5 ms·

maybe the competition who followed the law. maybe no one. i'm not sure. regardless of my opinion of who is hurt in the GPL case, i do have one in the movie dow

by xlnt 19y ago

maybe the competition who followed the law. maybe no one. i'm not sure. regardless of my opinion of who is hurt in the GPL case, i do have one in the movie downloading case. you seem to too, but you still won't say who is being hurt.

tptacek 19y ago
I don't accept your premise that the content downloaded on Torrent networks would otherwise not be paid for. So I'm going to go with, "the producers of content are hurt".
- xlnt 19y ago
  i said when it wouldn't be paid for anyway, then it doesn't hurt anyone. this is obviously common because people download more stuff than they could afford.
  - tptacek 19y ago
    So your argument is, even though a significant fraction of the market acquires a movie for free (the "vast good" the torrent networks do, in your view), the downloads don't depress the market value of the movie. In other words, when supply goes to "infinite", demand is unaffected. Your ideas are intriguing to me and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.
    - xlnt 19y ago
      Your ideas are intriguing to me and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter. you still haven't answered the question and now you're sarcastically insulting me. that's called trolling.
      - tptacek 19y ago
        You haven't asked a question since I answered your last specious one [1], but if you do, you can expect a response in the same tone. [1] Specious point: because we cannot pinpoint the parties harmed by our unauthorized use of other people's content, we should assume, until proven otherwise, that any such use is harmless. So, because you can't reason through who is harmed by GPL copyvio (hint: the developer and the community), by your logic, we should stop enforcing the GPL.
        xlnt 19y ago
        the question is, quote: In the movie downloading case, who is being hurt when they wouldn't have bought it anyway? You haven't answered that. Note also that I didn't say any of the stuff you are calling a specious point.
        tptacek 19y ago
        My answer remains as it was before: the producers of content, who sell to a dwindling number of honest buyers as a result of a growing number of dishonest freeloaders who believe content should be priced at its marginal cost. That's an externality of downloading and using content you would not otherwise pay for. But I think this argument is a red herring. Fewer people today buy DVDs, now that they can be easily downloaded. Ten years from now --- barring the success of BD+ --- it will be trivial to download DVDs, and fewer people still will buy them. I don't think reasonable people dispute this fact. The drop in content revenue comes directly out of the hide of the content producers. The issue isn't "the people who wouldn't buy the content anyways". The people who gorge themselves on content they wouldn't otherwise buy don't buy any content. It's ironic that they excuse themselves by taking yet more illicit content.
        xlnt 19y ago
        You keep bringing up things I haven't said, and not answering the question directly. The fact is, if I download a movie that I would not have bought or rented if downloading was not available, then the producers do not have a dwindling number of buyers. They have the exact same number of buyers as if I didn't download it. I say this means no one was hurt. You still seem to disagree, but still have not pointed to an actual way anyone would be hurt.
        deleted 19y ago
        [deleted]
        tptacek 19y ago
        I don't understand your argument. You seem to be saying that nobody is "hurt" by your download, because the marginal cost to the copyright owner is zero. But that's true of all downloads, not just yours. By your logic, how are producers ever compensated? The answer to your question is, everybody is hurt, because every illicit download robs content creators of the incentive to create, and content producers of the incentive to distribute. It's clear that in your case, when you download a movie you have no intention of buying, the stolen incentive is not great. But it is not zero: your download clearly helps establish the climate that facilitates other downloads (for instance, by drawing ad revenue to torrent search engines, or simply by creating the social proof that enables otherwise honest people to rationalize downloading). In the end, even insults to the market as small as yours can become overwhelming when multiplied by the tens of millions of actors.

by xlnt 19y ago

tptacek 19y ago

I don't accept your premise that the content downloaded on Torrent networks would otherwise not be paid for. So I'm going to go with, "the producers of content are hurt".

xlnt 19y ago
i said when it wouldn't be paid for anyway, then it doesn't hurt anyone. this is obviously common because people download more stuff than they could afford.
- tptacek 19y ago
  So your argument is, even though a significant fraction of the market acquires a movie for free (the "vast good" the torrent networks do, in your view), the downloads don't depress the market value of the movie. In other words, when supply goes to "infinite", demand is unaffected. Your ideas are intriguing to me and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.
  - xlnt 19y ago
    Your ideas are intriguing to me and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter. you still haven't answered the question and now you're sarcastically insulting me. that's called trolling.
    - tptacek 19y ago
      You haven't asked a question since I answered your last specious one [1], but if you do, you can expect a response in the same tone. [1] Specious point: because we cannot pinpoint the parties harmed by our unauthorized use of other people's content, we should assume, until proven otherwise, that any such use is harmless. So, because you can't reason through who is harmed by GPL copyvio (hint: the developer and the community), by your logic, we should stop enforcing the GPL.
      - xlnt 19y ago
        the question is, quote: In the movie downloading case, who is being hurt when they wouldn't have bought it anyway? You haven't answered that. Note also that I didn't say any of the stuff you are calling a specious point.
        tptacek 19y ago
        My answer remains as it was before: the producers of content, who sell to a dwindling number of honest buyers as a result of a growing number of dishonest freeloaders who believe content should be priced at its marginal cost. That's an externality of downloading and using content you would not otherwise pay for. But I think this argument is a red herring. Fewer people today buy DVDs, now that they can be easily downloaded. Ten years from now --- barring the success of BD+ --- it will be trivial to download DVDs, and fewer people still will buy them. I don't think reasonable people dispute this fact. The drop in content revenue comes directly out of the hide of the content producers. The issue isn't "the people who wouldn't buy the content anyways". The people who gorge themselves on content they wouldn't otherwise buy don't buy any content. It's ironic that they excuse themselves by taking yet more illicit content.
        xlnt 19y ago
        You keep bringing up things I haven't said, and not answering the question directly. The fact is, if I download a movie that I would not have bought or rented if downloading was not available, then the producers do not have a dwindling number of buyers. They have the exact same number of buyers as if I didn't download it. I say this means no one was hurt. You still seem to disagree, but still have not pointed to an actual way anyone would be hurt.
        deleted 19y ago
        [deleted]
        tptacek 19y ago
        I don't understand your argument. You seem to be saying that nobody is "hurt" by your download, because the marginal cost to the copyright owner is zero. But that's true of all downloads, not just yours. By your logic, how are producers ever compensated? The answer to your question is, everybody is hurt, because every illicit download robs content creators of the incentive to create, and content producers of the incentive to distribute. It's clear that in your case, when you download a movie you have no intention of buying, the stolen incentive is not great. But it is not zero: your download clearly helps establish the climate that facilitates other downloads (for instance, by drawing ad revenue to torrent search engines, or simply by creating the social proof that enables otherwise honest people to rationalize downloading). In the end, even insults to the market as small as yours can become overwhelming when multiplied by the tens of millions of actors.