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guitarzan
Premium
join:2004-05-04
Skytop, PA
 ·epix
| reply to Steve
Re: WRONG
said by Steve  :said by AbBaZaBbA : because of the greedy record companies. As opposed to the greedy users, who think nothing of stealing every bit of music they can find? Steve The central economic distinction between information and physical property is that information can be transferred without leaving the possession of the original owner.
Unbounded intellectual property is very different from physical property and can no longer be protected as though these differences did not exist. For example, if we continue to assume that value is based on scarcity, as it is with regard to physical objects, we will create laws that are precisely contrary to the nature of information, which may, in many cases, increase in value with distribution.
Perhaps those who are part of the problem will simply quarantine themselves in court, while those who are part of the solution will create a new society based, at first, on piracy and freebooting. It may well be that when the current system of intellectual property law has collapsed, as seems inevitable, that no new legal structure will arise in its place.
The laws regarding unlicensed reproduction of commercial software are clear and stern...and rarely observed. Software piracy laws are so practically unenforceable and breaking them has become so socially acceptable that only a thin minority appears compelled, either by fear or conscience, to obey them.
Whenever there is such profound divergence between law and social practice, it is not society that adapts. Against the swift tide of custom, the software publishers' current practice of hanging a few visible scapegoats is so obviously capricious as to only further diminish respect for the law.
Part of the widespread disregard for commercial software copyrights stems from a legislative failure to understand the conditions into which it was inserted. To assume that systems of law based in the physical world will serve in an environment as fundamentally different as cyberspace is a folly for which everyone doing business in the future will pay.
When the primary articles of commerce in a society look so much like speech as to be indistinguishable from it, and when the traditional methods of protecting their ownership have become ineffectual, attempting to fix the problem with broader and more vigorous enforcement will inevitably threaten freedom of speech. The greatest constraint on your future liberties may come not from government but from corporate legal departments laboring to protect by force what can no longer be protected by practical efficiency or general social consent.
Furthermore, the increasing difficulty of enforcing existing copyright and patent laws is already placing in peril the ultimate source of intellectual property - the free exchange of ideas.
Can one explain how the sharing,(A copy) From an original
in this case a cd or song is stealing.? All I see is it's stealing.Your stealing,Your stealing.Money out of the mouths of the **AA's.When A.If that someone didn't buy the original
cd at this very moment.B.It's impossible to know after hearing the cd would one like it enough to purchase the disk..err contents.?. C.Most major art galleries will sell a reproduction of the original painting,at a fraction of the originals true value.Did the artist of the Mona Lisa get ripped off in that case.? No of course not.Suppose one hired a private artist to paint a picture from a book you borrowed.
Is that stealing from the original artist as well.? No of course not.Can some one please explain how one can label something theft,when the physical property,is in the hands of its owner.? | |
Steve
I'm a PC, so shut up
Consultant
join:2001-03-10
Yorba Linda, CA
| said by guitarzan :The central economic distinction between information and physical property is that information can be transferred without leaving the possession of the original owner. Yes, both you and G_Poobah make the completely correct point that "theft" and "stealing" only apply if the original owner is deprived of the use of the item. If I take a CD from your desk, it's clearly stealing, but if I merely make a copy then it is not.
I, however, continue to use this term informally and pejoratively in reference the the disdain for the rights of artists by those who engage in wholesale piracy.
Fair use and "hey check out this cool song" is smalltime stuff that most people don't care about. I certainly don't. The amount of trading that qualifies for "fair use" varies widely in different people (especially in those who take a dim view of the whole notion of intellectual property).
But being exposed to those who do this notoriously and brazenly: "I don't ever pay for music/ software/ DVDs", bragging about the size of their collections, preparing cover stories in case they are caught, etc. This bothers me a lot, and I don't mind calling them names.
Steve
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Stephen J. Friedl • Unix Wizard • Microsoft Security MVP • Tustin, California USA • my web site | |
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