Pirates vs. America [Archive]

Oliver

15th July 2007, 07:56 PM

Most of you probably heard about the Swedish Torrent-Site "The Pirate Bay (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Pirate_Bay)", which is a pain in the Ass for copyright-holders all around the globe - because their Site doesn't violate Swedish Laws nor International Agreements.

But even if I don't support copyright violation, I think their resistance against the big cooperations like Apple, Warner, Microsoft, MPAA, Dreamworks ... is pretty boastful , but quite amusing:

http://thepiratebay.org/legal

> Dear Mr. Neij:
>
> It has been brought to the attention of Electronic Arts Inc. ("EA") that
> the website http://www.piratebay.org with the IP addresses of
> 217.75.120.115, 217.75.120.116, 217.75.120.118 is conducting
> unauthorized activities with respect to EA's copyrighted software, The
> Sims 2. The aforementioned website is offering and distributing
> bittorrent seeds for an unauthorized downloadable version of this EA
> game.

Hello and thank you for contacting us. We have shut down the website in
question.

Oh wait, just kidding. We haven't, since the site in question is fully
legal. Unlike certain other countries, such as the one you're in, we have
sane copyright laws here. But we also have polar bears roaming the
streets and attacking people :-(.

> This unauthorized activity with respect to the distribution of EA's
> software products constitutes infringement of EA's intellectual property
> rights. EA enforces its intellectual property rights very aggressively
> by using every legal option available.

Please don't sue us right now, our lawyer is passed out in an alley from
too much moonshine, so please at least wait until he's found and doesn't
have a huge hangover...

> As you are listed as the registrant for this website, EA demands that
> you immediately and permanently disable access to the aforementioned
> bittorrent seeds for The Sims 2 and any in the future.

You're free to demand anything you want. So are we. We demand that you
cease and desist sending letters like this, since they're frivolous and
meaningless. Where should I send the bill for the consumed diskspace and
bandwidth?

> Thank you for your cooperation. If you have any questions concerning
> this matter, please contact us via e-mail at:
> piracy-online@ea.com.

Thank you for your entertainment. As with all other threats, we will
publish this one on http://static.thepiratebay.org/legal/

Source: http://static.thepiratebay.org/ea_response.txt

So what do you guys think?
Who will win this nasty fight between Swedish and US-Law?
Is Sweden the next country that has to be "democratized" to US-Standards? :D

Cain

15th July 2007, 08:41 PM

From Wiki:

The Pirate Bay is well known for the "legal" page it hosts[9], featuring copyright infringement notices and cease and desist letters that The Pirate Bay claims to have received from various organizations, along with mocking replies. One of the site's co-operators, Peter, explains: "They are rude in a polite way. We are rude in a rude way back at them.

:)

How is this site allowed to operate legally again? Assuming Wiki is accurate: "In July 2005, new anti-piracy legislation was enacted in Sweden which made the distribution of software for the purposes of copyright violation illegal."

ARubberChickenWithAPulley

15th July 2007, 08:49 PM

Oliver

15th July 2007, 08:57 PM

???

Point me to the section that makes this a "nasty fight between Swedish and US-law." You posted a letter from a private entity (Electronic Arts) to the Pirate Buy. EA didn't cite any US laws, they simply pointed out that The Pirate Bay was facilitating the download of its software without compensation or permission.

And, as far as I know, the legality of the Pirate Bay has not been fully decided yet even in Sweden, and under the European Union Copyright Directive. I would say it is dubious, at best.

You should read all the Emails on their Website. I'm afraid that it might be against the profanity-rules to post the nasty parts. :boxedin:

Anyway: "In May 2007 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007) prosecutor Håkan Roswall made it clear that he intends to press charges against the administrators of The Pirate Bay.[4] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Pirate_Bay#_note-torrentfreak_1) That same month, new information has leaked which shows that the Swedish police has nothing to give to the district attorney, and doesn’t have a strong case.[27] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Pirate_Bay#_note-25)"

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Pirate_Bay#Aftermath

Tsukasa Buddha

15th July 2007, 09:02 PM

How is allowing mass theft "sane"?

Morrigan

15th July 2007, 09:08 PM

How is copyright infringement "theft"?

ARubberChickenWithAPulley

15th July 2007, 09:11 PM

You should read all the Emails on their Website. I'm afraid that it might be against the profanity-rules to post the nasty parts. :boxedin:

Anyway: "In May 2007 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007) prosecutor Håkan Roswall made it clear that he intends to press charges against the administrators of The Pirate Bay.[4] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Pirate_Bay#_note-torrentfreak_1) That same month, new information has leaked which shows that the Swedish police has nothing to give to the district attorney, and doesn’t have a strong case.[27] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Pirate_Bay#_note-25)"

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Pirate_Bay#Aftermath

I'm actually quite familiar with the Pirate Bay and its legal battles, having some interest in it myself. You still haven't cited anything that makes this a fight between Swedish and US laws. You just showed that a Swedish Prosecutor intends to prosecute the site, and that perhaps it won't go very well. I'm not seeing "US Law" in there anywhere.

I'm sure the US government has talked to the Swedish government about the Pirate Bay, given that the site provides access to tons of material owned by U.S. companies. It is, after all, kinda sorta the job of the US government to protect US Citizens and interests.

ARubberChickenWithAPulley

15th July 2007, 09:13 PM

How is copyright infringement "theft"?

The same way that stealing cable television is theft: using a service provided or created by someone else without paying them compensation.

ETA: Whether or not it fits a strict legal definition of theft is probably questionable. In a general sense of the word "theft," however, I think it is appropriate.

quixotecoyote

15th July 2007, 09:13 PM

quixotecoyote

15th July 2007, 09:14 PM

The same way that stealing cable television is theft: using a service provided or created by someone else without paying them compensation.

Software isn't really a service as cable is. It's closer to a product.

Morrigan

15th July 2007, 09:22 PM

Morrigan, I assume you are pointing out that copyright infringement and theft are distinct terms and the website engages in the former rather than the latter. Am I correct or are you implying that copyright infringement should be ok?

Neither, really. Piratebay is apparently not violating any Swedish law as of yet, so they can't be accused of copyright infringement.
I was saying that copyright infringement is not the same thing as theft and to equate the two is asinine, really. Especially when you consider that a lot of that so-called copyright infringement is done by people who had no intention of buying the product in the first place, making the whole "but it's taking their money!" point moot.

ARubberChickenWithAPulley

15th July 2007, 09:22 PM

Software isn't really a service as cable is. It's closer to a product.

I agree generally, although I think software ends up somewhere in between a product and service. Unlike most products, software can be created an infinite number of times. As such, you aren't stealing a physical thing as much as you are stealing the service that the company provided -- which was writing the software, plus maintaining it with updates, patches, and the like.

quixotecoyote

15th July 2007, 09:28 PM

I agree generally, although I think software ends up somewhere in between a product and service. Unlike most products, software can be created an infinite number of times. As such, you aren't stealing a physical thing as much as you are stealing the service that the company provided -- which was writing the software, plus maintaining it with updates, patches, and the like.

I get what you're saying, but I think it's a stretch. It's not directly harming anyone, rather it invalidates an economic model of business. I'm not saying that's ok or that we as a society shouldn't try to put a stop to it. What I am saying is that to attempt to equate it with theft is to obscure the issue and attempt to address it in the wrong terms.

Oliver

15th July 2007, 09:32 PM

I'm actually quite familiar with the Pirate Bay and its legal battles, having some interest in it myself. You still haven't cited anything that makes this a fight between Swedish and US laws. You just showed that a Swedish Prosecutor intends to prosecute the site, and that perhaps it won't go very well. I'm not seeing "US Law" in there anywhere.

I'm sure the US government has talked to the Swedish government about the Pirate Bay, given that the site provides access to tons of material owned by U.S. companies. It is, after all, kinda sorta the job of the US government to protect US Citizens and interests.

Since you claim to be familiar with this Issue but obviously failed to read the letters that clearly talk about the contradiction between Swedish and US-Copyright Laws:

What do you think the controversy is about if not Laws? ... Hobbits and Elves? :rolleyes:

ARubberChickenWithAPulley

15th July 2007, 09:35 PM

Neither, really. Piratebay is apparently not violating any Swedish law as of yet, so they can't be accused of copyright infringement.

They sure can be accused of copyright infringement. The Pirate Bay is essentially playing stupid with their claims of not violating the law. They're claiming that since they don't actually host the torrents themselves, they aren't violating anything -- they're just enabling other people to violate copyright if they so desire. Kind of like if I decided to hand out the phone numbers of known drug dealers.

"Here, I'm just giving you a phone number *wink wink*"

I was saying that copyright infringement is not the same thing as theft and to equate the two is asinine, really. Especially when you consider that a lot of that so-called copyright infringement is done by people who had no intention of buying the product in the first place, making the whole "but it's taking their money!" point moot.

Uhmm.. generally speaking, most people who steal something don't intend to by it in the first place. That's why they steal it. I'm not sure how that makes it not stealing. People are downloading a product (or service) that someone else created, and are using that product for their own benefit without compensating the people who created. That counts as theft in my book.

ARubberChickenWithAPulley

15th July 2007, 09:38 PM

Since you claim to be familiar with this Issue but obviously failed to read the letters that clearly talk about the contradiction between Swedish and US-Copyright Laws:

What do you think the controversy is about if not Laws? ... Hobbits and Elves? :rolleyes:

Ugh. I have read almost everything on their site, thanks, and I am well aware that there are differences between Swedish and US Copyright Laws. You are still not showing me how Swedish Police raiding a Swedish web site and a Swedish prosecutor threatening to prosecute that Swedish site makes this case a fight between US and Swedish Law.

ARubberChickenWithAPulley

15th July 2007, 09:41 PM

I get what you're saying, but I think it's a stretch. It's not directly harming anyone, rather it invalidates an economic model of business. I'm not saying that's ok or that we as a society shouldn't try to put a stop to it. What I am saying is that to attempt to equate it with theft is to obscure the issue and attempt to address it in the wrong terms.

I disagree that it's a stretch, but I am more talking about general usage of theft as opposed to legalities. I agree, from a legal standpoint copyright infringement is not theft, nor should it be. When people equate the two, however, they aren't usually talking in legalities, just in general principles. In principle, I think copyright infringement is theft. Legally, I don't think they are the same, nor do I think the ought to be the same.

Tony

15th July 2007, 09:51 PM

Kind of like if I decided to hand out the phone numbers of known drug dealers.

"Here, I'm just giving you a phone number *wink wink*"

Wait wait wait, are you saying that is illegal? I truly hope it isn't. Can you support that?

Morrigan

15th July 2007, 09:57 PM

They sure can be accused of copyright infringement. The Pirate Bay is essentially playing stupid with their claims of not violating the law. They're claiming that since they don't actually host the torrents themselves, they aren't violating anything -- they're just enabling other people to violate copyright if they so desire. Kind of like if I decided to hand out the phone numbers of known drug dealers.

"Here, I'm just giving you a phone number *wink wink*"

This is moving the goalposts, though, isn't it? If Piratebay has not been found guilty by any Swedish court, then they're not breaking the law, now are they. At that point, it doesn't matter if you think that they get away with it through a loophole or if you think Swedish law is flawed. ;)

Uhmm.. generally speaking, most people who steal something don't intend to by it in the first place. That's why they steal it. I'm not sure how that makes it not stealing. People are downloading a product (or service) that someone else created, and are using that product for their own benefit without compensating the people who created. That counts as theft in my book.

I disagree. If I don't want to pay for a car (whether it's because I'm cheap or can't afford one or any other reason), will thus not buy one, and therefore steal yours, I am taking something away from you. I am removing your property from you and making it mine, and you are effectively losing your property.
On the other hand, if I don't want to pay for your music CD, I'm not going to buy it. But if I download it, you still have your music intact. I am not taking it away from you - you still have it. You didn't lose any property, not even money, because I would not have given you money anyway. You might be irritated that I am enjoying your music without having paid for it, and I could understand that, but it's not at all the same thing as theft.

That's why theft and copyright infringement are two different offenses, and are treated differently.

Oliver

15th July 2007, 10:16 PM

Ugh. I have read almost everything on their site, thanks, and I am well aware that there are differences between Swedish and US Copyright Laws. You are still not showing me how Swedish Police raiding a Swedish web site and a Swedish prosecutor threatening to prosecute that Swedish site makes this case a fight between US and Swedish Law.

That's easy. If there were no copyright-laws in the US, it wouldn't be such an issue at all. The American copyright-holders are complaining about the Case because their Non-Swedish laws. Also the US government put pressure upon the Swedish Government, as far I remember. It's all about Laws - and a fight between swedish and American/non-Swedish interests - based on laws. You're trying to tweak my nose here, aren't you? :confused:

I posted the quote from Wikipedia because it showed "that the Swedish police has nothing to give to the district attorney, and doesn’t have a strong case" - which contradicts with Cains Quote: "In July 2005, new anti-piracy legislation was enacted in Sweden which made the distribution of software for the purposes of copyright violation illegal". The case is still open.

ARubberChickenWithAPulley

15th July 2007, 10:17 PM

This is moving the goalposts, though, isn't it? If Piratebay has not been found guilty by any Swedish court, then they're not breaking the law, now are they. At that point, it doesn't matter if you think that they get away with it through a loophole or if you think Swedish law is flawed. ;)

I don't think I'm moving the goalposts. I used your exact wording, in which you claimed that The Pirate Bay can't be accused of copyright infringement. Of course they can be accused. Heck, I can accuse you of being a scaly reptilian beast from the planet Xanax ;)

In any event, I was just pointing out that, as with arguing over "theft," whether or not they are legally infringing on copyright, I think they are certainly, practically speaking, infringing on copyright, and doing so knowingly. I agree, if Sweden rules that what they are doing is legal, then that's the way it is. However, it certainly matters to me that they are facilitating copyright infringement -- and I can imagine it would matter a heck of a lot more if it were my products being distributed.

If their rationale for legality is legit, then I can't see how it wouldn't just as legitimately apply to, say, a child pornography bit torrent site. They're not hosting the child pornography, they're just facilitating its download!

I disagree. If I don't want to pay for a car (whether it's because I'm cheap or can't afford one or any other reason), will thus not buy one, and therefore steal yours, I am taking something away from you. I am removing your property from you and making it mine, and you are effectively losing your property.

On the other hand, if I don't want to pay for your music CD, I'm not going to buy it. But if I download it, you still have your music intact. I am not taking it away from you - you still have it. You didn't lose any property, not even money, because I would not have given you money anyway. You might be irritated that I am enjoying your music without having paid for it, and I could understand that, but it's not at all the same thing as theft.

I think that's a very narrow definition of theft. If I acquire the exclusive design of the new BMW (or any other nice car) and build an exact replica myself, and sell it for my own company thus taking profits from BMW, by your reasoning, it isn't theft. BMW still has their design. They haven't technically lost anything, since they haven't yet made any profits. Similarly, if I steal someone's entire book, put my name on it, and sell it, they haven't lost anything either. They still have their book.

That's why theft and copyright infringement are two different offenses, and are treated differently.

And I agree, legally, we should differentiate. We also differentiate between different types of theft (petty theft, embezzlement, fraud, etc.) without actually calling them theft. But I think the title is valid. If you take something without permission and without paying for it, that is a form of stealing.

quixotecoyote

15th July 2007, 10:26 PM

I disagree that it's a stretch, but I am more talking about general usage of theft as opposed to legalities. I agree, from a legal standpoint copyright infringement is not theft, nor should it be. When people equate the two, however, they aren't usually talking in legalities, just in general principles. In principle, I think copyright infringement is theft. Legally, I don't think they are the same, nor do I think the ought to be the same.

I think that on general principles, they are different and that it is not theft.

A couple examples:

Lays creates a potato chip almost identical to Pringles, in the same style packaging. Pringles drops it's patent infringement lawsuit because it cannot win (assumption). In this case, society allows a business model where companies copy each other's product, to the detriment of the original innovator.
http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/food/2003-08-14-stax_x.htm

The sex shop Victor's Little Secret won a lawsuit brought by Victoria's Secret for trademark infringement. This demonstrates that our society is willing to allow similarly named businesses as part of it's model.
http://www.cnn.com/2003/LAW/03/04/scotus.trademark/

From Canada, but interesting. Prescription drugs now have eight years of protection. After that anyone can copy them.
http://www.ic.gc.ca/cmb/welcomeic.nsf/558d636590992942852564880052155b/85256a5d006b97208525720b004a7124!OpenDocument

Public Domain. Disney lawyers are most famous for pushing back the time limit for copyrighted works to enter the public domain. We've extended those protections time and time again.
http://writ.news.findlaw.com/commentary/20020305_sprigman.html

The common theme linking these examples together and to the topic at hand is that each focuses on how society will allow its business models to be structured. In each case decisions are sought that will harm or prevent harm to a business or industry. In each case certain actions that would ultimately cost a company money are made legal or illegal, yet none of these are commonly considered theft.

That copyright infringement and piracy is considered theft is a great victory for the RIAA, the ESA, and other similar groups. They've successfully got the population to frame the issue linking it to car-theft rather than the more similar issues I linked above.

luchog

15th July 2007, 10:53 PM

I think that's a very narrow definition of theft. If I acquire the exclusive design of the new BMW (or any other nice car) and build an exact replica myself, and sell it for my own company thus taking profits from BMW, by your reasoning, it isn't theft. BMW still has their design. They haven't technically lost anything, since they haven't yet made any profits. Similarly, if I steal someone's entire book, put my name on it, and sell it, they haven't lost anything either. They still have their book.
Legally, no, they're not theft. Nor are they theft in a formal (as opposed to colloquial or idiomatic) English definition of the word.

In the BMW case, you do not have any legal theft. What you do have is industrial espionage, patent infringement, and copyright infringement. If you wait a certain amount of time; then there is no patent or copyright infringement. However, taking the physical car itself is still theft no matter how long ago it was manufactured.

In the book case, if you take the physical book itself, then it's theft; regardless of how long ago the book was printed.. If you buy or download the book, then proceed to publish it under your own name, then that is copyright infringment; unless, again, a certain amount of time has elapsed, at which point it becomes perfectly legal.

That is the key difference between true theft and Intellectual Property infringement. A physical object has a value that is specific to that object. Taking it deprives the owner of that object of that object's value, regardless of the circumstances or time (ignoring degradation over time). Taking IP does not deprive the owner of the IP, since he still possesses it. Furthermore, IP only possesses, for the owner, a semi-arbitrary value -- a combination of a creator-defined arbitrary value, and a market value -- for a purely arbitrary length of time, which has varied considerably by region and over recent history.

As an aside, regarding market value. One could make the argument that the cost of many forms of IP is based far more on an owner-declared arbitrary value than on true market value; based on the level of piracy. There will, of course, always be piracy as long as it's possible to make reasonable-quality copies. However, many researchers, and even some in the entertainment media industry, claim that the arbitrary-value cost is higher than what a true market-value cost would be, and that reducing the cost to more closely coincide with actual market-value would go a long way toward reducing piracy. Since the largest part of the cost of most entertainment media is in promotion and advertising, rather than actual content, it wouldn't be that difficult to do.

ARubberChickenWithAPulley

15th July 2007, 10:55 PM

I think that on general principles, they are different and that it is not theft.

A couple examples:

Lays creates a potato chip almost identical to Pringles, in the same style packaging. Pringles drops it's patent infringement lawsuit because it cannot win (assumption). In this case, society allows a business model where companies copy each other's product, to the detriment of the original innovator.
http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/food/2003-08-14-stax_x.htm

In this case, Lays created and developed their own recipe and ideas. Similar to Pringles, and no doubt inspired by Pringles success. But they didn't copy Pringles outright.

The sex shop Victor's Little Secret won a lawsuit brought by Victoria's Secret for trademark infringement. This demonstrates that our society is willing to allow similarly named businesses as part of it's model.
http://www.cnn.com/2003/LAW/03/04/scotus.trademark/

In this case, they won because it didn't dilute the recognition of Victoria's Secret. But this more proves my point than yours: had they been identical (i.e. named their store Victoria's Secret), they would have lost.

From Canada, but interesting. Prescription drugs now have eight years of protection. After that anyone can copy them.
http://www.ic.gc.ca/cmb/welcomeic.nsf/558d636590992942852564880052155b/85256a5d006b97208525720b004a7124!OpenDocument

I believe this is the case in the US as well, only it is 20 years.

Public Domain. Disney lawyers are most famous for pushing back the time limit for copyrighted works to enter the public domain. We've extended those protections time and time again.
http://writ.news.findlaw.com/commentary/20020305_sprigman.html

No doubt, Disney has managed to extend their copyrights to practically infinity.

The common theme linking these examples together and to the topic at hand is that each focuses on how society will allow its business models to be structured. In each case decisions are sought that will harm or prevent harm to a business or industry. In each case certain actions that would ultimately cost a company money are made legal or illegal, yet none of these are commonly considered theft.

This is true for a lot of things. If I take money, it's theft. If the government does it, it's taxation (I am not, lest anyone misunderstand, arguing against the government's right to tax). If I were to capture a criminal and execute him, it would be murder. If the government does it, it's justice. So yes, the government frequently weighs public good versus private rights, and by passing laws, can make things legal that, if not codified in law, would probably be looked upon negatively.

That copyright infringement and piracy is considered theft is a great victory for the RIAA, the ESA, and other similar groups. They've successfully got the population to frame the issue linking it to car-theft rather than the more similar issues I linked above.

Perhaps. Or perhaps a lot of people think it is theft, without the RIAA. I am not a fan of the RIAA at all -- I think they way they have gone about this issue has been atrocious, and they shoulder a lot of responsibility themselves for treating even paying customers as if they were pirates or criminals. I am not, in any way, defending a lot of their conduct. I agree with them in principle, I have disagreed strongly with the way they've acted.

quixotecoyote

15th July 2007, 11:08 PM

No doubt there's some wiggle room in those examples.

But the point is that the legality of piracy is based on arbitrary standards rather than actual harm as in theft.

Consider the generic drug example using the theft example. If I copy your drug after you make it I've used your idea and innovation without compensating you, so that's theft. If I wait X amount of time and then use your idea and innovation without compensating you, it's not theft. Theft as a descriptor doesn't work.

Now that I think about it. I didn't even need to use the drug example. If we go back in time before the public domain deadline was lifetime + 80 years. IIRC it was originally 30 years. So if instead of stealing something immediately after production I stole it in 30 years, would it no longer be stealing?

eta: Missed this.

This is true for a lot of things. If I take money, it's theft. If the government does it, it's taxation (I am not, lest anyone misunderstand, arguing against the government's right to tax). If I were to capture a criminal and execute him, it would be murder. If the government does it, it's justice. So yes, the government frequently weighs public good versus private rights, and by passing laws, can make things legal that, if not codified in law, would probably be looked upon negatively.

I'm not trying to compare private actions versus government actions. I'm trying to say that making piracy illegal as in the status quo is only one way of going about doing this and that if we changed the business models that we are using what you call theft now could become proper use.

Imagine a world where your image was your property. If you are a celebrity (or just pretty like me) and tabloids take your picture, they have to pay you to take your picture. After all, you worked to create your image and by copying that image for free they are stealing the results of your work. It could be called theft under the same standards people are using to call piracy theft.

Yet in America and Australia (elsewhere I do not know), this theft of image is seen as fair and reasonable behavior and not considered theft at all.

ARubberChickenWithAPulley

15th July 2007, 11:10 PM

Legally, no, they're not theft. Nor are they theft in a formal (as opposed to colloquial or idiomatic) English definition of the word.

Indeed, you are correct, the word "theft" is incorrect. Copyright infringment does fit formal definitions of "stealing," however.

2. to appropriate (ideas, credit, words, etc.) without right or acknowledgment.

That is the key difference between true theft and Intellectual Property infringement. A physical object has a value that is specific to that object. Taking it deprives the owner of that object of that object's value, regardless of the circumstances or time (ignoring degradation over time). Taking IP does not deprive the owner of the IP, since he still possesses it. Furthermore, IP only possesses, for the owner, a semi-arbitrary value -- a combination of a creator-defined arbitrary value, and a market value -- for a purely arbitrary length of time, which has varied considerably by region and over recent history.

Except all of this would rule out theft of services and identity theft. I suppose you could consider both a form of fraud rather than theft, but the word "theft" is nevertheless used for the stealing intangibles.

As an aside, regarding market value. One could make the argument that the cost of many forms of IP is based far more on an owner-declared arbitrary value than on true market value; based on the level of piracy. There will, of course, always be piracy as long as it's possible to make reasonable-quality copies. However, many researchers, and even some in the entertainment media industry, claim that the arbitrary-value cost is higher than what a true market-value cost would be, and that reducing the cost to more closely coincide with actual market-value would go a long way toward reducing piracy. Since the largest part of the cost of most entertainment media is in promotion and advertising, rather than actual content, it wouldn't be that difficult to do.

I agree. Companies quote astronomical figures for their "losses," most of which seem quite unlikely. And the RIAA and MPAA could do a lot to combat piracy without suing people and shutting down web sites -- including, perhaps counterintuitively, getting rid of DRM and other such nuisances that drive people away from legitimate music sites.

Wheezebucket

15th July 2007, 11:12 PM

I love bit torrent! Hurray for the internet! Get 'em, pirate bay!

ARubberChickenWithAPulley

15th July 2007, 11:18 PM

But the point is that the legality of piracy is based on arbitrary standards rather than actual harm as in theft.

I agree, which is why I think it is good that they are legally different principles.

Consider the generic drug example using the theft example. If I copy your drug after you make it I've used your idea and innovation without compensating you, so that's theft. If I wait X amount of time and then use your idea and innovation without compensating you, it's not theft. Theft as a descriptor doesn't work.

Now that I think about it. I didn't even need to use the drug example. If we go back in time before the public domain deadline was lifetime + 80 years. IIRC it was originally 30 years. So if instead of stealing something immediately after production I stole it in 30 years, would it no longer be stealing?

This simply goes back to the "if the government passes a law and does it, it's okay, if I do it on my own, it's stealing" point. We (as a society) agreed on certain stipulations for the public good. One of those is patent expiration and copyright expiration. There is also taxation, and eminent domain. If the government takes money from me and gives it to someone else in the form of a welfare check, is it stealing? Well, if anyone other than the government did it, it sure would be. So yes, we do authorize "stealing" by mandating that patents and copyrights expire, just as we authorize "stealing" from my paycheck in the form of taxes for the greater good, and so forth.

quixotecoyote

15th July 2007, 11:22 PM

I agree, which is why I think it is good that they are legally different principles.

This simply goes back to the "if the government passes a law and does it, it's okay, if I do it on my own, it's stealing" point. We (as a society) agreed on certain stipulations for the public good. One of those is patent expiration and copyright expiration. There is also taxation, and eminent domain. If the government takes money from me and gives it to someone else in the form of a welfare check, is it stealing? Well, if anyone other than the government did it, it sure would be. So yes, we do authorize "stealing" by mandating that patents and copyrights expire, just as we authorize "stealing" from my paycheck in the form of taxes for the greater good, and so forth.

I truly do not understand why you are talking about the government as an actor. I'm talking about 2 hypothetical actions as a private citizen; copying immediately versus in thirty years with one considered theft and one not theft. I only brought the government into it because if the only reason it's being called theft is because it's illegal, then that's a poor application of the definition.

quixotecoyote

15th July 2007, 11:25 PM

ARubberChickenWithAPulley

16th July 2007, 12:03 AM

I truly do not understand why you are talking about the government as an actor. I'm talking about 2 hypothetical actions as a private citizen; copying immediately versus in thirty years with one considered theft and one not theft. I only brought the government into it because if the only reason it's being called theft is because it's illegal, then that's a poor application of the definition.

You were originally talking about copyright and patent infringement, both of which are legal matters, which is why I talked about the government. If it were illegal to violate copyright after 30 years (as it is), and you did so, then yes it could be a form of theft. If it were illegal for a generic drug company to copy another company's design even after 20 years, then yes, they would be stealing. We accept both as okay usually based on their legality. In other words we (as a society) reached a consensus, through the government, that those are not forms of stealing. Ditto with taxation and welfare. One could argue that we have consented to being taxed, allowing copyright to expire, etc. therefore, based on our consent, it is not stealing.

In the case of copyright infringement, we recognize it legally as separate from theft, and rightly so. I would argue, though, that in principle, it is a form of stealing, as much as embezzlement (also distinct from theft) is.

And sorry, I didn't catch this when you added it, which is what happens when we are posting at the same time ;)
I'm not trying to compare private actions versus government actions. I'm trying to say that making piracy illegal as in the status quo is only one way of going about doing this and that if we changed the business models that we are using what you call theft now could become proper use.

Fair enough. I agree, we should revise how we deal with copyright and private use of movies, software, music, etc. However, it still boils down to either the consent of the people who created the products to begin with, or the consensus of society. Barring the latter, the former has the right to decide whether or not it consents to distributing its products for free.

ARubberChickenWithAPulley

16th July 2007, 12:29 AM

That's easy. If there were no copyright-laws in the US, it wouldn't be such an issue at all. The American copyright-holders are complaining about the Case because their Non-Swedish laws.

Says who? You seriously think that, if all copyright laws in the United States suddenly vanished tomorrow, US media companies would suddenly stop caring about the issue? They'd be more frantic then ever -- both in the United States, and outside it. So no, I don't concede that, if copyright didn't exist in the U.S., US companies would stop trying to enforce/bolster it in places where it does exist. They might have less leverage, but they would still try.

Also the US government put pressure upon the Swedish Government, as far I remember. It's all about Laws - and a fight between swedish and American/non-Swedish interests - based on laws. You're trying to tweak my nose here, aren't you? :confused:

So? Sweden has never struck me as a country that has many qualms about brushing off the U.S. They are grown-ups who have their own laws. The case is about the Swedish police raiding a Swedish web site and a Swedish prosecutor talking about prosecuting them. Even if they did so because the US government asked them to, they are still bound to follow Swedish laws. The best the US can say is, "can you enforce your laws against the Pirate Bay?" and Sweden can either say, "Yes," or "No, they're not breaking a law." I'm still not seeing "U.S. Law" anywhere in that chain of events.

I posted the quote from Wikipedia because it showed "that the Swedish police has nothing to give to the district attorney, and doesn’t have a strong case" - which contradicts with Cains Quote: "In July 2005, new anti-piracy legislation was enacted in Sweden which made the distribution of software for the purposes of copyright violation illegal". The case is still open.

The Wikipedia entry doesn't contradict what Cains wrote. Sweden did enact new anti-piracy legislation, and they are considering even more. The Pirate Bay has argued that what it is doing is legal because they don't actually host any of the copyrighted material: they are a tracker that provides links to bittorrent files, which themselves provide a means to download files.

corplinx

16th July 2007, 12:31 AM

Pirate Bay isn't above the table? I thought all those fan-subbed episodes of "Death Note" I just watched were legit.

quixotecoyote

16th July 2007, 02:28 AM

Those were legit until until January 10 of this year, assuming you are in the US. Elsewhere......?
http://www.animeondvd.com/news/pr.php?pr_view=915

Ian Osborne

16th July 2007, 02:36 AM

And don't forget who it is that's rattling the moral sabre about copyright 'theft'. Check out Warner Bros' attitude to other people's intellectual property rights (http://www.randi.org/jr/120701.html) ('Leap of Faith' article, about halfway down).

Blank

16th July 2007, 02:41 AM

Those were legit until until January 10 of this year, assuming you are in the US. Elsewhere......?
http://www.animeondvd.com/news/pr.php?pr_view=915

Fansubs are never legal. Sure the Japanese studios rarely bother to take any action against the fansubbers, but they still have full copyrights to the products. Even if they aren't licensed to a US company.

Ryokan

16th July 2007, 02:44 AM

Pirate Bay isn't above the table? I thought all those fan-subbed episodes of "Death Note" I just watched were legit.

There's an unspoken and unwritten agreement between Japanese anime producers and anime fans in the west - if an anime is not licensed outside Japan, then it's okay to download fansub versions of that anime. After it's been licensed, it's not okay.

Jaggy Bunnet

16th July 2007, 02:47 AM

On the other hand, if I don't want to pay for your music CD, I'm not going to buy it. But if I download it, you still have your music intact. I am not taking it away from you - you still have it.

I do not understand the logic underlying this argument.

I want to own your music. Previously I had a choice of paying for and having the CD or not having it.

Now there is a third option, downloading and not paying for the music.

You seem to be suggesting that the people who take the third option are entirely from the category who did not value the music highly enough to pay for it when the only way to get it was to pay for it, rather than from the category who actually wanted it enough to pay for it but can now get it for nothing.

That seems a very, very questionable assumption.

TragicMonkey

16th July 2007, 02:57 AM

Jaggy Bunnet

16th July 2007, 03:13 AM

Has anybody else noticed that the companies that are most aggressive about defending their "intellectual property" are always the ones with the crappiest goods to begin with? Like Metallica all upset about pirating--who the hell would bother stealing Metallica songs? And Disney, making the same damn movie for how many decades now? Ooooh, "The Sims 2". Yeah, that's worth the effort of stealing.

I guess people must like buying crappy goods - and also stealing them.

I seem to remember a quote about not getting poor underestimating the taste of the general public....

Wheezebucket

16th July 2007, 03:34 AM

I guess people must like buying crappy goods - and also stealing them.

I seem to remember a quote about not getting poor underestimating the taste of the general public....

Nobody ever went broke overestimating the vulgarity of the American public.
-H.L. Mencken

I know I like stealing crap off the internet.

Overman

16th July 2007, 06:52 AM

OMG!!!! A Oliver Thread that is solid and has a point!!! What happened over the weekend!!! Has the world gone mad!

Seriously, good thread.

MilwaukeeMike

16th July 2007, 07:11 AM

NoZed Avenger

16th July 2007, 07:25 AM

OMG!!!! A Oliver Thread that is solid and has a point!!! What happened over the weekend!!! Has the world gone mad!

Seriously, good thread.

If it helps your sanity, the thread seems to have a substantive discussion going either (a) without, or (b) in spite of Oliver.

Does that help?

Beerina

16th July 2007, 07:32 AM

I was saying that copyright infringement is not the same thing as theft and to equate the two is asinine, really. Especially when you consider that a lot of that so-called copyright infringement is done by people who had no intention of buying the product in the first place, making the whole "but it's taking their money!" point moot.

Presuming you are correct about the numbers, it's still irrelevant. The desire to have luxury items like entertainment movies and music drives this part of the economy. Civilized society has decided that, no, you don't, in fact, get to have them if you don't pay the creator. Hence, "I wasn't gonna buy it anyway, so I should get it for free" is an invalid position to take.

If you want to improve your existence, per your own definition of that concept, as is every free person's natural right, then you should pay for that. If you don't think it's worth it financially, then you have chosen to do without, not chosen to get it for free, at your whim.

Blank

16th July 2007, 08:13 AM

If you want to improve your existence, per your own definition of that concept, as is every free person's natural right, then you should pay for that. If you don't think it's worth it financially, then you have chosen to do without, not chosen to get it for free, at your whim.

Plenty of good free music around in the form of independent bands distributing their own productions. I actually prefer that sort of music, they do what they like and it usually shows in their music. Sure the quality can vary a lot, but there are loads of great bands, especially if you're into some non commercialised styles of music (Ethnic music or such)

As for software, you can always look for a open source alternative.

Anyways it starts getting a bit more complicated once you go to something like songs recorded from internet radio (or just standard radio) or TV-broadcast recordings.

ponderingturtle

16th July 2007, 08:33 AM

ponderingturtle

16th July 2007, 08:45 AM

Come on guys... Look at it this way. If you have invested time (Years possibly) and your own money recording original music or writing software; you are going to want to be compensated. (At least to cover your costs) So would you want people illegally downloading what you made?)

But the thing is that you also get things like patent trolls who patent ideas and do nothing else. See the case with the blackberry recently. Here they did and do all the hard work of actualy developing the technology and get charged with stealing an idea that no one put any more work into than filling out forms.

That is a good thing apparently.

I believe in supporting the creation of new works, but the problem is that what is best for the public is not being discussed at all. It is what is best for those who own the ideas, not even nessacarily put the work into them at all.

casebro

16th July 2007, 08:52 AM

Under current American copyright laws, isn't this whole thread illegal? I believe that even discussing piracy is illegal.

Does that seem extreme? Have the latest round of copyright laws made it to SCOTUS?

strathmeyer

16th July 2007, 09:06 AM

I'm actually quite familiar with the Pirate Bay and its legal battles, having some interest in it myself. You still haven't cited anything that makes this a fight between Swedish and US laws. You just showed that a Swedish Prosecutor intends to prosecute the site, and that perhaps it won't go very well. I'm not seeing "US Law" in there anywhere.

I'm sure the US government has talked to the Swedish government about the Pirate Bay, given that the site provides access to tons of material owned by U.S. companies. It is, after all, kinda sorta the job of the US government to protect US Citizens and interests.

What about when the US government coerced the Swedish government to take the computers belonging to The Pirate Bay, as well as a number of unrelated sites? Your exclusion of this incident and your inability to tell the difference between distribution of information and the stealing of cable lead me to believe you're viewing this through rose colored glasses.

Kilgore Trout

16th July 2007, 09:15 AM

MilwaukeeMike

16th July 2007, 10:57 AM

MilwaukeeMike

16th July 2007, 11:01 AM

But the thing is that you also get things like patent trolls who patent ideas and do nothing else. See the case with the blackberry recently. Here they did and do all the hard work of actualy developing the technology and get charged with stealing an idea that no one put any more work into than filling out forms.

That is a good thing apparently.

I believe in supporting the creation of new works, but the problem is that what is best for the public is not being discussed at all. It is what is best for those who own the ideas, not even nessacarily put the work into them at all.

I'm not sure at what you are trying to say here. On one hand, you agree that it is important to support the creation of new works. However, on the other hand, you feel patents do work or are unfair?

You know, with the blackberry case, if they were too dumb/lazy/so on to simply fill out some patent papers then they deserve to lose their invention. I suspect there is much more to this case than simply paperwork.

ponderingturtle

16th July 2007, 11:46 AM

I'm not sure at what you are trying to say here. On one hand, you agree that it is important to support the creation of new works. However, on the other hand, you feel patents do work or are unfair?

You know, with the blackberry case, if they were too dumb/lazy/so on to simply fill out some patent papers then they deserve to lose their invention. I suspect there is much more to this case than simply paperwork.

No you don't understand. The guys who only filled out a patent for a mobile device to receive email patented that idea first. They had no actual product, they did not need one. Then when the people developed the blackberry they where infringing on the patent of the first guys who had no product. See this BBC (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/3722509.stm) article on patent trolls.

I simply think that for a patent you should have a substantive object, they let people patent business models, tax shelters and all kinds of things that you would not think of. Cranks also patent things that are impossible and then use the idea that it is patented as some sort of endorsement that it works.

As for books, movies and music, the question of how long is it in the public interest to protect these things with copywrites and so on vs letting into the public domain has shifted. They have managed to get public view to view them as tangible property and not specific writes granted for a limited period to promote new works.

So with it viewed as not special protections to promote the creation of new works, they are now viewed as absolute and permanent property. That is a remarkable sift when one thinks about it. But it is not surprising as so many powerful media forces want this and control what people are exposed to so much. It is also not surprising that the laws get passed to support them because that is where the money is, and that is largely what counts.

So case in point, how much does Micheal Jackson deserve to earn on current reproductions of Beatles songs? He purchased the rights and so owns them. So how does this promote the creation of new works?

What is in soceities interest is rarely discussed and the shifts in what people view intelectual property as is also relevant.

Mycroft

16th July 2007, 11:48 AM

Neither, really. Piratebay is apparently not violating any Swedish law as of yet, so they can't be accused of copyright infringement.
I was saying that copyright infringement is not the same thing as theft and to equate the two is asinine, really. Especially when you consider that a lot of that so-called copyright infringement is done by people who had no intention of buying the product in the first place, making the whole "but it's taking their money!" point moot.

I would also point out that people who get the product for free and then try it out may also be inspired to buy a product they would not have otherwise considered. In exactly the same way that radio gets people to buy CD's even though their music is free.

Wheezebucket

16th July 2007, 12:24 PM

I'm self-publishing my first comic book, which comes out this August. I went thousands and thousands of dollars in debt to produce it. It has a cover price of $3.50, and the first print run is just over a thousand. I'll be releasing it, in it's entirety, into the comic torrent community for anyone and everyone to steal, just before it's debut.

In this case, it's nothing but a good thing. I'll get more exposure, which I need WAY more than the extra cash. More people will read the book who never would have otherwise, since the indie comic scene is small, and few people like paying $3.50 for a 32 page b&w book. And some who do read it, if they like it, will end up buying a copy to help support us so we can keep making more (as evidenced by a lot of other wicked small publishing companies).

I'm not saying this strategy works for everyone obviously, but it works for us at the moment. In order for me to continue producing comic books for right now, I have to let people steal the **** outta them. Then again, I'm not trying to maximize my profits, just build a big enough community to get to the point where I can self-publish a few books and graphic novels a year.

TragicMonkey

16th July 2007, 12:33 PM

I seem to remember a quote about not getting poor underestimating the taste of the general public....

I had that quote saved somewhere on my hard drive, but I deleted a bunch of stuff so I could illegally download episodes of "Flavor of Love Girls: Charm School", a reality show that was the spinoff of a reality show that was the spinoff of a reality show that was a spinfoff of a reality show that was a ripoff of another reality show that was a ripoff of another reality show. (I wish I were exaggerating for humorous effect, but I'm not. It really is a sixth generation reality show.)

quixotecoyote

16th July 2007, 01:18 PM

So letting anything into the public domain would constitute legitimizing of theft and that is why nothing will ever enter that anymore?

Just for the record, this is the blunt version of what I was getting at on page 1.

Overman

16th July 2007, 01:44 PM

Segnosaur

16th July 2007, 02:03 PM

I would also point out that people who get the product for free and then try it out may also be inspired to buy a product they would not have otherwise considered. In exactly the same way that radio gets people to buy CD's even though their music is free.

You're right, people can and do use 'free' sources as ways to evaluate software, music, movies, etc. before purchasing them. It may also serve as free publicity for other products/services, such as how hearing an artist on line for free might entice people to go to their concerts. (Although there may be a problem with your radio anology... doesn't the artist still get royalties for radio play?)

The think is though... it should be up to the copyright holder if they want to engage in the 'giving it away for free in hopes of making a sale' business plan, or the more traditional 'gouge them right at the start'. Some artists COULD make more money by giving away their work for free, but if they choose not to, that is their fault.

Cain

16th July 2007, 02:33 PM

The problem I have with all these arguments over copyright, and I harp on it like an old man as often as I can, is this notion that creators have some natural right to be compensated. The U.S. government protects ideas as "property" (theoretically for a limited amount of time) in order to generate the greatest good for the greatest number. The U.S. Constitution is explicitly utilitarian on this point. Many of the people who cry out behalf of aggrieved corporations on Internet forums -- your standard "natural rights" market fundamentalists, more or less -- fail to apply one of their favorite boogeymen to the situation: "intellectual property" is a government created monopoly for purposes of social engineering. It gives people an incentive to spend time, energy and money doing things they otherwise would not do. This whole notion about creators deserving to be compensated for their labor sounds more like Karl Marx than Adam Smith.

Copyright violations should not be viewed through the frame of harming some individual holy creator, or more likely some faceless conglomerate. That does not strike at the foundation. What matters is if it harms the creator so much that innovation and productivity decline in ways we find economically unacceptable.

ARubberChickenWithAPulley

16th July 2007, 03:20 PM

What about when the US government coerced the Swedish government to take the computers belonging to The Pirate Bay, as well as a number of unrelated sites? Your exclusion of this incident and your inability to tell the difference between distribution of information and the stealing of cable lead me to believe you're viewing this through rose colored glasses.

I didn't "exclude" anything. In fact, I mentioned the US pressuring Sweden several posts back, and more than once. From the article Kilgore linked to, here is what their own State Secretary said:

"I know that the USA has opinions on the effectiveness in our system when it comes to copyright and that if Sweden and other countries aren't following their international agreements there are sanction mechanisms in the USA, which have been pointed out from their side."

And earlier in the article:

Both countries are members of the World Trade Organization (WTO), an entity that offers substantial trade benefits to member countries. A member country can impose trade sanctions against another for violationg specified rules of the WTO, including the failure to enforce global intellectual property rights.

So the US asked Sweden to enforce the very agreements it is a party to, and threatened to take appropriate actions in the trade body Sweden is a member of, which was has mechanisms that were designed to deal with exactly these types of issues. How presumptuous!

It's not like the US was threatening to go to war here. The US has lost WTO cases before, and if Sweden thought it had a leg to stand on, it could have defended itself in the WTO, probably with the backing of the EU. They chose not to.

Oliver

16th July 2007, 04:49 PM

OMG!!!! A Oliver Thread that is solid and has a point!!! What happened over the weekend!!! Has the world gone mad!

Seriously, good thread.

*lol* I blame Lisa for my mistake - but I promise that my next thread (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=87498) will be more pointless again. :D

In the meantime I stay out of this thread until the general copyright-controversy is over. :popcorn2

Davo

16th July 2007, 06:12 PM

Just my few points on ther topic.

If a $20 CD is pirated how much should the copyright owner be compensated ? The retail price of a CD or the Retail minus all the physical cost of producing the CD ?

When one purchases a CD they have the right to own and listen to those tracks? If you scratch a CD is it OK to pirate that missing track off the Internet ? I would say yes but the manufacturers wouldn`t agree.

Is there a time period when CD`s become public domain ?interested to know

The Shank

16th July 2007, 06:59 PM

I know I like stealing crap off the internet.

Me too, Pirate Bay rocks!

Still isn't a decent copy of the new Harry Potter flick though, dammit.

NoZed Avenger

16th July 2007, 08:09 PM

I would also point out that people who get the product for free and then try it out may also be inspired to buy a product they would not have otherwise considered. In exactly the same way that radio gets people to buy CD's even though their music is free.

Which may be a good argument to try on the people that created the product . . . but does not seem like a good thing to force the creator to do by deciding that marketing strategy *for* him or her. IOW, it sounds suspiciously like an ad hoc jusitification that could be made by someone who wants free stuff.

luchog

16th July 2007, 08:52 PM

Except all of this would rule out theft of services and identity theft. I suppose you could consider both a form of fraud rather than theft,
Fraud would be the most appropriate formal term for identity "theft". A case could be made that "theft", and possibly fraud as well, would apply to use of a service, depending on the circumstances, provided use of the service deprived a paying customer of access to the service, and the service provider lost some amount of a tangible resource in the process (eg. time, labour, bandwidth, etc.).
but the word "theft" is nevertheless used for the stealing intangibles.
Only as a colloquialism. Intangibles cannot truly be "stolen", they can only be copied, altered, or damaged (eg, slander/libel). Theft properly applies only to something tangible.

luchog

16th July 2007, 09:00 PM

As an aside, theft of services in the sense of stealing cable or electricity is pretty concrete; you're diverting a signal with they are actively and continuously producing and charging for. If they close the spigot your flow turns off. It's close enough to a product for me to categorize similarly to.

Using electricity unauthorized is theft, because electricity is a tangible substance with a limited supply. Using it deprives a paying customer of a similar amount of electricty.

Unauthorized viewing of a cable signal, however, is not theft, since using it doesn't cost the provider, since the signal is available on the cable whether it's used or not, nor does it deprive anyone else from being able to use it equally. It's not a theft of the service, any more than viewing a broadcast signal is theft of the signal. At worst, one is creating a "copy" of the cable signal in a way that doesn't affect the signal received by anyone else. That is why most cable signals are encrypted.

luchog

16th July 2007, 09:07 PM

Nobody ever went broke overestimating the vulgarity of the American public.
-H.L. Mencken

I know I like stealing crap off the internet.

Feh. I haven't pirated a single Metallica album since Black. I save my pirating for things that are worthwhile, but I can't afford yet, or stuff that's unfamiliar, to decide if i want to buy it. I've actually bought a lot of music, and some anime, because I was able to download it; whereas if I hadn't had that option, I wouldn't have risked the money on it.

luchog

16th July 2007, 09:14 PM

Many of the people who cry out behalf of aggrieved corporations on Internet forums -- your standard "natural rights" market fundamentalists, more or less -- fail to apply one of their favorite boogeymen to the situation: "intellectual property" is a government created monopoly for purposes of social engineering.

None of the greatest works of art in history have been created in a copyright environment.

luchog

16th July 2007, 09:18 PM

Which may be a good argument to try on the people that created the product . . . but does not seem like a good thing to force the creator to do by deciding that marketing strategy *for* him or her. IOW, it sounds suspiciously like an ad hoc jusitification that could be made by someone who wants free stuff.

Actually, there is strong evidence supporting this. I don't recall the study, but I read about it on The Register's website. Music sales have actually increased as music sharing/downloading has increased; particularly for indie and smaller labels. There was a dip in sales that the RIAA tried to claim was the result of piracy; but they neglected to mention that the dip corresponded closely to a similar dip in the economy (dotcom bust) and sales of all luxury goods.

Wheezebucket

16th July 2007, 10:09 PM

Feh. I haven't pirated a single Metallica album since Black. I save my pirating for things that are worthwhile, but I can't afford yet, or stuff that's unfamiliar, to decide if i want to buy it. I've actually bought a lot of music, and some anime, because I was able to download it; whereas if I hadn't had that option, I wouldn't have risked the money on it.

Well wasting time, money, or hd space on any Metallica (I just threw up a bit in my mouth) is never advised, legal or illegal. Yowzas!

Morrigan

16th July 2007, 10:37 PM

I don't think I'm moving the goalposts. I used your exact wording, in which you claimed that The Pirate Bay can't be accused of copyright infringement. Of course they can be accused. Heck, I can accuse you of being a scaly reptilian beast from the planet Xanax ;)

I see, you weren't moving the goalposts, you were merely being pedantic instead. Okay.

In any event, I was just pointing out that, as with arguing over "theft," whether or not they are legally infringing on copyright, I think they are certainly, practically speaking, infringing on copyright, and doing so knowingly.

I don't quite understand. Copyright infringement is purely a legal concept. What is "practically" infringing as opposed to "legally" infringing?

If their rationale for legality is legit, then I can't see how it wouldn't just as legitimately apply to, say, a child pornography bit torrent site. They're not hosting the child pornography, they're just facilitating its download!

Poor analogy. They faciliate downloads, yes. But not of actual illegal content. Downloading a movie or album torrent is not inherently illegal. I could be using Bittorrent to get an album I've bought, as a digital backup (hell, I've done it on some copyprotected albums I've bought), or a movie which DVD I own. Downloading the new Candlemass album might not be illegal. That depends entirely on the downloader.
On the other hand, downloading child pornography is always illegal.

I think that's a very narrow definition of theft. If I acquire the exclusive design of the new BMW (or any other nice car) and build an exact replica myself, and sell it for my own company thus taking profits from BMW, by your reasoning, it isn't theft. BMW still has their design. They haven't technically lost anything, since they haven't yet made any profits. Similarly, if I steal someone's entire book, put my name on it, and sell it, they haven't lost anything either. They still have their book.

That's more like plagiarism, and it not only involves stealing something (your word - the plans, their design), it also steals the credit, so I would not mind calling it theft. Something is definitely lost on one side, though it's not necessarily the actual property, but the ideas, and the credit toward its rightful original maker.

You seem to be suggesting that the people who take the third option are entirely from the category who did not value the music highly enough to pay for it when the only way to get it was to pay for it, rather than from the category who actually wanted it enough to pay for it but can now get it for nothing.

That seems a very, very questionable assumption.
Where did I say "only", please? I said "a lot". And I base this assumption on admittedly my personal experience and observations, but after spending years on several music forums, I start to notice some patterns. Namely, that people who pirate music they can, and would, otherwise pay for, are very, very few and far between. In my experience, music downloaders are either in the a) "I try before I buy", b) "downloading because I'm too poor, will buy when I get money because I love this band", c) "downloading because this CD is out of print and impossible to find anyway" or d) "this is worth listening, but not worth paying for" categories. A mere handful fell in the other category, and they were mostly little kids who never bought an album in their lives and apparently don't care for liner notes or artwork.

Has anybody else noticed that the companies that are most aggressive about defending their "intellectual property" are always the ones with the crappiest goods to begin with? Like Metallica all upset about pirating--who the hell would bother stealing Metallica songs? And Disney, making the same damn movie for how many decades now? Ooooh, "The Sims 2". Yeah, that's worth the effort of stealing.
:newlol I'll add that these aggressive folks also seem to be among the richest. Again, Metallica, Dr. Dre, the RIAA and other assorted @$$holes.

Presuming you are correct about the numbers, it's still irrelevant. The desire to have luxury items like entertainment movies and music drives this part of the economy. Civilized society has decided that, no, you don't, in fact, get to have them if you don't pay the creator. Hence, "I wasn't gonna buy it anyway, so I should get it for free" is an invalid position to take.
Where did I say it was a "valid position to take"? All I said was that it was wrong to call copyright infringement "theft" because nothing is actually stolen. That's really all I said.

If you want to improve your existence, per your own definition of that concept, as is every free person's natural right, then you should pay for that. If you don't think it's worth it financially, then you have chosen to do without, not chosen to get it for free, at your whim.
I'm going to assume that's an impersonal "you", because otherwise, my CD collection finds your preaching very funny.

I would also point out that people who get the product for free and then try it out may also be inspired to buy a product they would not have otherwise considered. In exactly the same way that radio gets people to buy CD's even though their music is free.
Absolutely.

ARubberChickenWithAPulley

16th July 2007, 10:58 PM

I see, you weren't moving the goalposts, you were merely being pedantic instead. Okay.

I was pointing out that certainly, the accusation isn't being pulled out of thin air. It is a legitimate and reasonable accusation.

I don't quite understand. Copyright infringement is purely a legal concept. What is "practically" infringing as opposed to "legally" infringing?

Millions of people go to the Pirate Bay to download pirated DVDs, music, etc. The name of the site itself makes it pretty obvious. Downloading pirated DVDs and music is illegal. Very few of those millions of people could successfully find those pirated DVDs or videos without the Pirate Bay. The Pirate Bay, however, gets around this because they don't host the files on their own servers, they merely provide a convenient place for people to come to through which they can find the pirated DVDs. As I mentioned before, it would be like if I put up a bulletin board that said "call here for free heroin!" and listed the numbers of drug dealers. I might not be breaking the law just by posting phone numbers, but if someone called me a drug dealer, they wouldn't be innacurate.

OJ Simpson is also not legally a murderer. But I have no qualms about calling him one.

Poor analogy. They faciliate downloads, yes. But not of actual illegal content. Downloading a movie or album torrent is not inherently illegal. I could be using Bittorrent to get an album I've bought, as a digital backup (hell, I've done it on some copyprotected albums I've bought), or a movie which DVD I own. Downloading the new Candlemass album might not be illegal. That depends entirely on the downloader.
On the other hand, downloading child pornography is always illegal.

Irrelevant. The Pirate Bay is not arguing they are legal because the site could be used for legitimate purposes. Their argument has been that they do not host any illegal content themselves, they merely point to torrent trackers, therefore their site is legal. From a 2006 Wired article (http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2006/03/70358):

Viborg credits The Pirate Bay's seeming immunity to the basic structure of the BitTorrent protocol. The site's Stockholm-based servers provide only torrent files, which by themselves contain no copyright data -- merely pointers to sources of the content. That makes The Pirate Bay's activities perfectly legal under Swedish statutory and case law, Viborg claims

As such, my analogy was perfectly valid. By that same argument, any site that only points to bit torrent trackers that have illegal content can be considered legal -- including child pornography -- as long as they don't have any of the content on their own servers.

That's more like plagiarism, and it not only involves stealing something (your word - the plans, their design), it also steals the credit, so I would not mind calling it theft. Something is definitely lost on one side, though it's not necessarily the actual property, but the ideas, and the credit toward its rightful original maker.

They could "steal" the plans and designs by copying them to a disk. So no, they are not stealing a physical object. Regardless, the idea is certainly not lost to one side -- they still have the idea. They can still build their own weeble-wobble, or whatever product they are creating. Ditto for stealing "credit" -- the original author can still take credit for their work. They just might have to share it.

In any event, in both cases we are talking about intangible objects. If you're claiming that stealing credit, or ideas, is theft, then so would stealing the right to decide how one's works are distributed.

Ryokan

17th July 2007, 01:51 AM

Me too, Pirate Bay rocks!

Still isn't a decent copy of the new Harry Potter flick though, dammit.

Millions of people go to the Pirate Bay to download pirated DVDs, music, etc. The name of the site itself makes it pretty obvious. Downloading pirated DVDs and music is illegal. Very few of those millions of people could successfully find those pirated DVDs or videos without the Pirate Bay. The Pirate Bay, however, gets around this because they don't host the files on their own servers, they merely provide a convenient place for people to come to through which they can find the pirated DVDs.

Pirate Bay is not the only torrent site out there, and far from the best.

I remember it used to be the best, about 5 years ago, when only Scandinavians with 10-100Mbit lines used it, but the ultrafast speed Pirate Bay was known for droppen when 'everyone else' discovered the site. Pirate Bay is only the most famous because of it's 'in your face' attitude towards copyright holders.

Personally, I prefer Mininova and Torrentspy.

As for the latest Harry Potter movie, you'll probably have to wait until it's out on DVD before a decent version is released, just like with all the other top mainstream movies that are released these days.

Jaggy Bunnet

17th July 2007, 02:02 AM

IAnd I base this assumption on admittedly my personal experience and observations, but after spending years on several music forums, I start to notice some patterns. Namely, that people who pirate music they can, and would, otherwise pay for, are very, very few and far between. In my experience, music downloaders are either in the a) "I try before I buy", b) "downloading because I'm too poor, will buy when I get money because I love this band", c) "downloading because this CD is out of print and impossible to find anyway" or d) "this is worth listening, but not worth paying for" categories. A mere handful fell in the other category, and they were mostly little kids who never bought an album in their lives and apparently don't care for liner notes or artwork.

I am deeply unsurprised that people claim there downloading is for "good" reasons and only other nasty people are really doing anything wrong.

I choose to remain sceptical.

Dark Jaguar

17th July 2007, 03:55 AM

It's not easy at all here. I've had to reevaluate my opinions on copyright law a lot in recent years (as I have on a lot of my stances). I no longer think laws forbidding people from getting around copyright protection mechanisms in order to make otherwise legal backups is wrong, for example. My thinking is now that if you own a copy of something, you can alter it in any way you want short of turning it into a bomb. To that end I've hacked my PSP to bejesus and back to get features I otherwise wouldn't have, and I still use it only for stuff I legitimately own (for example, ROMs of SNES games I own).

Whatever your opinion of it, let's make absolutely sure of one thing. Copyright theft is different from normal "take the thing" theft. The different is this. You made an illegal copy. You didn't actually deprive someone of a physical object.

Anyone who says "it's the same morally as taking a candy bar right out of a store" needs to alter their analogy to "it's the same morally as copying a candy bar and taking the copy with you but leaving the original candy bar". Again, this could be considered still immoral, as if you decide to hand out all those copies of a candybar people are less likely to buy that guy's candy bar, but that guy STILL has his candy bar and it wasn't taken.

I'm basically saying let's not be intellectually dishonest in arguing for or against copyright law. It IS a markeddly different sort of crime than literal theft, and there's no denying that.

Jaggy Bunnet

17th July 2007, 04:06 AM

You didn't actually deprive someone of a physical object.

I tend to agree.

However if I was being difficult I might point out that you DID deprive them of the phsyical notes and coins which you should have handed over to acquire the object. On the other hand those physical notes and coins would then be deposited in a bank and become virtual objects again reflected as an increase in the balance held electronically.

ARubberChickenWithAPulley

17th July 2007, 04:59 AM

I'm basically saying let's not be intellectually dishonest in arguing for or against copyright law. It IS a markeddly different sort of crime than literal theft, and there's no denying that.

You're basically saying that you disagree, therefore it's intellectually dishonest. I don't particularly like bringing "honesty" into this debate. I generally respect the opinions of everyone on here, even in heated debate, and I assume that they are being intellectually "honest" in their opinions.

Nobody is saying that copyright infringement is the exact, 100% same as stealing a candybar, just as embezzlment isn't the same as stealing a candybar, nor is stealing cable TV the same as stealing a candybar, though all could be considered stealing. The question of whether or not copyright infringment is a form of stealing, however, is certainly a valid and "honest" one.

ponderingturtle

17th July 2007, 05:20 AM

NoZed Avenger

17th July 2007, 05:46 AM

Actually, there is strong evidence supporting this. I don't recall the study, but I read about it on The Register's website. Music sales have actually increased as music sharing/downloading has increased; particularly for indie and smaller labels. There was a dip in sales that the RIAA tried to claim was the result of piracy; but they neglected to mention that the dip corresponded closely to a similar dip in the economy (dotcom bust) and sales of all luxury goods.

It may be a *wonderful* position backed up by mountains of facts, good or not. That is neither here nor there.

But it is still comes down to someone deciding to make that marketing decision *for* the creator (by taking stuff for free), rather than convincing him or her to allow copying.

NoZed Avenger

17th July 2007, 05:51 AM

Conceptually true but it is relevant to claims of harm. If they are not harmed financially by it, how much should we listen to their whining?

The harm is there. It may not be as direct, but denying it doesn't make it go away. And if the pirating becomes prevalent enough that the artist simply cannot afford to offer anything at all, we may never be able to point to the non-existent album or software and show the harm, but that doesn't stop it from happening.

Jaggy Bunnet

17th July 2007, 06:03 AM

Conceptually true but it is relevant to claims of harm. If they are not harmed financially by it, how much should we listen to their whining?

I agree. Why should we listen to the whining of the pirates about how they shouldn't be required to pay for stuff because they don't want to?

Dark Jaguar

17th July 2007, 06:24 AM

I tend to agree.

However if I was being difficult I might point out that you DID deprive them of the phsyical notes and coins which you should have handed over to acquire the object. On the other hand those physical notes and coins would then be deposited in a bank and become virtual objects again reflected as an increase in the balance held electronically.

I might argue that that's really no different than going to the store down the street to pay for their candybar instead. Again you are getting a copy without taking their copy of the candybar and they aren't getting your money, but isn't this perfectly acceptable social behavior? Isn't the idea that "taking business" is the same as stealing from someone a sort of mafia style think?

That said, I have to make my point very clear here. I am NOT defending piracy. I do consider it a crime, and damaging, and I defend copyright law to most extents. I do think however that it is not actual theft but a different sort of crime altogether. I consider it in the same category as plagerism, not stealing.

egslim

17th July 2007, 06:32 AM

I agree. Why should we listen to the whining of the pirates[...]
They don't whine, they just download.

ponderingturtle

17th July 2007, 06:45 AM

You're basically saying that you disagree, therefore it's intellectually dishonest. I don't particularly like bringing "honesty" into this debate. I generally respect the opinions of everyone on here, even in heated debate, and I assume that they are being intellectually "honest" in their opinions.

Nobody is saying that copyright infringement is the exact, 100% same as stealing a candybar, just as embezzlment isn't the same as stealing a candybar, nor is stealing cable TV the same as stealing a candybar, though all could be considered stealing. The question of whether or not copyright infringment is a form of stealing, however, is certainly a valid and "honest" one.

No stealing is a bad metaphore. Trespassing maybe, but stealing deprives someone of an actual object, this might deprive people of potential sales, and sometimes I am sure that is the case.

But should copywrite be used to keep things unavailable? Look at disney films and how they trot them out once a decade to let people buy them. Is it in the public interest to do that? How does that promote new movies being made?

ponderingturtle

17th July 2007, 06:47 AM

It may be a *wonderful* position backed up by mountains of facts, good or not. That is neither here nor there.

But it is still comes down to someone deciding to make that marketing decision *for* the creator (by taking stuff for free), rather than convincing him or her to allow copying.

Owner, as many of these things are owned by groups other than the creators.

ponderingturtle

17th July 2007, 06:51 AM

The harm is there. It may not be as direct, but denying it doesn't make it go away. And if the pirating becomes prevalent enough that the artist simply cannot afford to offer anything at all, we may never be able to point to the non-existent album or software and show the harm, but that doesn't stop it from happening.

But that is not the claimed harm. The claimed harm is economic, that it hurts their sales. That seems to not be accurate. The harm of reducing their control over their intellectual property, well that all depends on what control you think someone should have over their intellectual property.

For example people have stolen Steven Colbert's word "Truthiness", he created it, it should be his intellectual property. So the broader use of this is harming him quite significantly. He lost control over his idea.

We need to stop people from using that word with out permission.

So the idea that not having entire control over intellectual property is just wrong.

ponderingturtle

17th July 2007, 06:52 AM

I agree. Why should we listen to the whining of the pirates about how they shouldn't be required to pay for stuff because they don't want to?

So we should take the claims of harm by the music industry at face value and not see if they have any validity?

ARubberChickenWithAPulley

17th July 2007, 07:11 AM

No stealing is a bad metaphore. Trespassing maybe, but stealing deprives someone of an actual object, this might deprive people of potential sales, and sometimes I am sure that is the case.

According dictionary.com (which is based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary), the second definition of stealing is:

"to appropriate (ideas, credit, words, etc.) without right or acknowledgment. "

Neither ideas, nor credit, nor words (nor etc.) are actual objects. As such, stealing may very well be appropriate.

Pirating music is depriving artists of payment for their work. If I were to hypothetically invest $50,000 into making a CD, and people downloaded it for free resulting in me absorbing a $25,000 loss on my product, is that much different than someone stealing a candybar, resulting in a $.25 loss for the company that made the candybar? Both candybars and music/movies cost money to create. In the end, I don't see downloading music as much different than stealing an actual CD. The price and value of a music CD isn't based on the cost of the physical CD: if that were the case, all music CDs would cost a dollar. The price and value is based on the intellectual property on the CD. As such, it is equally poor to try to claim that downloading music online isn't stealing simply because it isn't a physical object, when the vast majority of the CD's value isn't based on the physical object, but rather, the intangible product on the object.

In any event, I was replying to the idea that it is "intellectually dishonest" to claim that copyright infringement is stealing. I respect that you disagree with me on that point, but I don't consider myself "dishonest" for arguing it.

But should copywrite be used to keep things unavailable? Look at disney films and how they trot them out once a decade to let people buy them. Is it in the public interest to do that? How does that promote new movies being made?

Maybe, maybe not. It's an interesting discussion. Ultimately, most laws are a balance between personal rights versus the greater good. However, who says it is Disney's job to promote new movies being made? Is Disney not releasing movies preventing new movies from being made? I would say it is neither here nor there -- neither against nor for the public interest.

ponderingturtle

17th July 2007, 07:21 AM

According dictionary.com (which is based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary), the second definition of stealing is:

"to appropriate (ideas, credit, words, etc.) without right or acknowledgment. "

Neither ideas, nor credit, nor words (nor etc.) are actual objects. As such, stealing may very well be appropriate.

Pirating music is depriving artists of payment for their work. If I were to hypothetically invest $50,000 into making a CD, and people downloaded it for free resulting in me absorbing a $25,000 loss on my product, is that much different than someone stealing a candybar, resulting in a $.25 loss for the company that made the candybar?

And if no one pirated it and you took say a $30,000 loss that would be your preferred solution. As no one stole anything you win, but you lose more money.

You are making a claim that those who pirate would purchase it otherwise. This is not always the case. Some who pirate it would buy it, others buy it after pirating it creating sales you would not otherwise have.

So simply claiming that you lose money is wrong. By this logic netflix is doing a horrible thing, letting people watch movies with out buying them, stealing the rightful profits from the true owners of the content. They MUST BE STOPPED!!.

Both candybars and music/movies cost money to create. In the end, I don't see downloading music as much different than stealing an actual CD. The price and value of a music CD isn't based on the cost of the physical CD: if that were the case, all music CDs would cost a dollar. The price and value is based on the intellectual property on the CD. As such, it is equally poor to try to claim that downloading music online isn't stealing simply because it isn't a physical object, when the vast majority of the CD's value isn't based on the physical object, but rather, the intangible product on the object.

Because the theft of a CD does result in a loss, the loss of the money it took to create the CD. The piracy of content is much more ephemeral. So as you seem to accept the people stole the word Truthiness what do users of it owe to Colbert?

Maybe, maybe not. It's an interesting discussion. Ultimately, most laws are a balance between personal rights versus the greater good. However, who says it is Disney's job to promote new movies being made? Is Disney not releasing movies preventing new movies from being made? I would say it is neither here nor there -- neither against nor for the public interest.

The stated intent of such laws it to promote new content. That is why patents are a good idea, it is also why patents expire, and why copywrites used to expire. This goes against many of the points about such absoluteness of the rights.

Walk The Line

17th July 2007, 07:36 AM

OMG!!!! A Oliver Thread that is solid and has a point!!! What happened over the weekend!!! Has the world gone mad!

Seriously, good thread.

Has Oliver started a thread that doesn't explicitly mention America in the last six months?

ARubberChickenWithAPulley

17th July 2007, 07:47 AM

And if no one pirated it and you took say a $30,000 loss that would be your preferred solution. As no one stole anything you win, but you lose more money.

You are making a claim that those who pirate would purchase it otherwise. This is not always the case. Some who pirate it would buy it, others buy it after pirating it creating sales you would not otherwise have.

Yes, and if I steal a candybar, I also might not have paid for the candybar otherwise. In fact, the candybar might have just sat on the shelf and rotted, resulting in a loss for the company anyway. Therefore, it is okay to take the candybar?

So simply claiming that you lose money is wrong. By this logic netflix is doing a horrible thing, letting people watch movies with out buying them, stealing the rightful profits from the true owners of the content. They MUST BE STOPPED!!.

Huh? Netflix paid for the videos -- as do public libraries and similar institutions. As such, your point is moot. Netflix cannot make additional copies themselves. If demand is such that they need more than one copy, then Netflix has to purchase those copies. Similarly, I can lend you a CD for a little while. You cannot, however, copy the CD -- or the music -- for yourself.

Because the theft of a CD does result in a loss, the loss of the money it took to create the CD. The piracy of content is much more ephemeral.

Ah. Okay, so I walk into a record store, take a CD, and leave enough money to cover the cost of the physical CD. The price is listed as $14.95, and I leave 50 cents. No problem there? Not stealing?

So as you seem to accept the people stole the word Truthiness what do users of it owe to Colbert?

Pat Riley trademarked the word "Threepeat." Colbert certainly could, if he wanted to, trademark "Truthiness." As far as "people" stealing the word, what people are you talking about? Simply uttering the word doesn't constitute stealing, anymore than humming a tune constitutes piracy. In what manner has somebody "stolen" Truthiness?

The stated intent of such laws it to promote new content. That is why patents are a good idea, it is also why patents expire, and why copywrites used to expire. This goes against many of the points about such absoluteness of the rights.

Exactly. Similarly, the government can tear down my house and build a bypass there if it is for the public good. The government can also execute me if it deems I have committed a crime grave enough to warrant it. As such, apparently, few rights are absolute: the right to the house I paid for, or to my own life, amongst them. That doesn't mean we throw them out the window altogether, and allow anyone to tear down my house or anyone to take my life.

Jaggy Bunnet

17th July 2007, 08:13 AM

And if no one pirated it and you took say a $30,000 loss that would be your preferred solution. As no one stole anything you win, but you lose more money.

Fine.

As long as you are able to prove that there is no economic loss for every single individual artist whose music is stolen through downloading.

Otherwise all you have is one huge pile of assumptions that you are using to justify taking something without paying for it. Broadly similar to the "big business has insurance therefore they suffer no loss from theft" argument.

ponderingturtle

17th July 2007, 09:13 AM

Fine.

As long as you are able to prove that there is no economic loss for every single individual artist whose music is stolen through downloading.

Otherwise all you have is one huge pile of assumptions that you are using to justify taking something without paying for it. Broadly similar to the "big business has insurance therefore they suffer no loss from theft" argument.

No but the losses claimed are not in evidence. ANd it might well cause people to realize a album is sucky before they buy it, thus the promotional aspects of it.

We should just let them go back to their traditional methods of dissemenination, paying radio disc jockies to play their songs.

MilwaukeeMike

17th July 2007, 09:30 AM

No you don't understand. The guys who only filled out a patent for a mobile device to receive email patented that idea first. They had no actual product, they did not need one. Then when the people developed the blackberry they where infringing on the patent of the first guys who had no product. See this BBC (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/3722509.stm) article on patent trolls.

Well, obviously the government that issued the patent believed that this was enough of a new idea to grant them a patent.

I simply think that for a patent you should have a substantive object, they let people patent business models, tax shelters and all kinds of things that you would not think of. Cranks also patent things that are impossible and then use the idea that it is patented as some sort of endorsement that it works.

Well, some people are inherently stupid and will buy anything. If these "cranks" do these endorsements within the law, I don't see a legal problem. Is it morally wrong to take consumers for a ride; yes.

As for books, movies and music, the question of how long is it in the public interest to protect these things with copywrites and so on vs letting into the public domain has shifted. They have managed to get public view to view them as tangible property and not specific writes granted for a limited period to promote new works.

Lets not get patents and copyrights confused here

Contrary to a common public misconception, a patent is not a right to practice or use the invention. Rather, a patent provides the right to exclude others from making, using, selling, offering for sale, or importing the patented invention for the term of the patent, usually 20 years from the filing date. A patent is, in effect, a limited property right that the government offers to inventors in exchange for their agreement to share the details of their inventions with the public. Like any other property right, it may be sold, licensed, mortgaged, assigned or transferred, given away, or simply abandoned.

Patent Law (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patents#Enforcement)

So you are against people who write a book to make money off of it? You would rather every person with a printer to sell this book. What you say doesn't make sense.

So with it viewed as not special protections to promote the creation of new works, they are now viewed as absolute and permanent property. That is a remarkable sift when one thinks about it. But it is not surprising as so many powerful media forces want this and control what people are exposed to so much. It is also not surprising that the laws get passed to support them because that is where the money is, and that is largely what counts.

Again, it sounds like you want to live in this utopian universe where people invent and make things free of charge to the rest of the world. That's just not how it is. People who invent something deserve to get compensated unless they decide they would like everyone to have it. I.E. Freeware... Open source.

So case in point, how much does Micheal Jackson deserve to earn on current reproductions of Beatles songs? He purchased the rights and so owns them. So how does this promote the creation of new works?

Come on, don't be stupid. He pays a royalty every time he makes money off of the Beatles to the owner's of those songs. Unless he actually owns them, I am not sure if he does or doesn't.

What is in soceities interest is rarely discussed and the shifts in what people view intelectual property as is also relevant.

:eek: Wow... If you ever invent anything, can I take all the credit and money from selling it as you deem patents unfair.

ponderingturtle

17th July 2007, 09:33 AM

Yes, and if I steal a candybar, I also might not have paid for the candybar otherwise. In fact, the candybar might have just sat on the shelf and rotted, resulting in a loss for the company anyway. Therefore, it is okay to take the candybar?

So it is stealing even if it results in more income for the person being stolen from,

Huh? Netflix paid for the videos -- as do public libraries and similar institutions. As such, your point is moot. Netflix cannot make additional copies themselves. If demand is such that they need more than one copy, then Netflix has to purchase those copies. Similarly, I can lend you a CD for a little while. You cannot, however, copy the CD -- or the music -- for yourself.
link (http://www.edwardsamuels.com/illustratedstory/isc3.htm)

Yes libraries are immorally distributing copywrited information to those who have not properly paid the owners of the copyright for it. They do not have the permission of the copyright holders to do such a thing, so they really should be prosecuted.

Remember that when VHS came out there where lawsuits claiming this exact thing, so it is the recorded legal opinion of the movie industry that this is not acceptable.

For example it would not be legal to rent CD's as they are exempted from that fair use provision

Under the first sale doctrine,* once someone buys a particular copy of a copyrighted work, they may dispose of that copy however they want, including by sale or by rental. It’s because of this doctrine that video rental stores can buy a copy of a movie, and then make money by renting it out over and over again, without paying any royalty above the price of the one copy. In 1984, the very year of the Betamax decision in the Supreme Court, the music recording industry managed to get Congress to pass an exception to the doctrine so that audio works may not be rented out without the authority of the copyright owner.† The movie industry originally had expected to be included in the amendment. But by now millions of people owned VCRs, and were used to the idea of renting movies cheaply. Congress was unwilling to pass a bill that threatened to end or “tax” a practice that people had gotten used to. In the end, the video amendment was severed from the audio amendment: the audio amendment passed, but the video amendment did not. In 1990, the computer software industry was also successful in getting an exemption to the first sale doctrine, barring rentals of computer programs;‡ but still video rentals were not included.

So netflix and libraries are not fundamentally so different or fundamentally legal. The related industries have just not been as effective at getting favorable legislation passed as the music and computer program industries have been.

Ah. Okay, so I walk into a record store, take a CD, and leave enough money to cover the cost of the physical CD. The price is listed as $14.95, and I leave 50 cents. No problem there? Not stealing?

No that is stealing, you are taking someones physical property with out their permission.

Now say you walk into a library or book store and pick up a book sit down and read it cover to cover. You have just copied the information into your brain, why is this copying not an illegal act? Is it only illegal if you have a photographic memory?

Pat Riley trademarked the word "Threepeat." Colbert certainly could, if he wanted to, trademark "Truthiness." As far as "people" stealing the word, what people are you talking about? Simply uttering the word doesn't constitute stealing, anymore than humming a tune constitutes piracy. In what manner has somebody "stolen" Truthiness?

You are removing their control over their intellectual property. The boundaries of what is stealing and what is fair use are very subjective and arbitrary, as seen that you can't rent computer games legally but you can rent movies or console games. Why one stealing and the other not?

Exactly. Similarly, the government can tear down my house and build a bypass there if it is for the public good. The government can also execute me if it deems I have committed a crime grave enough to warrant it. As such, apparently, few rights are absolute: the right to the house I paid for, or to my own life, amongst them. That doesn't mean we throw them out the window altogether, and allow anyone to tear down my house or anyone to take my life.

The point is that the laws don't care about the public and they are not getting written in the publics interest, they are being written in the interest of big business. So just like they can eminent domain your house because someone want to build a shopping mall there and it will improve the tax base. An improved tax base is in the public interest so you will be forced to sell your house to who ever wants to pay a certain amount of money for it.

It is based on the idea that who ever can buy the most legislators is obviously in the publics best interest at heart.

ponderingturtle

17th July 2007, 09:52 AM

Well, obviously the government that issued the patent believed that this was enough of a new idea to grant them a patent.

But the system is so broken that you can do things like The Man who Patented the Wheel in 2001 (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/1418165.stm)

There is not the sort of evaluation that you seem to think is happening in patents. Add to that problems of over broad patents being issued and the patent system is currently a total mess.

And I do not think you should be able to patent some things that people currently patent, like say tax shelter scam's.

Well, some people are inherently stupid and will buy anything. If these "cranks" do these endorsements within the law, I don't see a legal problem. Is it morally wrong to take consumers for a ride; yes.

Should the patent office be a party to it by the perceived endorsement of a product that can not possibly work? This lack of a requirement to produce something that works can have a real slowing down of innovation, as see with patent trolls.

Lets not get patents and copyrights confused here

Contrary to a common public misconception, a patent is not a right to practice or use the invention. Rather, a patent provides the right to exclude others from making, using, selling, offering for sale, or importing the patented invention for the term of the patent, usually 20 years from the filing date. A patent is, in effect, a limited property right that the government offers to inventors in exchange for their agreement to share the details of their inventions with the public. Like any other property right, it may be sold, licensed, mortgaged, assigned or transferred, given away, or simply abandoned.

And a copyright is much the same, it is a limited time that you have exclusive control over a piece of intellectual property that you create. It used to be for 50 years. Now because of treaties if it is copyrighted in one place it is copyrighted in most, so if you can get one country to extend copyright protection on an old song you can prevent it from entering public domain. This is a serious issue with Beatles songs as the 50 year date after their recording is coming up and they would traditionally have entered public domain then.

So the main difference between copyrights and patents is that copyrights have traditionally had somewhat longer valid periods, but where not permanent.

So you are against people who write a book to make money off of it? You would rather every person with a printer to sell this book. What you say doesn't make sense.

I know Michael Jackson needs to make money off of the Beatles recordings. It is his duty as he created them.

And I am not against copyrights and certainly not against sensible patents, but the problem is that they are being viewed as things that they never used to be. If you create something you should be able to make money off of it for a limited time, but I do not think you should be able to make money off of it indefinitely.

Again, it sounds like you want to live in this utopian universe where people invent and make things free of charge to the rest of the world. That's just not how it is. People who invent something deserve to get compensated unless they decide they would like everyone to have it. I.E. Freeware... Open source.
I have never said such things. I know that renting computer programs is so much different from renting a movie that the one is immoral and the other is moral.

Come on, don't be stupid. He pays a royalty every time he makes money off of the Beatles to the owner's of those songs. Unless he actually owns them, I am not sure if he does or doesn't.

He owns them, he heard Paul McCartney talking about how he wanted to buy the rights and so he did. He owns them, and as he is now the Artist who made them I guess, so he needs the money to for the work he did in their creation.
CNN story on Micheal Jackson owning the Beatles catalog (http://www.cnn.com/2005/BUSINESS/06/09/jackson.finances/index.html)

:eek: Wow... If you ever invent anything, can I take all the credit and money from selling it as you deem patents unfair.

No it is more if I patent an idea for something that you actual invent, then you owe me a massive amount of money for violating my patent for something I never invented.

NoZed Avenger

17th July 2007, 01:53 PM

So the idea that not having entire control over intellectual property is just wrong.

So it's certainly a good thing no one has argued for absolutre control over intellectual property.

Cain

17th July 2007, 03:00 PM

Can anyone imagine libraries emerging in the current climate? Assuming we did not have public libraries and someone proposed such an institution? Elites in charge would never allow for it.

Luchdog: you made some comment earlier about the greatest art being produced in a climate free from copyright. While true, I don't think that's a compelling argument on its own. Assuming some enlightened society is formed hundreds of years from now I'm sure they will be lamenting about how all the truly great art was created in distant past.

TragicMonkey

17th July 2007, 05:10 PM

If the greatest art was made in a period free from copyright, it was also made in a period where exact duplication was technologically infeasible. Nobody made a million cheap but good copies of Michelangelo's Pieta because nobody knew how. If they had, they would have. And would it have made the work less good?

I'd also remind fans of classical art that many surviving great sculptures are actually classical copies of the originals, long since lost.

ponderingturtle

18th July 2007, 06:45 AM

So it's certainly a good thing no one has argued for absolutre control over intellectual property.

So could you please explain to me why it is moral to rent a movie but immoral to rent a CD? The reason is that when the ban on renting music came about there was a market for rented movies and people would have been pissed enough to make changes if they banned video rentals.

ponderingturtle

18th July 2007, 06:47 AM

If the greatest art was made in a period free from copyright, it was also made in a period where exact duplication was technologically infeasible. Nobody made a million cheap but good copies of Michelangelo's Pieta because nobody knew how. If they had, they would have. And would it have made the work less good?

Of course it would. It would have made them Common, and that is the death knell for any true artistic respect. It must be only available to the elite.

Mycroft

18th July 2007, 08:01 AM

You're right, people can and do use 'free' sources as ways to evaluate software, music, movies, etc. before purchasing them. It may also serve as free publicity for other products/services, such as how hearing an artist on line for free might entice people to go to their concerts. (Although there may be a problem with your radio anology... doesn't the artist still get royalties for radio play?)

I have no idea if the artist is paid royalties for radio play, but I do know it's the best advertising for his albums and concerts there is.

The think is though... it should be up to the copyright holder if they want to engage in the 'giving it away for free in hopes of making a sale' business plan, or the more traditional 'gouge them right at the start'. Some artists COULD make more money by giving away their work for free, but if they choose not to, that is their fault.

The genie is out of the bottle. The truth is that music, movies, games, programs and other creations are all easily copied bits of computer data and there isn't going to be any way to protect them.

A hundred years ago music artists made money through the sale of sheet music. Before recordings became popular, they would buy the music so they could play it at home on their pianos. Modern photocopiers have certainly destroyed that market, yet the producers of music still have ways of making money.

When I was a teenager we used to get together and share 45's and make our own mix tapes. We did this a lot, and the companies that really proffited directly from this were Maxell, Sony, and anyone else who made blank tapes.

Owning free copies of the music never stopped us from buying the albums. When Bruce Springsteen or Billy Joel produced a great album, we all wanted it even though we could get the music for free. The only thing that's really changed since then is that computers and the internet make it easier for people to get together.

What's really driving the issue is that the producers of content want to overcharge for that content. This was driven home for me in my household when my daughter lost her MP3 player. The player itself was easily replaced, but the collection of music on it was huge. At 99 cents a song, the bill adds up quickly.

When someone buys an album, they keep that in their collection for decades. A digital file on an MP3 or a computer hard drive is much more ephemeral, but the producers of content want to charge the same amount despite the ridiculously low production costs and the more transient nature of the end product.

Mycroft

18th July 2007, 08:06 AM

Fine.

As long as you are able to prove that there is no economic loss for every single individual artist whose music is stolen through downloading.

Otherwise all you have is one huge pile of assumptions that you are using to justify taking something without paying for it. Broadly similar to the "big business has insurance therefore they suffer no loss from theft" argument.

This argument goes both ways. You can't prove an economic loss to an artist through downloading, you can only speculate that there might have been one. People will take files they can get for free that they would not pay for, so you can't prove that any one download represents a loss because that person may simply have done without rather than pay for it.

NoZed Avenger

18th July 2007, 08:20 AM

So could you please explain to me why it is moral to rent a movie but immoral to rent a CD? The reason is that when the ban on renting music came about there was a market for rented movies and people would have been pissed enough to make changes if they banned video rentals.

Yet another question/argument about a position have not espoused. I can explain my position about things, but you'll have to ask the people that advocate the last ones you've been arguing about to clarfiy, as I cannot speak for them.

Father Dagon

18th July 2007, 08:27 AM

The worst thing is that the people behind TPB claims that they started it as a contribution to the discussion while they obviously are raking in fortunes on ads.

ponderingturtle

18th July 2007, 09:32 AM

Yet another question/argument about a position have not espoused. I can explain my position about things, but you'll have to ask the people that advocate the last ones you've been arguing about to clarfiy, as I cannot speak for them.

There are roughly two groups here, the first is those who are supporting the current legal structure and the second opposes it.

If you support the current legal structure of intellectual property please explain such discrepancies. If it is moral to rent out copies you purchased of someone else's intellectual property, why is it illegal to do so with computer software and music?

That it is illegal with software and music leads me to believe that the only reason Netflix and libraries are allowed to legally operate is that people would object to them being shut down, they do not fit in with many of the ideas people advocate for intellectual property.

NoZed Avenger

18th July 2007, 02:47 PM

There are roughly two groups here, the first is those who are supporting the current legal structure and the second opposes it.

My point being responded to, however, had nothing to do with the present legal structure. I just seems a bit disingenuous for people who are grabbing songs and software for free to use the "it is really better marketing for the artist/owner," when I think that call -- right or wrong -- should actually be made by the artist/owner.

That has nothing to do with the legal system as it is or as it should be, nor does it endorse any particular part of any law from any country. For those who are actually defending the current system precisely as it is, and not the idea of intellectual property protection in general or in some form -- if those people are actually posting in this thread -- they are more than welcome to answer your questions. But I am still not one of them.

ARubberChickenWithAPulley

18th July 2007, 07:55 PM

No that is stealing, you are taking someones physical property with out their permission.

And this is where we disagree. According to the definition I provided earlier, stealing does not have to be a physical object. If I take a book you wrote and publish it with my name, I think it is perfectly acceptible (and very common) to say I "stole" your book, even though I didn't steal a physical item. If I hack into I-tunes and download their music without their permission, I think it is perfectly acceptible to say I am stealing their product or service. If I download a movie I did not pay for against the wishes of its creator, I think it is perfectly valid to say I am stealing their movie. Or, if you want to get technical, I am depriving them of the right to control their creation, just as plagiarism is depriving you of credit for your work.

You are removing their control over their intellectual property. The boundaries of what is stealing and what is fair use are very subjective and arbitrary, as seen that you can't rent computer games legally but you can rent movies or console games. Why one stealing and the other not?

Because we've come to a social consensus, just as we've come to a social consensus that taxation is not stealing, and eminent domain is not stealing. If you're pointing out that there is a degree of subjectiveness to it, I agree. That, however, isn't unique to "stealing." Many terms we use are arbitrary outside of their strict legal definitions -- "murder," for one example (a murder to one person might be a completely justified killing to another -- or not murder at all). That doesn't make the concepts less valid.

Ultimately, we can argue this until we are blue in the face, but we are more debating semantics than anything else. Even if you were to convince me that copyright infringement is 100%, not a form of stealing, I would still consider it to be the moral/ethical equivalent of stealing. As such, I cordially suggest we let this one go since we're probably not going to convince each other in either direction :)

The point is that the laws don't care about the public and they are not getting written in the publics interest, they are being written in the interest of big business. So just like they can eminent domain your house because someone want to build a shopping mall there and it will improve the tax base. An improved tax base is in the public interest so you will be forced to sell your house to who ever wants to pay a certain amount of money for it.

Slightly different issue, but I somewhat agree. However, while you might be valid in stating that copyright laws as they currently exist are not in the public interest, they do protect more than big business. They also protect small publishers, authors, and musicians.

I'm not, by the way, claiming that copyright laws as they exist are perfect. I think the DMCA, for example, was a horrible piece of legislation that went way beyond protecting copyright, and actually added rediculous restrictions that do not exist for any other type of product. The idea that it is a crime, for example, for me to remove copy protection from a CD or DVD I purchased legally is absolutely absurd -- as absurd as if the automotive industry made it illegal for me to disassemble my own car. I am merely defending the principle that music, books, games, art, etc. are products and should be accorded the same rights as other products. If I purchase it legally, I should be able to personally use the product and do with it as I desire. If I don't purchase the product, I don't have any right to use it.

Mycroft

18th July 2007, 08:10 PM

There are roughly two groups here, the first is those who are supporting the current legal structure and the second opposes it.

False dichotomy. We each have our own opinions, and this particular distinction is pretty arbitrary.

If you support the current legal structure of intellectual property please explain such discrepancies. If it is moral to rent out copies you purchased of someone else's intellectual property, why is it illegal to do so with computer software and music?

Our government is a bureaucracy, and sometimes bureaucracies make nonsensical distinctions. That the government has apparently set up rules on conflicting principles in this case is not itself evidence that any particular point of view is wrong or right, it's only evidence that our governmental bureaucracies sometimes behaves as a bureaucracy.

Dorian Gray

18th July 2007, 08:34 PM

That is the key difference between true theft and Intellectual Property infringement. A physical object has a value that is specific to that object. Taking it deprives the owner of that object of that object's value, regardless of the circumstances or time (ignoring degradation over time). Taking IP does not deprive the owner of the IP, since he still possesses it. Furthermore, IP only possesses, for the owner, a semi-arbitrary value -- a combination of a creator-defined arbitrary value, and a market value -- for a purely arbitrary length of time, which has varied considerably by region and over recent history. I was with you up until this part. See, a physical object ALSO has a combination of a creator-defined arbitrary value and a market value for a purely arbitrary length of time which has varied considerably by region and over recent history. A house, for example.

I don't think there is a product that doesn't have this combination.

Dorian Gray

18th July 2007, 08:38 PM

No doubt there's some wiggle room in those examples.

But the point is that the legality of piracy is based on arbitrary standards rather than actual harm as in theft. Theft is based on arbitrary standards. In fact, the very act of defining a difference between 'theft' and 'copyright infringement' is arbitrary.

Consider the generic drug example using the theft example. If I copy your drug after you make it I've used your idea and innovation without compensating you, so that's theft. If I wait X amount of time and then use your idea and innovation without compensating you, it's not theft. Theft as a descriptor doesn't work. The time limit on copyrights is arbitrary. Why shouldn't something you created be yours forever, and your heirs' property forever as well, just like your house?

Kerberos

18th July 2007, 10:56 PM

Our government is a bureaucracy, and sometimes bureaucracies make nonsensical distinctions. That the government has apparently set up rules on conflicting principles in this case is not itself evidence that any particular point of view is wrong or right, it's only evidence that our governmental bureaucracies sometimes behaves as a bureaucracy.

I really don't see how it has anything to do with bureaucracy (which has an unfairly bad reputation BTW). The decision not to step on the toes of the voters sounds more like a political descision than a bureaucratic one.

egslim

19th July 2007, 02:09 AM

Why shouldn't something you created be yours forever, and your heirs' property forever as well, just like your house?
Because that may not benefit society as a whole.

We have property laws against theft to provide an incentive to create wealth instead of only redistribute (steal) it. This strenghtens society.

If copyright laws benefit only a small group (of copyright owners) while society as a whole doesn't they should be repealed.

There is no such thing as inalienable rights, only laws that strengthen society and those that don't. Societies that adopt the former thrive, while those adopting the latter falter.

TragicMonkey

19th July 2007, 03:03 AM

There is no such thing as inalienable rights, only laws that strengthen society and those that don't. Societies that adopt the former thrive, while those adopting the latter falter.

Societies that don't believe in inalienable rights fail because they are not worth having members of that society. Why should anyone join a club that cares more for the collective than the individual, even though the collective is merely the sum of the individuals? The good of the state is the good of the individuals within that state--the state has no other purpose in existing than to strive for the maximum benefit for each and every person in it. And if it stops trying for that, it deserves to fail.

egslim

19th July 2007, 03:34 AM

The good of the state is the good of all the individuals within that state--the state has no other purpose in existing than to strive for the maximum benefit for each and every person in it.
Bolding inserted by me, with that I agree completely. And while for example the DMCA benefits a small number of individuals, it hurts a far larger number of individuals. If the hurt inflicted by the DMCA exceeds its benefits it should be repealed.

Societies that don't believe in inalienable rights fail because they are not worth having members of that society.
If that is true then these so-called inalienable rights are per definition part of the laws that strenghten a society.

gumboot

19th July 2007, 05:09 AM

Theft is based on arbitrary standards. In fact, the very act of defining a difference between 'theft' and 'copyright infringement' is arbitrary.

The time limit on copyrights is arbitrary. Why shouldn't something you created be yours forever, and your heirs' property forever as well, just like your house?

The purpose of Copyright Law is to protect a person's right to exploit and benefit from something that they themselves created. This is only reasonable and just. You do not share the earnings of your labour with everyone else. You do not have to divvy up the vegetables you grew in your garden amongst your neighbours.

If you put in the effort required to produce a book or a song or a film or any other piece of "intellectual property" (and as someone who has produced many pieces of intellectual property, I can attest that it takes an enormous amount of effort) it is only just that you should retain exclusive right to exploit that property for material gain.

Of course once you die, there's really no reason to keep that right exclusive, as you can no longer exploit it anyway.

The period over which the copyright is retained is there really to allow your immediate heir to benefit for a time from the fruits of your labour. I think it's reasonable that this happen, but I think extending the duration of the copyright is an unworthy activity. Primarily because it is not the heirs of artists who are pushing the extension of copyright. It is corporations that have purchased the copyright off artists as a condition for publishing their material. Thus the entire intention of copyright - to ensure the creator of the work benefits from it - is lost, and it just makes corporations rich.

In regards to torrent sites, the argument by hosters of such sites is that they themselves have no control over the torrents uploaded. Seeding itself is not illegal, of course. Many torrent sites clearly state that material that breaches copyright is not to be uploaded.

This is the position from which the torrent sites make their claims.

There is an argument that, in almost all legal jurisdictions, aiding others in criminal behaviour is also illegal. Hosting a torrent site, on which you know illegal material is being uploaded (and the operators of those website know the material is there) makes you a party to the offense. In many nations, being a party to an offense makes you liable for whatever any other party to the offense does.

Of course, copyright law is not universally a criminal act.

-Gumboot

ARubberChickenWithAPulley

19th July 2007, 05:14 AM

Of course, copyright law is not universally a criminal act.

Good point -- as was the rest of your post. Very well said. Even in the U.S., I don't think violating copyright is usually a criminal matter.

gumboot

19th July 2007, 05:17 AM

Good point -- as was the rest of your post. Very well said. Even in the U.S., I don't think violating copyright is usually a criminal matter.

I knew those lectures would come in handy some day... :boxedin:

-Gumboot

ponderingturtle

19th July 2007, 10:50 AM

My point being responded to, however, had nothing to do with the present legal structure. I just seems a bit disingenuous for people who are grabbing songs and software for free to use the "it is really better marketing for the artist/owner," when I think that call -- right or wrong -- should actually be made by the artist/owner.

And I can agree with that. But why should we accept the claims from artists and labels that it is hurting them financially when there is little supporting evidence? We do not look at the financial harm done to them by libraries and rental businesses.

So the idea that they are being hurt financially vs having the decisions over how it is promoted made by others are very different arguments and should not be taken as a single position.

That has nothing to do with the legal system as it is or as it should be, nor does it endorse any particular part of any law from any country. For those who are actually defending the current system precisely as it is, and not the idea of intellectual property protection in general or in some form -- if those people are actually posting in this thread -- they are more than welcome to answer your questions. But I am still not one of them.

So then you agree that the system is being manipulated by groups who do not have the publics interests at heart and are trying to remove rights that people traditionally had over content that they have purchased?

ponderingturtle

19th July 2007, 11:05 AM

And this is where we disagree. According to the definition I provided earlier, stealing does not have to be a physical object. If I take a book you wrote and publish it with my name, I think it is perfectly acceptible (and very common) to say I "stole" your book, even though I didn't steal a physical item. If I hack into I-tunes and download their music without their permission, I think it is perfectly acceptible to say I am stealing their product or service. If I download a movie I did not pay for against the wishes of its creator, I think it is perfectly valid to say I am stealing their movie. Or, if you want to get technical, I am depriving them of the right to control their creation, just as plagiarism is depriving you of credit for your work.

And if you rent a CD or computer program you are stealing the music or software.

Because we've come to a social consensus,
BULL. When did society decided that the public wanted to reduce the rights they have on Music or Computer Programs that they have purchased?

Lawmakers decided but that is not at all the same thing.

just as we've come to a social consensus that taxation is not stealing, and eminent domain is not stealing.
Eminent domain can certainly be stealing. What else should think of it when it is done to promote a private business venture?

If you're pointing out that there is a degree of subjectiveness to it, I agree. That, however, isn't unique to "stealing." Many terms we use are arbitrary outside of their strict legal definitions -- "murder," for one example (a murder to one person might be a completely justified killing to another -- or not murder at all). That doesn't make the concepts less valid.

So why should different types of material under copyright be treated differently? Libraries or "Book Sharing" would certainly be considered illegal if introduced now and would be called theft. So why are they being grandfathered out of the status that they rightly deserve, that of stealing?

Ultimately, we can argue this until we are blue in the face, but we are more debating semantics than anything else. Even if you were to convince me that copyright infringement is 100%, not a form of stealing, I would still consider it to be the moral/ethical equivalent of stealing. As such, I cordially suggest we let this one go since we're probably not going to convince each other in either direction :)

Copyright infringement can be stealing, I am thinking of counterfeit products that are sold. As some of them are functionally identical the buyer has little or no way of knowing if the product is legitimate or not.

Slightly different issue, but I somewhat agree. However, while you might be valid in stating that copyright laws as they currently exist are not in the public interest, they do protect more than big business. They also protect small publishers, authors, and musicians.

And in principle I agree that such protections should exist, it is how they have been bent in ways that are not in the public interest that pisses me off. If the recent trends in how intellectual property is treated continue libraries will be illegal, or prevented from having anything not in the public domain. I do not really expect that to happen, but individuals are losing rights that they have over things that they have purchased.

I'm not, by the way, claiming that copyright laws as they exist are perfect. I think the DMCA, for example, was a horrible piece of legislation that went way beyond protecting copyright, and actually added ridiculous restrictions that do not exist for any other type of product. The idea that it is a crime, for example, for me to remove copy protection from a CD or DVD I purchased legally is absolutely absurd -- as absurd as if the automotive industry made it illegal for me to disassemble my own car. I am merely defending the principle that music, books, games, art, etc. are products and should be accorded the same rights as other products. If I purchase it legally, I should be able to personally use the product and do with it as I desire. If I don't purchase the product, I don't have any right to use it.

So where does the public domain fit into this? Is it an out modded concept?

Then what about some small businesses that made a nice business publishing thing that sat in large record company vaults and would never have been published with out it? Why is it in the public interest to keep such things out of the publics hands?

ponderingturtle

19th July 2007, 11:09 AM

Societies that don't believe in inalienable rights fail because they are not worth having members of that society. Why should anyone join a club that cares more for the collective than the individual, even though the collective is merely the sum of the individuals? The good of the state is the good of the individuals within that state--the state has no other purpose in existing than to strive for the maximum benefit for each and every person in it. And if it stops trying for that, it deserves to fail.

A good reason to make patents like copyrights and have them be permanent as well. Sure it will hurt innovation and competition but those are not individually useful they are putting society ahead of the individual.

TragicMonkey

19th July 2007, 01:00 PM

A good reason to make patents like copyrights and have them be permanent as well. Sure it will hurt innovation and competition but those are not individually useful they are putting society ahead of the individual.

Um, no. Society is each and every individual. Nothing can be good for the society if it isn't good for the individuals in it. Even when it looks like it might be, like when you have to jail one innocent man to keep a hundred killers locked up, it's not in society's best interest--because any one of the individuals who comprise it might be that one man.

Patents and copyrights should expire with the death of the original inventor/creator. Why should anyone who didn't do the work of inventing or creating benefit from a monopoly upon it? Johnny da Vinci didn't paint it, so I don't see why he should get two bucks a view of his grandad's Mona Lisa. Who the heck is so greedy that they insist on profitting from their work even after their own death? What are they going to spend it on?

Kerberos

19th July 2007, 01:13 PM

TragicMonkey

19th July 2007, 01:22 PM

Is that so? Now what if it's 200 killers? 2000? 50 million? You can't possibly be dumb enough to argue that we should let an infinite number of criminals walk to avoid an infinitely small risk of convicting an innocent man.

If you have 50 million killers, locked up or not, your society and its civilization has already collapsed.

If a society is willing to lock up the innocent, it is sick and needs to be corrected. Fortunately, the just solution is also the most sensible one: find out who's actually guilty, and only lock those people up. It's the best way for individuals, their society, and even conforms to higher considerations like ethics and junk.

ponderingturtle

19th July 2007, 05:12 PM

Um, no. Society is each and every individual. Nothing can be good for the society if it isn't good for the individuals in it. Even when it looks like it might be, like when you have to jail one innocent man to keep a hundred killers locked up, it's not in society's best interest--because any one of the individuals who comprise it might be that one man.

Patents and copyrights should expire with the death of the original inventor/creator. Why should anyone who didn't do the work of inventing or creating benefit from a monopoly upon it? Johnny da Vinci didn't paint it, so I don't see why he should get two bucks a view of his grandad's Mona Lisa. Who the heck is so greedy that they insist on profitting from their work even after their own death? What are they going to spend it on?

So when the invention is the product of a great many peoples labor they all get the patent? And this clearly means generic drugs are theft.

gumboot

19th July 2007, 05:52 PM

So when the invention is the product of a great many peoples labor they all get the patent? And this clearly means generic drugs are theft.

If you produce work for a company, the patents, copyright, etc belong to the company.

-Gumboot

ETA. I would also point out that all other property a person owns is given exclusively to their heirs. When you die your house does not become "public domain" for "society" to enjoy. The millions you had saved in a bank account because you were an old miser doesn't become "public domain".

Copyright law is first and foremost is property law. As it is, intellectual property is treated very differently to other forms of property, because after a time they enter the public domain. I don't see why it should be treated so differently to other types of property that the moment you die it should be stripped from your estate. Allowing your estate to benefit for a time, before gifting the work to society, seems a reasonable compromise to me. If nothing else, having a 50 year gap means only good works will be exploited in the public domain, works that have stood the test of at least 50 years of worthiness.

ARubberChickenWithAPulley

19th July 2007, 09:16 PM

And if you rent a CD or computer program you are stealing the music or software.

Nonsense. You are not doing anything to own a copy of that intellectual property. If you rent a CD, copy it, and keep it in your CD collection, then you might be stealing it. Renting a DVD, however, is no different than renting any other piece of property: like a car, for example. Somebody purchased the car (the rental company) and they are lending it to you for a period of time for your personal use. When that period of time is over, you no longer have control of that automobile. Similarly, if you rent a DVD, Blockbuster is lending you the DVD -- or, specifically, the intellectual property on the DVD -- for a brief time. If you want to own that intellectual property, just like if you want to own a car, you can go and purchase the DVD yourself. It's just like any other product.

BULL. When did society decided that the public wanted to reduce the rights they have on Music or Computer Programs that they have purchased?

Lawmakers decided but that is not at all the same thing.

In a democratic country, it is the only official avenue we have for implenting such a consensus, so effectively, it is the same thing.

Eminent domain can certainly be stealing. What else should think of it when it is done to promote a private business venture?

So are you ready to charge public officials with theft?

So why should different types of material under copyright be treated differently? Libraries or "Book Sharing" would certainly be considered illegal if introduced now and would be called theft. So why are they being grandfathered out of the status that they rightly deserve, that of stealing?

As with DVD rentals, libraries do not allow people to copy entire books and take them home to own. The person can borrow the book, and then has to return it. Ownership is the key here. If I want to own the book, I have to buy it.

Copyright infringement can be stealing, I am thinking of counterfeit products that are sold. As some of them are functionally identical the buyer has little or no way of knowing if the product is legitimate or not.

Though I agree, this doesn't seem to jibe with the rest of your position here. Even in counterfeiting, they aren't depriving anyone of a physical object, they're simply copying a logo or name. It's essentially the same thing as plagiarism.

And in principle I agree that such protections should exist, it is how they have been bent in ways that are not in the public interest that pisses me off. If the recent trends in how intellectual property is treated continue libraries will be illegal, or prevented from having anything not in the public domain. I do not really expect that to happen, but individuals are losing rights that they have over things that they have purchased.

Well, like I said, I think intellectual property should have the same protections as any other product. As such, just as someone can rent or borrow a car, the same should extend to people renting or borrowing DVDs, CDs, or books. I agree, I don't think they will ever pass a law banning that -- at least, I sure hope they don't.

So where does the public domain fit into this? Is it an out modded concept?

Then what about some small businesses that made a nice business publishing thing that sat in large record company vaults and would never have been published with out it? Why is it in the public interest to keep such things out of the publics hands?

Valid question and points, and I certainly don't claim to have an answer. Logically, as Gumboot has argued, we don't do this with anything else: my house doesn't become public property after I pass away. On the other hand, though, I agree that I would hate to see classic works sit in vaults collecting dust.

I am curious, though, what companies you are talking about (and I mean this question honestly): are there public domain works that were discovered sitting unpublished before a company came along and, because of public domain, was able to release them to the public?

NoZed Avenger

19th July 2007, 10:01 PM

And I can agree with that. But why should we accept the claims from artists and labels that it is hurting them financially when there is little supporting evidence? We do not look at the financial harm done to them by libraries and rental businesses.

So the idea that they are being hurt financially vs having the decisions over how it is promoted made by others are very different arguments and should not be taken as a single position.

Until and unless harm or lack thereof can be shown by one side or the other, we have to make a decision regarding which side we err on the side of caution for. The arguments for erring on the side of the creator/owner -- because of the potential for harm and the arguments for the right to control their own works -- trump, IMO, the speculative benefits that they might get. That's a judgment call, and no one else has to disagree.

So then you agree that the system is being manipulated by groups who do not have the publics interests at heart and are trying to remove rights that people traditionally had over content that they have purchased?

I don't see that I have taken any type of position that would lead you to believe that I either believe or disbeleive that. In fact, I have tried to pretty hard to expressly indicate that I was not taking a position in the larger debate.

NoZed Avenger

19th July 2007, 10:04 PM

Valid question and points, and I certainly don't claim to have an answer. Logically, as Gumboot has argued, we don't do this with anything else: my house doesn't become public property after I pass away.

Well, the estate tax -- if you have enough assets -- may well force you to sell off that house to pay the rather large taxes. Not a perfect analogy, but your other property may well be at risk on your death, too.

egslim

19th July 2007, 11:45 PM

I don't see why it should be treated so differently to other types of property that the moment you die it should be stripped from your estate.
Because we want people to create new intellectual property, instead of profiting from their past accomplishments indefinately. The former means progress, the latter stagnation.

And you never lose intellectual property anyway, only the sole right to its benefits is temporary.

ponderingturtle

20th July 2007, 07:29 AM

If you produce work for a company, the patents, copyright, etc belong to the company.

Then when do they expire? The idea was that they would expire with the creators death. But that is largely what we have now, companies don't die like people do so they can own such things indefinitely.

ETA. I would also point out that all other property a person owns is given exclusively to their heirs. When you die your house does not become "public domain" for "society" to enjoy. The millions you had saved in a bank account because you were an old miser doesn't become "public domain".

But then again they don't get to keep your pension/social security. Copyright and intellectual property is different because it is not about ownership but the granting of special rights to someone who created an idea or other intellectual exorcise. So they are not at all like property. So you are not granting them property you are granting them special rights over ideas that are not theirs.

Hmm suing your neighbor for copying your house...

Copyright law is first and foremost is property law.

Wrong. It is fundamentally different. Property laws are not written with the intent of providing an incentive to make new property, that is the basis for copyrights. That has been entirely forgotten.

Here is a question is anyone who takes a generic drug a dirty dirty thief?

As it is, intellectual property is treated very differently to other forms of property, because after a time they enter the public domain. I don't see why it should be treated so differently to other types of property that the moment you die it should be stripped from your estate. Allowing your estate to benefit for a time, before gifting the work to society, seems a reasonable compromise to me. If nothing else, having a 50 year gap means only good works will be exploited in the public domain, works that have stood the test of at least 50 years of worthiness.

I am not arguing for a death based time limit on intellectual property. I think that what should work is a time where it is cheap and easy to keep something under copyright, and then as years pass it gets progressively more and more expensive. So if Disney wants to keep steam boat Willy under copyright then can, it just gets more and more expensive every year. I was thinking about an exponential growth system myself.

What really bugs me is using copyrights to keep things unavailable to the public.

Geckko

20th July 2007, 08:00 AM

If you produce work for a company, the patents, copyright, etc belong to the company.

-Gumboot

ETA. I would also point out that all other property a person owns is given exclusively to their heirs. When you die your house does not become "public domain" for "society" to enjoy. The millions you had saved in a bank account because you were an old miser doesn't become "public domain".

Copyright law is first and foremost is property law. As it is, intellectual property is treated very differently to other forms of property, because after a time they enter the public domain. I don't see why it should be treated so differently to other types of property that the moment you die it should be stripped from your estate. Allowing your estate to benefit for a time, before gifting the work to society, seems a reasonable compromise to me. If nothing else, having a 50 year gap means only good works will be exploited in the public domain, works that have stood the test of at least 50 years of worthiness.

Gumboot,

Copyright and patent law is designed to address market failures, as some here have identified (e.g. there will under-investment in new ideas etc. if the origniators of those ideas cannot profit from them, but find them snapped up and copied by others). Hence patents to allow protection to avert this.

However, the solution is simply one that allows monopoly rights and that itself represents another type of market failure that leads to higher prices and lower consumption.

So the compromise is to allow a temporary period of monopoly rights to provide the incentive to innovate, but to limit this period to allow competition to bring down prices below monopoly levels after (even leading up to) expiration to bring larger and more widespread economic benefits.

Mycroft

21st July 2007, 02:24 PM

I really don't see how it has anything to do with bureaucracy (which has an unfairly bad reputation BTW). The decision not to step on the toes of the voters sounds more like a political descision than a bureaucratic one.

Of course it will be a political decision. Laws are made by lawmakers who are politicians. That is also characteristic of a bureaucracy.

Kerberos

21st July 2007, 11:33 PM

If you have 50 million killers, locked up or not, your society and its civilization has already collapsed.
Thanks for sharing, now could you answer the question or do you realize how stupid a consistent answer would sound?

If a society is willing to lock up the innocent, it is sick and needs to be corrected. Fortunately, the just solution is also the most sensible one: find out who's actually guilty, and only lock those people up. It's the best way for individuals, their society, and even conforms to higher considerations like ethics and junk.
And if it's not willing to run the risk of locking up innocents it's got murderers, rapist and other criminals running rampant in the streets because they can't be convicted under the "proven beyond any doubt, reasonable or not”, standard. I prefer a "sick” society to such a monumentally stupid one.

Kerberos

21st July 2007, 11:39 PM

Of course it will be a political decision. Laws are made by lawmakers who are politicians. That is also characteristic of a bureaucracy.

No it's not, first of all that's simply not what the word means, politicians are not part of the bureaucracy. Secondly many organisations that don't have politicians at the top are still run partially or wholly by bureaucracies. Big companies for example.

TragicMonkey

22nd July 2007, 07:16 AM

Thanks for sharing, now could you answer the question or do you realize how stupid a consistent answer would sound?

And if it's not willing to run the risk of locking up innocents it's got murderers, rapist and other criminals running rampant in the streets because they can't be convicted under the "proven beyond any doubt, reasonable or not”, standard. I prefer a "sick” society to such a monumentally stupid one.

I never said anything about "proven beyond any doubt, reasonable or not".

Kerberos

22nd July 2007, 09:26 AM

I never said anything about "proven beyond any doubt, reasonable or not".

So you've changed you mind and now think that we must (regretfully of cause) accept that innocent people will sometimes be convicted and imprisoned?

TragicMonkey

22nd July 2007, 09:30 AM

So you've changed you mind and now think that we must (regretfully of cause) accept that innocent people will sometimes be convicted and imprisoned?

I didn't say that, either. There is a very large difference between "reasonable doubt" and "let's not worry about imprisoning the innocent".

I wonder how'd you feel about it if you were the one innocent imprisoned?

But then, I think that when people don't care about injustice, they deserve it to happen to them.

Kerberos

22nd July 2007, 12:33 PM

I didn't say that, either. There is a very large difference between "reasonable doubt" and "let's not worry about imprisoning the innocent".
And who has said that exactly? It’s really quite simple. One possibility is that we tolerate a system which convicts people based on evidence beyond a certain limit short of 100% certainty which also means accepting that sometimes innocent people will be convicted. The alternative is to let everyone off. Which do you prefer?

I wonder how'd you feel about it if you were the one innocent imprisoned?
I probably wouldn't like that very much. I wouldn't like to be shot either or die in a car crash, that doesn't mean that I think society is a failure because it’s unacceptable for society that it cannot eliminate murder or traffic accidents. I accept that these things happen because the consequence of trying to eliminate them totally would be far worse than the problem itself.

But then, I think that when people don't care about injustice, they deserve it to happen to them.
I suppose this is you rather unsubtle attempt to smear me and others willing to face reality? If so please at least have the courage to voice your pathetic straw men clearly.