7 ms·

"Seems to me to be an understandable principle that it's okay to consume and share nonrivalrous [sic] good which are available on the net for free." I keep hea

by sfk 18y ago

"Seems to me to be an understandable principle that it's okay to consume and share nonrivalrous [sic] good which are available on the net for free." I keep hearing this argument that the owner of the original file does not lose anything if you copy it. Well, the owner of a banknote does not lose anything either if you make 10000 copies of it. Both files and money have an abstract value, and copying dilutes the value, hence copying is forbidden.

ajkirwin 18y ago
But, that's the point. Things usually only have value based on scarcity, at least for luxury items. The problem is that data is never a scarce resource. It's, for all practical purposes, inexhaustible. So trying to put a price on a collection of bits is virtually impossible using classical models. So what you end up with is companies trying to recreate this 'scarcity' with encryption schemes and lockins and all manner of other protective measures. Which all inevitably fail, rendering the production cost of this new item extremely close to zero. Now, some people argue that you must take development costs into account, lost sales, etcetera and then you end up straying into wild, untamed territory. After all, you don't see car companies suing the manufacturers of bicycles for taking away sales, or anything like that. But yet, when it comes to digital information, this seems to be par for the course. And of course, the counter-argument to it is thus: If I make say, 1,000 copies of a game and keep all these copies on my hard drive, does that cost the company more? No. But if I give these new copies that I made at my own expense (as little as that is) to my friends, this is somehow a transformative process and is treated as costing the IP owner profit (or increasing effective cost or somesuch). It would probably serve better to just give up on this and focus on creating product in a way that follows traditional markets. Give away the music for free, it's only data. But make your revenue from shirts, concerts, etcetera.
ajkirwin 18y ago
Also, your argument is fallacious. A digital good does not really have any instrinsic value in and of itself, only what people make of it. Whereas a dollar bill is worth just that, a dollar.
- rw 18y ago
  A dollar is worth a dollar because a lot of people want it that way. Gold is "worth" 900USD because a lot of people want gold. But not too many people - otherwise the price would rise. My point is that nothing has intrinsic value. The market parameters of supply, demand and prices are one way we assign value to things.
RobGR 18y ago
Yes, but copying a banknote is akin to "copying" my signature onto a check. It's a form of forgery, not of information propagation.

by sfk 18y ago

ajkirwin 18y ago

But, that's the point. Things usually only have value based on scarcity, at least for luxury items. The problem is that data is never a scarce resource. It's, for all practical purposes, inexhaustible. So trying to put a price on a collection of bits is virtually impossible using classical models. So what you end up with is companies trying to recreate this 'scarcity' with encryption schemes and lockins and all manner of other protective measures. Which all inevitably fail, rendering the production cost of this new item extremely close to zero. Now, some people argue that you must take development costs into account, lost sales, etcetera and then you end up straying into wild, untamed territory. After all, you don't see car companies suing the manufacturers of bicycles for taking away sales, or anything like that. But yet, when it comes to digital information, this seems to be par for the course. And of course, the counter-argument to it is thus: If I make say, 1,000 copies of a game and keep all these copies on my hard drive, does that cost the company more? No. But if I give these new copies that I made at my own expense (as little as that is) to my friends, this is somehow a transformative process and is treated as costing the IP owner profit (or increasing effective cost or somesuch). It would probably serve better to just give up on this and focus on creating product in a way that follows traditional markets. Give away the music for free, it's only data. But make your revenue from shirts, concerts, etcetera.

ajkirwin 18y ago

Also, your argument is fallacious. A digital good does not really have any instrinsic value in and of itself, only what people make of it. Whereas a dollar bill is worth just that, a dollar.

rw 18y ago
A dollar is worth a dollar because a lot of people want it that way. Gold is "worth" 900USD because a lot of people want gold. But not too many people - otherwise the price would rise. My point is that nothing has intrinsic value. The market parameters of supply, demand and prices are one way we assign value to things.

RobGR 18y ago

Yes, but copying a banknote is akin to "copying" my signature onto a check. It's a form of forgery, not of information propagation.