The issue is simply what are they actually doing, and why they're doing it.
The fact is, your entire argument has now fallen back on discussing intent, at which point we can dispense with any facts of how any of these sites work or what they do. We can merely claim or show their intent, and regardless of the merits of any discussion about the technology, how it works or their striking similarities to about a dozen and one other services, we should throw them in jail based on intent. There mere fact they intended to do something, regardless of whether this was actually achieved or whether the means were any different than any other service, is enough to convict them of criminal copyright infringement, fined a significant sum and/or thrown in jail.
They must have more than just a generalized knowledge that their site is primarily used for infringement.
And yet this was not quite as low a standard as the one set for Isohunt, nor Veoh.
In order to obtain safe harbor, a defendant cannot have knowledge of ongoing infringing activities. This “knowledge” standard is defined as “actual knowledge” or “willful ignorance.” According to the widely-cited House and Senate Report on the law, “if the service provider becomes aware of a ‘red flag’ from which infringing activity is apparent, it will lose the limitation of liability if it takes no action.” H.R. Rep. 105-551(II), at 53; see also Perfect 10, Inc. v. CCBill LLC, 488 F.3d 1102, 1114 (9th Cir. 2007). The Congressional Report notes that the service provider is only liable if it “turned a blind eye to ‘red flags’ of obvious infringement.” 551(II), at 57. Other courts have applied this test as requiring “willful ignorance of readily apparent infringement.” UMG Recordings Inc. v. Veoh Networks Inc., __ F. Supp. 2d __, 2009 WL 3422839, at *7 (C.D. Cal. 2009) (citing Corbis Corp. v. Amazon.com, Inc., 351 F. Supp. 2d 1090, 1108 (W.D. Wash. 2004)). H.R. Rep. 105-
Even under this stringent “willful ignorance” test, it is apparent that Defendants have “turned a blind eye to ‘red flags’ of obvious infringement.” See H.R. Rep. 105-551(II), at 57.
Note that half the reason Isohunt lost was because of Fung's own actions specifically referencing torrents to infringing content, manually adapting (what I assume they're referring to) the autocomplete when a user starts typing search terms, and specifically indexing and providing lists of current top shows and films with the corresponding torrents, and that they didn't provide evidence nor even argue certain points. Meanwhile, Veoh won its case.
Here we're discussing a torrent site that uses entirely different means of providing users with search results with which they have no direct control over.
It was claimed Grokster could control their service and were told to try and stop/block all infringing files. Torrent-finder has no control over the search results of others, it merely queries other search engines and presents their results in what amounts to an embedded browser.
No one has even pondered the idea of removing the incentive to innovate. What we're saying is you don't need to be granted a monopoly on the market to be successful nor to have incentive in the first place. Ideas are already free, what matters is execution.
I think the original point has been lost somewhat. In the Napster et al cases, they were not shut down before some sort of hearing/trial - the first amendment issues had already been addressed either way by the time the services were shut down. That hasn't happened here with the seizure of the domains, which was the point - that there hadn't been an opportunity in the courts in the first place for the potential first amendment issue in closing the sites to actually be addressed.
Yet you are unable to provide any reason or logic yourself for why I am wrong, and ignoring I myself cited an economist. It is ridiculous to assert that free access to a work destroys its value. The only thing it does it decrease the value of gatekeepers whose business depends on being the one to provide access, but this is entirely different than value of the work itself being decreased.
You are confusing the value of a company and its business model with the value of the end work in itself. You consequently ignore how value resides in the ability for a work to be widely used and seen which must consequently come from greater access. Access is only one part of the value in any work, one that actively limits others when it is restricted.
Supporters of intellectual property, and of copyright extension in particular, seem to be blind to such distinction. Landes and Posner, who provide the least incoherent exposition of why retroactive extension of copyright might be a good thing, acknowledge that the "assessment of welfare effects of congestion requires distinguishing technological from mere pecuniary externalities." They then go on to say, concerning the Mickey Mouse character, "If because copyright had expired anyone were free to incorporate the Mickey Mouse character in a book, movie, song, etc., the value of the character might plummet." The value for whom? It cannot be the social value of the Mickey Mouse character that plummets - this increases when more people have access. Rather it is the market price of copies of the Mickey Mouse character that plummets. As Landes and Posner admit, "If this came about only...as the ordinary consequence of an increase in output, aggregate value would actually increase." They then assert "however, the public might rapidly tire of Mickey Mouse." But this is in fact the ordinary consequence of an increase in output. If I eat a large meal, I am less hungry - the value to me of a meal is diminished, and restaurants will find I am not willing to pay them much money. No externality is involved: as more of a good is consumed, the more tired people become of it. For there to be an externality, it would have to be the case that my consumption of Mickey Mouse made you more tired of it - an improbability, to say the least.
Although Landes and Posner make the distinction between pecuniary and technological externality, they do not appear to understand it. They quote from a book on Disney marketing: "To avoid overkill, Disney manages its character portfolio with care. It has hundreds of characters on its books, many of them just waiting to be called out of retirement...Disney practices good husbandry of its characters and extends the life of its brands by not overexposing them...They avoid debasing the currency." This is of course exactly how we would expect a monopolist to behave. If Disney were to be given a monopoly on food, we can be sure they would practice "good husbandry" of food, most likely leaving us all on the edge of starvation. This would be good for Disney, since we would all be willing to pay a high price for food. But the losses to the rest of us would far outweigh the gain to Disney. It is a relief to know that, after all, Mickey Mouse is not such an essential ingredient of the American diet.
Mike above is that the value is intrinsic and hence that value cannot be diluted by the act of putting the content on youtube.
Erm, no it doesn't. Content is not devalued by being put up on Youtube, it is made more valuable as the people who demand it can now actually access it and can do so what they want. Youtube adds value of convenience. Value - as Mike said - is in the eye of holder, the market. You're defining value from the producers view - that idea that free access, when the lack of free access limits the usage of and therefore the value of the work. Economic value comes from that actual usage, free access enables that.
If you make something free and freely available you may well make it extremely convenient and hence in that sense valuable for the consumer but you have also thereby destroyed its economic value for the content creator. And Mike was arguing that you don't destroy its value.
And none of this makes any economic sense. Economic value comes from the ability to actually gain access and use something. It's actually your definition that confuses value as entirely about access, and not about its use and its affect on the audience. Access is only one small part, something whos limitation can in fact actively lowers the value of other parts. Information and its usage is only as valuable as its use. You're actually arguing the point you claim to be against - that content inherently has value, and thus providing access to it destroys value, which makes no sense.
Viacom, crazy and hyperbolic though they may well be, are not talking about "value"' as some intrinsic quality, they are talking about "economic value" and it is this economic value they are claiming is being destroyed.
No, it's the former they're talking about, more importantly, how much they think they should be paid based on their ability to control access, and demanding laws to help them do that. They haven't defined value by the market at all, their rhetoric is based on the idea that they and only they get to set prices (a privilege commonly enjoyed when there is a monopoly in play to the detriment of the market).
Modern economics considers value to be determined by the market
None of which goes against anything that has been said here.
I think it is quite credible that the market value of work is damaged by work being freely available.
[...]
But record companies find that a hard argument to swallow and having seen the damage wreaked on them it is understandable that movie companies are sceptical.
This makes no sense. A work being freely available is *more* valuable to people who demand it. This may mean trouble for business that depends on being the sole decider of who gets to access what and when, but this is a business model issue, and has nothing to do with any drop in value of the work.
The fact that they might also have non-infringing activity does not excuse their infringing activity.
One again you rely on deliberately missing out specifics. Reading through the Napster case it was ruled that there was no free speech issue because the judge felt there was no protected speech being infringed upon. There was no weighing of free speech and copyright infringement because it was believed that protected use was so minute by the judge (in other words, the belief that Napster was used solely for copyright infringement and nothing or little else).
We've been over this before. It's also shown quite clearly by Arcara v Cloud Books.
No it has not, once again you rely on a generalisation that depends on missing out what is specifically stated. Here:
from the Acara case itself:
The First Amendment does not bar enforcement of the closure statute against respondents' bookstore. United States v. O'Brien, supra, has no relevance to a statute directed at imposing sanctions on nonexpressive activity, and the sexual activities carried on in this case manifest absolutely no element of protected expression. The closure statute is directed at unlawful conduct having nothing to do with books or other expressive activity. Bookselling on premises used for prostitution does not confer First Amendment coverage to defeat a statute aimed at penalizing and terminating illegal uses of premises. Pp. 702-707. We imposed a greater burden of justification on the State even though the tax was imposed upon a nonexpressive activity, since the burden of the tax inevitably fell disproportionately - in fact, almost exclusively - upon the shoulders of newspapers exercising the constitutionally protected freedom of the press.
[..]
It is true that the closure order in this case would require respondents to move their bookselling business to another location. Yet we have not traditionally subjected every criminal and civil sanction imposed through legal process to "least restrictive means" scrutiny simply because each particular remedy will have some effect on the First Amendment activities of those subject to sanction. Rather, we have subjected such restrictions to scrutiny only where it was conduct with a significant expressive element that drew the legal remedy in the first place, as in O'Brien, 3 or where a statute based on a [478 U.S. 697, 707] nonexpressive activity has the inevitable effect of singling out those engaged in expressive activity, as in Minneapolis Star. This case involves neither situation, and we conclude the First Amendment is not implicated by the enforcement of a public health regulation of general application against the physical premises in which respondents happen to sell books.
One thing you keep glossing over is several of these sites taken down do in fact have significant non-infringing uses, whereas AFAIK in the Napster case at least, the judge decided the non-infringing uses were so rare if not even non-existent that their argument didn't hold up.
No one says that under the eyes of the law - or at least, those who currently implement it - do not have the power to assert that they are rights, but the suggestion that the courts are right because they claim or assume they are right is something that wouldn't pass a laugh test of any human being with basic logical reasoning capabilities.
Does it make the rights granted by copyright any less enforceable? Of course it doesn't.
Who ignored it? It's only been your terrible attempt at diverting discussion that has brought this up. What it does do is undermine your own assertion that copyright is an equal right to freedom to speech.
What is the supposed significance of what you're saying? Does it make the rights granted by copyright any less enforceable? Of course it doesn't.
It does if those laws can be shown to undermine free speech and someone argues that "but they must be balanced!", not that was an argument I brought up to begin with - it's you who wanted to assert that copyright is of equal standing to free speech.
it's a right that is on par with all your other rights. In other words, they are equal.
Assuming that permission for Congress to create copyright laws is in any way makes copyrights granted to authors equal to the express denial of Congress limiting freedom of speech such that free speech can be paired back for the sake of copyright, once again ignoring that copyright is fundamentally an economic instrument to change behaviour given certain circumstances, not a recognised inalienable natural right.
What does this have to do with the fact that copyright secures certain rights?
The question of whether copyright is some how an equal right to freedom of speech. Everything about how the law was originally constructed and its interpretation in the courts as shown by even your own citation shows that copyright law is not of equal weight to freedom of speech.
Copyright and the First Amendment grant us certain rights.
What is granted is the ability to Congress to create copyright law should it deem it socially productive to do so. Copyright is not granted as an inalienable right akin to freedom of speech, it is granted as something the Government may do if there is good reason to, and by just about everything I've read does not interfere with free speech. In fact, every argument I've ever seen about copyright is careful to point out expression/idea dichotomies and Fair Use (as Eldred v Ashcroft did) in suggesting that copyright law as it exists at the time cannot be deemed unconstitutional.
The granting of the ability for Congress to create copyright law is vastly different from the express denial of limiting a right like freedom of speech, not least because in process of creating that law Congress may for whatever reasons produce a law that conflicts with freedom of speech. Eldred v Ashcroft in fact confirms this as their own reasoning as to why a term extension was not unconstitutional was based on the same principles that have always been used to say copyright law at that time is not unconstitutional, that is exemptions to copyright like Fair Use. Nowhere did they affirm that copyright is of equal importance and weight (particularly as copyright law is not defined in the constitution, only that Congress may create such a law), and their arguments seem to affirm that any copyright law is not of equal importance by their heavy reliance on Fair Use.
I should also note that immediately after the section you quote from your citation is something that specfically deals with this in the same way I have presented:
In addition to spurring the creation and publication of new expression, copyright law contains built-in First Amendment accommodations. See id., at 560. First, it distinguishes between ideas and expression and makes only the latter eligible for copyright protection. Specifically, 17 U.S.C. § 102(b) provides: "In no case does copyright protection for an original work of authorship extend to any idea, procedure, process, system, method of operation, concept, principle, or discovery, regardless of the form in which it is described, explained, illustrated, or embodied in such work." As we said in Harper & Row, this "idea/expression dichotomy strike[s] a definitional balance between the First Amendment and the Copyright Act by permitting free communication of facts while still protecting an author's expression." 471 U.S., at 556 (internal quotation marks omitted). Due to this distinction, every idea, theory, and fact in a copyrighted work becomes instantly available for public exploitation at the moment of publication. See Feist, 499 U.S., at 349-350.
Second, the "fair use" defense allows the public to use not only facts and ideas contained in a copyrighted work, but also expression itself in certain circumstances. Codified at 17 U.S.C. § 107, the defense provides: "[T]he fair use of a 220*220 copyrighted work, including such use by reproduction in copies . . ., for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright." The fair use defense affords considerable "latitude for scholarship and comment," Harper & Row, 471 U.S., at 560, and even for parody, see Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music, Inc., 510 U.S. 569 (1994) (rap group's musical parody of Roy Orbison's "Oh, Pretty Woman" may be fair use).
The CTEA itself supplements these traditional First Amendment safeguards. First, it allows libraries, archives, and similar institutions to "reproduce" and "distribute, display, or perform in facsimile or digital form" copies of certain published works "during the last 20 years of any term of copyright ... for purposes of preservation, scholarship, or research" if the work is not already being exploited commercially and further copies are unavailable at a reasonable price. 17 U.S.C. § 108(h); see Brief for Respondent 36. Second, Title II of the CTEA, known as the Fairness in Music Licensing Act of 1998, exempts small businesses, restaurants, and like entities from having to pay performance royalties on music played from licensed radio, television, and similar facilities. 17 U.S.C. § 110(5)(B); see Brief for Representative F. James Sensenbrenner, Jr., et al. as Amici Curiae 5-6, n. 3.
Finally, the case petitioners principally rely upon for their First Amendment argument, Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. v. FCC, 512 U.S. 622 (1994), bears little on copyright. The statute at issue in Turner required cable operators to carry and transmit broadcast stations through their proprietary cable systems. Those "must-carry" provisions, we explained, implicated "the heart of the First Amendment," namely, "the principle that each person should decide for himself or herself the ideas and beliefs deserving of expression, consideration, and adherence." Id., at 641.
221*221 The CTEA, in contrast, does not oblige anyone to reproduce another's speech against the carrier's will. Instead, it protects authors' original expression from unrestricted exploitation. Protection of that order does not raise the free speech concerns present when the government compels or burdens the communication of particular facts or ideas. The First Amendment securely protects the freedom to make— or decline to make—one's own speech; it bears less heavily when speakers assert the right to make other people's speeches. To the extent such assertions raise First Amendment concerns, copyright's built-in free speech safeguards are generally adequate to address them. We recognize that the D. C. Circuit spoke too broadly when it declared copyrights "categorically immune from challenges under the First Amendment." 239 F. 3d, at 375. But when, as in this case, Congress has not altered the traditional contours of copyright protection, further First Amendment scrutiny is unnecessary. See Harper & Row, 471 U. S., at 560; cf. San Francisco Arts & Athletics, Inc. v. United States Olympic Comm., 483 U. S. 522 (1987).[24]
In other words, they considered copyright not to be in breach of free speech not because they are equal and must be weighed as equal rights, but because they hadn't modified the "traditional contours" of copyright that included exceptions specifically designed to stop copyright interfering with free speech, like the idea/expression dichotomy and fair use provisions. The only reference to balance appears to be in referencing balancing the monopoly that copyright grants so that it doesn't interfere with free speech, not holding back free speech to allow for copyright.
So it's false that copyright is purely an economic instrument for changing behavior? It's false that Fair Use and idea/expression dichotomies are instrumental in allowing copyright to exist? It's false that free speech takes precedent over copyright, requiring these distinctions to exist?
You're really obfuscating the point,
Asking you to back up your assertion that free speech is/should be balanced against copyright as if the 2 are equal in consideration is not obfuscating the point Joe. The tests we have for whether copyright can or cannot be extended say nothing that is is an equal right to free speech that should be given equal weight. In fact, the only reference to balance I have ever seen prior to you has been in regards to interests of publishers and consumers, not free speech and copyright law.
One of which is a recognized natural right that the First Amendment states cannot be limited by government, whilst the other an instrument of manipulating economic incentives with no basis in natural right, nor guaranteed recognition.
You guys are trying to make it more complicated than it is, and for obvious reasons.
Then cite something that states copyright has to be considered equal to freedom of speech - that copyright is just an inalienable right of society as freedom of speech is, and that the 2 must be balanced. So far, the only thing you've cited is a suggestion of compatibility (which only exists granting certain limits deliberately designed to stop copyright impeding on freedom of speech), not equality in consideration.
I think everyone here has regretted responding to you at some point, particularly when your argument is to dismiss exactly the kind of citation you love so much before going on a tirade against Mike for no reason. What does Mike have to do with this all of a sudden? No one mentioned his views, and his views are not important to your assertion that copyright is a right equal to freedom of speech, which there appears to be no evidence for.
Freedom of speech is recognized as a natural right that shall not be limited by Government. Copyright is created and enforced solely through Government action, and only to be granted and enforced assuming certain economic conditions. That you ignore this basic fact shows this is entirely your own view that you are rather desperately trying to support with little ability to. It's fine that your own view of copyright is that it is/should be a natural right of artists on equal standing with freedom of speech, but this not one supported in the US by law nor by the founders themselves in creating copyright.
On the post: Torrent-Finder Plans To Fight Domain Seizure
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The fact is, your entire argument has now fallen back on discussing intent, at which point we can dispense with any facts of how any of these sites work or what they do. We can merely claim or show their intent, and regardless of the merits of any discussion about the technology, how it works or their striking similarities to about a dozen and one other services, we should throw them in jail based on intent. There mere fact they intended to do something, regardless of whether this was actually achieved or whether the means were any different than any other service, is enough to convict them of criminal copyright infringement, fined a significant sum and/or thrown in jail.
And yet this was not quite as low a standard as the one set for Isohunt, nor Veoh.
Note that half the reason Isohunt lost was because of Fung's own actions specifically referencing torrents to infringing content, manually adapting (what I assume they're referring to) the autocomplete when a user starts typing search terms, and specifically indexing and providing lists of current top shows and films with the corresponding torrents, and that they didn't provide evidence nor even argue certain points. Meanwhile, Veoh won its case.
Here we're discussing a torrent site that uses entirely different means of providing users with search results with which they have no direct control over.
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It was claimed Grokster could control their service and were told to try and stop/block all infringing files. Torrent-finder has no control over the search results of others, it merely queries other search engines and presents their results in what amounts to an embedded browser.
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Re: Re: Re: "creating a market niche"????
On the post: Homeland Security Admits That It's The Private Police Force Of The Entertainment Industry
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On the post: Viacom Plays The Insane Hyperbole Card In Claiming YouTube Ruling Would 'Completely Destroy' Content Value
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You are confusing the value of a company and its business model with the value of the end work in itself. You consequently ignore how value resides in the ability for a work to be widely used and seen which must consequently come from greater access. Access is only one part of the value in any work, one that actively limits others when it is restricted.
http://levine.sscnet.ucla.edu/general/intellectual/lp.htm
On the post: Viacom Plays The Insane Hyperbole Card In Claiming YouTube Ruling Would 'Completely Destroy' Content Value
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Erm, no it doesn't. Content is not devalued by being put up on Youtube, it is made more valuable as the people who demand it can now actually access it and can do so what they want. Youtube adds value of convenience. Value - as Mike said - is in the eye of holder, the market. You're defining value from the producers view - that idea that free access, when the lack of free access limits the usage of and therefore the value of the work. Economic value comes from that actual usage, free access enables that.
And none of this makes any economic sense. Economic value comes from the ability to actually gain access and use something. It's actually your definition that confuses value as entirely about access, and not about its use and its affect on the audience. Access is only one small part, something whos limitation can in fact actively lowers the value of other parts. Information and its usage is only as valuable as its use. You're actually arguing the point you claim to be against - that content inherently has value, and thus providing access to it destroys value, which makes no sense.
No, it's the former they're talking about, more importantly, how much they think they should be paid based on their ability to control access, and demanding laws to help them do that. They haven't defined value by the market at all, their rhetoric is based on the idea that they and only they get to set prices (a privilege commonly enjoyed when there is a monopoly in play to the detriment of the market).
http://levine.sscnet.ucla.edu/general/intellectual/coffee.htm
On the post: Viacom Plays The Insane Hyperbole Card In Claiming YouTube Ruling Would 'Completely Destroy' Content Value
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None of which goes against anything that has been said here.
This makes no sense. A work being freely available is *more* valuable to people who demand it. This may mean trouble for business that depends on being the sole decider of who gets to access what and when, but this is a business model issue, and has nothing to do with any drop in value of the work.
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Re: Re: Re: They have to protect - because people are willing to steal.
Then why exactly do we need stronger laws if what they've already been doing has worked so well?
Darryl, clueless whenever he disproves himself.
On the post: Wait, Can Anyone Explain Why Google Should Promote Other Search Engines?
Investigating complaints made is not the same as having actually judged Google of any wrongdoing.
On the post: Five Questions For Homeland Security Concerning Its Online Censorship Campaign
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One again you rely on deliberately missing out specifics. Reading through the Napster case it was ruled that there was no free speech issue because the judge felt there was no protected speech being infringed upon. There was no weighing of free speech and copyright infringement because it was believed that protected use was so minute by the judge (in other words, the belief that Napster was used solely for copyright infringement and nothing or little else).
No it has not, once again you rely on a generalisation that depends on missing out what is specifically stated. Here:
from the Acara case itself:
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On the post: Just Calling Something Property, Doesn't Make It Property
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On the post: Senator Wyden Says He'll Block COICA Censorship Bill
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On the post: Senator Wyden Says He'll Block COICA Censorship Bill
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Who ignored it? It's only been your terrible attempt at diverting discussion that has brought this up. What it does do is undermine your own assertion that copyright is an equal right to freedom to speech.
It does if those laws can be shown to undermine free speech and someone argues that "but they must be balanced!", not that was an argument I brought up to begin with - it's you who wanted to assert that copyright is of equal standing to free speech.
Assuming that permission for Congress to create copyright laws is in any way makes copyrights granted to authors equal to the express denial of Congress limiting freedom of speech such that free speech can be paired back for the sake of copyright, once again ignoring that copyright is fundamentally an economic instrument to change behaviour given certain circumstances, not a recognised inalienable natural right.
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On the post: Senator Wyden Says He'll Block COICA Censorship Bill
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The question of whether copyright is some how an equal right to freedom of speech. Everything about how the law was originally constructed and its interpretation in the courts as shown by even your own citation shows that copyright law is not of equal weight to freedom of speech.
What is granted is the ability to Congress to create copyright law should it deem it socially productive to do so. Copyright is not granted as an inalienable right akin to freedom of speech, it is granted as something the Government may do if there is good reason to, and by just about everything I've read does not interfere with free speech. In fact, every argument I've ever seen about copyright is careful to point out expression/idea dichotomies and Fair Use (as Eldred v Ashcroft did) in suggesting that copyright law as it exists at the time cannot be deemed unconstitutional.
The granting of the ability for Congress to create copyright law is vastly different from the express denial of limiting a right like freedom of speech, not least because in process of creating that law Congress may for whatever reasons produce a law that conflicts with freedom of speech. Eldred v Ashcroft in fact confirms this as their own reasoning as to why a term extension was not unconstitutional was based on the same principles that have always been used to say copyright law at that time is not unconstitutional, that is exemptions to copyright like Fair Use. Nowhere did they affirm that copyright is of equal importance and weight (particularly as copyright law is not defined in the constitution, only that Congress may create such a law), and their arguments seem to affirm that any copyright law is not of equal importance by their heavy reliance on Fair Use.
On the post: Senator Wyden Says He'll Block COICA Censorship Bill
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In other words, they considered copyright not to be in breach of free speech not because they are equal and must be weighed as equal rights, but because they hadn't modified the "traditional contours" of copyright that included exceptions specifically designed to stop copyright interfering with free speech, like the idea/expression dichotomy and fair use provisions. The only reference to balance appears to be in referencing balancing the monopoly that copyright grants so that it doesn't interfere with free speech, not holding back free speech to allow for copyright.
On the post: Senator Wyden Says He'll Block COICA Censorship Bill
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Asking you to back up your assertion that free speech is/should be balanced against copyright as if the 2 are equal in consideration is not obfuscating the point Joe. The tests we have for whether copyright can or cannot be extended say nothing that is is an equal right to free speech that should be given equal weight. In fact, the only reference to balance I have ever seen prior to you has been in regards to interests of publishers and consumers, not free speech and copyright law.
On the post: Senator Wyden Says He'll Block COICA Censorship Bill
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One of which is a recognized natural right that the First Amendment states cannot be limited by government, whilst the other an instrument of manipulating economic incentives with no basis in natural right, nor guaranteed recognition.
Then cite something that states copyright has to be considered equal to freedom of speech - that copyright is just an inalienable right of society as freedom of speech is, and that the 2 must be balanced. So far, the only thing you've cited is a suggestion of compatibility (which only exists granting certain limits deliberately designed to stop copyright impeding on freedom of speech), not equality in consideration.
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Freedom of speech is recognized as a natural right that shall not be limited by Government. Copyright is created and enforced solely through Government action, and only to be granted and enforced assuming certain economic conditions. That you ignore this basic fact shows this is entirely your own view that you are rather desperately trying to support with little ability to. It's fine that your own view of copyright is that it is/should be a natural right of artists on equal standing with freedom of speech, but this not one supported in the US by law nor by the founders themselves in creating copyright.
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