5 ms·

End Piracy, Not Liberty – Google

77 points by necenzurat 15y ago

joelgrus 15y ago
That's a nice sound bite, but "piracy" means "copying things". I've yet to see a plan that both prevents people from copying things and preserves liberty.
- runamok 15y ago
  Seems like there might be a way to do so that preserves due process, has the burden of proof on the accuser and has penalties for abuses. As far as I can tell DMCA takedown notices work fairly well in most cases. The main issue is that the US doesn't have international juridiction and they don't like that very much. The US puts a lot of pressure on foreign governments to enforce our laws (I believe wikileaks recently leaked how the US influenced a SOPA-like law in Spain.)
p0ss 15y ago
No, how about we not end either? Can anyone demonstrate to me that Piracy is actually such a huge problem? These media corporations are making record profits, piracy is not killing them, they are just being greedy.
- the-cakeboss 15y ago
  How is wanting to protect your IP ( whether or not you agree with the very notion of IP ) being greedy?
  - deleted 15y ago
    [deleted]
  - gojomo 15y ago
    At the founding of the US, copyright was for 14 years, with optional extension to 28. Lobbying since then has extended it, in many cases, to over 100 years, and via repeated extension, potentially to a de facto infinite term. That was kind of greedy. Every copyright holder has a mini-monopoly in the production (aka reproduction) of their own content. It is a well-established result in economics that a monopolist provides a price/quantity combination which maximizes their own profits, but not the total welfare of both the producer and consumer. (With competitive providers, under usual and fairly reasonable assumptions, the price/quantity of a good traded trends towards a level maximizing overall welfare.) So the very idea of "intellectual property" as little monopolies-on-reproduction is in service of rightsholder greed, maximizing their profits at the expense of others, often beyond necessary creative costs or incentives. Granting such monopolies may have been a necessary compromise when copying and distribution was costly. A better system that maximizes returns for a larger group should be possible today.
    - dexy 15y ago
      Unfortunately, I've yet to hear a convincing alternative incentive scheme to that of copyrights and patents. The necessity of copyright and patent law varies widely from industry to industry, and the limited expertise (and interest) of legislators keeps them from taking any bold steps adjust the law to better fit the intricate needs of the people (ie, short/no patents in industries that move quickly and communally, like software, and longer patents for industries like pharmaceutical development, that are immensely costly and provide limited network effects to the first mover (a drug's prices decline by 90% in the US when it goes off patent). People view copyright as less essential than patents, but the truth of the matter is that without copyright laws, there would be a significant decline in the production of movies, music, games, and many other costly mediums. Without copyright, I could legally create a competitor to netflix that paid studios nothing and played every movie ever made on any device for close to nothing. I could create a competitor to steam that distributed games and was every bit as useful and integrated, and I'd pay nothing to developers. Even if you think online piracy isn't as big of a problem as studios claim it is (and you'd be very right), the laws that keep it illegal are all that stand between today and a collapse of the content development ecosystem. Even if copyright doesn't maximize for society's benefit because of the monopoly it creates, every copyrighted work sold is a net plus to both the consumer and the producer. Without any copyright framework, there's a significant chance that the producer could never afford to make that beneficial product in the first place. Even if you only eliminate prosecution of people/entities that don't make any money from what they're doing and allow non-profits like wikipedia to host full movies, you still irreparably break the incentive system that exists today. Maybe we don't need new movies and games, but people want them and as long as that's the case they'll want to keep protecting them with copyright. Maybe someday, systems more like kickstarter could replace copyright, but I highly doubt it. They don't do nearly as good of a job. That said, I'm all for much shorter terms for copyrights and the elimination of software patents.
      - literalusername 15y ago
        …without copyright laws, there would be a significant decline in the production of movies, music, games, and many other costly mediums. I disagree. What were talking about here is art, and mankind has been producing art since long before government-guarded IP. It isn't because IP laws provide an incentive that we create things; we do it because it's human nature. The ability to freely copy other people's work lowers the barrier to entry, so eliminating IP laws would spur a creative renaissance. The only downside is those big media companies would be forced to innovate.
  - randomdata 15y ago
    Protecting IP is how we got into this mess. If the music industry, all those years ago, would have recognized music licences instead of music media, a plethora of iTunes-like services would have sprung up as soon as the technology was ready, there to fill the demands of consumers. There never would have been a Napster to let the genie out of the bottle because most people would have been more than happy to pay $0.99 for a song. While there will always be a small underground of sharing "mix tapes," Napster only rose to fame because there was no other choice for consumers. For copyright to be successful, it requires respect from both parties. Dictating exactly how media must be consumed is not showing respect. In turn, the consumers lose their respect to spend their money. I have my own copyrighted work that is pirated more than it is paid for. While it would be nice to paid paid for each transaction, I recognize it is not the consumer's fault. Those who put a death grip on their works before me have ruined it for the rest of us.
humbledrone 15y ago
Aren't so-called infographics supposed to make information easier to understand? This, hell, I'm not going to call it an infographic, this, "graphic," does the exact opposite. I downloaded the PDF and attempted to see what it's trying to convey, and I gave up after zooming way in and still not being able to read the text after waiting for what seemed like an eternity for it to re-render.
orborde 15y ago
Dupe: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3477968 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3477968
squiggly101 15y ago
So Google is taking the position of the RIAA, MPAA etc? I have not heard any of them advocate for the "end of liberty" per se. Fucking evil Google.

77 points by necenzurat 15y ago

That's a nice sound bite, but "piracy" means "copying things". I've yet to see a plan that both prevents people from copying things and preserves liberty.

runamok 15y ago
Seems like there might be a way to do so that preserves due process, has the burden of proof on the accuser and has penalties for abuses. As far as I can tell DMCA takedown notices work fairly well in most cases. The main issue is that the US doesn't have international juridiction and they don't like that very much. The US puts a lot of pressure on foreign governments to enforce our laws (I believe wikileaks recently leaked how the US influenced a SOPA-like law in Spain.)

p0ss 15y ago

No, how about we not end either? Can anyone demonstrate to me that Piracy is actually such a huge problem? These media corporations are making record profits, piracy is not killing them, they are just being greedy.

the-cakeboss 15y ago
How is wanting to protect your IP ( whether or not you agree with the very notion of IP ) being greedy?
- deleted 15y ago
  [deleted]
- gojomo 15y ago
  At the founding of the US, copyright was for 14 years, with optional extension to 28. Lobbying since then has extended it, in many cases, to over 100 years, and via repeated extension, potentially to a de facto infinite term. That was kind of greedy. Every copyright holder has a mini-monopoly in the production (aka reproduction) of their own content. It is a well-established result in economics that a monopolist provides a price/quantity combination which maximizes their own profits, but not the total welfare of both the producer and consumer. (With competitive providers, under usual and fairly reasonable assumptions, the price/quantity of a good traded trends towards a level maximizing overall welfare.) So the very idea of "intellectual property" as little monopolies-on-reproduction is in service of rightsholder greed, maximizing their profits at the expense of others, often beyond necessary creative costs or incentives. Granting such monopolies may have been a necessary compromise when copying and distribution was costly. A better system that maximizes returns for a larger group should be possible today.
  - dexy 15y ago
    Unfortunately, I've yet to hear a convincing alternative incentive scheme to that of copyrights and patents. The necessity of copyright and patent law varies widely from industry to industry, and the limited expertise (and interest) of legislators keeps them from taking any bold steps adjust the law to better fit the intricate needs of the people (ie, short/no patents in industries that move quickly and communally, like software, and longer patents for industries like pharmaceutical development, that are immensely costly and provide limited network effects to the first mover (a drug's prices decline by 90% in the US when it goes off patent). People view copyright as less essential than patents, but the truth of the matter is that without copyright laws, there would be a significant decline in the production of movies, music, games, and many other costly mediums. Without copyright, I could legally create a competitor to netflix that paid studios nothing and played every movie ever made on any device for close to nothing. I could create a competitor to steam that distributed games and was every bit as useful and integrated, and I'd pay nothing to developers. Even if you think online piracy isn't as big of a problem as studios claim it is (and you'd be very right), the laws that keep it illegal are all that stand between today and a collapse of the content development ecosystem. Even if copyright doesn't maximize for society's benefit because of the monopoly it creates, every copyrighted work sold is a net plus to both the consumer and the producer. Without any copyright framework, there's a significant chance that the producer could never afford to make that beneficial product in the first place. Even if you only eliminate prosecution of people/entities that don't make any money from what they're doing and allow non-profits like wikipedia to host full movies, you still irreparably break the incentive system that exists today. Maybe we don't need new movies and games, but people want them and as long as that's the case they'll want to keep protecting them with copyright. Maybe someday, systems more like kickstarter could replace copyright, but I highly doubt it. They don't do nearly as good of a job. That said, I'm all for much shorter terms for copyrights and the elimination of software patents.
    - literalusername 15y ago
      …without copyright laws, there would be a significant decline in the production of movies, music, games, and many other costly mediums. I disagree. What were talking about here is art, and mankind has been producing art since long before government-guarded IP. It isn't because IP laws provide an incentive that we create things; we do it because it's human nature. The ability to freely copy other people's work lowers the barrier to entry, so eliminating IP laws would spur a creative renaissance. The only downside is those big media companies would be forced to innovate.
- randomdata 15y ago
  Protecting IP is how we got into this mess. If the music industry, all those years ago, would have recognized music licences instead of music media, a plethora of iTunes-like services would have sprung up as soon as the technology was ready, there to fill the demands of consumers. There never would have been a Napster to let the genie out of the bottle because most people would have been more than happy to pay $0.99 for a song. While there will always be a small underground of sharing "mix tapes," Napster only rose to fame because there was no other choice for consumers. For copyright to be successful, it requires respect from both parties. Dictating exactly how media must be consumed is not showing respect. In turn, the consumers lose their respect to spend their money. I have my own copyrighted work that is pirated more than it is paid for. While it would be nice to paid paid for each transaction, I recognize it is not the consumer's fault. Those who put a death grip on their works before me have ruined it for the rest of us.

humbledrone 15y ago

Aren't so-called infographics supposed to make information easier to understand? This, hell, I'm not going to call it an infographic, this, "graphic," does the exact opposite. I downloaded the PDF and attempted to see what it's trying to convey, and I gave up after zooming way in and still not being able to read the text after waiting for what seemed like an eternity for it to re-render.

orborde 15y ago

Dupe: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3477968 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3477968

squiggly101 15y ago

So Google is taking the position of the RIAA, MPAA etc? I have not heard any of them advocate for the "end of liberty" per se. Fucking evil Google.