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Author Topic: Opinions on Pirating
Dagonee
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quote:
Now, here's my questions for pH and all the rest of y'all. First, take legalities out of the picture. I'm talking from a strictly moral standpoint.
First, it's impossible to separate legality from morality in this case. There are lots of different ways a society can choose to allocate rights to creative works, from no protection ever to total protection always. Each person gets the benefit of both sides of the bargain, although many choose not to exercise the monopoly rights over their own works.

But, if we atalk about what the law should be, not what it is, we can set legality aside for now.

quote:
1)What if the artist is dead?
Doesn't matter. If we make an economic right, there's no particular reason to sever that right at death. Artists need to provide for their family, plus making the rights sellable gives artists the chance to gain economic reward in advance of the popular market for their works.

If those rights didn't survive death, no one would be able to sell a creative work. Plus, what about multi-author works?

quote:
2)What if the pirate downloads only songs that were played on the radio, in the same format that the radio played them?
Doesn't matter one bit to the morality of it. First, composers/songwriters receive royalties for radio play of their works. Revoking that right now is not fair. Second, because someone publishes a work in a way that doesn't require money to view or listen to it does not mean that the work becomes public domain in that medium.

quote:
3)What if it were certain that the artist would recieve no money from the only cd's you could buy?
Doesn't matter - the artist received some payment when s/he transferred the rights. copying the CD dilutes the worth of that transferred good, making it harder to receive compensation in the future for new works. Plus, there's nothing less moral about a royalty because it goes to a company.

quote:
4)(this kinda follows up #3) What if there were NO other way to get their music?
Doesn't matter. They have chosen to limit distribution of their work - it's not your place to change that.

quote:
5)What if they happen to be System of a Down? (Sorry, personal biases run deep. There are some bands I hope fail so that they'll stay off the radio.)
Then you shouldn't need to listen to their music.
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Orincoro
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quote:
Originally posted by Dagonee:
First, it's impossible to separate legality from morality in this case.


You have a habit of substituting legality for morality, and I believe there is no circumstances in which morality is defined by or guided by legality. Legality must always be defined by moral principles, and it must reflect them. Once you start getting into the legal principles defining morals: i.e. since its illegal, it is somewhat immoral, sorry but you have lost you way as a person and a lawyer.

I know you didn't do that, but this statement hints at that kind of reasoning, which is just plain scary. You can go into the fact that laws are based on morals, therefore we must try and uphold laws, lest we ignore morals etc. I get all that, but we also need to keep a clear understanding of the function of the law. You sometimes talk as if the function of the law is to be the law, not to benefit society, or ethics, or reasonable intercourse between civilized people.
The law isn't the final word, history is the judge of all things.

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pH
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It depends on what defines your morals. If your morals are defined, at least partly, by a specific religious code, then chances are that religious code (especially if it is a Christian code) dictates that one should follow the laws of the land insofar as such laws do not directly conflict with the laws of the Father.

I, personally, do not think that the law exists to enforce morality.

-pH

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Orincoro
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Hmm. Yes pH you make a good point. I am thinking of it this way: Christianity's religious laws are all based upon a morality which is (supposedly) held in common by all christians. The purpose of the religious code is therefore to enforce the morals which are its foundation. For instance the morality says: respect life, so the the code says: don't kill things, don't hurt people, don't polute your body, etc. All the little codes are just smaller parts of one basic principle.

Isn't it the same with municipal laws? Yes its a different set of "morals," so maybe I should just say ethics, or goals. The laws exist to represent the deeper complete meaning of a set of common ethics. Of course if we were all telepathic and could live inside each other's memories and thoughts, we would need no laws because we would all have a common knowledge of the same ethical principles. Since we don't, I wonder how often the laws substitute themselves for ethics.

For instance the long battles over prohibition or marijuana use. The laws which exist against marijuana are largely in place for economic reasons, as well as political and societal inhibitions against Mexican encrouchment into Texas in the 1920s and 1930s. As a result of this marijuana remains illegal, and thus unstudied by modern medicine. As a result of the public awareness campaigns against cannibis, which were undertaken for these political reasons, the American consciousness has a skewed understanding of what it is. So it is illegal, and thus is becomes immoral.

Not to make you think that I have a particular agenda with marijuana, not so. This is all while it remains legal for a doctor to prescribe methamphetamines, cocaine, and opiates to their patients. Ecstacy is being studied for its effects on mood disturbances, as a low-dose anti-depressent. All of the drugs I've mentioned are the sources of terrible drug overdoses, addictions and deaths each year in the U.S. Opiate addiction is common among prescription drug users, however since it is legal, nothing is done about it, and people die.

I'm sure you can think of instances where this kind of dynamic arises: a small group or minority interest gets something made illegal, and that becomes part of the culture, to a point where we become convinced that the law has always represented our beliefs in full. So pH I think we do substitute laws for moral sometimes, even if we don't like it, or think we shouldn't. I think that for many people, laws do exist to reinforce their moral beliefs; they believe that laws are a way of extending their beliefs onto other people.

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Dagonee
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quote:
You have a habit of substituting legality for morality,
No, I don't. I have a very clear understanding of the differences between the two and which is more relevant to a particular issue.

In fact, more than most people on this board, I have advocated the legalization of acts I distinctly think to be immoral. Further, I am also one of the strongest advocates of limiting government's power to restrict speech while at the same time advocating that certain things just shouldn't be said.

You don't know what you are talking about when you say this. I am very conscious of the distinction between morality and legality and use that distinction with a fair amount of precision.

quote:
and I believe there is no circumstances in which morality is defined by or guided by legality.
Then you scare the hell out of me. We ride on the right side of the road because we need a convention to keep our roads safe. There's nothing moral about driving on the right side of the road, but there is something moral about obeying the law describing what side of the road one should drive on.

quote:
Legality must always be defined by moral principles, and it must reflect them. Once you start getting into the legal principles defining morals: i.e. since its illegal, it is somewhat immoral, sorry but you have lost you way as a person and a lawyer.

I know you didn't do that,

Then what's the lecture for?

quote:
but this statement hints at that kind of reasoning, which is just plain scary.
It only hints at that kind of reasoning if one lacks the ability to appreciate a highly nuanced issue. The distinction between law and morality is not one-way. It is a feedback loop, and recognizing that isn't scary, it's smart.

BTW, almost all ISP Terms Of Service prohibit use of the internet connection for copyright violations. Which means almost everyone hooked to the net has promised not to share files illegally - and breaking one's promise IS immoral.

quote:
You can go into the fact that laws are based on morals, therefore we must try and uphold laws, lest we ignore morals etc. I get all that, but we also need to keep a clear understanding of the function of the law.
I have a very clear understanding. I'm beginning to think you don't.

quote:
You sometimes talk as if the function of the law is to be the law, not to benefit society, or ethics, or reasonable intercourse between civilized people.
No, I don't. Just because I'm capable of making distinctions without (as you admitted I did not) erroneously confusing law and morality does not mean that I am unaware of the distinctions.

Next time you feel the need to make broad, inaccurate statements about me, do me the courtesy of at least trying to back them up first.

quote:
The law isn't the final word, history is the judge of all things.
No, it's not. History is more manipulable than law. There is a final word, but it's not the interpretation of events by a particular branch of academia.

There are many moral reasons to disobey the law. Wanting a bigger music collection isn't one of them.

[ April 03, 2006, 01:05 PM: Message edited by: Dagonee ]

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twinky
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quote:
If there hadn't been millions of people on napster, we still wouldn't have any legal download services available to us.
Exactly. The entire record and music industries missed the boat on the Internet in a huge way. There are two lessons that the record and music industries need to learn from the successes of online music stores:

(1) People want digital distribution.

Slowly but surely, the record and music industries seem to be figuring this out. However, consumers also want DRM restriction that are as non-intrusive as possible, if they have to be in place at all. A nice-to-have here would be the ability to re-download tracks you purchase in the case of things like hard drive failures. Until that happens, those who purchase music online have to put up with not really owning anything.

(2) People want to buy singles, not albums.

This, I think, is what really concerns the record and music industries -- that consumers really do just want that one hit single they hear incessantly on the radio (because the labels paid off the DJs to play it incessantly), rather than the whole album. There's a lot of pressure on Apple to allow price variation on iTMS, presumably so that hit singles and obscure classics could be priced higher. Of course, this wouldn't be the first time that the record industry engaged in price shenanigans.

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pH
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I'll be very surprised if anyone actually goes through with different pricing for singles.

And also, one of the reasons it's so hard for record labels to switch over to digital distribution: a lot of these guys just don't "get it." Most likely, it's because they were born too early to have really seen the evolution of digital distribution up close.

-pH

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twinky
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quote:
I'll be very surprised if anyone actually goes through with different pricing for singles.
On iTMS, it's already happening with albums. In some cases this is done under the guise of "bonus content," as with Coldplay's X&Y, where for $11.99 you get a video interview and a "digital booklet" of the album art along with your album download. For me, this was the lesser of two evils, since the CD was copy-protected and I don't buy copy-protected CDs anymore. In other cases, as with the recently-added Red Hot Chili Peppers catalogue, the albums are $11.99 for no apparent reason other than their popularity (Peppers albums are long, but you can get longer, less popular albums for the standard $9.99).

I wouldn't say I'm expecting to see variable single pricing, but if it doesn't happen it'll be in spite of the labels' desires, not because of them.

quote:
And also, one of the reasons it's so hard for record labels to switch over to digital distribution: a lot of these guys just don't "get it." Most likely, it's because they were born too early to have really seen the evolution of digital distribution up close.
Yes, I agree -- like how Bill Gates misjudged the whole Internet thing in The Road Ahead (published December 1995), only much more so. That isn't a justification for their reaction to the expression of consumer desire for legal digital distribution, though, just an explanation for it.
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pH
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twinky, the only differences in albums that I've seen are if you have to buy each separate track. Like, some albums are $11.95, and they have twelve tracks. That kind of thing. I don't think it's that big a deal. But I also don't have to pay for individual albums or tracks anymore, and when I did, I wouldn't buy the whole album unless I either was totally infatuated with the artist or knew for sure that I wanted to hear a significant portion of the songs.

-pH

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Chris Bridges
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I would really, really appreciate it if the "I can loan a friend a CD, why can't I put songs online" argument was dropped forever as being exceptionally stupid. It leaves out the element of scale, which makes a big difference in any argument.

If I drove by and tossed a cigarette butt in your driveway you probably wouldn't call the cops on me. Annoying, but no big deal, even though littering is against the law. It's just not worth the trouble enforcing the law right then. If I backed up a truck and started filling up your yard with cigarette butts, you would call the cops, even though I'm just doing what I did before when you let it go.

There are plenty of excellent arguments to be made in this topic. "It's OK sometimes, it should be OK all the time" is not one of them.

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twinky
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pH, I preferentially buy (and pirate, when I do that) by album. In that respect it seems I differ from most of the online music services' customers. [Smile]

iTMS has by far the biggest piece of the pie -- last time I checked, its share of the legal download market was greater than 70%. And like I said, the labels want variable pricing. If they can pressure Apple into changing, they can almost certainly do the same to any of the smaller vendors (Napster, Puretracks, whoever).

Apple has already introduced variable single pricing in iTMS Japan (ranging from about US$1.35 to US$1.80 per song), and the Japanese store was one of the last ones to open. Apple's U.S. licensing deal with the labels is set for renegotiation this year, so we'll see what happens.

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Chris Bridges
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It'll be interesting to watch because one thing the record companies cannot seem to understand is that consumers aren't listening to them anymore. We no longer accept that their way is the only to get music. Every draconian DRM method that has been presented has resulted in bad press and lackluster sales, while download services with minimal or no DRM and reasonable prices have sold as fast as people could click.

We want our music our way, to be enjoyed as we see fit, and we know how easy it is to get. The companies that can provide that are taking over the marketplace. The companies that fear it will eventually go away. Even iTunes isn't immune, and I think they're smart enough to know that.

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twinky
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Apple may be smart enough to know that, but even if they are, they may not be persuasive enough to overcome the labels' sense that Apple is just using iTMS as a vehicle for selling iPods (which is true).

So yeah, I agree, it'll be interesting. [Smile]

The main reason I oppose variable album pricing is that so far it has gone only one way: up. Popular albums cost more and the only albums that cost less have fewer than 10 tracks (and so are sold on a per-track basis, as with EPs). There's a firm upper limit on what I'm willing to pay for lossy audio with DRM restrictions; the convenience of downloading doesn't outweigh the higher quality of CD audio when the prices are equivalent. If I can buy an album on iTMS for $12 and the CD for $14, I'm a lot more likely to go with the CD. If I can buy the album on iTMS for $10, it's a different story.

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Chris Bridges
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And you don't think that's why the labels want it? Price iTMS up and people will start buying CDs again, I'm guessing that's the reasoning.

Thing is, the choice isn't just between high priced downloads and CDs. People may also choose between higher priced downloads and free downloads. I think the music industry is misunderstanding the current boom in legal music downloads. It's not because everyone suddenly realized Stealing Is Wrong. It's because finally music is easy and convenient to buy at a reasonable price.

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twinky
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I agree completely. [Smile]
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Mabus
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Without condoning piracy....

I make a note that the concept of "owning" an infinitely duplicable idea is difficult to absorb. I buy a CD; it's mine; why shouldn't I share the music? I buy a PC; it's mine; why shouldn't I share the software?

If I steal someone's television, I take it for myself, but I also deprive them of it. If I steal someone's song, they still have it. It's hard to get your mind around the idea that the real use of a creative property is not to entertain (which can be shared by everyone) but to make money for the creator.

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mr_porteiro_head
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This is exactly why "piracy" is not "stealing" -- it's copyright infringement.
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Mabus
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If this was discussed earlier, MPH, and I thus missed it by not reading the whole thread, I am hereby abashed, humbled, and embarrassed.
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twinky
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Here's an example of a record exec making his desire for variable single pricing quite clear.
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mr_porteiro_head
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I don't recall it being discussed before, Mabus. My statment wasn't an attack on you -- it was just a satement of my view.
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Mabus
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Oh. So here I was being all embarrassed for nothing. Phooey on you. [Razz]

Could you elaborate? If copyright infringement is something other than a form of theft, what makes it wrong, exactly?

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mr_porteiro_head
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Two quick reasons:

A) It's against the law.
B) It can deprive artists ahd their industry from profits they would have had otherwise.

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Irregardless
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quote:
Originally posted by Mabus:
Could you elaborate? If copyright infringement is something other than a form of theft, what makes it wrong, exactly?

IMO, copyright infringement is *not* necessarily wrong. Taking credit for someone's work is wrong, because it's deceptive, but merely replicating and distributing someone else's original content is not; we do this every time we repeat a joke we've heard. Copyright is a somewhat imaginary right that, in the U.S. and other countries, people have chosen to codify in law. But I agree with MPH that it is not theft, or any other sort of property crime.
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Chris Bridges
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What is needed -- although not in the eyes of the RIAA -- is a system that acknowledges and even embraces the distributing power of the Internet while still providing a way for artists to receive compensation for, and retain some measure of control over, their work. Arguments in that direction would be useful.
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fugu13
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Property rights are the foundation of a modern economy. Absent well defined, protected property rights, an economy cannot function (edit: efficiently, just to be clear), because the principles of exchange break down. For the purposes of economics, it doesn't matter whether the property is or is not tangible; people will be more reluctant to found businesses involving such goods if property rights are not effectively protected. For instance, intellectual property businesses are markedly behind other businesses in those regimes that allow rampant pirating.

Copyright infringement most definitely is an infringement on property. In many ways it is more akin to trespass (another property violation) than theft. Generally it is not a "crime", being a matter of civil rather than criminal law.

Also, remember that the copyright law that protects musical artists is the same law that protects, say, graphic designers. Someone could spend many hours working on a website design, then see it taken by a dozen others absent effective protections that allow the designer to pursue action. Many seem to see their actions as not hurting the music industry, but its much harder to argue such copying doesn't hurt the graphic design industry.

As a side note, the (physical) property rights many of us consider so fundamental and obvious, aren't. There are many countries where most of the population has substantial illegal property, due to excessive regulations on establishing the presence of those rights. Being able to prove to another that you own something in a legal sense, a sense more than "I have physical control of this", is unusual, and is not a natural, obvious right. So when saying how intellectual property rights are artificial, be aware that so are many of the physical property rights we enjoy.

[ April 03, 2006, 02:03 PM: Message edited by: fugu13 ]

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pH
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Price increases could also just increase the number of "to go" subscribers.

[Cool]

-pH

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Chreese Sroup
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Or it would decrease the amount of sales period.

Edit: Here is a good link for people to read: http://www.linuxp2p.com/forums/portal.php?article=0

[ April 03, 2006, 04:11 PM: Message edited by: Chreese Sroup ]

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Orincoro
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Dag, I believe you have a very good understanding of the difference. I only wish you would choose not to snow every issue with the letter of the law interpretation. Your jumping in with the legal facts is nice, however it doesn't convince me of anything except your handle on those facts. I don't know them, and to a large extent I don't need to know them, since they often don't apply to the practical discussion at hand.

People are talking about right and wrong, and you jump in to let us all know what the law says. That's fine, but I don't feel its always as important to reinforce that aspect of the discussion. We all have a reasonable idea of the legality of downloading, and we're discussing it with the assumption that its illegal, so your saying something to the effect of:, "hey everybody, its illegal!," also keeps us from hearing your opinions. Since your very smart, I would like to hear you express yourself without heaping on the legal stuff sometimes. I don't control you plainly, this is just my opinion, as always I am not supported by a mountain of research, just my gut.

As for your point by point rebutal. You assume an incorrect interpretation of every sentence you quote from my post. There it is, you're either putting words in my mouth, or taking a critique of style as a critique of character. Its frankly very easy to pull sentences out of context and blow them up by assuming I mean this or that, or the other such nonsense. Its by degrees more difficult to read your opinions when you write this way.

I'm particularly suprised that you would dismiss me by saying I don't know what I'm talking about, as if my gut reaction to your style is somehow flawed (I can only feel what I feel). Also you say that history can be interpreted by a particular branch of academia. Are you only in favor of the branch in which you're included- the one that can tell me I'm not qualified to express my opinions?

This all being based on a false assumption: I said you subtitute legality for morality because that's what I see. I didn't say you do this out of ignorance, nor do I think you are confused by the two, so forgive me if I gave you that impression, its far from accurate. I simply meant that you do it here, you present your opinions on legality as if they were moral reasoning. Whether that is true or not, it is the impression I had, and still have. So on the whole I apologize if I misled you in my wording, but the sentiment still stands; more so on reading your reply. [Smile] But I don't hold grudges, so I hope you won't if you feel I'm insensitive. (I am, ussually)

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Orincoro
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quote:
Originally posted by Dagonee:


BTW, almost all ISP Terms Of Service prohibit use of the internet connection for copyright violations. Which means almost everyone hooked to the net has promised not to share files illegally - and breaking one's promise IS immoral.


I forgot about this point at first. Yes good point, didn't know that, but its quite a different matter. In this case I think many people aren't aware of the restriction, like me, so you have to take that into account. But a valid point nonetheless, makes the whole thing more personall. I agree anyway, downloading is wrong, though it is an enigmatic issue.
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mr_porteiro_head
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quote:
Also you say that history can be interpreted by a particular branch of academia.
I think he meant that history is a branch of academia.
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Chris Bridges
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In this case I think many people aren't aware of the restriction, like me, so you have to take that into account.

Not really. If you sign a document -- any document -- without reading and fully understanding the things you have just agreed to, I have little sympathy for you.

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mr_porteiro_head
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Chris -- how carefully do you read the EULAs of all the software you use?
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Robin Kaczmarczyk
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I made a strong proposal to the WGA, DGA and other guilds to resolve once and for all the pirate problem in Latin America. Did they listen? Nooooooo...

Next thing will be to suspend parley.

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Dagonee
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quote:
Dag, I believe you have a very good understanding of the difference. I only wish you would choose not to snow every issue with the letter of the law interpretation. Your jumping in with the legal facts is nice, however it doesn't convince me of anything except your handle on those facts. I don't know them, and to a large extent I don't need to know them, since they often don't apply to the practical discussion at hand.
I think you shoudl reread my post at the top of the page, specifically "But, if we atalk about what the law should be, not what it is, we can set legality aside for now."

The numbered response speak directly to the morality. At most, only one of them references the current legal regime, but via a moral premise: that changing the rules at this point would be unfair. Reliance has moral, economic (I'm sure fugu could fill you in extensively on why reliance is essential to economic efficiency), and legal aspects. I spoke to the moral side of the concept.

quote:
People are talking about right and wrong, and you jump in to let us all know what the law says.
Again, that's not what I did. I have at other points in this thread made comments about the current state of the law, but only either in response to misstatements or questions about it, or where it's relevant to the moral aspect. Anyway, people were not merely talking about right and wrong, but also about the law, so your characterization of the thread is inaccurate.

quote:
We all have a reasonable idea of the legality of downloading, and we're discussing it with the assumption that its illegal, so your saying something to the effect of:, "hey everybody, its illegal!," also keeps us from hearing your opinions.
Actually, there has been ongoing dispute as to what is illegal about downloading. Further, people have referenced other legal forms of sharing (see "books from the library"), drawing an analogy via the law to argue why file sharing isn't immoral. A legal explanation in response to such an argument is perfectly relevant.

quote:
I'm particularly suprised that you would dismiss me by saying I don't know what I'm talking about, as if my gut reaction to your style is somehow flawed (I can only feel what I feel).
"You have a habit of substituting legality for morality" isn't an expression of a feeling. It's an inaccurate factual statement about me.

quote:
Also you say that history can be interpreted by a particular branch of academia. Are you only in favor of the branch in which you're included- the one that can tell me I'm not qualified to express my opinions?
That's not what I said at all. Chris B. got it.

quote:
This all being based on a false assumption: I said you subtitute legality for morality because that's what I see. I didn't say you do this out of ignorance
Well, yes, you actually did say it out of ignorance. Specifically, you were ignorant about what I was doing in the post at the top of this page and ignorant as a matter of fact about my "substituting" legality for morality. I don't do that, certainly not to the extent that it's a "habit."

quote:
I simply meant that you do it here, you present your opinions on legality as if they were moral reasoning.
Again, I don't.

quote:
Whether that is true or not, it is the impression I had, and still have.
Sure, you can have that impression. It's wrong, and when you state it publicly as a factual statement, I will correct you.

quote:
In this case I think many people aren't aware of the restriction, like me, so you have to take that into account.
I doubt that (edit: to be specific, I doubt that it's "many" people that don't know that, not you specifically), but it doesn't change the morality of the situation one bit.

quote:
Chris -- how carefully do you read the EULAs of all the software you use?
I'm not Chris, but I read them very carefully. Raise your hand if your shocked. [Big Grin]
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Chris Bridges
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Chris -- how carefully do you read the EULAs of all the software you use?

Depends on the software. If it's something I suspect is going to bite me, I read it or at least skim through it to look for sneaky stuff.

BUT if I did sign without reading and then inadvertantly violate an agreement, I would not then try to explain away my culpability because hey, no one ever reads those things. Or are you arguing that I should be less responsible for my own actions?

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mr_porteiro_head
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I was arguing nothing of the sort. I was trying to understand where you are coming from.
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Chris Bridges
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Fair enough. I don't like the "I didn't read what I signed" excuse.
While there are few people who do read every line of everything they sign in their lives, the proper response upon finding out you've violated an agreement would be more like "Oh, I didn't realize, I'll accept the responsibility," instead of "it's not my fault, no one ever reads those things."

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Orincoro
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Dag, I wished you'd paid my attention to my point about your argumentative style: I am not going to wade through an out of context analysis of every sentence I write. I don't do this to you because it would be tedious for both of us. Sorry, but if you refuse to form a coherent narrative of your own, I won't spend my time reading my words thrown back at me. That's childish.
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Dagonee
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quote:
Dag, I wished you'd paid my attention to my point about your argumentative style: I am not going to wade through an out of context analysis of every sentence I write. I don't do this to you because it would be tedious for both of us. Sorry, but if you refuse to form a coherent narrative of your own, I won't spend my time reading my words thrown back at me. That's childish.
You've now had two opportunities to either provide some backup for your "feeling" or withdraw your statement about how I substitute legality for morality. You've refused to do both, using as an excuse that you don't like my "style."

Fine. I'll just go on record as saying your style of making up stuff about me isn't any more pleasing to me.

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pH
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You know, I will be really happy when it is possible for me to purchase a ringtone version of any song I can legally download, and I'm guessing I'm not the only one.

And I would pay far, far out the ass for such a possibility. I mean, seeing as I pay $2.49 a ringtone plus $.01 a kilobite for these less-than-thirty-second clips now, I think it's pretty clear that I would have no problem paying for more of them.

Besides, I really want ringtones of songs that will never be popular enough to be sold for my phone.

In fact, someone should create a service that allows me to pay a fee to make an X-second clip of a song myself. Because seriously, I would pay good money to have my phone play a Zeromancer clip when it rings.

/random thought.

-pH

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camus
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quote:
In fact, someone should create a service that allows me to pay a fee to make an X-second clip of a song myself.
A free and fairly simple option is to use iTunes. Just set the begin and end times of the song, convert to mp3, and a copy of the song will be made in iTunes. Assuming your phone can play mp3 files and has a fairly simple data transfer method (USB or Blue Tooth), putting it on your phone should be fairly simple.

Audacity is another free program that you can use to edit audio files.

Or do you view this as infringing on copyrights unless the owner can in some way get compensated?

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pH
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My phone won't accept an audio clip as a ringtone unless it's sent to my phone from Cingular as a ringtone.

And I'd still like to pay for the ringtone.

And I don't use iTunes. Although from what I understand, Napster is actually selling ringtones now...maybe they have a better selection than Cingular.

I just realized that I COULD do the exact same thing with the songs I have now...but again, then there's the problem of getting them to my phone and having my phone recognize them as ringtones. Cingular has a function with which I can make custom wallpaper...*shakes fist*

-pH

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the_Somalian
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There really is no moral defense for pirating as much as those who pirate try. All this issue proves is that the great majority of people will willingly steal if stealing is made convenient and reprucussions unlikely.
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mr_porteiro_head
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Or that people don't consider copyright violations as "stealing".
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the_Somalian
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mr_porteiro_head, if I am acquiring a product when its owners don't want me to because I have not paid for it, then, nevermind how I rationalize the fact to myself, I am stealing.
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raventh1
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Not really, most of the music and TV that is broadcast to the general public is actually technically Public Domain. I'm bombarded with it, and I can't refuse it. More Info


Technically, everything that has been recorded from the air and copied is ok, as long as it isnt for monetary gain. (friends, family)

Edit: It also isn't stealing. Stealing is depriving someone of a good. You'd be depriving them of the money they got from a service, I say service because it isn't a tangible good.

[ April 04, 2006, 03:07 PM: Message edited by: raventh1 ]

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Chris Bridges
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It may be covered under Fair Use, but it is not Public Domain. That is a specific designation that covers items past a copyright date, or items purposely released into public domain by the copyright holders.

Fair Use covers instances when copyrighted material may still be copied and/or distributed under certain conditions such as for personal or scholastic use, journalistic review (and then only a small portion), etc.

It also isn't stealing. Stealing is depriving someone of a good. You'd be depriving them of the money they got from a service, I say service because it isn't a tangible good.

It is, however, illegal, whatever word you want to use for it. Please stop trying to make it sound somehow less illegal by muddying the language.

Argue against the draconian tactics of the RIAA, or the unfair profit markup, or the way artists are treated, or even argue towards the necessity of a new system if only because the old one is proving to be more and more unenforceable, and I'm right there with you.

But the "it isn't stealing" semantics are just lame.

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mr_porteiro_head
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quote:
Originally posted by the_Somalian:
mr_porteiro_head, if I am acquiring a product when its owners don't want me to because I have not paid for it, then, nevermind how I rationalize the fact to myself, I am stealing.

If I acquire something without depriving anybody of anything, it's different enough from traditional physical theft that I think it is misleading to call them by by same word.

In other words, it's not theft, it's copyright infringement.

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Dagonee
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quote:
If I acquire something without depriving anybody of anything,
But you're begging the question with the conclusion that you aren't depriving them of anything. For example, there are mechanical royalties (an automatic right to make such a performance for a payment amount that is set by law or regulation) due for public performances of certain works. Are you depriving the authors of those royalties if you make a public performance without paying the mechanical royalty?

Similarly, if a company is selling a song in iTunes for .99, and they get half that amount, are they being deprived of that 49.9 cents if you download it from elsewhere?

I can see arguments going either way, but it's certainly not a foregone conclusion.

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Orincoro
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I think mph was more interested in the passivity of the crime: your not "taking" 99 cents away, your really just not caughing up the 99 cents you might have payed. You ARE taking the song, but that isn't "real" in a physical way so it doesn't feel any different from looking at a free webpage. Also the whole thing occurs in a kind of effect vacuum, you could do it or not do it, the immediate effect on the world outside of you will be zero, no-one is going to notice their music missing from the shelf or anything, so it feels different.
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