I see. So drinking was immoral during prohibition. As was freeing the slaves prior to emancipation?
Drinking during Prohibition was illegal. It didn't violate anyone's personal property rights. Was it immoral? That depends on your perspective. There was no law that said slaves couldn't be freed before "emancipation," whatever event that refers to. So I don't get your point.
Neither of those examples involves violating someone's personal property rights. Can you come up with a single, nonextreme example where it's moral to violate someone's property rights?
If you don't understand the "business stuff" you'll never understand copyright -- because copyright is a *BUSINESS* monopoly privilege provided by the gov't. It does not exist outside of the business realm.
I understand the law (doctrines, theory, and jurisprudence) better than you, and yet I'm not a business person. I haven't studied business formally. You have an MBA. You approach it from a business perspective. I have JD. I approach it from a law perspective.
No wonder it's so difficult to discuss this stuff with you. You want to ignore the crux of what copyright is all about... and then focus on the meaningless part.
And you refuse to discuss the law part, instead focused on only business end of things. Your approach to the law is to first decide what you think the correct answer is, and then to try and make the law fit into your predetermined answer. That's working backwards. Unlike you, I'm able to analyze a legal problem without starting with my answer. They're different approaches, Mike. No need to be all uppity and insulting because I approach things differently than you. I recognize that multiple points of view, including views that are different than my own, are important and productive. You just mock anyone and anything that's different.
Have you ever met a tautological argument you didn't slobber all over?
How is tautological to state that if Person A violates Person B's rights, then Person B is a victim? I know you won't answer.
If you can't make a LOGICAL argument, but instead resort to insanity like the above, it's really really difficult to take you seriously.
Again, how is it insane to point out the obvious? If a pirate is violating someone's rights, then someone is a victim of that pirate's actions. I know you won't answer.
Since you're so focused on the Socratic method: if someone has their copyright infringed upon, yet ends up better off because of it, are they a victim?
The question itself is suspect. Are you implying that pirates are doing their victims a favor? But what if the victim doesn't want their rights to be violated? Does it matter then that you, Mike Masnick, think they are better off? Or should we just respect people's wishes when it comes to their rights? I think the answer is obviously, "yes."
Joe: but, but, morality!
Leigh: if you like, but that's not what we're talking about.
Joe: but, but, MORALITY!
Leigh is ignoring the moral implications because they aren't pleasant. That's not what he wants to talk about. Why? Because he sides with the amoral side of the debate.
As far as saying which rights are more important than others, I don't see the point. Either someone has the right, or they don't.
I don't see a lot of point in debating someone who can't remain consistent over a 5-minute span whenever it suits their argument to wiffle-waffle
I said that rights are classified into different types. They are. I also said that a right is a right and it doesn't matter what type of right it is. For example, it doesn't matter which right of yours is at issue, I wouldn't violate it and I wouldn't support anyone else who does. Whether your property right or your free speech rights, I think your rights are important. I haven't wiffle-waffled. Just because you don't understand something, don't assume that others don't. Google the word "right" and get back to me. It's clear that you've never even noticed that there's different types of rights and at this point you're just trying to argue any little silly point you think you can make.
There are more people who don't pirate than who do. That said, I think people pirate because it's easy, because they see lots of other people doing it, and because so few get caught. Rather than pay money for that great content that they really want, they just take it. And they read blogs like Techdirt where they are told that piracy is really the victims' fault, and they should just take whatever they want whenever they want it. It's a childish view. It's refusing to look past the end of their nose. When they grow up and have money and have some skin in the game, I suspect the point of view grows up too.
A "very real" sense, yes. Not, however, a sense that I think is particularly egregious, or of high priority, or productive to worry about.
So because you don't think they should be worried about it, they then shouldn't be worried about it? Compelling. Maybe they, who actually have their own skin in the game, feel differently. Does it threaten you when someone feels differently than you?
Against someone who just openly admitted they are basing their position on opinions from when they were four years old? Yes, I feel I do.
I said that some moral things are so basic and so obvious that I've known them to be true since I was a child. You're really sounding like a child yourself with this line of argument.
Not long ago you said rights are rights and it's always wrong to violate them, and it's black and white and simple. Now suddenly there are different types of rights?
There have always been different kinds of rights. There's this thing that smart people do called "classification." They don't put all rights into one category, but instead they separate them into different types of rights. Crazy, I know.
Compelling!
I have seen him run from debates hundreds if not a thousand times.
Er, when id he say to kill off the most successful models?
Techdirt's position is that the successful of the world of yesteryear are not the successful model of today.
And of course the model based on a goverment monopoly will be more successful than without monopoly, doesn't mean that's how the would should work
Yeah, 'cause selling a product that people absolutely love and want is a terrible business model. Give me a break. The content providers are creating products that everyone wants so much that people are willing to break the law to get it. They have every right to sell that product and not give it away. Just because it's easy to take it without paying doesn't mean that they have to change their model. Why aren't you demanding that the pirates stop taking what they haven't paid for?
A simple moral compass is flawed because morallity is not simple
They aren't the same. They have different words and everything. But the laws usually track what we as society think is moral. How else would it work? And we don't get to decide which rights of others are important and which are not. Instead, as a society we decide in certain rules. And our duty as members of that society is to follow the rules. And no, a pirate's need to get the latest movie for free doesn't rise up to one of those situations where the law is clearly wrong. This isn't racism or slavery.
Personally, I would take this a step further back and point out that copyright is a suspension of everyone else's right to do as they please with elements of culture, that there is no inherent exclusive natural right to exclude others from copying your book or song or whatever. It is, instead, an artificial marketplace convenience founded on suspending everyone else's natural rights.
If you want to get moral about it, copyright is a slight immorality that we all tolerate so long as copyright results in a net benefit to society.
Yep, copyright limits what everyone else can do with someone's property. All property rights do this. Would it be better for society if we took away all your property and gave it to the poor? Of course. Then why don't you advocate that?
Yeah, I get it. You think all rights are equal, all violations of rights are equally wrong, all laws are correct, and laws themselves never violate anyone's rights.
Simplistic. Suit yourself.
You yourself said that "violating the rights of creators is wrong in a very real sense." If it's so wrong, then why don't you ever speak out against it?
As far as saying which rights are more important than others, I don't see the point. Either someone has the right, or they don't. If they have the right, it should be respected. I treat others as I would have them treat me. I learned that when 4 as well.
You keep referring to infringement as violating someone's rights. This is not true and the point you are missing. Copyright is the name of the law, not a human right or civil right, just the name of an outdated law. An example of someone's rights being violated is when free speech is taken down do to a bogus copyright claim(DCMA).
Huh? If you are violating copyright law, you are violating someone's rights. This is undebatable fact. You aren't violating a human right (in this country; whatever that means) or a civil right, but you are violating someone's right.
Hahaha, so it's wrong to compare it to stealing food, but not wrong to compare it to murder or rape as you and others have repeatedly? Cognitive dissonance!
You say it's less severe because the motivation -- entertainment versus starvation -- is less sever. But you leave out the fact that the other half, the action itself -- copying versus theft -- is also far less severe. Great way to twist the facts to suit your point.
Do you have to debate like a child? I wasn't saying that property rights like copyright are the same kind of rights. You don't appear to understand how analogies work. Read it back over and see if you can see the analogy I was making. My point was that you can claim that any right is made up. So what? And I'm not saying it's less severe. I'm saying that you're trying to compare jaywalking, where no individual's rights are violated in the process, to copyright infringement, where someone's rights are violated. I think you need to recognize that there are different types of rights. Jaywalking is still wrong. So is infringement. But infringement violates an individual's rights.
No need to crack this nut open again. You've gotten your responses from Mike plenty of times, and you will never ever be satisfied with them. If I were to stop talking right now, you'd accuse me of running from your questions -- even though you have asked the same question in slightly different ways a dozen times here, and gotten an answer from me every time. That's just your M.O.
Absolutely untrue. No one runs from debate faster than Mike. No one.
So you are proud of having the simplistic, underdeveloped morality of a 4-year-old? That explains a lot.
My point, which went over your head, is that I learned that violating people's personal rights was wrong when I was four. Good job ignoring everything else I stated so you could get your childish dig in.
But jaywalking isn't violating someone's personal rights. It's violating a criminal law, sure, but it's not also a violation of any individual's rights. See the difference. If you're violating someone's personal rights, then you are acting immorally. And this isn't at all like trying to find food to feed a starving family. This is about entertainment--things that people can live without. No one *needs* the latest Harry Potter movie. The morality in this situation is a lot clearer than the questionable situations you allude to.
I'm glad you admit that Techdirt is about way more than just helping people out. Techdirt is at the forefront of the copyright debate. So be so surprised when people want to discuss copyright with you guys. Funny how Mike always runs away from such debates. He's so opinionated and so vocal, yet when questioned about his beliefs, he's nowhere to be found. Weird. And don't pretend for one second that all I want to talk about is the morality. That's one thing I want to talk about, because it disgusts me how you guys pretend like it's not an issue ("wrong or not, it doesn't matter!"). I ask Mike all sorts of questions, and he runs from them all. He refuses to ever discuss his personal beliefs about copyright directly with any detractor.
Yes, it gives congress the power to enact such laws, yes. You try to use that to claim that the specific laws are automatically correct. That's a false conclusion, and you know it. You're the one grasping.
I'm saying it's correct because it in fact is the law and in fact people have copyright laws and in fact copyright rights are violated when someone pirates. If a pirate violates someone's rights, that is per se wrong. My moral compass is quite simple. I learned this stuff when I was like 4.
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Their rights ended when the 13th Amendment was passed, no? What's that got to do with copyright?
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Drinking during Prohibition was illegal. It didn't violate anyone's personal property rights. Was it immoral? That depends on your perspective. There was no law that said slaves couldn't be freed before "emancipation," whatever event that refers to. So I don't get your point.
Neither of those examples involves violating someone's personal property rights. Can you come up with a single, nonextreme example where it's moral to violate someone's property rights?
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I understand the law (doctrines, theory, and jurisprudence) better than you, and yet I'm not a business person. I haven't studied business formally. You have an MBA. You approach it from a business perspective. I have JD. I approach it from a law perspective.
No wonder it's so difficult to discuss this stuff with you. You want to ignore the crux of what copyright is all about... and then focus on the meaningless part.
And you refuse to discuss the law part, instead focused on only business end of things. Your approach to the law is to first decide what you think the correct answer is, and then to try and make the law fit into your predetermined answer. That's working backwards. Unlike you, I'm able to analyze a legal problem without starting with my answer. They're different approaches, Mike. No need to be all uppity and insulting because I approach things differently than you. I recognize that multiple points of view, including views that are different than my own, are important and productive. You just mock anyone and anything that's different.
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How is tautological to state that if Person A violates Person B's rights, then Person B is a victim? I know you won't answer.
If you can't make a LOGICAL argument, but instead resort to insanity like the above, it's really really difficult to take you seriously.
Again, how is it insane to point out the obvious? If a pirate is violating someone's rights, then someone is a victim of that pirate's actions. I know you won't answer.
Since you're so focused on the Socratic method: if someone has their copyright infringed upon, yet ends up better off because of it, are they a victim?
The question itself is suspect. Are you implying that pirates are doing their victims a favor? But what if the victim doesn't want their rights to be violated? Does it matter then that you, Mike Masnick, think they are better off? Or should we just respect people's wishes when it comes to their rights? I think the answer is obviously, "yes."
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Leigh: if you like, but that's not what we're talking about.
Joe: but, but, MORALITY!
Leigh is ignoring the moral implications because they aren't pleasant. That's not what he wants to talk about. Why? Because he sides with the amoral side of the debate.
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As far as saying which rights are more important than others, I don't see the point. Either someone has the right, or they don't.
I don't see a lot of point in debating someone who can't remain consistent over a 5-minute span whenever it suits their argument to wiffle-waffle
I said that rights are classified into different types. They are. I also said that a right is a right and it doesn't matter what type of right it is. For example, it doesn't matter which right of yours is at issue, I wouldn't violate it and I wouldn't support anyone else who does. Whether your property right or your free speech rights, I think your rights are important. I haven't wiffle-waffled. Just because you don't understand something, don't assume that others don't. Google the word "right" and get back to me. It's clear that you've never even noticed that there's different types of rights and at this point you're just trying to argue any little silly point you think you can make.
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There are more people who don't pirate than who do. That said, I think people pirate because it's easy, because they see lots of other people doing it, and because so few get caught. Rather than pay money for that great content that they really want, they just take it. And they read blogs like Techdirt where they are told that piracy is really the victims' fault, and they should just take whatever they want whenever they want it. It's a childish view. It's refusing to look past the end of their nose. When they grow up and have money and have some skin in the game, I suspect the point of view grows up too.
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So because you don't think they should be worried about it, they then shouldn't be worried about it? Compelling. Maybe they, who actually have their own skin in the game, feel differently. Does it threaten you when someone feels differently than you?
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I said that some moral things are so basic and so obvious that I've known them to be true since I was a child. You're really sounding like a child yourself with this line of argument.
Not long ago you said rights are rights and it's always wrong to violate them, and it's black and white and simple. Now suddenly there are different types of rights?
There have always been different kinds of rights. There's this thing that smart people do called "classification." They don't put all rights into one category, but instead they separate them into different types of rights. Crazy, I know.
Compelling!
I have seen him run from debates hundreds if not a thousand times.
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Techdirt's position is that the successful of the world of yesteryear are not the successful model of today.
And of course the model based on a goverment monopoly will be more successful than without monopoly, doesn't mean that's how the would should work
Yeah, 'cause selling a product that people absolutely love and want is a terrible business model. Give me a break. The content providers are creating products that everyone wants so much that people are willing to break the law to get it. They have every right to sell that product and not give it away. Just because it's easy to take it without paying doesn't mean that they have to change their model. Why aren't you demanding that the pirates stop taking what they haven't paid for?
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A simple moral compass is flawed because morallity is not simple
They aren't the same. They have different words and everything. But the laws usually track what we as society think is moral. How else would it work? And we don't get to decide which rights of others are important and which are not. Instead, as a society we decide in certain rules. And our duty as members of that society is to follow the rules. And no, a pirate's need to get the latest movie for free doesn't rise up to one of those situations where the law is clearly wrong. This isn't racism or slavery.
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If you want to get moral about it, copyright is a slight immorality that we all tolerate so long as copyright results in a net benefit to society.
Yep, copyright limits what everyone else can do with someone's property. All property rights do this. Would it be better for society if we took away all your property and gave it to the poor? Of course. Then why don't you advocate that?
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Simplistic. Suit yourself.
You yourself said that "violating the rights of creators is wrong in a very real sense." If it's so wrong, then why don't you ever speak out against it?
As far as saying which rights are more important than others, I don't see the point. Either someone has the right, or they don't. If they have the right, it should be respected. I treat others as I would have them treat me. I learned that when 4 as well.
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Huh? If you are violating copyright law, you are violating someone's rights. This is undebatable fact. You aren't violating a human right (in this country; whatever that means) or a civil right, but you are violating someone's right.
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You say it's less severe because the motivation -- entertainment versus starvation -- is less sever. But you leave out the fact that the other half, the action itself -- copying versus theft -- is also far less severe. Great way to twist the facts to suit your point.
Do you have to debate like a child? I wasn't saying that property rights like copyright are the same kind of rights. You don't appear to understand how analogies work. Read it back over and see if you can see the analogy I was making. My point was that you can claim that any right is made up. So what? And I'm not saying it's less severe. I'm saying that you're trying to compare jaywalking, where no individual's rights are violated in the process, to copyright infringement, where someone's rights are violated. I think you need to recognize that there are different types of rights. Jaywalking is still wrong. So is infringement. But infringement violates an individual's rights.
No need to crack this nut open again. You've gotten your responses from Mike plenty of times, and you will never ever be satisfied with them. If I were to stop talking right now, you'd accuse me of running from your questions -- even though you have asked the same question in slightly different ways a dozen times here, and gotten an answer from me every time. That's just your M.O.
Absolutely untrue. No one runs from debate faster than Mike. No one.
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My point, which went over your head, is that I learned that violating people's personal rights was wrong when I was four. Good job ignoring everything else I stated so you could get your childish dig in.
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I'm glad you admit that Techdirt is about way more than just helping people out. Techdirt is at the forefront of the copyright debate. So be so surprised when people want to discuss copyright with you guys. Funny how Mike always runs away from such debates. He's so opinionated and so vocal, yet when questioned about his beliefs, he's nowhere to be found. Weird. And don't pretend for one second that all I want to talk about is the morality. That's one thing I want to talk about, because it disgusts me how you guys pretend like it's not an issue ("wrong or not, it doesn't matter!"). I ask Mike all sorts of questions, and he runs from them all. He refuses to ever discuss his personal beliefs about copyright directly with any detractor.
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I'm saying it's correct because it in fact is the law and in fact people have copyright laws and in fact copyright rights are violated when someone pirates. If a pirate violates someone's rights, that is per se wrong. My moral compass is quite simple. I learned this stuff when I was like 4.
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