4 ms·

This is the Napster generation. We don't think all laws should be obeyed.

by dublidu 10y ago

TeMPOraL 10y ago
I don't think all laws should be followed either[0]. But I try to follow them to the best of my abilities regardless. [0] - Since you bring up Napster; yes, I'm guilty of piracy just like everyone else and I'm in general opposed to the very concept of "intellectual property". I applaud initiatives like SciHub too, but don't encourage - or consider virtuous - breaking laws for personal profit at expense of society at large. So while it may seem so, it's not hypocritical. I think of SciHub as a Good Thing, while I consider my own past history with downloading video games as a small but bad thing. The stuff Uber, AirBnB and tax evasion in general does lands squarely on the bad side of this - ignoring laws for personal profit, local markets and society in general be damned.
- danso 10y ago
  Piracy isn't personal profit? You're acquiring something without paying for it. That has a direct effect on your personal bottom line, while depriving revenue for the content creator and the tax collector.
  - TeMPOraL 10y ago
    Piracy like the kind I admitted to doing in the past - yes, it is personal profit and it's bad in my books. Piracy like SciHub does is literally propelling humanity forward.
    - paulryanrogers 10y ago
      Unless it discourages future researchers from undertaking costly research.
      - TeMPOraL 10y ago
        So far the consensus seems to be that it enables researchers to do their work, by not having to bleed their budgets out on accessing tons of papers they need. Also, research doesn't run on dollars as a currency, but on prestige. Which requires one's work to be read by others. At this point a lot of scientific publishers are simply rent seekers - you have to pay them to get published and then they turn around and make others pay to access the PDF. But this topic has been discussed many times on HN, so I'll refer you to those threads - a good search keyword would be "Elsevier".

This is the Napster generation. We don't think all laws should be obeyed.

by dublidu 10y ago

This is the Napster generation. We don't think all laws should be obeyed.

I don't think all laws should be followed either[0]. But I try to follow them to the best of my abilities regardless. [0] - Since you bring up Napster; yes, I'm guilty of piracy just like everyone else and I'm in general opposed to the very concept of "intellectual property". I applaud initiatives like SciHub too, but don't encourage - or consider virtuous - breaking laws for personal profit at expense of society at large. So while it may seem so, it's not hypocritical. I think of SciHub as a Good Thing, while I consider my own past history with downloading video games as a small but bad thing. The stuff Uber, AirBnB and tax evasion in general does lands squarely on the bad side of this - ignoring laws for personal profit, local markets and society in general be damned.

danso 10y ago
Piracy isn't personal profit? You're acquiring something without paying for it. That has a direct effect on your personal bottom line, while depriving revenue for the content creator and the tax collector.
- TeMPOraL 10y ago
  Piracy like the kind I admitted to doing in the past - yes, it is personal profit and it's bad in my books. Piracy like SciHub does is literally propelling humanity forward.
  - paulryanrogers 10y ago
    Unless it discourages future researchers from undertaking costly research.
    - TeMPOraL 10y ago
      So far the consensus seems to be that it enables researchers to do their work, by not having to bleed their budgets out on accessing tons of papers they need. Also, research doesn't run on dollars as a currency, but on prestige. Which requires one's work to be read by others. At this point a lot of scientific publishers are simply rent seekers - you have to pay them to get published and then they turn around and make others pay to access the PDF. But this topic has been discussed many times on HN, so I'll refer you to those threads - a good search keyword would be "Elsevier".