Good effort, Absolute, but you’re never going to win with this argument on a place where so many have never earned a penny off of their creative works (let alone had a whole career based on them). You can search the Net for a long time and never find a similar circus of “the smartest folks in the room” going to such lengths to justify theft, rather than just admitting they need the allowance their mom gives them for more Hot Pockets and Tombstone pizzas.
That snark having been made, I do feel that the law should be changed to allow an “abandonment” clause, where if nothing is done with a creative work it can fall out of copyright. I also favor shortening the length of copyright to the lesser of 50 years, or the life of the author + 18 years. Also “regioning” of things like DVDs is silly and ignorant, and should be breakable. Imagine my anger when I pay money to the copyright holders for DVDs in the UK - and then I take an 8-hour flight, and suddenly I’m a pirate if I try to play the DVDs I legally paid for on my US DVD player? That’s fucked up beyond belief.
I think that copyright is far too restrictive now, to the point of ridiculousness, and that is helping to breed contempt for it.
That dog won’t hunt. I’ve had two Windows installations corrupted by a virus or exploit via an embedded advertisement, and innumerable times I’ve had Windows crash in the middle of doing productive work, thus costing me lost time, effort, and revenue. When people stop putting or allowing malicious code in adverts, then I’ll unblock them.
I’m an avid movie goer. I see at least one movie per week and buy a bunch of snacks from the theater. Average trip to the theater per movie for me only would be $20.
There are a lot of movies I have no interest in, but sometimes I get curious and want to see what made them so bad. I definitely would not want to pay to watch a POS movie but I’ll sure DL it, watch it, then get rid of it, or at least go watch it online and have to deal with some advertisement.
As for the ad blockers, I agree here also.
Typically, a website’s main source of revenue is advertisement. This advertisement is not placed there as eye candy. It’s placed there to remind you that the service/information you are being provided does cost money to operate and the ad’s are the only way for them to continue their operation. By blocking their advertisement it is basically equivalent to downloading movies.
So for those of you recommending the ban on movie piracy, would you also be in the fight to shut down ad-blocker software? Who are you to judge how much advertisement a site requires? That’s like saying “Why would I pay $10 to watch this movie when I really think it isn’t worth shit”
Now for the argument of people downloading movies for the sheer enjoyment of ripping off the industry and do not want to support it in any way and possibly make a profit from it I can understand where you are coming from. Thing is, there is nothing you can do about it. These people will always exist. Information is information. You can’t share it and expect none of it to leak to unintended sources. If they really cracked down on it it would definitely have an impact but there would still be piracy. There’s already warnings of $250,000 fines and prison sentences for those who pirate and what not… but that hasn’t stopped anyone. It’s just one of those things you’ll have to live with. For now at least. Besides, the movie business is doing better than ever these past few years.
I suppose pointing out that copying is fundamentally different from stealing would be a “pedantic tangential hijack”.
What about asking if there are any thieves out there who have deluded themselves into thinking there is nothing wrong with enforcing artificial scarcity?
“To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries.” sets up a system where a balance must be struck between the harm caused by the artificial scarcity created by granting an exclusive right vs. the cultural benefit gained from promoting progress by allowing creators to profit by their creations.
Is the system as currently operated doing more harm than good? If so in some cases, does that justify revocation of a copyright granted to an abuser of the system?
It may not appear such, but it is decidedly different. It’s not a matter of convenience - I use my web browser extensively for work purposes while on the clock, every single day. I bill clients for my time (and you really do NOT want to know my billing rate). If I spend half a day trying to un-fuck Windows with 2 IT folks, because I’m reviewing permitting documents online and suddenly a talking moose that wants my credit cards pops up and crashes my computer, who pays for that? (Answer - most of the time, YOU, the electric ratepayer, do.) Note I’m pointedly ignoring the crapitude of Windows for allowing such to happen…
Yes. People who produce ideas can be paid to produce ideas… not for having produced an popular idea once. For 20 minutes. In 1960. At the bottom of the Mariana Trench.
Thanks, but they weren’t about simply insulting you, they were actual questions. I can’t force you to answer them, but I was just intrigued by the mindset. It has fuckall to do with digital piracy, and more to do with human nature. I understand if you don’t think it’s wrong and you don’t care if it is illegal. But this idea that you KNOW it’s wrong, but you just don’t give a fuck, seems … odd to me. Usually, I just ascribe that mindset to online bravado, the whole “I’m so fucking cool, I do bad stuff and don’t even care!!” But most people grow out of that in high school, and I always thought more of you than that.
Sorry to waste your time asking a question I found interesting. Enjoy your day.
The one who installs onto your PC and refuses to go away and does not work with certain DVD. You pay money for a product, and it doesn’t work and the developer are not obliged to solve the problem? WTF?
The type who limits you to 5 or N numbers of install. I think it is to clamp down game lending/rental and etc, but what about those who changes computer, need to reformat and etc.? Should I only pay the actual price divided by N for this sort of product?
The second one is the more despicable one (IMHO). If I ever need to install a game for the sixth time, I am getting a crack.
Or the question is: If you are convinced that a publisher, distributor or etc. are out to rip you off, how likely are you going to turn pirate, especially if there a 7 in 10 chances that their product would actually suck, or you only need 10% of the entire album or etc? Somehow consumers have to pick up the slack for sloppy delivery.
Well, it’s certainly possible to surf safe even with Windows while allowing ads, but I can’t really fault you for not wanting to jump through these hoops; nevertheless, whatever your reasoning, in effect you’re depriving people of revenue for their creations, so I don’t see any deep distinction coming into play here.
I wrote a 5-paragraph essay to respond to this, but as I have chores to do today and cannot give you the respect of a proper back-and-forth exchange, instead I’m going to simply post that I respectfully disagree.
Absolute (or Una Persson or whoever else wants to address this in addition to Der Trihs), I would be interested in seeing your comments on this.
Is the public library pirating content? Why not?
If I loan one of my books to a friend to read, or buy the book, read it, and then give to someone else, am I pirating content? Why not?
In my view, the effect is the same. More than one person gets the content, only one person has paid the creator (and the creator’s distribution process.)
All of you penises trying to pretend that you’re brave defenders of the humble artist, sticking it to The Man by refusing to “pay for the packaging” or whatever bullshit justification it is you’re using today, I’d like to ask you to explain how World of Goo, an independently programmed and published game that shipped with no DRM whatsoever, has reported an 80-90% piracy rate since its release last month. Can you tell me how 2dboy, the creator, is some faceless corporation who deserves to be fucked over for exploiting consumers? Can you explain why consumer power is required to sample a game where the writer released a quarter of the content for free as a demo? If not, I’m just going to have to go on thinking you’re all completely full of shit.
Sure, the World of Goo experiment proves that DRM is pointless; games without it are pirated just as much as those with it. But only because it proves that pirates are venal fucks who’ll pirate off anyone, no matter how nice to their customers they are, and no matter how small and deserving of support they may be.
Don’t tell me about consumer power. You’ve got consumer power. Consumer power is choosing not to buy something if you don’t think it’s a good deal. It is not deciding to take a product in the manner of your choosing, and deciding later whether you’re going to deign to pay for it. That’s having your cake and eating it. The message that sends is “don’t bother to try and entertain me; I’ll take your work and shit all over you in return.”
Incidentally, World of Goo is brilliant, and a snip at $20. I am in no way affiliated with the publishers, although I am often lightly sticky.
Possession is transfered in each case, even if temporarily. There is no copy. Yes it does deprive the artist of revenue, but then I’ve never, ever, ever argued that the artist has an absolute and irrevocable right to have revenue from every use of their work. One has to allow possession to be transfered freely without burden in cases like this (note that works with an NDA, dealing with trade secrets, EULA, etc. are different, but honestly, how fine-grained do we want to make this argument?), otherwise imagine the chaos. People would be faced with buying books and throwing them away when done and not wanting them further, rather than loaning, donating, or re-selling them. Imagine if you will a probate case where the court orders a royalty payment upon transfer to every single copyright holder who may or may not still have a copyright, after the death of a book owner? It would be easier by far to just send them to a landfill, which is silly and ignorant.
Lending libraries and loaning of works (WITHOUT a copy being made) is a limitation on copyright which also benefits the poor in Society, who can go to the library or have a work loaned to them rather than being deprived of the benefits of many worthy labours of humanity due to not being rich enough (the fact that the non-poor, or even the ultra-rich can also go to a library or loan a book is a necessary thing from a practical standpoint).
So can Person A loan a CD to Person B? Sure. Can Person A burn a copy of a CD to give to Person B? No - that does not transfer possession, it creates a new copy and dilutes the revenue-producing pool of the work.
I believe Gfactor has addressed all of these points in his multi-part Staff Report.
Absolute, you’re not helping your case any by making unfounded accusations against everyone else in this thread. Here’s what I said about it being okay to steal from them:
Since then, I’ve been discussing changes in the current system that would, in my opinion, reduce piracy.
We live in a world where more great works of literature are all available for free than anyone could read in their lifetime. Where books, relative to our income levels, are cheaper than they’ve been in human history. Where we have an Internet which allows us to view and create works and share them - if we choose - with people from all over the entire planet, an audience and source of billions.
An era of untold creative material freely available or available for a pittance:
…combined with an untold level of information exchange and access. Any one of us here could write the Greatest Work Ever Known by Humankind, put it on a free Google web page, and have 2 billion people, theoretically, read it.
And yet, with all that available, we have people making excuses about why they practically need to - nay, have a basic human right to - unlawfully utilize creative content (aka “rip the latest Coldplay and give it my 10,000 closest friends”).
All legal issues and accusations of “pirate” and “lawbreaker” aside, it’s just sort of intellectually disappointing. Even more than Kangaroo Jack, and believe me that’s saying something.
Fuck you, you piss gargle dirt whistle. My first post was in direct reply to your tightass moralizing bullshit. My second post wasn’t even directed at you. If you want to own the thread, asshole, I suggest you wrap it in copy protection.
I did not play it, and I did not pirate it. Just because I have a beef with publishers doesn’t mean I go around pirating for the heck of it. And besides, from the posted URL, the methodology is a bit spotty.
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And don’t forget people who are behind proxy and virtual network addresses.
Incidentally, I bought Red Alert 3 (original) and think it is a piece of crap. Despite reviews telling me so and giving me a false impression of the co-commander. So where is my consumer power now? I also smell some bug with the game itself, but EA seem to have stop with patching the game-play. So where is my consumer power now? I do all the research I could and I still end up with a game which I think is sub-par in terms of innovation (and the developer diary claim it is there all over the place).
I find the idea that consumers don’t have the right to preview the quality of what they are getting into is absurd. Have you ever go to a clothing store where you cannot examine your product? Bought a car without test-driving it? Somehow for software, we are denied that and for crazy reasons, if I buy the software, I can only install it five times.
If the music the record industry produces is so poor, why is it being pirated? Obviously any pirate who tries to justify his behaviour with such an argument has painted themselves into a corner: if the music was so bad, they wouldn’t try to obtain it in the first place, and the fact that they are trying to obtain it is watertight evidence that their argument is a load of bullshit.
And how do you justify your claim that it’s harder to procure legal music than pirating it? There’s iTunes, Amazon MP3 (DRM free), a host of other web services, local record shops etc. I’m not seeing the problem here.
Really the only people that get hurt by music “pirating” is the record companies. The bands signed to major labels make pennies in royalties off CD sales compared to what they rake in on tour ticket sales and merchandise, etc.
Record companies often pay upfront costs for music videos, studio time, etc that the bands have to pay back.
Funny thing is, computer technology in my mind is what’s starting to and will inevitably impact the record companies the most, as more and more people develop skills to exploit home studio computer recording/filming technologies.
Still, even if you could finance your own CD recording and pressing, the marketing and distribution networks that the record companies have a stranglehold on would be the hardest obstacle to overcome.
At the end of the day, I “steal” music off of Limewire, etc because I can and because I enjoy listening to music that I want to listen to. I also make MP3-based CD’s to listen to in my car. That’s it…I don’t distribute or sell any CD’s I make. I liken it to when I used to record songs off the radio with my tape recorder, except now it’s much better quality. Honestly I don’t see the harm in doing what I do. Apparently the RIAA sees otherwise. I still buy CD’s, too.
