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>"Piracy" has been a term of art in the copyright world for over 100 years. So if it's long enough it assumes it's correct? Hard to see logical connection ther

>"Piracy" has been a term of art in the copyright world for over 100 years. So if it's long enough it assumes it's correct? Hard to see logical connection there. In our power to reconsider false and confusing terminology.

technothrasher 5y ago
> In our power to reconsider false and confusing terminology. Is it? Framing a conversation through word connotation is a very powerful, and oft used, political tool. It isn't necessarily within your power to control it when stronger political and social forces are pushing it in other directions.
lelandfe 5y ago
> So if it's long enough it assumes it's correct Sure, that's a good enough of a descriptivist basis for a definition to be "correct." I'd wager most folks on here don't see the name "The Pirate Bay" and question what it has to do with literal seafaring scallywags.
- mountainboy 5y ago
  counterpoint. I do. every time. Using the term "pirate" or "piracy" for copyright infringement annoys the hell out of me.
  - skinnymuch 5y ago
    You don’t question it because of actual confusion. You’re questioning it because you want to question it each time you come across it. Makes sense. It is an issue for you.
Levitz 5y ago
>So if it's long enough it assumes it's correct? Hard to see logical connection there. Well... Yes? That's how words work, really. If enough people agree a word means something, then it does.
- lovelyviking 5y ago
  When healthy discussion is needed wrong terms do not help because they become propaganda terms masking the real meaning. In that case they should be reconsidered and corrected for discussion to have any chance for success.
- Andrew_nenakhov 5y ago
  No, that's how words lose their meaning: when they are used in inappropriate context to describe something completely unrelated. Another modern example of a word that rapidly loses its meaning is "fascism": these days it is used as a general term for any policy not supported by the person that uses it. BLM fascists, left fascists, ultraright fascists, antifa fascists. On the subreddit about new Apple "Foundation" show someone described the depicted Empire as fascist. Everybody are fascists, especially the US who have fascias everywhere in state imagery!
  - Levitz 5y ago
    I hate what you refer to too, it's essentially changing the meaning of a word with political intent. It also happened with "tolerance", went from enduring something you don't like to not caring about it in the first place. But all that does it make words mean different things at different points in time, which is still just how words work. The meaning of the word "gay" is pretty different now than what it was, "meat" used to refer to all solid food, not just muscle and organs, "tweeting" is, at this point, more used as a reference to an internet service than to birds. We didn't get to learn a final and set version of our languages, we just got the current one, they all keep changing nonstop and words changing meaning is just one of the ways in which that happens.
    - Andrew_nenakhov 5y ago
      But in our case, "piracy" has exactly same meaning as it did 400 years ago: attacks on sea vessels, plunder of wealth and kidnapping of people for ransom or for sale. It has precisely zero relation to copyright infringement, and should not be used to denote the it.

technothrasher 5y ago

> In our power to reconsider false and confusing terminology. Is it? Framing a conversation through word connotation is a very powerful, and oft used, political tool. It isn't necessarily within your power to control it when stronger political and social forces are pushing it in other directions.

lelandfe 5y ago

> So if it's long enough it assumes it's correct Sure, that's a good enough of a descriptivist basis for a definition to be "correct." I'd wager most folks on here don't see the name "The Pirate Bay" and question what it has to do with literal seafaring scallywags.

mountainboy 5y ago
counterpoint. I do. every time. Using the term "pirate" or "piracy" for copyright infringement annoys the hell out of me.
- skinnymuch 5y ago
  You don’t question it because of actual confusion. You’re questioning it because you want to question it each time you come across it. Makes sense. It is an issue for you.

Levitz 5y ago

>So if it's long enough it assumes it's correct? Hard to see logical connection there. Well... Yes? That's how words work, really. If enough people agree a word means something, then it does.

lovelyviking 5y ago
When healthy discussion is needed wrong terms do not help because they become propaganda terms masking the real meaning. In that case they should be reconsidered and corrected for discussion to have any chance for success.
Andrew_nenakhov 5y ago
No, that's how words lose their meaning: when they are used in inappropriate context to describe something completely unrelated. Another modern example of a word that rapidly loses its meaning is "fascism": these days it is used as a general term for any policy not supported by the person that uses it. BLM fascists, left fascists, ultraright fascists, antifa fascists. On the subreddit about new Apple "Foundation" show someone described the depicted Empire as fascist. Everybody are fascists, especially the US who have fascias everywhere in state imagery!
- Levitz 5y ago
  I hate what you refer to too, it's essentially changing the meaning of a word with political intent. It also happened with "tolerance", went from enduring something you don't like to not caring about it in the first place. But all that does it make words mean different things at different points in time, which is still just how words work. The meaning of the word "gay" is pretty different now than what it was, "meat" used to refer to all solid food, not just muscle and organs, "tweeting" is, at this point, more used as a reference to an internet service than to birds. We didn't get to learn a final and set version of our languages, we just got the current one, they all keep changing nonstop and words changing meaning is just one of the ways in which that happens.
  - Andrew_nenakhov 5y ago
    But in our case, "piracy" has exactly same meaning as it did 400 years ago: attacks on sea vessels, plunder of wealth and kidnapping of people for ransom or for sale. It has precisely zero relation to copyright infringement, and should not be used to denote the it.