12 ms·

The problem is information wants to be read and be free. Copyright is a wall around information that has already been thought of and recorded. Pirate Bay is e

by wolco 6y ago

The problem is information wants to be read and be free. Copyright is a wall around information that has already been thought of and recorded. Pirate Bay is exactly like a local libruary which is like a book store. The only difference is physical books vs digital, if you have to give it back and when and the cost. Book stores will let you violate the publishers copyright as long as you don't leave the store. Want to read that entire book, sit on a chair and read. A libruary will let you read at the place or at home but you have to bring it back in a week. Piratebay lets you read it forever but it's a digital copy. All scenerios you can read without paying.

ramshorns 6y ago
Well, reading a book doesn't violate copyright even if you do it inside a bookstore.
6gvONxR4sf7o 6y ago
To the consumer, maybe Pirate Bay and a library and reading in a book store look the same, but behind the scenes they are very different. For a library or reading in a book store, the store has paid the publisher for the book you are reading. They can only let as many people read as copies they have purchased. In Pirate Bay’s case, someone pays for the book (but not necessarily) and then infinite people can read. Same thing to a consumer maybe, but very different to a publisher or to an author. There’s a reason libraries will buy multiple copies of popular books.
- nybble41 6y ago
  > For … reading in a book store, the store has paid the publisher for the book you are reading. That depends. Most of the time the store has the option of tearing off the cover and reporting it to the publisher as "destroyed unsold" for a refund. That applies no matter how many people may have read it while it was sitting on the shelf. And why must the entire book be treated as a unit? I see no legal reason why a library could not cut off the binding and lend out chapters or individual pages from the book to patrons on demand, which would allow multiple patrons to read (different parts of) the same book simultaneously. You could easily have 20 or more people reading the same book without major conflicts if you can pass the pages around quickly enough.
Silhouette 6y ago
The problem is information wants to be read and be free. It doesn't necessarily want to be written, though. That's the part people who make this argument always seem to forget. Whether it's through our existing copyright-supported frameworks or some other mechanism, there needs to be enough in it for authors (and editors and cover illustrators and printers and online distribution services and...) to be worth producing the work in the first place.
- sildur 6y ago
  There was a time before copyright existed, and we got pretty nice books from it. And now that I’m thinking on it, considering how the internet of today looks, with people creating content to earn money versus the internet of 20 years ago, with people creating content for the love of it, I think I would like a future where books are written for passion instead of for money. Less books, more quality.
  - gamblor956 6y ago
    Yes, and all of those works that you're thinking of were written either by individuals from wealthy families (today we would call them trust fund babies), royalty, clergyman, or artists funded by patrons from one of the first 3 groups. I disagree about the "less books, more quality" argument. Today, we have more books, more quality. Sure, there are lots of bad books today, but the volume of high-quality works today so far exceeds the volume of any books (good or bad) produced during the patronage era that it's like comparing a nuclear bomb to a match.
    - a1369209993 6y ago
      > individuals from wealthy families (today we would call them trust fund babies), royalty, clergyman, None of whom got their money from exorting readers of their books. What you have there is a argument for basic income, not a argument for copyright.
      - gamblor956 6y ago
baneonplane 6y ago
If a bookstore buys a book, they now have a book. What they do with it is mostly up to them. They have the right to "sell or otherwise dispose of" the work, according to the first sale doctrine / 17 U.S.C. 109. They do not have the right to copy it. The Pirate Bay involves one person sending a copy of a file to another person, but that doesn't mean the original copy was destroyed. That lack of destruction is really the foundation of BitTorrent in a way - files are shared among many people. Then, if one person has the file active, it can be downloaded again. So people who upload a new torrent on TPB are breaking the law in that they're copying something they aren't allowed to copy. People who download and then seed a torrent are illegally obtaining a copyrighted work. The fact they upload it also means they're illegally copying it, as the author has the sole right to copy it.
bdowling 6y ago
> The problem is information wants to be read and be free. Copyright is a wall around information that has already been thought of and recorded. Copyright isn't a wall around information. Copyright doesn't prohibit anyone from taking the information in a book and presenting it in their own way. For example, you or anyone else can take a copyrighted book, extract the valuable information like mathematical equations and methods and data, write your own explanations of the information, make your own diagrams, write your own exercises for readers, and then publish it and sell it. Copyright won't stop you or anyone else from doing that, because copyright only protects expressions of ideas, not the ideas themselves.
- nybble41 6y ago
  > copyright only protects expressions of ideas, not the ideas themselves Copyright absolutely does place a wall around certain kinds of information. The fact that a certain book consists of a particular arrangement of words is just as much information as the meaning behind the words.
kmeisthax 6y ago
Book stores do not violate copyright law when you read a book on their premises without paying for it. Copyright law specifically concerns who is allowed to make copies. Yes, TPB can serve the same purpose as a physical library, but the law doesn't care about the market role of the infringers (mostly). It cares about whether or not a copy was made. That's why it's legal when libraries and bookstores let you read something you didn't pay for, but not when websites do the same thing. Accessing a library does not create a copy, but accessing a website does.

by wolco 6y ago

ramshorns 6y ago

Well, reading a book doesn't violate copyright even if you do it inside a bookstore.

6gvONxR4sf7o 6y ago

To the consumer, maybe Pirate Bay and a library and reading in a book store look the same, but behind the scenes they are very different. For a library or reading in a book store, the store has paid the publisher for the book you are reading. They can only let as many people read as copies they have purchased. In Pirate Bay’s case, someone pays for the book (but not necessarily) and then infinite people can read. Same thing to a consumer maybe, but very different to a publisher or to an author. There’s a reason libraries will buy multiple copies of popular books.

nybble41 6y ago
> For … reading in a book store, the store has paid the publisher for the book you are reading. That depends. Most of the time the store has the option of tearing off the cover and reporting it to the publisher as "destroyed unsold" for a refund. That applies no matter how many people may have read it while it was sitting on the shelf. And why must the entire book be treated as a unit? I see no legal reason why a library could not cut off the binding and lend out chapters or individual pages from the book to patrons on demand, which would allow multiple patrons to read (different parts of) the same book simultaneously. You could easily have 20 or more people reading the same book without major conflicts if you can pass the pages around quickly enough.

Silhouette 6y ago

The problem is information wants to be read and be free. It doesn't necessarily want to be written, though. That's the part people who make this argument always seem to forget. Whether it's through our existing copyright-supported frameworks or some other mechanism, there needs to be enough in it for authors (and editors and cover illustrators and printers and online distribution services and...) to be worth producing the work in the first place.

sildur 6y ago
There was a time before copyright existed, and we got pretty nice books from it. And now that I’m thinking on it, considering how the internet of today looks, with people creating content to earn money versus the internet of 20 years ago, with people creating content for the love of it, I think I would like a future where books are written for passion instead of for money. Less books, more quality.
- gamblor956 6y ago
  Yes, and all of those works that you're thinking of were written either by individuals from wealthy families (today we would call them trust fund babies), royalty, clergyman, or artists funded by patrons from one of the first 3 groups. I disagree about the "less books, more quality" argument. Today, we have more books, more quality. Sure, there are lots of bad books today, but the volume of high-quality works today so far exceeds the volume of any books (good or bad) produced during the patronage era that it's like comparing a nuclear bomb to a match.
  - a1369209993 6y ago
    > individuals from wealthy families (today we would call them trust fund babies), royalty, clergyman, None of whom got their money from exorting readers of their books. What you have there is a argument for basic income, not a argument for copyright.
    - gamblor956 6y ago

baneonplane 6y ago

If a bookstore buys a book, they now have a book. What they do with it is mostly up to them. They have the right to "sell or otherwise dispose of" the work, according to the first sale doctrine / 17 U.S.C. 109. They do not have the right to copy it. The Pirate Bay involves one person sending a copy of a file to another person, but that doesn't mean the original copy was destroyed. That lack of destruction is really the foundation of BitTorrent in a way - files are shared among many people. Then, if one person has the file active, it can be downloaded again. So people who upload a new torrent on TPB are breaking the law in that they're copying something they aren't allowed to copy. People who download and then seed a torrent are illegally obtaining a copyrighted work. The fact they upload it also means they're illegally copying it, as the author has the sole right to copy it.

bdowling 6y ago

> The problem is information wants to be read and be free. Copyright is a wall around information that has already been thought of and recorded. Copyright isn't a wall around information. Copyright doesn't prohibit anyone from taking the information in a book and presenting it in their own way. For example, you or anyone else can take a copyrighted book, extract the valuable information like mathematical equations and methods and data, write your own explanations of the information, make your own diagrams, write your own exercises for readers, and then publish it and sell it. Copyright won't stop you or anyone else from doing that, because copyright only protects expressions of ideas, not the ideas themselves.

nybble41 6y ago
> copyright only protects expressions of ideas, not the ideas themselves Copyright absolutely does place a wall around certain kinds of information. The fact that a certain book consists of a particular arrangement of words is just as much information as the meaning behind the words.

kmeisthax 6y ago

Book stores do not violate copyright law when you read a book on their premises without paying for it. Copyright law specifically concerns who is allowed to make copies. Yes, TPB can serve the same purpose as a physical library, but the law doesn't care about the market role of the infringers (mostly). It cares about whether or not a copy was made. That's why it's legal when libraries and bookstores let you read something you didn't pay for, but not when websites do the same thing. Accessing a library does not create a copy, but accessing a website does.