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Why are we working on new distribution channels like The Pirate Bay? Because we categorically reject the notion that corrupt, law-breaking middlemen who abuse

by sounds 12y ago

Why are we working on new distribution channels like The Pirate Bay? Because we categorically reject the notion that corrupt, law-breaking middlemen who abuse the artist's right to be paid and abuse or refuse service to the customer -- I mean the MPAA, RIAA, etc. -- are a better alternative or economic model for a digital age than the free sharing of bits which is what the internet (and before that, usenet, and before that, sneakernet) has always been. We categorically reject the notion that we need state-sponsored controlled locked-down DRM ecosystems where hackers are thrown in jail for sending an HTTP request to an open server and cell phone unlocking is illegal, just so that the MPAA can continue to exist. The free as in zero dollars alternative _is_ what is happening to software: the price of an operating system is being driven to zero dollars. We celebrate this as the liberation of technology from the monopolistic, predatory, illegal activities that happened 20 years ago. We applaud the brilliant, profitable companies that are not hostile to free software (as in freedom). We hope more companies will learn how to do something like Github, The Linux Foundation, or Amazon EC2. Meanwhile, you can question the magic. It might not make sense to you, but it makes sense to John Perry Barlow: https://projects.eff.org/~barlow/Declaration-Final.html https://projects.eff.org/~barlow/Declaration-Final.html Why aren't you championing Actors Guilds, Authors fighting against Amazon's policies and fees, or even the fight against DRM?

api 12y ago
Edit: I deleted my original response because I figured out why we're arguing. "Free" is really a punk idea. It's a counterculture idea. "Steal this book" and all that. But ideas like that undergo a strange transformation when the power dynamics invert. Graffiti is also a counterculture thing, a rebellious thing. But what would happen if the police started doing it? Imagine you go outside and see a couple cops spray painting "just say no to drugs!" on the side of your house? You confront them and they start spewing stuff about how "there is no property man! I should be free to express myself!" (Great comedy skit right there...) The trouble is that hackers aren't rebels anymore. They aren't a counterculture. They've won. So stop talking like a rebel, because you aren't one. You are a member of a super-privileged super-empowered super-educated upper class with tremendous opportunity and unbelievable power. With your ideas and gravitas you can raise more capital than most people can save over a working lifetime, and if your "startup" is successful you could find yourself with four houses and a private jet. With somewhat less effort you can command incomes that are twice the national average for a whole family and still have enough energy left over to hack on things "in your spare time" and debate politics on sites like this. You can, with a few "hacks," crash whole corporate systems and cost people millions upon millions of dollars all by yourself. If you know a bit about networks you can probably pull it off without being caught, maybe deflect the blame toward a third world dictator and create an international incident that captures global headlines... FROM YOUR BEDROOM. You are upper class. You are rich and powerful -- far more powerful than the clueless geezers at the MPAA. I mean look... TPB gets taken down and six copies pop up in 24 hours. You can run circles around those morons because you're smarter, faster, ... YOU ARE THE F'ING MAN. You're not desperately struggling against the MPAA and the RIAA. Don't you get it? They're the ones desperately struggling against you, and it's a total rout. You are beating the living hell out of them. "Steal this book" is punk, but "steal all the books" is tyranny. In the hands of "the man," piracy becomes a tool for crushing and beggaring labor, disempowering the consumer, and creating a surveillance dystopia by baiting users into passive surveillance-based content aggregators. It's as ridiculous as graffiti in the hands of the police. You say "we" a lot. Let me tell you this. History will judge us on what we do with the awesome power we have been given. I'm not defending the old record companies. We could do better. We could create systems that allow artists to sell their works directly to their customers with almost zero percent overhead -- 100% to the artist! Not only that, but we could create in that transaction a direct personal social link between artist and fan, a real relationship. That's so much better than the old model for everyone. But no, we're building The Pirate Bay again, and again, and again, because we're cheap and we want free stuff. It's not just tyrannical and infantile. It's lame. It's not even technically interesting.
- sounds 12y ago
  Thanks for the thoughtful response. I disagree, which is why I picked other companies as my examples: companies for which you _are_ the customer.
- Fargren 12y ago
  Woah. This is the best comment I've ever read anywhere in a long time. I'm not sure if I agree with it; it goes against a lot of things I believe. And yet I can find nothing wrong in your argument. Do you have any recommended readings on the subject or something?
  - api 12y ago
    No. I feel like a loner howling at the moon on this one. I would look up a series of talks on YouTube called "free is a lie" by Aral Balkan. They deal more with the free service bait and switch than piracy, but I found them influential in getting me to question "free."
    - sounds 12y ago
      Free is not a lie, it's the simple physics of copying bits. DRM and the old record companies are the lie you're selling. If they were fighting for their lives, they wouldn't have Washington DC, Apple, Google, Microsoft, New Zealand, Australia, Canada, Sweden, the United Kingdom, ... in their pockets. The 100%-to-the-artists stores exist. I love 'em. I'm not the man, I'm just another guy looking for a job. The interview process for computer jobs should make it obvious that I'm not the super-elite like Chris Dodd. I just don't think people will ever stop freely sharing culture... long after the MPAA, DMCA, RIAA, and all DRM schemes are forgotten.
      - api 12y ago
        Hardware isn't free. Code isn't free. Electricity isn't free. The zero marginal cost of copying bits is only true if you look at the copying of bits in isolation. If you take a whole system view, it isn't free.

by sounds 12y ago

api 12y ago

Edit: I deleted my original response because I figured out why we're arguing. "Free" is really a punk idea. It's a counterculture idea. "Steal this book" and all that. But ideas like that undergo a strange transformation when the power dynamics invert. Graffiti is also a counterculture thing, a rebellious thing. But what would happen if the police started doing it? Imagine you go outside and see a couple cops spray painting "just say no to drugs!" on the side of your house? You confront them and they start spewing stuff about how "there is no property man! I should be free to express myself!" (Great comedy skit right there...) The trouble is that hackers aren't rebels anymore. They aren't a counterculture. They've won. So stop talking like a rebel, because you aren't one. You are a member of a super-privileged super-empowered super-educated upper class with tremendous opportunity and unbelievable power. With your ideas and gravitas you can raise more capital than most people can save over a working lifetime, and if your "startup" is successful you could find yourself with four houses and a private jet. With somewhat less effort you can command incomes that are twice the national average for a whole family and still have enough energy left over to hack on things "in your spare time" and debate politics on sites like this. You can, with a few "hacks," crash whole corporate systems and cost people millions upon millions of dollars all by yourself. If you know a bit about networks you can probably pull it off without being caught, maybe deflect the blame toward a third world dictator and create an international incident that captures global headlines... FROM YOUR BEDROOM. You are upper class. You are rich and powerful -- far more powerful than the clueless geezers at the MPAA. I mean look... TPB gets taken down and six copies pop up in 24 hours. You can run circles around those morons because you're smarter, faster, ... YOU ARE THE F'ING MAN. You're not desperately struggling against the MPAA and the RIAA. Don't you get it? They're the ones desperately struggling against you, and it's a total rout. You are beating the living hell out of them. "Steal this book" is punk, but "steal all the books" is tyranny. In the hands of "the man," piracy becomes a tool for crushing and beggaring labor, disempowering the consumer, and creating a surveillance dystopia by baiting users into passive surveillance-based content aggregators. It's as ridiculous as graffiti in the hands of the police. You say "we" a lot. Let me tell you this. History will judge us on what we do with the awesome power we have been given. I'm not defending the old record companies. We could do better. We could create systems that allow artists to sell their works directly to their customers with almost zero percent overhead -- 100% to the artist! Not only that, but we could create in that transaction a direct personal social link between artist and fan, a real relationship. That's so much better than the old model for everyone. But no, we're building The Pirate Bay again, and again, and again, because we're cheap and we want free stuff. It's not just tyrannical and infantile. It's lame. It's not even technically interesting.

sounds 12y ago
Thanks for the thoughtful response. I disagree, which is why I picked other companies as my examples: companies for which you _are_ the customer.
Fargren 12y ago
Woah. This is the best comment I've ever read anywhere in a long time. I'm not sure if I agree with it; it goes against a lot of things I believe. And yet I can find nothing wrong in your argument. Do you have any recommended readings on the subject or something?
- api 12y ago
  No. I feel like a loner howling at the moon on this one. I would look up a series of talks on YouTube called "free is a lie" by Aral Balkan. They deal more with the free service bait and switch than piracy, but I found them influential in getting me to question "free."
  - sounds 12y ago
    Free is not a lie, it's the simple physics of copying bits. DRM and the old record companies are the lie you're selling. If they were fighting for their lives, they wouldn't have Washington DC, Apple, Google, Microsoft, New Zealand, Australia, Canada, Sweden, the United Kingdom, ... in their pockets. The 100%-to-the-artists stores exist. I love 'em. I'm not the man, I'm just another guy looking for a job. The interview process for computer jobs should make it obvious that I'm not the super-elite like Chris Dodd. I just don't think people will ever stop freely sharing culture... long after the MPAA, DMCA, RIAA, and all DRM schemes are forgotten.
    - api 12y ago
      Hardware isn't free. Code isn't free. Electricity isn't free. The zero marginal cost of copying bits is only true if you look at the copying of bits in isolation. If you take a whole system view, it isn't free.