no idea).
They're rhetorical questions, not strawmen. The idea is that you answer an emphatic "no" to the both questions (obviously), and then the last ties it back copyright infringement. He's not misrepresenting someone else's argument, he's merely creating his own.
Sure it's technically fallacious, but he's most of the way there to a decent argument. What he missed was the premise that if you want to be paid for your work, then you want the same for everyone else. It's true that you may well be an asshole, and want just yourself to be paid, and you could give a flying Foxtrot if anyone else gets paid for their work.
OK, fair enough. What about the other 99% of artists, who do spend more than a week in the recording studio (or on location at a film, or in their studio painting, etc), or who some consider to be talented, or who can't get anywhere near the equivalent income from selling their art as any other skilled person? Do you have sympathy for them? Or do you lump all artists into that extremely tiny subcategory just to make yourself feel better when you rip them off?
Seriously? You really think there's some master conspiracy to take away free speech using the internet? You think that human beings are coordinated and evil enough to "get us hooked" on the internet, without any concrete evidence slipping into the public eye, without anyone having an attack of moral conscience, and without any precedent for this kind thing?
I think the important part is the second sentence. Unnecessary code risks unnecessary, regardless of how many occur, on average, every 1000 lines.
There's nothing to say you can't buy it, not install it, and then torrent it (besides, possibly, the DMCA). You get your game without securom, the developers get their money.
Or, I guess, you could boycott it properly.
On Slashdot? You're asking for the mother of all insensitive clod jokes.
I kid, I kid! ;)
That was my first thought too, but I believe there are reasons why they don't contact over the internet. For one, not everyone has internet, and even though most people (if not everyone) who sponsored online has at least semi-regular access to the internet, I think companies are required to contact them by mail for important meetings like that, in case people don't have internet access. Maybe not explicitly by law, but perhaps in fear of lawsuits for misleading investors, or something like that.
It's a myth because its highly misleading. There is the condition, which you failed to mention, that you must have seen that string of words before, as they are exactly, in another work. There's also the fact that you have to form extremely large strings of words to qualify - far too large for there to be any measurable chance of it happening by accident. Suddenly, your phrasing, which suggests that forming strings of words is like treading in a minefield doesn't sound nearly so ludicrous. That is the myth.
"Certain facts" is another misleading statement. That suggests that, say, summarising the book is not OK (it is), or that lending it to a friend is not OK (it is), or any of the other many activities that you seem to be suggesting are not allowed.
I have a better idea than coming up with these "certain facts", or "sequences of words". Why don't you call them like they are? "Large portions of the work", for example. Yes, I know it tends to poke holes in your argument, but that's what you get when you base your argument entirely on the incorrect innuendo of the words that you chose to use in the first place! Copyright isn't as single-minded as you seem to be suggesting. It does support the sharing of ideas and inspiration, just not large verbatim portions of the work! That's it!
Yes it is odd, this concept of moderation, and pointing out exceptions upfront. I suggest you try it sometime. Who knows, your argument might reflect reality some time.
If you don't actively seek it out, then the courts would have a hard time showing that copyright infringement took place. Let's look at the reality of the situation. If you walk into a shopping centre, you hear a copyrighted song playing in the speakers, and you have no recording equipment (as you would mot commonly do), then nothing you could do could be considered copyright infringement. You would have to actively seek out a recording of the song and copy it. If you did have recording equipment, then your audio/video would be considered to have its own "artistic merit" and that tinny sound, barely recognisable over the background noise, would not enter into it at all.
Oh, come on mods. I laughed. ;)
Which all contributes to the opinion that this system is not ideal. The wrong people end up paying for your entertainment.
Naturally, which is why I don't object to running this side-by-side with copyright business models. That way, both groups can be satisfied. If one group ends up shrinking in the long term, then their preferred business model will also shrink.
OK, I assume you are referring to publishers, right? It's different in the case of publishers. They are primarily concerned with making money, not the specific content. Whether it's a comedy or a thriller is neither here nor there if it sells. Plus, if they do have those kinds of objections, they have constant access to the artists involved, and can negotiate with them. Large groups of investors (under your system) can do that, but only if meetings are arranged, and pamphlets published, all costing a lot of money. Cutting corners on the cost might not even be an option, since, naturally, the artist will be obliged to make is intentions sufficiently clear, or else face the consequences. Finally, imagine what Joe Quick-fix will do. Will he read his pamphlets, should they be afforded, find any changes he doesn't like, attend the meetings, and vote against them? No, of course not. He'll just resent the process and stop paying money in future, possibly adjusting his tastes to more mainstream affairs that other people will fund for him.
I think you missed my point. Lets say for argument's sake (since I don't know any exact figures) that 1% of people who support a party donate. For a large party, like the democrats and republicans, that's a lot of dough, and they can survive on it. For a smaller party, it's not so much, but even though it isn't enough for a campaign in its full splendour, they can spend their money trying to get their message across, even if they don't get elected. Entertainment isn't nearly so consolidated as politics. The 1% ends up being a lot less, even for mainstream works. It ends up being insufficient for less mainstream works. That's my point.
No problem financially. We do miss out on the culture though.
... or start doing it better yourself, which is what I suggested you choose.
That's another myth. It's only illegal (at least, here in Australia) if you reproduce 10% of the work or more, and I'm sure there are similar provisions in the US under the fair use doctrine. Not only that, it doesn't prevent you from coming up with those words on your own, only if you actually copy them. If you choose to read a copyrighted work, then be prepared to see (really, really large - pages even) strings of words that you can't copy verbatim.
No, that's not true. You can avoid experiencing any copyrighted work. Sure, you can't avoid certain public arenas where
Oh, you are so wrong!
OK, but what if there aren't a million people willing to put up cash up front? If the work is released, you don't just get money from the early adopters (for lack of a better term), you get money from people who pick it up and like it, you get money from people who withhold their judgement and then buy. You might even get money from people determined to hate it, but love it after they experience it. It's true: people share tastes, but it's more difficult than providing a framework. You have to convince them to pay significantly before they get any real indication of the quality of the work, or any benefits from it, and that's tough, especially from the large group of people who are looking for instant-fix entertainment.
Hmm. The problem with that solution is that artistry is a trial and error operation. What started out as a serious nuclear doomsday thriller could easily turn out to become a comedy classic. Under that system, that could constitute fraud. Turning artists into contract workers will turn a lot of artists away from their art. Most of them, I predict, would want to avoid the legal issues.
That's true to an extent. I thought of that while writing it, but I was more referring to the assumption that someone else will do it, which isn't so rational. It's laziness more than anything, and I predict it won't just affect the popular works.
The argument never was that no-one would contribute, the argument was that the amount contributed is considerably less than the demand. Out of all the voters who vote for a specific party, how many of them contribute? Not many comparatively. Many of them who don't will think (correctly) exactly that: someone else will do it for them. Of course, those numbers are inflated compared to entertainment, because one is politics, and the other is, well, entertainment. People are going to be a lot more interested in politics.
In fact, every dollar spent on politics counts, even if the person doesn't get elected. It represents an ideology being spread through advertising. It amounts to people's voices being heard by proxy, whether or not the figurehead rises to power. With music, you get nothing if the project fails. Nothing.
That's a myth. There's more than demand that affects availability (Dagnabbit, where's my time machine?). The fact that people want it doesn't mean that they will cough up the cash, or that coughing up cash is enough. For example, say I have a completely unique taste for a particular type of movie, one that I don't have the capacity to make myself. I want to buy it, but, of course, I don't want to pay more than about $40. That won't cover the cost of making it, unfortunately. There it is: demand, willingness to buy does not necessarily imply availability.
That's an unlikely example, but the same principle applies in more common situations. If we want to pay for creation, it won't be uncommon for amounts of $200 or more to be required from each person. That's not even to say the demand isn't there; most people who would enjoy the work would either not know it yet, or be too lazy/financially prudent to donate money for something they will probably get anyway (well, that's the way they'll see it).
Could be, but the market hasn't produced any superior alternatives, and our current system works fine.
I think that's bullshit. Look at you, look at sites like questioncopyright.com, and look at FOSS. People are questioning copyrights, and trying to come up with business models that, if not replace copyright, then use it in alternative ways (GPL, I'm looking at you). There's plenty of effort being poured into new business models. But it seems, with the exception of FOSS, there aren't any viable alternatives emerging from the think tank. It's becoming increasingly unlikely that we'll find a better system, but there's no harm in trying. Even most FOSS-licensed software have licenses that are reliant on copyright.
Agreed, but artists are our one and only gateway to culture, and making a living off art is, on average, very tough, even with copyright as it is, so expect any system weighing up the needs of both parties to be highly skewed towards the artist.
This is not like other services that you pay for beforehand. Unlike these services, you have no guarantee that your money will produce anything, and you may get what you want without paying, which is a big disincentive to invest.
Naturally, there are other problems, like the extinction of non-mainstream tastes and no-name artists to deal with as well. Still, limitations in the business model don't necessarily have to bring it down. It could and, unless I'm mistaken, it currently does, op
"Sweat from our brow" doesn't refer to ownership per se; it refers to payment and incentive. The house painter provides a service, which he sells by choice for a profit. The farmer, again by choice, owns his crops until he sells them. He is entitled to the sweat from his brow, right up until the point he trades it for the sweat from another person's brow. An artist, without copyright, has little choice but to trade. The farmer and house painter are free to choose to sell their "sweat" for as little or as much as they want. An artist, if he chooses to trade, is forced to trade for zero value. His sweat is effectively stolen. His work is for nothing he can use or subsist off of.
The "sweat of the brow" thing describes the general concept running capitalism: hard work is rewarded with riches. Just like it works for farmers and house-painters, it should also be applied artists, lest they feel strongly compelled to actually work at something they get a reward from. The problem is that this doesn't work automatically, thanks to a relatively unprecedented situation. We have intangible goods which can be copied by anyone, but they can't be created originally by anyone. New works are in demand and scarce, but as soon as they hit the shelves, they lose all their commercial value. The fact that this situation is relatively unprecedented means that we need to go back to first principles in order to find a solution. Our first, and, IMHO, best solution to date was to extend property to a limited extent to accommodate for those intangible goods. The solution managed not only to reward art, but to make formal an informal notion of intangible property that many people recognised artists held over their works (even if you don't).
It actually does follow. If they are unnecessary, you don't need them. Period. By definition. That means, assuming you're right, there is no need to rely on any of the fruit of their work. You can acceptably ignore any and all contributions to the world. Whether you do that or not is your prerogative, but I must warn you, people (me included) are not going to think much of your argument if you can't be bothered to do a trivial demonstration, like not seek out any copyrighted work ever created. It's trivial, of course, because you don't need them.
Oh, and by the way, there's no asking involved. If I find them unnecessary, then naturally that won't guarantee you that I'll stop. If they are unnecessary (i.e. no-one finds them necessary), then I will close up shop (unless I prop my business up with a night job). That's right: you have to convince others that they don't need their favourite commercial bands, or commercial movies, or commercial games, else they are not unnecessary. You could speed up that process by providing an alternative that truly replaces the current system, that makes people buy exclusively from you, but people have been trying that since the current system's conception.