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Yes, he's objecting to the idea that intellectual property is valid, and there's a good case to be made for that. People instinctively feel paying for property

Yes, he's objecting to the idea that intellectual property is valid, and there's a good case to be made for that. People instinctively feel paying for property and services is justified, but not for information and intellectual property is just a way of trying to make people think information is property. If I steal something from you, I must have deprived you of it; copying is not stealing.

dromidas 14y ago
It's really just the entertainment media version of patent trolling... it will eventually be killed or moderated just like patent trolling is. We just have to wait until someone figures out a better system to replace them with.
agravier 14y ago
You are raising good point, as information before the modern age used to be generally free (freedom + beer), and artists earned on performance.
chimi 14y ago
This semantic argument really needs to die. The legality and/or morality of the act is not determined by its label. Stealing or not, it is immoral and illegal to appropriate digital goods for oneself without honoring the financial stipulations set forth by the creator/owner of the property.
- gnaritas 14y ago
  That is your opinion, many disagree. Your morals may not be my morals and many reject any notion of information copying being wrong in any way. You're still trying to call information property that can be owned, apparently not realizing that the very concept is being rejected, information is not property and the concept of ownership simply makes no sense. The very notion of ownership stems from physical scarcity, the concept does not logically transfer to digital information.
  - chimi 14y ago
    This is why this debate is really a religious one. It's your beliefs against mine. You believe digitization relinquishes one's right to future revenue from the creation. I do not. In a world where your beliefs are supported by the courts, a creator's only means to ensure a revenue stream from their creations is to present them only in controlled physical environments free of digitizers. I don't think that's a better world than the one where creators can expect revenue by selling their digitized creations.
    - slowpoke 14y ago
      >In a world where your beliefs are supported by the courts, a creator's only means to ensure a revenue stream from their creations is to present them only in controlled physical environments free of digitizers. Bullcrap. They'd just have to make their money in ways that do not depend on distribution of non-scarce goods. And they already do. Musicians, for example, are performers. They have a service to sell. That's how many make their bucks. There's models like Kickstarter, where you pay upfront - for the act of creating, not for the eventual distribution (which is costless). Donations or patronage can be a valid source of income, too. Your claim that we need to restrict access to a good that is inherently not scarce (and indeed, not depletable) for artists to make a living at all is a disingenuous lie and flies in the face of reality.
    - gnaritas 14y ago
      You're quite simply wrong; content creators have plenty of ways to make money other than distribution. Secondly, the market doesn't owe creators a living and manipulating the market by creating an artificial concept that allows someone to own information is wrong. If the only way a creator can make money is by using law to create artificial scarcity, then whatever he's creating isn't deserving of pay; if it were, the market would value it without the fake scarcity imposed by law. There was a time when creators were paid to create, rather than for content distribution, we need to return to those times. You are simply defending the status quote without understanding the critique against it.
  - res0nat0r 14y ago
    All books and the information contained therein should be free because Xerox allows you to copy them?

dromidas 14y ago

It's really just the entertainment media version of patent trolling... it will eventually be killed or moderated just like patent trolling is. We just have to wait until someone figures out a better system to replace them with.

agravier 14y ago

You are raising good point, as information before the modern age used to be generally free (freedom + beer), and artists earned on performance.

chimi 14y ago

This semantic argument really needs to die. The legality and/or morality of the act is not determined by its label. Stealing or not, it is immoral and illegal to appropriate digital goods for oneself without honoring the financial stipulations set forth by the creator/owner of the property.

gnaritas 14y ago
That is your opinion, many disagree. Your morals may not be my morals and many reject any notion of information copying being wrong in any way. You're still trying to call information property that can be owned, apparently not realizing that the very concept is being rejected, information is not property and the concept of ownership simply makes no sense. The very notion of ownership stems from physical scarcity, the concept does not logically transfer to digital information.
- chimi 14y ago
  This is why this debate is really a religious one. It's your beliefs against mine. You believe digitization relinquishes one's right to future revenue from the creation. I do not. In a world where your beliefs are supported by the courts, a creator's only means to ensure a revenue stream from their creations is to present them only in controlled physical environments free of digitizers. I don't think that's a better world than the one where creators can expect revenue by selling their digitized creations.
  - slowpoke 14y ago
    >In a world where your beliefs are supported by the courts, a creator's only means to ensure a revenue stream from their creations is to present them only in controlled physical environments free of digitizers. Bullcrap. They'd just have to make their money in ways that do not depend on distribution of non-scarce goods. And they already do. Musicians, for example, are performers. They have a service to sell. That's how many make their bucks. There's models like Kickstarter, where you pay upfront - for the act of creating, not for the eventual distribution (which is costless). Donations or patronage can be a valid source of income, too. Your claim that we need to restrict access to a good that is inherently not scarce (and indeed, not depletable) for artists to make a living at all is a disingenuous lie and flies in the face of reality.
  - gnaritas 14y ago
    You're quite simply wrong; content creators have plenty of ways to make money other than distribution. Secondly, the market doesn't owe creators a living and manipulating the market by creating an artificial concept that allows someone to own information is wrong. If the only way a creator can make money is by using law to create artificial scarcity, then whatever he's creating isn't deserving of pay; if it were, the market would value it without the fake scarcity imposed by law. There was a time when creators were paid to create, rather than for content distribution, we need to return to those times. You are simply defending the status quote without understanding the critique against it.
- res0nat0r 14y ago
  All books and the information contained therein should be free because Xerox allows you to copy them?