Anonymous Coward, I hope you realized I was being sarcastic. I was pointing to the fact that you don't need to put price tag on something to "recognize it's value". Price=value is a fallacy.
some people don't want to pay for content and, to make that work, some people create a belief construct that they shouldn't have to pay for it
BobinBaltimore, I have no doubt that description applies to some people in this debate, but even last month there was a new study in Norway (interviewing 1600 people) that concluded file sharers are 10 times more likely to buy "legal" music online than those who do not make "ilegal" downloads. This isn't about buyers vs downloaders, they are one and the same. They are consumers and fans that often want to hear something before they buy, or are dissastisfied with prices or the current legal offerings, can't afford all the content they want, etc. The fact that there is "piracy" serves as an excuse to the producers of content to ignore market forces. They live under the illusion that a lot more people would be buying their content if not for file sharing, while that is not necessarly true.
Plus, the fact that people might defend something for their own self interest does not disqualify their arguments. Otherwise the same could be used against people arguing for social security, universal health care, unemployment subsidies, lower taxes, etc, etc. Just about every issue in politics!
The western civilization once had lofty ideals about universal access to culture, knowledge and information. Ideals which gave us libraries. The US founding fathers where no exception. They setup a system where the default for creative works was the public domain (anyone can copy and publish at will). Creators that wanted a commercial monopoly on their works, had to register them, and only got 14 years. Now that we have this thing called the internet, that removed scarcicities on the making and distribuiton of copies, we can finally get much much closer to the ideal of universal access than anyone ever dreamed of. And without goventment funding! Yet some people don't want us to use it, just to protect their current business models! It's insane and a terrible shame if we go down that road. Just like it would have been a shame if we had allowed the "rights owners" to strangle radio broadcasting at birth!
I'm all for creators getting a share of commercial use of their works, even a share of the advertising from file sharing webistes (just like radio). Or even maybe a share of ISP revenue. But pursuing individual users sharing files "non-proffit", trampling over their privacy and freedoms in the process, is insane. It will only drive them fruther and fruther underground, and generate resentment towards big commercial enttities (like the major labels) and political backlash. And in the meantime not one penny more goes to the creators.
Secretly gathering information is a privacy concern
I would say that having a private company secretly gather information about what a person does online is a privacy concern. Hence all the controversy about tracking cookies, targeted advertising, google keeping search records, systems like Phorm, etc.
And this Logistep company isn't just collecting anonymized usage info for statistical purposes, to offer other useful services to the people targeted, or to serve advertising to them. They are collecting this info with the aim of tracking down the persons involved and using it against them!
Imagine a company joining public chat rooms to indiscrimately record everything said and the respective IP addresses with the intent of selling it to others who might want to sue somebody for libel and defamation.
Some information can be publicly available and still be protected as private. Phone numbers and addresses are often published on "phone books". That doesn't mean companies can collect all that info and use as they wish. Here in europe the law says a company must ask a person's permission before they transmit personal info they have collected to third parties. A person also has the right to contact any company and ask them to correct or delete any personal info it might have about them.
Has anyone stopped to think why a law that was, at least originally, a form of market regulation, made only for commercial exchanges, is suddenly being taught in schools? Are they teaching banking regulations as well?
Private uses of copyrighted works where always either outside the scope of the law, or implicitly or explicitly allowed. Now with digital technology every use implies a copy, and is therefore presumptively regulated. Its either illegal or fair use. And some of those private uses are now threatening the usual business models. So they want to convince children to also obey the same law.
Why don't teachers and parents revolt at people trying to brainwash their children so they can continue to sell stuff? How about brainwashing people to also keep on buying inefficient low quality cars to save GM and Chrysler?? GM and Chrysler actually pulled it off for many years, and made very little effort to adapt, except lobbying to keep things the same. Eventually it all backfired and came tumbling down like a house of cards.
I hope governments wont be bailing out the major labels in 5 years. But they probably will be asking for it!
How about recognizing the value of sex with Jon Miller's logic? There's a girl in Nevada actioning off her virginity for 3+ millions of dollars... while millions of girls give it for free! OMG! That's a lot of wasted value right there!
Mikelo, content can be fixed on a physical device, and requires physical interactions in order to be accessed (duhhh), but the content itself is not physical. You can make infinite copies of a piece of content, at zero cost, requiring no new effort from the creator, or taking away anything from him. That's the difference.
You can say content belongs to it's creator, and in the sense of authorship (what in Europe is called moral rights), I totally agree. If you take other people's content and claim as your own, that's plagiarism.
But copyright is different. It's not legally a property right. It's a temporary monopoly right on copies and uses of a work (with limitations like fair use, education, libraries, etc). It used to be a very short right, and limited to commercial activities, but has been greatly expanded. Moral rights however, are eternal.
The public interest is for content to be universally available (it's a non-rivalrous good). That's why we have public libraries. Copyright is just a way to allow the commercial exploitation of content, as an incentive to creation. It is not a "natural" right like property, it is market regulation to enforce a certain business model (content as product). Amazingly it even trumps real property rights (as you can't do everything you want with the books, CDs, and DVDs you own and payed for). And as we have been seeing, there are other ways for creators to make money, so copyright today is probably just a unnecessary restriction of freedoms.
If google is blocking music in their korean blogging platform, why not block text as well and close the site? Can't people also post copyrighted material in text? Why the double standard?
Avatar28, good for you. But don't exaggerate either. The eskimos teach their children how to use a knife around the age of 10 I think (its a very important tool in their culture). But your kids seem to know WHY knives are dangerous, which is good. If you simply take away or hide from them every sharp thing around, they are just going to stab themselves the first chance they get. It's the difference between teaching and overprotecting.
Of course that, for a 2 year old, that picks everything up and starts trashing about... dumbass parents for leaving a knife within reach!
So a baby playing with a knife, hurts his 5 year old brother... and video-games are to blame? Didn't anything like that happen BEFORE there where video-games??? What was to blame then? TV? Books?
Its common sense that babies shouldn't play with knifes.
a town built on showing no regard for the intellectual property of Thomas Edison
Could you explain this point further? I don't know what you are referring too.
Thomas Edison invented a lot of the early technologies for filming movies and projecting them in theaters. Instead of paying Edison, the studios ran to California. I'm not sure why they avoided paying Edison by operating there (different laws perhaps?), but that's the story.
I'm afraid Sony has become a "carriage company". They don't see the value of "automobiles" until others show it to them. Sony made the Walkman, while some people where still saying "home taping will kill the music industry". Sony didn't care. It made a valuable product that people wanted, and to hell with the labels if they couldn't adapt and live with it. But when the MP3 came along... Sony ignored it. MP3 was just for piracy, and Sony had a music label now. They couldn't imagine selling MP3s, so they never made a player. It took someone else, Apple, to show them the way. Only then did they try to follow, but still with proprietary formats and DRM... another big mistake. Incredibly Sony has only made real MP3 players for a couple of years!
Same thing with VCRs and DVRs. Sony invented the VCR, and yet refrained from digital versions. TiVo and others innovated where Sony no longer dared too.
This is a company very much afraid of digital stuff that will break the content division's business models. And they keep forgetting that if they don't do it, someone else will. It has missed huge opportunities because of this, and despite some execs recognizing this and wanting to be more forward thinking, clearly some still don't. They deserve every bit of red ink on their financial reports!
Hey Mike, good to see you went with the phone company argument I mentioned on my comment to the previous news about Craiglist. Fortunately that's not covered by copyright, or I would sue you for every penny! :D
It really is a double standard when phone companies and newspapers don't get persecuted for doing the same as online services. And why? Because they are old, and people are used to them! It's the new stuff people fear (H1N1 flu, anyone? biggest overreaction I ever saw!) and blame for everything.
This idea of a file sharing tax, which they called "global license" or "cultural license" was actually defended by the opposition (socialist party) in the parliament as an ALTERNATIVE to the 3 strikes law, and strongly rejected by Sarkozy's government.
So this is not gonna happen. At least not until 3 strikes fails miserably and/or the socialists rise to power in France again.
Why don't these AGs go after the phone companies? Aren't criminal or otherwise illegal activities organized everyday using phones?
Even in these prostitution ads there are phone numbers potential clients use to get in touch with the "escorts". If AGs are going to go after tools and services because people use them for illegal purposes, it seems to me phone company execs should be the first to be thrown in jail.
So why do phone companies and newspapers get a free ride on this issue? Does being old business give them immunity?
Sorry... forgot about line breaks. Please delete previous comment.
For example, he stated that if Google started offering free cars, everyone would agree that this would be a bad thing that needed to be stopped.
Why would this possibly be? Yes, many that make their living selling cars would loose their businesses and jobs, but so what? Everyone would get free cars! This is just competition at work. Google did it in the webmail market for example. I don't see anybody saying that was bad.
I frequently see complaints like this, mostly from salespeople complaining about how their competitors are cutting their margins too much and hurting everybody. I always have to remind them this is the free market at work, and that they themselves have undercut the profit margins of others. If any company can offer a product for a lower price, and do so legally and remain profitable, then more power to it. This is competition. Giving cars, or whatever product, for free, is just an extension of this.
What surprises me the most is seeing similar complaints (and calls for "protecting an industry") from economists or other people that are otherwise strong free market defenders.
Yes, if a company offers a product significantly cheaper than the others (or even for free) it will disrupt the market. The companies that can't follow them or otherwise adapt to the new reality will go down. Jobs will be lost. But consumers get cheaper products and the surviving companies will hopefully create more jobs to compensate. This has been happening for a long time, and its a good thing. If this wasn't allowed... well... forget google, forget the present, and think about the past. Think about Henry Ford. The people making cars in less efficient and cheap ways would have stopped him. The car market wouldn't even exist as it is today.
Here in Portugal we actually have some companies experimenting with selling cheaper Smart cars with advertising on the sides. But I doubt it will ever get to free cars.
We will see these complaints about free "killing business" in the music industry first. Right now they are focused on illegal free (aka "piracy"), but soon there will be companies and artists complaining about the legal free; all the artists giving away their music with CC licenses and hurting the market for paid music. Just like some software companies worry and complain just as much about open-source as they do about piracy (if not more).
For example, he stated that if Google started offering free cars, everyone would agree that this would be a bad thing that needed to be stopped.
Why would this possibly be? Yes, many that make their living selling cars would loose their businesses and jobs, but so what? Everyone would get free cars! This is just competition at work. Google did it in the webmail market for example. I don't see anybody saying that was bad.
I frequently see complaints like this, mostly from salespeople complaining about how their competitors are cutting their margins too much and hurting everybody. I always have to remind them this is the free market at work, and that they themselves have undercut the profit margins of others. If any company can offer a product for a lower price, and do so legally and remain profitable, then more power to it. This is competition. Giving cars, or whatever product, for free, is just an extension of this.
What surprises me the most is seeing similar complaints (and calls for "protecting an industry") from economists or other people that are otherwise strong free market defenders.
Yes, if a company offers a product significantly cheaper than the others (or even for free) it will disrupt the market. The companies that can't follow them or otherwise adapt to the new reality will go down. Jobs will be lost. But consumers get cheaper products and the surviving companies will hopefully create more jobs to compensate. This has been happening for a long time, and its a good thing. If this wasn't allowed... well... forget google, forget the present, and think about the past. Think about Henry Ford. The people making cars in less efficient and cheap ways would have stopped him. The car market wouldn't even exist as it is today.
Here in Portugal we actually have some companies experimenting with selling cheaper Smart cars with advertising on the sides. But I doubt it will ever get to free cars.
We will see these complaints about free "killing business" in the music industry first. Right now they are focused on illegal free (aka "piracy"), but soon there will be companies and artists complaining about the legal free; all the artists giving away their music with CC licenses and hurting the market for paid music. Just like some software companies worry and complain just as much about open-source as they do about piracy (if not more).
It's the same struggle all over. :)
When is the US going to join the rest of the civilized and free world and legalize prostitution? Is it the land of the free, or saudi arabia??
Here in Portugal it's not really a recognized profession (so prostitutes don't pay taxes and have no social security), and brothels are illegal, but prostitution itself is not illegal. Prostitutes openly advertise on the classified ads of major daily newspapers, and of course online.
Unless copyright law is very unusual in Finland, I don't see how they can expect to win this case. A book is the property of the person who buys it. They can be resold, borrowed or rented.
But according to the logic of "1 download = 1 lost sale = stealing", that the copyright maximalists like so much, then this lawsuit makes perfect sense. This site, and its users, are stealing!
Don't be surprised if books start coming out with EULAs, or RLAs (readers license agreements), saying:
"You cant resell, rent or borrow this book to anyone. Don't even dare let anyone peek over your shoulder while you are reading on the bus! You wouldn't steal a book from a store. Borrowing a book to or from a friend is stealing too!"
And then of course the public libraries will be next on the hit list. :)
On the post: News Corp. Digital Boss Says Free Doesn't Work, Doesn't Bother To Explain How Pay Will Work
Re: Re: How about recognizing the value of sex
On the post: Swedish Pirate Party Wins
TwoOne Seat In EU ParliamentRe: Wow
BobinBaltimore, I have no doubt that description applies to some people in this debate, but even last month there was a new study in Norway (interviewing 1600 people) that concluded file sharers are 10 times more likely to buy "legal" music online than those who do not make "ilegal" downloads. This isn't about buyers vs downloaders, they are one and the same. They are consumers and fans that often want to hear something before they buy, or are dissastisfied with prices or the current legal offerings, can't afford all the content they want, etc. The fact that there is "piracy" serves as an excuse to the producers of content to ignore market forces. They live under the illusion that a lot more people would be buying their content if not for file sharing, while that is not necessarly true.
Plus, the fact that people might defend something for their own self interest does not disqualify their arguments. Otherwise the same could be used against people arguing for social security, universal health care, unemployment subsidies, lower taxes, etc, etc. Just about every issue in politics!
The western civilization once had lofty ideals about universal access to culture, knowledge and information. Ideals which gave us libraries. The US founding fathers where no exception. They setup a system where the default for creative works was the public domain (anyone can copy and publish at will). Creators that wanted a commercial monopoly on their works, had to register them, and only got 14 years. Now that we have this thing called the internet, that removed scarcicities on the making and distribuiton of copies, we can finally get much much closer to the ideal of universal access than anyone ever dreamed of. And without goventment funding! Yet some people don't want us to use it, just to protect their current business models! It's insane and a terrible shame if we go down that road. Just like it would have been a shame if we had allowed the "rights owners" to strangle radio broadcasting at birth!
I'm all for creators getting a share of commercial use of their works, even a share of the advertising from file sharing webistes (just like radio). Or even maybe a share of ISP revenue. But pursuing individual users sharing files "non-proffit", trampling over their privacy and freedoms in the process, is insane. It will only drive them fruther and fruther underground, and generate resentment towards big commercial enttities (like the major labels) and political backlash. And in the meantime not one penny more goes to the creators.
On the post: Switzerland Decides That It's Ok For Private Firm To Violate Your Privacy If It's Searching For 'Pirates'
Secretly gathering information is a privacy concern
And this Logistep company isn't just collecting anonymized usage info for statistical purposes, to offer other useful services to the people targeted, or to serve advertising to them. They are collecting this info with the aim of tracking down the persons involved and using it against them!
Imagine a company joining public chat rooms to indiscrimately record everything said and the respective IP addresses with the intent of selling it to others who might want to sue somebody for libel and defamation.
Some information can be publicly available and still be protected as private. Phone numbers and addresses are often published on "phone books". That doesn't mean companies can collect all that info and use as they wish. Here in europe the law says a company must ask a person's permission before they transmit personal info they have collected to third parties. A person also has the right to contact any company and ask them to correct or delete any personal info it might have about them.
On the post: Entertainment Industry Propaganda Moves Into Schools In Australia As Well
Teaching market regulations in school
Private uses of copyrighted works where always either outside the scope of the law, or implicitly or explicitly allowed. Now with digital technology every use implies a copy, and is therefore presumptively regulated. Its either illegal or fair use. And some of those private uses are now threatening the usual business models. So they want to convince children to also obey the same law.
Why don't teachers and parents revolt at people trying to brainwash their children so they can continue to sell stuff? How about brainwashing people to also keep on buying inefficient low quality cars to save GM and Chrysler?? GM and Chrysler actually pulled it off for many years, and made very little effort to adapt, except lobbying to keep things the same. Eventually it all backfired and came tumbling down like a house of cards.
I hope governments wont be bailing out the major labels in 5 years. But they probably will be asking for it!
On the post: Is Anyone Actually Surprised That China Has Blocked Social Media Sites For Tiananmen Anniversary?
Ideology of control
On the post: News Corp. Digital Boss Says Free Doesn't Work, Doesn't Bother To Explain How Pay Will Work
How about recognizing the value of sex
On the post: Sony Pictures CEO: The Internet Is Still Bad
Re: Content IS Property
You can say content belongs to it's creator, and in the sense of authorship (what in Europe is called moral rights), I totally agree. If you take other people's content and claim as your own, that's plagiarism.
But copyright is different. It's not legally a property right. It's a temporary monopoly right on copies and uses of a work (with limitations like fair use, education, libraries, etc). It used to be a very short right, and limited to commercial activities, but has been greatly expanded. Moral rights however, are eternal.
The public interest is for content to be universally available (it's a non-rivalrous good). That's why we have public libraries. Copyright is just a way to allow the commercial exploitation of content, as an incentive to creation. It is not a "natural" right like property, it is market regulation to enforce a certain business model (content as product). Amazingly it even trumps real property rights (as you can't do everything you want with the books, CDs, and DVDs you own and payed for). And as we have been seeing, there are other ways for creators to make money, so copyright today is probably just a unnecessary restriction of freedoms.
On the post: New Law In Korea Means Google Bans The Uploading Of Music On Any Blog
Why not block text as well?
On the post: Police Blame Video Games For 2-Year-Old Stabbing 5-Month-Old
Re: Re: Before video-games
Of course that, for a 2 year old, that picks everything up and starts trashing about... dumbass parents for leaving a knife within reach!
On the post: Police Blame Video Games For 2-Year-Old Stabbing 5-Month-Old
Before video-games
Its common sense that babies shouldn't play with knifes.
On the post: Sony Pictures CEO: The Internet Is Still Bad
Re: NFL Analogy
Could you explain this point further? I don't know what you are referring too.
Thomas Edison invented a lot of the early technologies for filming movies and projecting them in theaters. Instead of paying Edison, the studios ran to California. I'm not sure why they avoided paying Edison by operating there (different laws perhaps?), but that's the story.
On the post: Sony Pictures CEO: The Internet Is Still Bad
It's a shame, Sony was a visionary company once
Same thing with VCRs and DVRs. Sony invented the VCR, and yet refrained from digital versions. TiVo and others innovated where Sony no longer dared too.
This is a company very much afraid of digital stuff that will break the content division's business models. And they keep forgetting that if they don't do it, someone else will. It has missed huge opportunities because of this, and despite some execs recognizing this and wanting to be more forward thinking, clearly some still don't. They deserve every bit of red ink on their financial reports!
On the post: Cuomo Uses Craigslist To Bust Prostitution Ring... Still Blaming Craigslist
Mike, you stole my idea!
It really is a double standard when phone companies and newspapers don't get persecuted for doing the same as online services. And why? Because they are old, and people are used to them! It's the new stuff people fear (H1N1 flu, anyone? biggest overreaction I ever saw!) and blame for everything.
On the post: France Continues Its Campaign To Pass The Worst Internet-Related Laws Around
Calm down, it's not gonna happen!
So this is not gonna happen. At least not until 3 strikes fails miserably and/or the socialists rise to power in France again.
On the post: Why Are AGs Targeting Craigslist Rather Than Newspapers Or Other Websites?
Even in these prostitution ads there are phone numbers potential clients use to get in touch with the "escorts". If AGs are going to go after tools and services because people use them for illegal purposes, it seems to me phone company execs should be the first to be thrown in jail.
So why do phone companies and newspapers get a free ride on this issue? Does being old business give them immunity?
On the post: Recapping The Free Summit
For example, he stated that if Google started offering free cars, everyone would agree that this would be a bad thing that needed to be stopped.
Why would this possibly be? Yes, many that make their living selling cars would loose their businesses and jobs, but so what? Everyone would get free cars! This is just competition at work. Google did it in the webmail market for example. I don't see anybody saying that was bad.
I frequently see complaints like this, mostly from salespeople complaining about how their competitors are cutting their margins too much and hurting everybody. I always have to remind them this is the free market at work, and that they themselves have undercut the profit margins of others. If any company can offer a product for a lower price, and do so legally and remain profitable, then more power to it. This is competition. Giving cars, or whatever product, for free, is just an extension of this.
What surprises me the most is seeing similar complaints (and calls for "protecting an industry") from economists or other people that are otherwise strong free market defenders.
Yes, if a company offers a product significantly cheaper than the others (or even for free) it will disrupt the market. The companies that can't follow them or otherwise adapt to the new reality will go down. Jobs will be lost. But consumers get cheaper products and the surviving companies will hopefully create more jobs to compensate. This has been happening for a long time, and its a good thing. If this wasn't allowed... well... forget google, forget the present, and think about the past. Think about Henry Ford. The people making cars in less efficient and cheap ways would have stopped him. The car market wouldn't even exist as it is today.
Here in Portugal we actually have some companies experimenting with selling cheaper Smart cars with advertising on the sides. But I doubt it will ever get to free cars.
We will see these complaints about free "killing business" in the music industry first. Right now they are focused on illegal free (aka "piracy"), but soon there will be companies and artists complaining about the legal free; all the artists giving away their music with CC licenses and hurting the market for paid music. Just like some software companies worry and complain just as much about open-source as they do about piracy (if not more).
It's the same struggle all over. :)
On the post: Recapping The Free Summit
On the post: South Carolina Wants To Put Craigslist Management In Jail?
Prostitution still illegal??
Here in Portugal it's not really a recognized profession (so prostitutes don't pay taxes and have no social security), and brothels are illegal, but prostitution itself is not illegal. Prostitutes openly advertise on the classified ads of major daily newspapers, and of course online.
On the post: Copyright Lobbyists Threaten To Sue Book Renting Firm In Finland
EULAs coming to books?
But according to the logic of "1 download = 1 lost sale = stealing", that the copyright maximalists like so much, then this lawsuit makes perfect sense. This site, and its users, are stealing!
Don't be surprised if books start coming out with EULAs, or RLAs (readers license agreements), saying:
"You cant resell, rent or borrow this book to anyone. Don't even dare let anyone peek over your shoulder while you are reading on the bus! You wouldn't steal a book from a store. Borrowing a book to or from a friend is stealing too!"
And then of course the public libraries will be next on the hit list. :)
On the post: Copyright Lobbyists Threaten To Sue Book Renting Firm In Finland
EULAs coming to books?
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