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I always mistrust discussions of the legal content on the pirate bay as a defence. Doing something legal does not defend illegal activities in general, and the

I always mistrust discussions of the legal content on the pirate bay as a defence. Doing something legal does not defend illegal activities in general, and the pirate bay is, by any measure, predominantly copyrighted material whose owners do not want their material on TPB. The other argument, that TPB helps distributes culture so is a public good, it's a much better argument. It is however hard to know if it is overall better for society.

maxharris 14y ago
"Better for society," as it is typically invoked, is an invalid standard for determining what's good. It's a vague concept, and it's easy to shred intellectually. For example, we're often told that eminent domain is in "the public interest," but what about the homeowner facing eviction and demolition so that a new stadium, highway or shopping mall can be built? Isn't he part of the public? What about his interests? In reality, society is nothing more than a group individuals. A society has no special attributes apart from those of its individual members. If the "good of society" has any meaning, it must refer to the good of each of its individual members, as individuals. So how do we know what's good for an individual and what isn't? The correct standard for determining the good is the life of the person being discussed. The good is that which furthers that particular individual's life (with this standard, it is obvious that the evil is that which destroys that person's life). Finally, regarding the counter-argument about conflicts of interest that some might raise: I don't believe that there are any, in reality. What is in the true, rational self-interest of one person is never in conflict with the interests (defined in the same way) of any other person. [I don't have time to sketch this argument further, and I have to stop somewhere, so I'll leave it at that. If you're interested in more on this point, Google for "conflicts of interest among rational men."]
coliveira 14y ago
> distributes culture so is a public good only if you consider Disney moves as well as other Hollywood productions to contribute to the public good. I, for myself, think that enabling the distribution of this kind of content is a disservice to humanity. I much prefer that people would have to pay for access.
- Drakim 14y ago
  For a lot of people who don't live in the profitable western parts of the world, paying for access is often not an option, because the company that owns the rights doesn't bother releasing their content in such places. A lot of companies even frown upon manual importing of physical media across the world, regional-locking the content. In the perfect world where piracy is stopped, they simply don't have access to this culture.
  - coliveira 14y ago
    That's my point, why technology should be used to freely export Hollywood's version of culture? There are many ways in which technology can improve people's lives, but this is not one of them. On the contrary, it is making even harder for foreign countries to create their own entertainment industry, because it is very hard to compete with free.
  - benologist 14y ago
    I think this is a an easily believable lie. People in developing countries almost exclusively do not have a personal computer and internet connection at home or work they can use to download stuff. They have basically three options: - buy movies and console games on the street 1000x faster and cheaper than downloading and 100% reliably - pay by the hour in an internet cafe to download to their usb stick or dumb phone / mp3 player, very heavily restricted by time, price and storage capacity - offline sharing amongst friends/family TPB is just a playground for rich kids in rich countries to download everything they want in exchange for viewing a smorgasbord of advertisements and affiliate links and dodgy spyware offers.
- mtgx 14y ago
  I understand what you're saying - that most of it is crap - just like in any particular ecosystem or class of content. Most of it will always be crap. However think about the impact some productions could have in some cultures - like say the V for Vendetta movie in China.
vibrunazo 14y ago
> It is however hard to know if it is overall better for society. Really? Have tried to stop and think about the pros vs cons? I would be surprised if someone did, and didn't conclude it's heavily in the pirate bay's favor. The pros are it makes it easier for people to access art. The primary con would be one weaker revenue channel for some artists. But there are so many means to fund arts. Specially in the kick stater era. Arts are still being funded, not only that. Are finding new brilliant ways to get funded. And on the other side, accessing art is easier than ever. It's just an obvious smashing win for the pirate bay. I mean, just look at how easy it is to access art today. Versus I don't think anyone would argue it's any harder to create arts today. Quite the opposite.
- rayiner 14y ago
  I disagree. There are lots of legal channels available for artists that want to publish their art for free. But by and large people on TPB don't want that. They want Hollywood movies, etc. Those Hollywood movies would not be created if it was legal to distribute them for free. They are purely commercial entertainment products.
  - praxeologist 14y ago
    "Those Hollywood movies would not be created if it was legal to distribute them for free." I find this to be one of the most hilarious stances of IP advocates. Yes, $50+ million classics like Blade 2 might not be created without the monopoly system of copyright protection. IP apologists act like we would be in a movieless, art-free world if we got rid of copyright.
    - rayiner 14y ago
      I didn't say we wouldn't have movies. I said we wouldn't have big budget Hollywood films. Which would be fine with me, but those are the subject of the major traffic on TPB. That's the part I find tremendously disingenuous. All this tall about art--there is a ton of great free or cheap art. Indie movies, music, etc. But people don't want that. They want the high budget entertainment products. Well, it's the copyright system that makes those products viable. Without copyright, you'd have lots of art, but not the kind the torrenters are interested in.
mseebach 14y ago
When the mob does it, it's called a front. For moral justification of The Pirate Bay, there's only the Jefferson quote, "If a law is unjust, a man is not only right to disobey it, he is obligated to do so". It's a damn good one, but the "legal content" defense is just silly posturing.
- shawn-butler 14y ago
  To my knowledge Thomas Jefferson never wrote any such thing. Spurious quotation at worst, specious at best. If you can provide a source I would appreciate it. Jefferson loved the law and rational debate and would never have elevated the opinion of one person above the law except in matters of religion or spiritual freedom. Jefferson by the way sold his library of 6000 volumes to the library of Congress for US ~$20k after the British burned Washington DC in the war of 1812. He was not a wealthy man and in fact was nearly bankrupt many times in his life. If I recall his remaining books were sold at auction after his death to pay off his debts. He was also an inventor that sought protection by the state of his ideas from theft. On the other hand he was also a staunch advocate of free education.
  - mseebach 14y ago
    "The problem with quotes from the Internet is that it is hard to verify their authenticity" -- Abraham Lincoln In this particular case, it doesn't really matter as the inclusion of Jefferson is just for spice, it's not an appeal to authority (as quoting people like that often is). History is littered with heroes who agreed with the assertion. That said, it's a moral assertion, not a legal one. I'm no scholar on the subject, but the way I read it, I don't see any expectation of immunity from disobeying the law, but rather a paraphrasing of "be ready to die for what you know to be true". It's unlikely that anybody is going to die for the Pirate Bay, but the founders and several users have certainly felt the heavy hand of the law, but they and their supporters still consider themselves to be morally right.
    - shawn-butler 14y ago
      Would your view change greatly if it was you being (mis)quoted? I am a little sensitive I suppose due to my belief system being based on truth and accuracy and not rhetoric. Also historians tend to get wrankled about accuracy, mostly because we paid the price of inhaling all that dust in an effort to be historically precise.
visarga 14y ago
> TPB helps distributes culture so is a public good What does it matter if it is right or not? It is a paradigm change and there's nothing moral or immoral about it. Was it moral that humans started using fire and weapons against animals? Is it moral that we control the vegetation of this planet to our interests? Was it moral for the copyists to be replaced by printing press? The cart and buggy businesses to go under after the apparition of the car? It's just change. It is what it is, a transformation beyond the control of a few. This transition phase will be over sooner or later and the new settled order will emerge. Until then, we are in flux. And it's not for any one group or person to decide if they find it convenient and block it - they can't. If they tried, they'd blown to pieces by history.

maxharris 14y ago

"Better for society," as it is typically invoked, is an invalid standard for determining what's good. It's a vague concept, and it's easy to shred intellectually. For example, we're often told that eminent domain is in "the public interest," but what about the homeowner facing eviction and demolition so that a new stadium, highway or shopping mall can be built? Isn't he part of the public? What about his interests? In reality, society is nothing more than a group individuals. A society has no special attributes apart from those of its individual members. If the "good of society" has any meaning, it must refer to the good of each of its individual members, as individuals. So how do we know what's good for an individual and what isn't? The correct standard for determining the good is the life of the person being discussed. The good is that which furthers that particular individual's life (with this standard, it is obvious that the evil is that which destroys that person's life). Finally, regarding the counter-argument about conflicts of interest that some might raise: I don't believe that there are any, in reality. What is in the true, rational self-interest of one person is never in conflict with the interests (defined in the same way) of any other person. [I don't have time to sketch this argument further, and I have to stop somewhere, so I'll leave it at that. If you're interested in more on this point, Google for "conflicts of interest among rational men."]

coliveira 14y ago

> distributes culture so is a public good only if you consider Disney moves as well as other Hollywood productions to contribute to the public good. I, for myself, think that enabling the distribution of this kind of content is a disservice to humanity. I much prefer that people would have to pay for access.

Drakim 14y ago
For a lot of people who don't live in the profitable western parts of the world, paying for access is often not an option, because the company that owns the rights doesn't bother releasing their content in such places. A lot of companies even frown upon manual importing of physical media across the world, regional-locking the content. In the perfect world where piracy is stopped, they simply don't have access to this culture.
- coliveira 14y ago
  That's my point, why technology should be used to freely export Hollywood's version of culture? There are many ways in which technology can improve people's lives, but this is not one of them. On the contrary, it is making even harder for foreign countries to create their own entertainment industry, because it is very hard to compete with free.
- benologist 14y ago
  I think this is a an easily believable lie. People in developing countries almost exclusively do not have a personal computer and internet connection at home or work they can use to download stuff. They have basically three options: - buy movies and console games on the street 1000x faster and cheaper than downloading and 100% reliably - pay by the hour in an internet cafe to download to their usb stick or dumb phone / mp3 player, very heavily restricted by time, price and storage capacity - offline sharing amongst friends/family TPB is just a playground for rich kids in rich countries to download everything they want in exchange for viewing a smorgasbord of advertisements and affiliate links and dodgy spyware offers.
mtgx 14y ago
I understand what you're saying - that most of it is crap - just like in any particular ecosystem or class of content. Most of it will always be crap. However think about the impact some productions could have in some cultures - like say the V for Vendetta movie in China.

vibrunazo 14y ago

> It is however hard to know if it is overall better for society. Really? Have tried to stop and think about the pros vs cons? I would be surprised if someone did, and didn't conclude it's heavily in the pirate bay's favor. The pros are it makes it easier for people to access art. The primary con would be one weaker revenue channel for some artists. But there are so many means to fund arts. Specially in the kick stater era. Arts are still being funded, not only that. Are finding new brilliant ways to get funded. And on the other side, accessing art is easier than ever. It's just an obvious smashing win for the pirate bay. I mean, just look at how easy it is to access art today. Versus I don't think anyone would argue it's any harder to create arts today. Quite the opposite.

rayiner 14y ago
I disagree. There are lots of legal channels available for artists that want to publish their art for free. But by and large people on TPB don't want that. They want Hollywood movies, etc. Those Hollywood movies would not be created if it was legal to distribute them for free. They are purely commercial entertainment products.
- praxeologist 14y ago
  "Those Hollywood movies would not be created if it was legal to distribute them for free." I find this to be one of the most hilarious stances of IP advocates. Yes, $50+ million classics like Blade 2 might not be created without the monopoly system of copyright protection. IP apologists act like we would be in a movieless, art-free world if we got rid of copyright.
  - rayiner 14y ago
    I didn't say we wouldn't have movies. I said we wouldn't have big budget Hollywood films. Which would be fine with me, but those are the subject of the major traffic on TPB. That's the part I find tremendously disingenuous. All this tall about art--there is a ton of great free or cheap art. Indie movies, music, etc. But people don't want that. They want the high budget entertainment products. Well, it's the copyright system that makes those products viable. Without copyright, you'd have lots of art, but not the kind the torrenters are interested in.

mseebach 14y ago

When the mob does it, it's called a front. For moral justification of The Pirate Bay, there's only the Jefferson quote, "If a law is unjust, a man is not only right to disobey it, he is obligated to do so". It's a damn good one, but the "legal content" defense is just silly posturing.

shawn-butler 14y ago
To my knowledge Thomas Jefferson never wrote any such thing. Spurious quotation at worst, specious at best. If you can provide a source I would appreciate it. Jefferson loved the law and rational debate and would never have elevated the opinion of one person above the law except in matters of religion or spiritual freedom. Jefferson by the way sold his library of 6000 volumes to the library of Congress for US ~$20k after the British burned Washington DC in the war of 1812. He was not a wealthy man and in fact was nearly bankrupt many times in his life. If I recall his remaining books were sold at auction after his death to pay off his debts. He was also an inventor that sought protection by the state of his ideas from theft. On the other hand he was also a staunch advocate of free education.
- mseebach 14y ago
  "The problem with quotes from the Internet is that it is hard to verify their authenticity" -- Abraham Lincoln In this particular case, it doesn't really matter as the inclusion of Jefferson is just for spice, it's not an appeal to authority (as quoting people like that often is). History is littered with heroes who agreed with the assertion. That said, it's a moral assertion, not a legal one. I'm no scholar on the subject, but the way I read it, I don't see any expectation of immunity from disobeying the law, but rather a paraphrasing of "be ready to die for what you know to be true". It's unlikely that anybody is going to die for the Pirate Bay, but the founders and several users have certainly felt the heavy hand of the law, but they and their supporters still consider themselves to be morally right.
  - shawn-butler 14y ago
    Would your view change greatly if it was you being (mis)quoted? I am a little sensitive I suppose due to my belief system being based on truth and accuracy and not rhetoric. Also historians tend to get wrankled about accuracy, mostly because we paid the price of inhaling all that dust in an effort to be historically precise.

visarga 14y ago

> TPB helps distributes culture so is a public good What does it matter if it is right or not? It is a paradigm change and there's nothing moral or immoral about it. Was it moral that humans started using fire and weapons against animals? Is it moral that we control the vegetation of this planet to our interests? Was it moral for the copyists to be replaced by printing press? The cart and buggy businesses to go under after the apparition of the car? It's just change. It is what it is, a transformation beyond the control of a few. This transition phase will be over sooner or later and the new settled order will emerge. Until then, we are in flux. And it's not for any one group or person to decide if they find it convenient and block it - they can't. If they tried, they'd blown to pieces by history.