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No one would make money off of it. That is the point. There are innumerable things which are worthwhile which are not profitable. The idea that we do not do a

No one would make money off of it. That is the point. There are innumerable things which are worthwhile which are not profitable. The idea that we do not do a world library of free digital copies of every book ever written really highlights the problem with the thinking your comment has demonstrated. The idea that individual pursuits must make a profit to be justified leads to us doing terrible things like: not making a free world library of every book. Though in this particular case this also demonstrates a major problem with intellectual property concepts. Actually hosting the library isn't very expensive. But we have made doing so illegal. Of course, authors deserve to live a decent life just like everyone else. We currently do that by restricting all access to duplications of information they have produced so that they can charge a fee for access, and that fee provides for their survival. But we suffer an incalculable loss by making all this information restricted. In my view we would be MUCH better off as a society with respect to creativity, innovation, and other popular metrics for progress, if we actually made sure as a society that every person's survival was provided for with no need for them to pay for it. Then authors wouldn't need to get paid, engineers could do what they love to do and post all their work as open source, and we could have a free library for everyone. This extreme openness would in my mind lead to more rapid innovation, and markets would still function as first movers would maintain an advantage for new product releases, though they would have to keep moving as anything they've done that is worthwhile would be copied. But since no one's livelihood would be at stake, this is not a real issue. This can all be done in a voluntary, libertarian society as long as we have community ownership of the means of production, and promote these ideals of community support in this society. And I think we would be way better off. Doing this would allow us to offer every book ever recorded for free to every person on Earth. A big change, but one with obviously a very big benefit to humanity. One note though: people who want to own a lot for themselves really mess this up. So people would need to dissuade those people from acting that way. My preferred method of doing so is by starving them of workers and customers, though when it comes to control of land matters get more serious.

rexpop 4y ago
You're responding to a comment which aims to make your same point.
- arpa 4y ago
  in the world that has become a parody of itself it is not unfathomable that the GP post was dead serious.
  - mdp2021 4y ago
    Aside note, but: "Hear, hear!". Until years ago, I would normally use that kind of mockery of absurd ideas by reciting adherence to impossible beliefs and opinions, with the implicit that nobody would hold them unless insane, so of course I was being purely ironic. I do not do that anymore. The world is clearly full of cases for which absurdities are tenable - not by an odd minority, but by "(pseudo)random people". If you declare them, the presumption of irony is gone.
  - Brian_K_White 4y ago
    I'm not sure what dead serious means, but the comment was quite literal and simple. Which is not to say that I approve, merely to state the root explaination for the insane state of affairs. You could say dead serious in the sense that I wasn't joking, that really is the explaination.
- TaylorAlexander 4y ago
  Ah. Reading it again, I can see what you mean. Unfortunately I encounter a lot of people here who would write that comment in all seriousness, so if it was sarcastic I hadn’t noticed. I think I’m still not sure about that.
  - Brian_K_White 4y ago
    It was neither approving or sarcastic. It was simply the explaination for the supposedly unfathomable state of affairs. I don't say I like it or that it's reasonable or fair, it wasn't approving. It's not sarcastic because it's literally the actual explaination.
WalterBright 4y ago
> libertarian society as long as we have community ownership of the means of production Libertarianism includes the right to own property. Also common ownership of the means of production is an old idea, and has been tried many times. It always results in poverty.
- TaylorAlexander 4y ago
  Ah hello Walter. I recognize your username as you and I have disagreed on this before. I’m not saying people shouldn’t have the right to own property. But that a good way of organizing society is collective ownership of the means of production. If you are part owner in something with shares and a contract, that obviously still relies on property rights. That is how the stock market works after all. EDIT: I am basically proposing a change in norms, rather than a change in rights. Currently the norm is individual private owners or ownership by a board of directors. I am proposing ownership by communities as a collective. Same rights involved, but a different norm.
  - WalterBright 4y ago
    The US is a free country. You can form a voluntary collective any time you like.
    - incompatible 4y ago
      I doubt that you are free to share copyrighted information, even if you declare yourselves a voluntary collective.
      - WalterBright 4y ago
        You can contribute to your collective all of your property and intellectual property. I suggest you contact all like-minded authors and suggest they join your book collective and donate all their intellectual property rights.
        4y ago
criddell 4y ago
Libraries these days also offer movies, music, and some even have games. Should digital versions of all that stuff be free for all as well?
- TaylorAlexander 4y ago
  I can't say what we should or shouldn't do. But I think we would be better off if we did that. Notice I said that in order to make this viable we would want to make sure to provide for everyone so that no one's livelihood is threatened. I look at it this way: digital information has value. digital information can be copied for free. therefore we can copy value for free. if we leverage this principle we can generate a whole lot of value for essentially zero cost. this distribution of value would lead to more value creation, as for example children that grow up with access to way more books are probably more likely to produce more valuable art, science, and engineering output of their own. I think we would be better off if we do this with movies, music, games, and engineering designs like designs for medical equipment, cars, etc. most of the standard economic arguments for intellectual property restrictions are wrong and short sighted, and I have heard them all. I think this concept is well worth exploring both philosophically and in practice
- mdp2021 4y ago
  Is there a good reason why not? The broader class of cultural products includes different types of expression as subclasses: the discriminator is in the broader class - cultural products.
- dredmorbius 4y ago
  What are the benefits vs. deadweight losses of a copyright-maximalist regime? Who benefits? Who loses? And to what extent? And what would the net total cost of rectifying any shift of advantage to a copyright-minmalist regime be? For that last, look to the net total annual revenues of commercial media. And keep in mind that we're carrying out this discussion on a technological ecosystem founded in very large part on FSF Free Software / Open Source software.
  - criddell 4y ago

rexpop 4y ago

You're responding to a comment which aims to make your same point.

arpa 4y ago
in the world that has become a parody of itself it is not unfathomable that the GP post was dead serious.
- mdp2021 4y ago
  Aside note, but: "Hear, hear!". Until years ago, I would normally use that kind of mockery of absurd ideas by reciting adherence to impossible beliefs and opinions, with the implicit that nobody would hold them unless insane, so of course I was being purely ironic. I do not do that anymore. The world is clearly full of cases for which absurdities are tenable - not by an odd minority, but by "(pseudo)random people". If you declare them, the presumption of irony is gone.
- Brian_K_White 4y ago
  I'm not sure what dead serious means, but the comment was quite literal and simple. Which is not to say that I approve, merely to state the root explaination for the insane state of affairs. You could say dead serious in the sense that I wasn't joking, that really is the explaination.
TaylorAlexander 4y ago
Ah. Reading it again, I can see what you mean. Unfortunately I encounter a lot of people here who would write that comment in all seriousness, so if it was sarcastic I hadn’t noticed. I think I’m still not sure about that.
- Brian_K_White 4y ago
  It was neither approving or sarcastic. It was simply the explaination for the supposedly unfathomable state of affairs. I don't say I like it or that it's reasonable or fair, it wasn't approving. It's not sarcastic because it's literally the actual explaination.

WalterBright 4y ago

> libertarian society as long as we have community ownership of the means of production Libertarianism includes the right to own property. Also common ownership of the means of production is an old idea, and has been tried many times. It always results in poverty.

TaylorAlexander 4y ago
Ah hello Walter. I recognize your username as you and I have disagreed on this before. I’m not saying people shouldn’t have the right to own property. But that a good way of organizing society is collective ownership of the means of production. If you are part owner in something with shares and a contract, that obviously still relies on property rights. That is how the stock market works after all. EDIT: I am basically proposing a change in norms, rather than a change in rights. Currently the norm is individual private owners or ownership by a board of directors. I am proposing ownership by communities as a collective. Same rights involved, but a different norm.
- WalterBright 4y ago
  The US is a free country. You can form a voluntary collective any time you like.
  - incompatible 4y ago
    I doubt that you are free to share copyrighted information, even if you declare yourselves a voluntary collective.
    - WalterBright 4y ago
      You can contribute to your collective all of your property and intellectual property. I suggest you contact all like-minded authors and suggest they join your book collective and donate all their intellectual property rights.
      - 4y ago

criddell 4y ago

Libraries these days also offer movies, music, and some even have games. Should digital versions of all that stuff be free for all as well?

TaylorAlexander 4y ago
I can't say what we should or shouldn't do. But I think we would be better off if we did that. Notice I said that in order to make this viable we would want to make sure to provide for everyone so that no one's livelihood is threatened. I look at it this way: digital information has value. digital information can be copied for free. therefore we can copy value for free. if we leverage this principle we can generate a whole lot of value for essentially zero cost. this distribution of value would lead to more value creation, as for example children that grow up with access to way more books are probably more likely to produce more valuable art, science, and engineering output of their own. I think we would be better off if we do this with movies, music, games, and engineering designs like designs for medical equipment, cars, etc. most of the standard economic arguments for intellectual property restrictions are wrong and short sighted, and I have heard them all. I think this concept is well worth exploring both philosophically and in practice
mdp2021 4y ago
Is there a good reason why not? The broader class of cultural products includes different types of expression as subclasses: the discriminator is in the broader class - cultural products.
dredmorbius 4y ago
What are the benefits vs. deadweight losses of a copyright-maximalist regime? Who benefits? Who loses? And to what extent? And what would the net total cost of rectifying any shift of advantage to a copyright-minmalist regime be? For that last, look to the net total annual revenues of commercial media. And keep in mind that we're carrying out this discussion on a technological ecosystem founded in very large part on FSF Free Software / Open Source software.
- criddell 4y ago