4 ms·

Ah yes, Mob justice, bring the pitchforks plz. I start hearing Smeagol's my preccccciiooosssss when some artists and coders talk about their work. [Edit] Owne

by madair 16y ago

Ah yes, Mob justice, bring the pitchforks plz. I start hearing Smeagol's my preccccciiooosssss when some artists and coders talk about their work. [Edit] Ownership of goods is a social construction, not a universal truth nor is there some universal morality to consider. We can consider his feelings, but I'll tell you what, the peeps getting snippy here about justice for someone's ASCII generator, while simultaneously accepting the near universal oppression of poor people by their own consumption habits protected by intellectual property laws have somewhat questionable priorities, it would seem.

houseabsolute 16y ago
> nor is there some universal morality to consider It's a social construction most of us agree on, though. In fact, I have no doubt that some on here consider it fundamental to the advancement of the species. You're free to be here and disagree with us about it, but don't expect us to couch all our conversations in hypotheticals because you differ with us on our "undebatable subjects" -- those subjects we have pondered over enough that we need not debate them again and again every time someone raises an objection. > near universal oppression of poor people by their own consumption habits . . . The theory is that if the content isn't protected it won't be generated _at all_ at the margin. You can debate that theory if you like, but if it is true then the mere removal of the laws won't do a lick of good for poor people. Similarly, if wealth accumulation is disallowed, it's not that poor people will magically become wealthier. Instead what will happen is those who had previously worked hard to accumulate wealth will stop working as hard, and less wealth overall will be created.
- madair 16y ago
  1. Agreeing on it doesn't make it moral. [Edit: although it does create a moral majority, aka, the tyranny of the majority] 2. Trickle down economics at its finest. Where's the evidence? I'll give you some counter-evidence: music after vs music before MP3 pirating. Seems like this vibrant cultural explosion happened despite all that lack of trickle down, huh. By your logic the colonialists and imperialists did a favor for all those tragic natives. I mean, where would all those Indians and Indonesians be without all that wealth creation by the East India Company?!?? [Edit: or Apple] The point is this system of IP is predicated on acceptance of not just winners but losers (at life), and justified with a generous self-serving of trickle-down economics. [Edit, to insert an LOL at people who think IP wouldn't be created without necessarily oppressing foreigners and people born without silver spoons. Note, I am aware that I have to construct the connection, and I haven't done that here, but there's no point in this forum, abstractions like this remain couched as a conveniently theoretical debate, despite the very real lives that poor people lead] [Edit, to insert another LOL at people who think that we must support our wealthy people's desire to create more wealth]
  - houseabsolute 16y ago
    > 1. Agreeing on it doesn't make it moral. [Edit: although it does create a moral majority, aka, the tyranny of the majority] Yeah, but it does mean that we may unapologetically assume it when we talk about economic issues.
    - madair 16y ago
      You can unapologetically assume that only for as long as you do not accept culpability for the outcome. Or rather, you may accept culpability unapologetically, it just says a lot about you, even if you don't realize it. [Edit: people can't stand when you only debate on the actual terms of an artificially constructed reality, rather than the make-believe terms that only exist within that reality. It's human, it keeps us from having to think about consequences. But why is that reasonable, it is just convenient.]
      - houseabsolute 16y ago
        You can talk about artificially constructed realities all you want, but the idea that other people matter is also artificially constructed. It's not the "source" of the reality that matters. What matters is whether we generally agree on it.
        madair 16y ago
        >>> You can talk about artificially constructed realities all you want, but the idea that other people matter is also artificially constructed. Yes, we can choose to believe that other moral matters relating to people driven in herds to create profit for far wealthier people matters more than say moralizing about IP regimes which have a large net negative affect on those same people. As I said earlier, it's a matter of priorities. Nicely put ;) There's a handy quotation from random famous person that nails this one nicely, but I can't think of it right now. [Edit, but we can break it down more in so many directions, and all of them end up very badly for the true believers in advancing civilization with schemes that necessarily require there to be vast numbers of losers for the small numbers of winners. Goddamn that whole conscience thing gets in the way, put a cork in it fast!!!] >>> It's not the "source" of the reality that matters. What matters is whether we generally agree on it. Actually, I think that only matters to the winners under that scheme.
chc 16y ago
You start by eschewing the idea of "universal truth" and "morality" in order to show that we don't have the right to act so high-and-mighty, but then you attack us for our "questionable priorities." I can't really figure out your standpoint, unless it's just "What I believe is correct and anybody who holds a contradictory view is immoral."
- madair 16y ago
  In the absence of an absolute, we have to deal with what we have, there are people who wish to grant monopolies and claim a moral prerogative, all the while assuming or claiming that the inequalities created are justified. I suggest that those assumptions or claims are faulty. And yes, I choose to attack priorities that do act high and mighty (good description for the whole general mob outcry, btw) while they ignore the inequalities created and/or bolstered by the very same IP regime which is at issue. Why is that confusing? We must constantly select intellectual abstractions to guide our reasoning. That becomes more difficult once there is a realization of the lack of clear absolutes (and very difficult if one is originally religious). As coders we're aware better than most that all abstractions are leaky, but they are still valuable. My specific desire in the discussion for this article is to cause someone who is in the midst of mob furor to question the trade-offs of the IP issue at hand and consider that all this sense of justice may (I say does) create and rationalize more inequalities than we would have otherwise, and either way is utilitarian in its notions (i.e. the greater good, etc) and the people arguing for it may not have considered that and may not actually agree with the full implications of those ideas. We've got enough actual scarcity, why are we creating more? [Edit: It's very convenient for artists and artisans (coders, for instance) to feel morally justified, but why are the inequalities created by them in the pursuit of wealth or fame any different than those created by the uber-wealthy? It's all just a bit too self serving.] [Edit: We have to live in the world we have. Getting the impression that I'm claiming a person should not utilize IP at all is incorrect, it's a whole other thing to light the torches and burn down a house with a smug sense of rightness of a cause, and that's when I think, okay, enough play, you might have to use what we've got to survive, be stable, attempt to find satisfying lives for ourselves and our families, but let's not get too sure of the justice of it all.]

by madair 16y ago

houseabsolute 16y ago

> nor is there some universal morality to consider It's a social construction most of us agree on, though. In fact, I have no doubt that some on here consider it fundamental to the advancement of the species. You're free to be here and disagree with us about it, but don't expect us to couch all our conversations in hypotheticals because you differ with us on our "undebatable subjects" -- those subjects we have pondered over enough that we need not debate them again and again every time someone raises an objection. > near universal oppression of poor people by their own consumption habits . . . The theory is that if the content isn't protected it won't be generated _at all_ at the margin. You can debate that theory if you like, but if it is true then the mere removal of the laws won't do a lick of good for poor people. Similarly, if wealth accumulation is disallowed, it's not that poor people will magically become wealthier. Instead what will happen is those who had previously worked hard to accumulate wealth will stop working as hard, and less wealth overall will be created.

madair 16y ago
1. Agreeing on it doesn't make it moral. [Edit: although it does create a moral majority, aka, the tyranny of the majority] 2. Trickle down economics at its finest. Where's the evidence? I'll give you some counter-evidence: music after vs music before MP3 pirating. Seems like this vibrant cultural explosion happened despite all that lack of trickle down, huh. By your logic the colonialists and imperialists did a favor for all those tragic natives. I mean, where would all those Indians and Indonesians be without all that wealth creation by the East India Company?!?? [Edit: or Apple] The point is this system of IP is predicated on acceptance of not just winners but losers (at life), and justified with a generous self-serving of trickle-down economics. [Edit, to insert an LOL at people who think IP wouldn't be created without necessarily oppressing foreigners and people born without silver spoons. Note, I am aware that I have to construct the connection, and I haven't done that here, but there's no point in this forum, abstractions like this remain couched as a conveniently theoretical debate, despite the very real lives that poor people lead] [Edit, to insert another LOL at people who think that we must support our wealthy people's desire to create more wealth]
- houseabsolute 16y ago
  > 1. Agreeing on it doesn't make it moral. [Edit: although it does create a moral majority, aka, the tyranny of the majority] Yeah, but it does mean that we may unapologetically assume it when we talk about economic issues.
  - madair 16y ago
    You can unapologetically assume that only for as long as you do not accept culpability for the outcome. Or rather, you may accept culpability unapologetically, it just says a lot about you, even if you don't realize it. [Edit: people can't stand when you only debate on the actual terms of an artificially constructed reality, rather than the make-believe terms that only exist within that reality. It's human, it keeps us from having to think about consequences. But why is that reasonable, it is just convenient.]
    - houseabsolute 16y ago
      You can talk about artificially constructed realities all you want, but the idea that other people matter is also artificially constructed. It's not the "source" of the reality that matters. What matters is whether we generally agree on it.
      - madair 16y ago
        >>> You can talk about artificially constructed realities all you want, but the idea that other people matter is also artificially constructed. Yes, we can choose to believe that other moral matters relating to people driven in herds to create profit for far wealthier people matters more than say moralizing about IP regimes which have a large net negative affect on those same people. As I said earlier, it's a matter of priorities. Nicely put ;) There's a handy quotation from random famous person that nails this one nicely, but I can't think of it right now. [Edit, but we can break it down more in so many directions, and all of them end up very badly for the true believers in advancing civilization with schemes that necessarily require there to be vast numbers of losers for the small numbers of winners. Goddamn that whole conscience thing gets in the way, put a cork in it fast!!!] >>> It's not the "source" of the reality that matters. What matters is whether we generally agree on it. Actually, I think that only matters to the winners under that scheme.

chc 16y ago

You start by eschewing the idea of "universal truth" and "morality" in order to show that we don't have the right to act so high-and-mighty, but then you attack us for our "questionable priorities." I can't really figure out your standpoint, unless it's just "What I believe is correct and anybody who holds a contradictory view is immoral."

madair 16y ago
In the absence of an absolute, we have to deal with what we have, there are people who wish to grant monopolies and claim a moral prerogative, all the while assuming or claiming that the inequalities created are justified. I suggest that those assumptions or claims are faulty. And yes, I choose to attack priorities that do act high and mighty (good description for the whole general mob outcry, btw) while they ignore the inequalities created and/or bolstered by the very same IP regime which is at issue. Why is that confusing? We must constantly select intellectual abstractions to guide our reasoning. That becomes more difficult once there is a realization of the lack of clear absolutes (and very difficult if one is originally religious). As coders we're aware better than most that all abstractions are leaky, but they are still valuable. My specific desire in the discussion for this article is to cause someone who is in the midst of mob furor to question the trade-offs of the IP issue at hand and consider that all this sense of justice may (I say does) create and rationalize more inequalities than we would have otherwise, and either way is utilitarian in its notions (i.e. the greater good, etc) and the people arguing for it may not have considered that and may not actually agree with the full implications of those ideas. We've got enough actual scarcity, why are we creating more? [Edit: It's very convenient for artists and artisans (coders, for instance) to feel morally justified, but why are the inequalities created by them in the pursuit of wealth or fame any different than those created by the uber-wealthy? It's all just a bit too self serving.] [Edit: We have to live in the world we have. Getting the impression that I'm claiming a person should not utilize IP at all is incorrect, it's a whole other thing to light the torches and burn down a house with a smug sense of rightness of a cause, and that's when I think, okay, enough play, you might have to use what we've got to survive, be stable, attempt to find satisfying lives for ourselves and our families, but let's not get too sure of the justice of it all.]