How Copyright Extension Undermined Copyright: The Copyright Of Parking (Part I)
from the parallel-parking dept
What do copyright and parking laws have in common?
The short answer: no one takes either very seriously.
According to a recent article in L.A. Magazine, only 10% of parking citations ever get written. Which is to say that 90% of the times that people park illegally, there are no consequences. Those who violate the increasingly strict parking rules in most U.S. cities are more likely to associate a ticket with bad luck or personal hostility against them than with the fact that they broke the law.
In other words, when you get a ticket, you don’t feel guilty. You feel victimized. As John Van Horn, the editor of Parking Today, explains, low levels of enforcement undermine the deterrent intent of parking laws. “We break the law often and get away with it. Deep down inside we know that. What makes us mad is getting caught the few times we do. ‘Ninety percent of drivers on this street got away scot-free today, but I get the ticket?’ That makes us crazy.”
Part of what drives us to rage at getting a ticket is that we don’t actually believe parking should be illegal in the first place. The freedom to park wherever there’s space is deeply ingrained in the American psyche if not the law. The invention of the parking meter in the late 1930’s was greeted with near-riots across the country. Editorials railed against the new devices as “illegal,” “immoral” and a “perversion.” The Alabama state Supreme Court declared meters unconstitutional in 1937, and ordered them removed from Birmingham streets.
“I truly believe that when men and women think about parking, their mental capacity reverts to the reptilian cortex of the brain,” says UCLA’s Donald Shoup, perhaps the nation’s only academic devoted to the study of parking.
A law that is rarely enforced—indeed, which is not cost-effective to enforce except sporadically—is no law at all. Which brings us to copyright.
Overprotective and largely unenforced rules, combined with a deep-rooted sense of entitlement, create an explosive combination. The problem is the same with parking and copyright. As copyright law becomes more strict, and its penalties more byzantine, Americans are less likely to make the effort to follow the rules, or to believe that new forms of technology-enabled copying are immoral in the first place.
We refuse to see our behavior as illegal, even when we know it is. Recent surveys by the Pew Research Center, for example, report that 72 percent of Americans between ages 18 and 29 “do not care whether the music they download onto their computers is copyrighted or not.” Rightly or wrongly (if those terms even mean anything anymore in this context), the added penalties, extensions, and limits on copying, along with decreasing rates of successful enforcement, are making it less, not more, likely that Americans will obey the rules.
We are collectively living in a state of cognitive dissonance, uncomfortably embracing two conflicting beliefs at the same time. Copying is illegal. Copying is not wrong.
Where did we get the idea of a right to free content? In large part, from the content producers themselves. An older generation grew up with music, movies and television programs beamed directly to their televisions and transistor radios at no charge. Those consumers can’t understand why saving content onto some medium and enjoying it again or later should suddenly transform a strongly-encouraged behavior into a felony.
A younger generation, raised on cheap Internet access, was likewise encouraged to enjoy all manner of copyrighted materials freely and frequently by content providers who wisely chose to rely, as their predecessors did, on advertising and other indirect revenue to pay their costs and generate profits. That’s the message of newspapers, magazines, and broadcast networks who offer some or even all of their content without a paywall. And the movie industry teases consumers mercilessly with trailers, interviews, and production blogs that show just enough of upcoming movies to make us feel entitled to see the rest, one way or the other, the sooner the better.
Yet when fans enthusiastically encourage others to embrace their preferences by posting clips or copies of popular content to YouTube or by ripping CDs and DVDs to repeat their enjoyment on other devices, they instantly cross the legal line from well-trained consumers to dangerous criminals—even terrorists.
Copyright may be the law, in other words, but it no longer holds any moral authority with most consumers. There’s no longer an ethical imperative to obey it or even understand it. Self-enforcement is fading, and the rules are so severe and so frequently violated that effective legal enforcement has become nearly impossible.
It’s a meter, and we all know that the meter is rarely checked. Copyright is a law in name only—as obsolete and irrelevant as rules still on the books in some jurisdictions that regulate who can or must wear what kind of clothing.
Next: How making the law stronger makes the law weaker »
Filed Under: copyright extension, enforcement, free content, parking
Comments on “How Copyright Extension Undermined Copyright: The Copyright Of Parking (Part I)”
Parking Today?
There is a magazine called Parking Today? how many people care that much about parking that it needs a magazine? a blog maybe but a whole magazine?
Re: Parking Today?
Trade mags always have served various nice markets. Doesn’t make them sound any less silly sometimes, regardless as to how informative the actual content is. Parking is a frickin’ industry.
I live in one of those sprawling cities and the only place that charges for parking is a 10 square block section in the center of town. Everywhere else is free.
If copyright were like parking, I wouldn’t be able to park anywhere in my city without paying a toll. There might be a few place out in the country where I could park, but every decade or so the government expands the boundaries.
Oh, and what’s the maximum fine on a parking ticket again? Is it anywhere close to $150,000?
But I still find parking laws more valid than current copyright laws.
Re: Re:
Well, sure: if I park in a space and don’t pay, that stops a paying parker from parking there and paying. On the other hand…
Re: Re: Re:
So now you owe the cost of completely re-paving, from the dirt up, several parking spaces. Every time you exceed the time limit by one second.
Copyright and piracy are global issues. The content industry is global. Rather bizarre then that you choose a local (LA) law enforcement issue as an example to contrast with copyright.
On from that, I can’t honestly remember the content industry, specifically the music industry, encouraging the public to think content is free. the content is free myth has really come about since the internet.
Television is a paid for delivery medium, either through licenses, cable, or advertising.
Neither radio or television has gone away. So it’s hard to see how the internet would replace them in the minds of the public. The internet is new, and therefore new conditions apply.
Lastly, I would strongly question your idea that most people think copyright is irrelevant.
Re: Re:
“Cars and Parking are global issues. The car industry is global. Rather bizarre then that you choose a local (Hollywood) law enforcement issue as an example to contrast with parking.”
FTFY
Re: Re:
Wow, really??? I am awestruck by this. I would have asserted the exact opposite: it’s hard to see how the internet would not replace them in the minds of the public.
Amongst the people I know (even the non-geek ones), when it comes to media consumption the internet is not distinct in their minds from TV or radio at all. They are all completely interchangeable.
Re: Re: Re:
Amongst the people I know (even the non-geek ones), when it comes to media consumption the internet is not distinct in their minds from TV or radio at all. They are all completely interchangeable.
Exactly my point, thank you.
We pay for radio and tv content, so if the internet is the same, we should pay to have internet content produced.
There is no free lunch.
Re: Re: Re: Re:
Um. When was the last time you paid for the radio?
Re: Re: Re:2 Re:
The last time I paid for a radio it came with a free car attached. I’ve gotten more use out of the car than the radio though. I feel bad that I swindled the dealership.
Re: Re: Re:2 Re:
Dumbass – you pay for radio with your ATTENTION. You are so ignorantly literal at times, child.
Re: Re: Re:3 Re:
Dumbass – you pay for radio with your ATTENTION. You are so ignorantly literal at times, child.
So, er, same as on the internet then. So, if you agree that “attention” is currency, then there’s no problem with infringement, right?
Re: Re: Re:3 Re:
Does the Internet not also require our attention? A lot of websites have figured this out, and have advertising there, why can’t “Big Media” also figure this one out?
Re: Re: Re: Re:
Really? I’ve been enjoying a legal lunch of free licensed content for about three years now. It’s delicious.
Re: Re: Re: Re:
We pay for the cable box to receive the TV programming. We buy a radio to capture the broadcasts. We pay an ISP for connection to the internet.
Sometimes we pay for access to certain premium channels on TV.
Paying for the content directly doesn’t happen except in certain cases on the internet (charged downloads). Everything else is access to a service that provides the content, which is done through ISPs on the Internet.
Re: Re: Re: Re:
>We pay for radio and tv content, so if the internet is the same, we should pay to have internet content produced.
There is no free lunch.
If I ripped a CD I legally bought and made a copy of the files inside the content producer made no effort in making that extra copy (regardless of what happens to it). Yet, I’m not paid for the manufacture.
There shouldn’t be a free lunch.
Re: Re: Re: Re:
I agree with you completely.
I pay for TV through Cable or Satellite subscriptions on a monthly basis. Funny, that is EXACTLY how I pay for my internet as well. It even comes to my house through the same pipe as my TV.
I pay for TV through Cable or Satellite subscriptions on a monthly basis. It is a monthly subscription. I have never had to pay per show I watch.
I pay for TV through Cable or Satellite subscriptions on a monthly basis. I do not then have to pay extra to watch on the TV in the basement vs that in the den.
I pay for TV through Cable or Satellite subscriptions on a monthly basis. I can then Tivo, VHS, DVR, etc and watch them when it is most convenient for me. I do not have to pay extra for this.
So again, AC, I agree with you entirely. We should treat Internet content the same.
Re: Re:
Rather bizarre then that you choose a local (LA) law enforcement issue as an example to contrast with copyright.
Bizarre if you’ve never heard of analogies, I guess…
I can’t honestly remember the content industry, specifically the music industry, encouraging the public to think content is free
Hint: the free TV and radio signals saturating the airwaves, though invisible, are in fact present.
Television is a paid for delivery medium, either through licenses, cable, or advertising.
You can’t call advertising payment. When people say that content should be free, they are not saying it shouldn’t make any money in any way. Advertising is one of the best ways to make money off free content, as TV and radio clearly demonstrate. The fact that you can’t process this simple point is ridiculous. Nobody is claiming that media has to be magically produced with zero revenue
In fact, by your view, piracy isn’t free either. After all, pirate sites are all covered in ads. I think we should hold you to that – no more claiming that pirates just want stuff for free since, by your definition of a “paid for delivery medium”, all pirates are paying.
Neither radio or television has gone away. So it’s hard to see how the internet would replace them in the minds of the public.
You don’t think the fact that millions of people now use the internet instead of TV or radio as their first source for news, weather, traffic, music and movies represents a serious shift in the way the public views these different media? Seems pretty obvious to everyone else.
The internet is new, and therefore new conditions apply.
Actually, the internet is a couple decades old, and there are now entire generations that don’t think of it as “new”. While you were trying to figure out which “new conditions apply”, the world got on with life and embraced this amazing new distribution medium and the obvious conditions implicit in its technology (i.e. that digital information is infinite and thus cheap or free). It’s hilarious, and telling, that you call it “new” when its implications have been well known and widely discussed for twenty years or more.
Re: Re: Re:
Bizarre if you’ve never heard of analogies
And you’ve never heard of good analogies obviously. This ain’t one.
You can’t call advertising payment.
Hmm, that’s another good one. I’ll remember that the next time I’m discussing The Sky Is Rising.
no more claiming that pirates just want stuff for free since, by your definition of a “paid for delivery medium”, all pirates are paying.
Wrong. We’ve said for years the pirate sites are profiting from piracy. The people who consume the pirated content are of course looking for free content.
‘New’ compared to radio and tv of course. No one was sharing music on the net 20 years ago. Pretty silly then to claim the phenom is 20 years old. In terms of content delivery, the law and copyright, it’s NEW.
Re: Re: Re: Re:
. We’ve said for years the pirate sites are profiting from piracy.
And even as you say it, it has made no sense. The pirate sites don’t make a lot of money. The people you represent do.
The people who consume the pirated content are of course looking for free content.
Again, nonsense. They click on the TV and they’ve paid for that content. People can look for free online in the form of Youtube streams. People can look for free in regards to new games that can be found for free. The concept of time shift from the Betamax ruling is not lost on anyone. Yet you ignore this important aspect to consider people thieves when they can find the alternatives at a time and a place that’s convenient for them. Why must you continue to ignore actual facts for this moral belief in “But… But… Piracy” routines?
New’ compared to radio and tv of course. No one was sharing music on the net 20 years ago. Pretty silly then to claim the phenom is 20 years old. In terms of content delivery, the law and copyright, it’s NEW.
Again, this is short sighted and wrong. People are using new mediums of delivery at their convenience. Even if you think it’s dead, time shifting is not gone. People can hear songs on the radio or their mp3 player. They can watch Cable TV or use the internet for news. They can play games on PC or find old games. This does not equate to lost money.
It’s new monetary avenues. Why aren’t you exploring what you can do with these new avenues instead of wasting time fighting things you can’t resolve?
Re: Re: Re: Re:
You are just talking in circles, and switching the way you are using words halfway through.
Advertising is a great way to get paid – by the advertiser. That’s not the same thing as a direct payment from the consumer. When we talk about “free content” from a consumer perspective, that includes advertising-supported content. Broadcast TV and radio are free media – as in, the consumer does not pay for them.
Yes, you can frame advertising as “another form of payment” (and in can be useful to do so) – but that’s exactly what we mean when we talk about content being free but still finding other ways to get paid. Meanwhile, in the context of “free content” versus “paid content”, it’s quite clear that those terms are meant in the sense of direct monetary payment.
Re: Re: Re: Re:
“New’ compared to radio and tv of course. No one was sharing music on the net 20 years ago. “
Bullshit.
I can remember people sharing music on places like Compu$pend, Fidonet and others as well as film clips, pictures and all of those goodies. All crappy, all taking half the night to download or upload BUT they were sharing stuff. And that was 30 years ago in the late 1980s through to the first ISP’s appearing in the early 1990s (20 years ago) where pictures,music and everything else you can imagine was being passed around. Usenet was, and still is, full of that kind of stuff.
And you probably wouldn’t be at all surprised, even if morally outraged (which you do SO well) that it was mostly porn and warez, right?
Not New. You FAIL, again.
Re: Re:
Pre-IP maximalist days, well before TCP/IP was even the distant glimmer of a network protocol I could pick up, free of charge a couple of Seattle radio stations in Vancouver and listen to music that didn’t need regional licensing as it does today. Oh, and the music was free even if the used car lot ads were driving me bonkers. Welcome back to the world of AM Top 40 radio. It isn’t so much how the programming was paid for or licensing fees were paid it was that the music arrived on my little Japanese transistor radio arrived there utterly and totally free of any charge to ME. The same applies to television programming in the United States and Canada. We don’t have BBC style licensing.
As for television I could watch the latest edition of an American program on an American station out of Bellingham or Seattle without silly notices about it not being available in my area. Canadian stations competed by showing the program a day or two ahead of the US stations/networks in the area. Again, no charge to me.
I could record off air, which I did from time to time some of the middle of the night stuff like Wolfman Jack and that kind of stuff and time shift it to the following day. Or, if a friend was interested give the tape to him. No cost, other than the tape to either of us. At 16 we didn’t know the niceties of copyright way back in the middle 60s nor would we have cared.
By the time the 80s rolled around I could record anything I wanted when I wanted and where even if cassettes of the day were the equivalent of mp3s today. Sonic junk.
So the notion that just because the Internet is “new” and it was around in the 80s, by the way, doesn’t mean “new” conditions apply just because you and Sonny Bono and Disney say they do.
Contempt for copyright, and in some circles it’s become that and more ever widening circles, comes from the ever increasing terms, the ever increasing penalty costs which are rarely granted and when they are seem to apply to 15 year old high school girls and people who have never had an internet connection in their lives. Keeping in mind that the *AA’s are screaming bankruptcy while their revenues and profits have been increasing annually.
Rarely does the contempt include the artists, mind, because most of us have been around the block a few times enough to know that the creative accounting used by the “content” industry is designed to keep the pay away from the talent long enough and far enough to ensure that only the biggest of the big actually DO get paid and even then probably not all they ought to be. Even acts held in wide contempt like Nickleback and Van Halen. Ok, widespread critical contempt.
Copyright as it’s currently structured IS irrelevant. At least in the sense of doing what it was supposed to do when it originally appeared on the scene. (See Statute of Anne or Statue of Anne, whichever appeals to you more. ;-))
The analogy with municipal parking regs is dead on. As is the comparison to parking meters. (which are there to make money not regulate parking as honest parking officials will tell you.)
Laws that can only be unevenly enforced if an when they are enforced at all are, in plain language, irrelevant.
Have fun. I just did. 🙂
Re: Re:
Actually, I blame cassette recordings and the VCR, both of which allowed us to record off the air and share it with our friends and family, and are perfectly legal. Updated versions include DVR’s and others that I cannot think of right now. So far as I am concerned, once it has been on broadcast TV the rights holders lose their entitlement to charge me for it.
BTW, have you ever heard of a library. The ones (many) I have been to not only don’t charge but have a lot of media in a large variety of formats. Yes I pay taxes and the libraries buy their copies, but they are free to me. Then there are the private libraries, to which my tax contributions do not aid. They also pay for their content, but it is still free to me.
Re: Re: Bit what about the lost episodes?
Technically recording music on cassettes and passing it around or mixing it for dances or just to listen to in the cassette eater in most cars was copyright infringement. It was just never enforced via lawsuit and other ways available then and now.
The same occurs for VCR recordings and those who recorded stuff like every episode of programs like Doctor Who or a Star Trek series and tucked them away. Those copyright infringers are responsible for the recovery of “lost episodes” after the BBC and NBC disposed of the masters. Similar situations exist for other programming of that period.
As for recording cassettes for my car to say it’s difficult to play a LP and listen to it is understatement I never thought the “content”/”copyright”/entertainment” industry would never object even if they did find out. By the letter of the law what I did WAS infringement, of course. But I’d paid for the LP and I wasn’t going to destroy it figuring out a rig to listen to it in an Austin Mini-Cooper SS.
Re: Re: Re: Bit what about the lost episodes?
Actually, so long as the copying and passing around was minimal, it falls under fair use exemptions. You see, copyright was originally intended to target commercial publishers that didn’t have rights. The laws were written under the assumption that publishing was a costly endeavor only taken on for financial gain. That is no longer true.
Re: Re: Re:2 Bit what about the lost episodes?
> it falls under fair use exemptions
Considering he was talking about an Austin Mini-Cooper, there’s more than a good chance he hails from a country where format shifting is infringement.
Re: Re:
See? Audio and video tape, and later forms of digital recording/timeshifting didn’t destroy the industry at all, despite the fact that content distributors have cried doom the entire time.
You were saying?
Blame Game
We are collectively living in a state of cognitive dissonance, uncomfortably embracing two conflicting beliefs at the same time. Copying is illegal. Copying is not wrong.
You may blame the industry, but I blame my parents and the society they come from. “Sharing is caring.” And if I didn’t share with my brothers and sisters, it was taken away from me and given to my brothers and sisters. It is part of society and it is even written in the book that many of us profess to believe (“To who much has been given, much will be taken away.”)
Plus the fact that like the parking meters being introduced long after cars, people have been sharing entertainment for many, many years before the Statue of Anne made it illegal.
Re: Blame Game
“Sharing is caring.” And if I didn’t share with my brothers and sisters, it was taken away from me and given to my brothers and sisters. It is part of society
I’m amazed how many times this pirate BS is put forward.
Yes, our parents taught us to share. My parents, I’m sure many others, also taught me not to walk up to another child and reef their toy from them.
The biggest part of sharing we were taught was the MUTUAL CONSENT.
Maybe the problem is your parents allowed you to take whatever you wanted, whatever the consequences. Mine taught me was that ‘caring’ was about empathy and politeness, not greed and entitlement.
Re: Re: Blame Game
Copying does not take anything from another.
If I can make a copy with my own property, no one is deprived of something which he according to the laws of nature would otherwise have.
If it was possible to copy cars, houses or even food at no or minimal cost other than energy, it would unethical to keep the wealth from the rest of humanity.
Re: Re: Re: Blame Game
Also if copyright infringement = stealing, it’s stealing when little Bob makes a copy of his favorite cd for his friend.
Private non-commercial sharing is at the core of sharing is caring.
Re: Re: Blame Game
Copying != Taking
To have something that is infinitely copiable, but say that others are not allowed to copy it, is the epitome of greed and entitlement.
Re: Re: Blame Game
The problem here is that you are stuck on some physical good. Every one throughout time has shared ideas with each other, and we did so precisely because we want those ideas to spread. If you didn’t want someone to copy your idea, you didn’t tell any one or told the few people you did tell that your idea was a secret. Humans instinctively know that that is how ideas are spread.
Now you bring up the idea/expression dichotomy, but that only shows you don’t understand what I’m talking about. Ideas are infinitely copyable. It doesn’t matter if we’re talking about vague ideas are a specific expression of that idea; either is infinitely copyable with no loss to the originator of that idea.
If you don’t want your ideas to spread, then keep it a secret. Copyright law is an attempt to make public knowledge a secret, and that is impossible. Not only is it impossible, it flies in the face of human-ness. We share ideas with each other. It’s what we do. It’s how we got to where we are. Thinking you can change that is asinine. I agree with the article that irregularly enforced laws become no law at all, but the fact that sharing ideas (again, whether vague or specific) is so intrinsic to humanity already weakens copyright law.
Re: Re: Blame Game
“Sharing is caring.” And if I didn’t share with my brothers and sisters, it was taken away from me and given to my brothers and sisters. It is part of society”
I have to admit I don’t see the logic of that argument either…!
Re: Re: Blame Game
We’re not talking about property here. If you want to call it property, then tell me this: How can it be your property, when it’s made up from your collective experiences with the works of others? How can you claim property over something that is built on the works of thousands of generations of artists? Tell me, how? Every time one of you copyright shills gets red in the face about sharing, you troll up a storm how people are violating your property, even though you’ve transformed and remixed everything that came before you. You take the collective works from the entirety of history and claim that it’s “yours” when you transform them. How egotistical! How selfish and greedy! You took that which wasn’t yours, that which overlaps the works of every other creator throughout history and put a metaphorical box on it call it a discreet unit of property, your property. You cannot claim property over that which defies and supersedes any attempt to hold in exclusivity.
Sharing allows culture and knowledge to touch a greater number of minds, which expands their understanding of the world around them. It inspires them to create works of their own using what they’ve learned from other works as their foundation. Copyright serves only to restrict that access to those that meet a proprietor’s wishes. Sharing culture and knowledge can only improve society, so guess what copyright does to it?
Re: Re: Blame Game
Sure, but the people seeding torrents and hosting mirrors and streams are giving their consent. So I’m not just “reefing” (strange choice of wording, by the way) something from someone. Someone is sharing something with me of their own volition.
Nor is this a case of illegally acquired goods, as the original purchase and even the copy are perfectly legal prior to the sharing.
As such, this really does come down to the question of whether sharing is immoral.
Re: Re: Re: Blame Game
Sure, but the people seeding torrents and hosting mirrors and streams are giving their consent.
Sharing with consent is great. But many times the seeding and sharing is against the wishes of the content producer. How is that something we are taught is right when children? It isn’t.
Re: Re: Re:2 Blame Game
We are also taught not to hoard that which we can freely give without depriving ourselves possession of it. Sharing culture is far more moral than holding it for ransom. Using copyright is hoarding knowledge and culture from the masses in order to extract money from those that can afford it. Culture and knowledge, for those that can afford it.
Re: Re: Re:2 Blame Game
“But many times the seeding and sharing is against the wishes of the content producer.”
Hey, if I own a copy, it doesn’t matter what they say, I can do to that copy what I want to do to it. I own it, after all.
And if I want to make a torrent with it, that’s my business.
Re: Re: Re:2 Blame Game
If you put a poster on your door, and said your brother wasn’t allowed to look at it, would your parents let that fly? Would they agree to make him sit in the corner if he didn’t close his eyes when he walked past, or else pay 10 cents every time for the next 150 years in order to cover your fixed costs?
That’s what we’re talking about here – enjoying content while leaving the original perfectly intact. Not taking.
Re: Re: Re:2 Blame Game
When it’s a label’s own publicity people or A&R people uploading to a side or seeding a torrent to get publicity it’s hard to claim that it’s without the label’s consent Given that has been going on for decades in modified form where radio stations are supplied free copies of music as publicity in the hopes of being added to the play list and are often given away at some point by the station or its employees sounds similar to the mp3 whizzing around the universe.
“Thirty-third caller with the correct answer will win! Hurry and call now 1-888-DJS-COOL!”
Re: Re: Re:2 Blame Game
One person’s wishes do not override the right to do with one’s property what one desires. I wish you would cease using the disingenuous tactics* that you employed earlier in these comments. That doesn’t make it illegal for you to do so, nor should it.
*Under the context of what a viewer pays to TV show producers, ads were stated to not qualify as payment. You argued that this invalidated advertising as a form of revenue. This is provided here for ease of finding an example of the behavior in question.
Re: Re: Blame Game
> I’m amazed how many times this pirate BS is put forward.
It’s not “BS”. The idea that “copying is theft” is what’s BS and everyone knows it. They understand this on a very intuitive level. That’s why people like you have to put so much effort into propaganda. Your views simply aren’t natural. They highly artificial and very new.
Sharing is a basic expectation in human society.
The idea that copying is theft is not.
Re: Re: Re: Blame Game
Sharing is a basic expectation in human society.
Sharing is not, and never has been, taking something against another person’s wishes. That’s why piracy as sharing is a BS claim.
If you were right, I could share your car whether you liked it or not. Or share your post graduate thesis, so I could get a degree without doing the work myself.
Wanna share some of your bank balance with me?
It’s total bull.
Re: Re: Re:2 Blame Game
You’re right, sharing is not, and never has been, taking something against another person’s wishes. Which is why what you’ve been stating is a BS claim.
Sharing, as in the act of committing copyright infringement, is NOT taking something against another person’s wishes. It is violating their copyright, but their “object” (whatever it may be) is still intact. In point of fact, a copy has been made, and there is now something more where before there was only one.
You could indeed share someone’s car, assuming they let you do so, but taking say my car without my permission would be considered theft in the eyes of the law, as I have been deprived of something. But to make the analogy more appropriate (and correct), and I’m helping you out here because you suck with analogies in a manner that literally causes the rest of us pain to read, what you mean is you MAKE A COPY of his car and share that, whether he likes it or not. In which case, no theft has occurred. And there is no problem. Because the original is still in possession of the AC you were replying to, while what has been lent out is merely your copy (which you may do with as you please).
As far as sharing some of his bank balance, well, that would be entirely up to him. I know I share some of my money (because I don’t believe in having a bank account) with people all the time. I see these people without jobs and living underneath freeway overpasses all the time, so I share with them whatever I happen to have on me at any point. Which usually isn’t much to be honest, I try not to keep more than $10 on me at any given time so I am limited to sharing only up to that amount. But that is NOT total bull. That is me being a decent human being and sharing what I have with others. Although, in such an example, I am being deprived of something (money I have worked for and earned). But it’s not theft, as no one is taking anything from me, I am willingly giving it away.
Man, you suck with analogies and from what I’m reading appear to have not been raised to even remotely be a decent human being. I’d blame your parents, but I’m sure even as a child they took one look at you and realized you were a lost cause. (See how I saved the ad hom til after I made an actual point? Try it, it’s quite fun. Also, notice how my analogies actually were much better than yours because they were made in a proper comparison to what was being discussed and kept reasonable? That’s what people do, make proper comparisons to further their points. Not completely irrelevant things that are different to what is being discussed. Again, try it sometime. It’s amazing.)
Re: Re: Re:2 Blame Game
Sharing is not, and never has been, subject to the whims of a third party. Only the permission of the sharer is necessary, provided the sharer has lawfully acquired what they are sharing.
You would have to either steal or purchase his car in order to share it. If you stole it, then the theft (and not the sharing) is what is wrong. If you purchased it, then he has no reason to complain if you later share it.
As for the thesis, that falls under the provisions of academic integrity, which simply has no bearing outside of a university.
Finally, as for the bank balance, that is done quite frequently. It is usually called a gift.
Re: Re: Re:2 Blame Game
Are you really going to equate something physical and finite, like a car, to something that is intangible and infinite, like information? They just aren’t the same. If I take your car, you don’t have it. If I copy your music, you still have it and now I do too. It’s a good thing for people to have unlimited access to culture and knowledge, because we are all the better for it. Holding content for ransom, giving copies to only those that can pay, limits the beneficial properties of culture because culture that isn’t experienced can’t affect anyone at all. An idea is worthless if it can’t be divulged to others and acted upon. How would the disciplines that rely on math be different if Newton kept calculus under lock and key? Hell, how would that change human progress in its entirety? What great advancements are we missing out on because some snobby people want to hold on to their antiquated monopolies? It’s far more damaging to deny society access to works than to nullify an author’s favored business model.
Creativity isn’t an ethereal talent granted to a chosen few to set them above the rank and file. Creativity is a process. Just like building a car is a process. It is a process of taking what one has learned and finding a new expression or commentary on it.
Re: Re: Re:3 Blame Game
Creativity isn’t an ethereal talent granted to a chosen few to set them above the rank and file.
Which really begs the question..
If creativity was so easy, why don’t you all create content, then freely share it with your friends?
Because what you are actually doing is sharing QUALITY content, you aren’t capable of creating yourself, against the wishes of the talented person who worked hard to create it.
We would never have to have this debate if you were right. because you are all apparently creative enough to make your own music and film, so why take ours without our permission? It doesn’t make any sense, and of course neither does your argument.
Re: Re: Re:2 Blame Game
If you were right, I could share your car whether you liked it or not. Or share your post graduate thesis, so I could get a degree without doing the work myself.
Wanna share some of your bank balance with me?
You might want to look up what a non-rivalrous, non-excludable good is, compared to one that is rivalrous and excludable. Making comparisons across those categories is silly.
Re: Re: Blame Game
I’m amazed how many times this pirate BS is put forward.
I am always amazed at how many times ACs here automatically accuse someone who says something that they think they don’t agree with of being a pirate. I welcome you to prove that I am, but I doubt you will. I’d like for you to show where I have ever taken anything of yours (or anyone for that matter) without your permission, but I suspect you’ll have a difficult time proving that as well.
Stay classy with the ad homs though…
Re: Re: Re: Blame Game
I am always amazed at how many times ACs here automatically accuse someone who says something that they think they don’t agree with of being a pirate.
Fail.
I didn’t accuse you of being a pirate. I said some of your text was pirate BS.
Lot’s of ordinary people have swallowed the pirate BS as if it’s fact. It’s in fact BS.
Re: Re: Re:2 Blame Game
I didn’t accuse you of being a pirate. I said some of your text was pirate BS.
Lot’s of ordinary people have swallowed the pirate BS as if it’s fact. It’s in fact BS.
I’d like for you to prove that it is BS. Anyone can say it is BS, but until you come with hard numbers and science, you will be spouting just as much BS as you claim others are. You won’t, but prove me wrong.
The name itself tells you how outdated the concept is. The right to COPY? Really? Making copies of something is wrong?
Tell that to my Prusa 3D printer, currently making a copy of this cool warhammer leman tank miniature.
Re: Re:
But can you download a car?
Re: Re: Re:
The manufacturing process itself is “copying”. Downloading a car is possible if you consider that you have to download and “copy” each part for assembly.
It would be quite a list and the assembly process would be considerable but possible nonetheless.
The Core Issue
“Where did we get the idea of a right to free content? In large part, from the content producers themselves. An older generation grew up with music, movies and television programs beamed directly to their televisions and transistor radios at no charge. Those consumers can’t understand why saving content onto some medium and enjoying it again or later should suddenly transform a strongly-encouraged behavior into a felony. “
And this is the core of the issue. You reap what you sow. Or, apparently, you sue those who reap what you have sown.
” to make us feel entitled to see the rest”
Not only entitled, but near required. Take for instance the avengers or the upcoming iron man 3. If I want to be up on the latest things iron man then I pretty much have to go see 3 even though 2 kinda suxed and the avengers are also kind of required or I’m missing a big chunk of robert downey’s iron man’s story.
Cognitive dissonance
Agreed with the points in the article, and really enjoyed the example given. I have two things to add:
1. The consumers are not the only ones suffering from cognitive dissonance. The companies that bought the copyright extension laws seem to believe that everyone should follow them, even though they are demonstrably bad laws.
2. The Alabama Supreme Court may have banned parking meters back in 1937, but they’re damn sure back in force now.
As much as we hate parking meters, it does help keep abandoned vehicles from littering the streets.
Re: Re:
parking meters don’t help with that. Laws against abandoning vehicles do.
Where I live, you are only allowed to park on the street for 72 hours unless it is in front of your house. No meter necessary. Police or parking attendants don’t even have to go around looking for such abandoned vehicles. The way it works in practice is: a citizen complains to the city about the vehicle, the city comes out and chalks the tires, then if the car hasn’t moved in 72 hours it is impounded. No meter necessary.
Re: Re: Re:
What happens if the car is moved by the owner, but then put back within the 72 hour period?
Re: Re: Re: Re:
The chalk wears off. What you mean to ask is: what happens if the car is moved by the owner but put back within the 72 hour period and “someone” re-chalks the tires?
Oh, and answer: it gets towed.
Re: Re: Re:
> here I live, you are only allowed to park on the street for 72
> hours unless it is in front of your house. The way it works
> in practice is: a citizen complains to the city about the
> vehicle, the city comes out and chalks the tires, then if the
> car hasn’t moved in 72 hours it is impounded.
Such bullshit. So if I come home and someone is already parked in the space in front of my house, I can’t park a few dozen feet away without having to move my car every three days– which really becomes a problem if you travel frequently and have to worry that your car will be towed every time you have to be away and don’t get that one spot right in front of your house.
Re: Re: Re: Re:
So if I come home and someone is already parked in the space in front of my house, I can’t park a few dozen feet away without having to move my car every three days– which really becomes a problem if you travel frequently and have to worry that your car will be towed every time you have to be away and don’t get that one spot right in front of your house.
What kills me is that some cities have now enacted Municipal Codes even outlawing “disabled” vehicles parked in driveways for longer than 72 hours. It used to be to control obvious “chop shops”, where people would have vehicles in their driveways in various states of disrepair, but I left for Japan for two weeks only to come back and find that the city ticketed my vehicle (because it had a flat tire,) even though it was operable and only needed to have the tire inflated.
I was told that in the future, when I leave for extended periods of time, to move my cars behind a fence (wish I had a back yard to put them,) or in a garage to avoid being ticketed.
Not cognitive dissonance
This is not an example of cognitive dissonance. Not everything which is illegal is wrong. Historical and present-day legislation is full of things which are illegal but aren’t “wrong” in any sense of the word.
(Note to trolls: I am not saying that copyright violation isn’t wrong. I’m just saying that those two categories are not from mutually exclusive.)
What the recent copyright efforts have been doing is not inducing cognitive dissonance, but highlighting that fact.
Re: Not cognitive dissonance
You just made the same exact point as the line you are arguing against.
I like the analogy as far as it’s intended to go – which is just enough to show the feelings of people toward a law based on its strictness and how it is enforced. Obviously, parking laws have some important purposes, including making sure handicapped people have access to buildings and sidewalks, that buses can run smoothly, and that traffic flows. In that way, I think people are more likely to obey certain parts of parking regulations (like not parking in handicapped spaces at the grocery store) than others (such as leaving a space after 2 hours or paying the meter at 8am on a Saturday morning).
Copyright lacks the level of moral or practical authority that some parts of parking regulation still retain.
Re: Re:
Well, when you realize that copyright isn’t even necessary, it kind of pulls the rug from under it in terms of respectability.
Re:
Why do people even on Techdirt go to great length disclaiming that they support copyright infringement?
Copyright is only a monopoly and the sooner it dies the better.
I visit a friend, arrive after 11pm, in the dark find only one available parking space halfway down the block, go out to my car at 10:07am the following morning and find a parking ticket for parking on the wrong side of the street after 10am on street cleaning day. My car breaks down and I push it to the side of the street where parking is allowed, and come back in half an hour with the tow truck driver and find a parking ticket because there’s some damned law against being parked pointing the wrong direction. I limp back to my car on my sprained ankle and find a parking ticket written two minutes after the meter expired. That was in three different cities; one of them was L.A. I don’t know what city they’re talking about with that “10%” stuff, but I never break parking laws intentioanlly and get whacked in the head 100% of the time it happens accidentally. (In every case I boycott all businesses in the entire city for one month per dollar of the fine, and habits are hard to break when it’s over, so at least I get even.)
Sorry, not much to say about copyright this time.
Re: Re:
I once had my car break down in a parking lot of a city I use to shop in every weekend. I let a note that I would be back in a couple of days (best I could do–very poor at the time) to retrieve the car. When I came back I had three parking tickets. It wasn’t even a popular lot; it was used very little. I’ve never shopped in that city since.
Voting
I have a solution to this. Since anything we create in our mind and publish is intelectual property that is protected by copyright, i would like to claim protection on my votes during elections. Its not a big deal though b/c i’d only like to collect $1 from each party interested in seeing my vote. This revolutionary new system of voting will not only guarantee that every citizen will vote, it will earn me enough income that all the lawsuits that are filed against me for violating copyright law will come out even. The best part is that everyone (big business) wins!
Copyright
Nobody i know believes that copyright laws are fair, so why should we listen to those people demanding it get extended every time it comes close to running out.
A few well paid middlemen make money from copyright laws, the actors don’t the musicians don’t so why would we want to listen to the laws they have paid for, that they have managed to get passed by threatening that the world will end if it is not extended again and again.
TV is free Radio is free the internet is free other than a small fee for access.
Why would we now start paying for our entertainment, yes they want to stop free tv and they may get there way eventually but the internet will always be there to take up the slack
I really do not care what they have to say and there threats and warnings. It goes over my head and if i am eventually brought before a court and asked if i share i will say yes , because that is what the internet was designed to do copyright or no copyright.
If they wanted to join the interent revolution and supply us high quality entertainment at a reasonable price , great we would probably have welcomed them with open wallets, but they chose to sue and name call, so now they are not welcome in my home no matter what they offer, unless it is free.
Myths
Good to see all the pirate propaganda myths having their outing (NOT).
You pay for libraries with taxation. Libraries are not ‘free to you’.
Since the punk, new wave revolution, and ESPECIALLY since the internet, a great many artists, film makers and musicians earn money directly from copyright.
You seem clued up on the latest tech, but clueless on the latest developments in music. People make and sell their own music. It’s a comfortable lie that you’re only punishing lazy middlemen when you pirate, but many times you are punishing self releasing artists, indie film makers, and one man band record companies.
Re: Myths
Since the punk, new wave revolution, and ESPECIALLY since the internet, a great many artists, film makers and musicians earn money directly from copyright.
Then why are so many artists revolting against the old copyright regime?
People make and sell their own music.
But they’re not going to the labels and keeping their own copyrights. So saying that enforcement equates to they’re making money on copyright is disingenuous and obnoxious at best.
It’s a comfortable lie that you’re only punishing lazy middlemen when you pirate, but many times you are punishing self releasing artists, indie film makers, and one man band record companies.
Re: Re: Myths
Then why are so many artists revolting against the old copyright regime?
What, like a couple of dozen at best? The greater majority are NOT revolting against copyright. The revolt against copyright is almost all content consumer lead. No surprise there.
But they’re not going to the labels and keeping their own copyrights. So saying that enforcement equates to they’re making money on copyright is disingenuous and obnoxious at best.
Dude, they AREN’T going to labels. They are empowering themselves with their own recording, release and distribution. So forget excusing infringement as only hurting the lazy gatekeeper. You are in fact hurting the artist.
Re: Re: Re: Myths
Say, you know Conan O’Brien/Brian (however you spell his last name)?
When he took over for Jay Leno, NBC owned the rights to his show.
Then he got fired.
He now works on TBS, and has ALL the rights to his show.
And, that’s just one example.
More and more, people are breaking away from labels and major producers to make their own stuff.
Are they all successful? No, of course not. But success or failure, it’s all on them and they do a better job of it by themselves.
Have you watched TBS at all lately? Conan gets a LOT of commercial time on that station, more than he got on NBC.
Re: Re: Re: Myths
“The revolt against copyright is almost all content consumer lead. No surprise there.”
No surprise at all, since copyright was supposed to be specifically for the benefit of consumers, but over the years has been twisted around to benefit only copyright holders. If laws don’t benefit the public, they will be rejected, which was the whole point of the post.
Re: Re: Re:2 Myths
Two initial problems.
Copyright law hasn’t been rejected.
You don’t get to personally CHOOSE which laws you obey and which you don’t. You get to vote at elections and have your say then.
Secondly, I think you’d find most people agree parking meters benefit society.
At least they offer you a few hours of parking in the city. If there were no meters, in most cities there would be NO place to park, period.
Re: Re: Re:3 Myths
>You don’t get to personally CHOOSE
>which laws you obey and which you don’t.
Hmmm… Yes you do.
>You get to vote at elections and have your say then.
If money talks, and bullshit walks. Then you sir, are flying.
Re: Myths
Good to see your still here, pushing the Copyright Cartels myths and propaganda. oh wait, did I say good? Sorry, I meant extremely transparent. Your personal vested interest bullshit, the one you vomit all over this site all day everyday, is obvious for everyone to see. I really don’t know who you think your fooling.
Re: Myths
Library cost per capita is roughly $54. Libraries have an extensive collection of works, far more than 54. In fact your average library will have upwards of 10,000 in books available to it. That is $0.0054 per book, or half a cent cost to you per book, before we account for any other works.
Library’s costs are virtually irrelevant to the individual patron.
As to the rest of your post, mind posting some examples of such artists that actually rely on copyright law (as opposed to fan support)? Basically, show us the DMCA notices these artists have sent.
Without those, it is equally likely that the artists have taken the prudent approach of ignoring piracy in order to focus on their paying patrons.
Re: Re: Myths
After reviewing my sources, I must confess to having made a rather extreme error. The spending per capita in the US is $43. The spending in the UK (the maximum spent anywhere) is $54.
On the stock side, the error is far worse, as I was quoting numbers from around the time of the Civil War. In 2004, the volumes per library in US libraries was, on average, 87,427.
This puts the cost per citizen to have access to each volume at $0.0005. In other words, each cent pays for access to 20 volumes on average.
Re: Myths
many times corporations (with government assistance) punish people who (arguably) stole $60 worth of IP with fines ranging from $50,000 to $150,000 that the individual will need decades to recover from. It may be a little known fact to some people but businesses (especially big ones) often don’t bother pursing debts that go unpaid when the cost of recovering the loss outweighs the amount of the loss itself. These ridiculous cases against individuals are the exception. The reason these companies are doing this is b/c they are working (successfully) to establish a new structure of buying (a new consumerism) for our entire society which is the underlying point of this article. They know that if they can successfully change the laws in favor of corporations over the individual citizen, the future of their business is virtually unlimited. This mentality is prevailing b/c the thought leaders can afford to buy the politicians who don’t understand the consequences it will have in the next generation or so. I firmly believe that if the corrupt trends that are trying to emerge today are successful, the entire middle class will be bankrupt before the end of the century, if not well before.
After reading it….
you can’t deny it…
The more you enforce something… The more people tries to bypass the enforcement…
Re: Re:
As I’ve said before…
No one follows stupid laws. If a law isn’t stupid, people will follow it.
Parking in major metropolitan areas is a problem, not only the cost involved but simply finding a spot close to where you are going … and then the businesses in that city wonder why there are not more people visiting their fine downtown utopia. Here’s an idea – why not buy parking lots and put more buildings. Zoning boards and city planning are a joke.
This situation is very similar to that of copyright and the content industry.
Re: Re:
i think you’re crossing over into another systemic problem in our country, our addiction to cars. I love driving my own car too but we love it so much that we forget about public transportation which has led to it practically vanishing in all but the few largest cities. What your city needs (and mine) is a better form of public transportation (light rail, trolley) and/or rules governing city driving, not more parking. I always think back to what my friend told me when she visited Germany, the type of car you drive determines how far into the city you can drive it – i.e. Hummers and F150s would have to park on the outskirts, the more fuel efficient SUVs can go a little further than the previous, sedans can make it into the area just outside of hardcore downtown and SMART cars and compact hybrids can go wherever they want. I would like to see an American city try something like this. And now i’ll try to loosely tie my response to the topic of the article like you did.
This streamlined form of city parking and public transportation could be very effective solutions when applied to copyright law as well (use your imagination).
Re: Re: Re:
I love driving my own car too but we love it so much that we forget about public transportation which has led to it practically vanishing in all but the few largest cities.
The last time I went to a local supermarket, I picked up three gallons of milk and four 12-packs of soda. I’d like to see you try to lug that home on the bus or subway.
Not to mention that public transportation doesn’t always run to the places you need to go. Depending on how close the bus comes, you might have to walk an extra mile, to & from your destination. Not a problem for healthy people, but for anyone who has a problem walking, it’s a nightmare. Plus, there’s the extra time involved.
You’re also at the mercy of someone else’s schedule. With the way the buses run around here (suburbs) I have no idea how anyone could rely on them to get to/from a job. Twice, I’ve missed appointments because the bus never came. Then there’s the time issue. You have get to the bus stop early to ensure that you don’t miss it, then wait 15-20 minutes for it to show up, then on your way back, you may have to wait another 30 minutes for the return bus.
Here’s what my last trip to the doctor was like;
I live on a dead end street, and it’s probably 1000-1500 feet to the corner, which isn’t a huge distance, but it’s also not like it’s right next door. My appointment was for 1PM and the bus normally passes by the end of my street at about 20 after the hour, going in that direction. I left the house at 12pm and got to the corner at maybe ten minutes after. I then waited, and waited, and waited… No bus. Finally, at 1pm, I walked back home and called the bus company. “Oh, the city handles that part of the route until 1pm, so I don’t know what happened. One of our buses should be by there any minute now.” I then called the doctor’s office to make sure I wasn’t going to be wasting a trip and they put me on hold! Finally they come back on and tell me that I can arrive late. So, I literally run back to the corner, by which time I’m ready to pass out (I’m not in the best shape), just in time to catch the bus. Since I had just gotten over a cold, all the heavy breathing brought back my cough, which persist for the next hour or so. If I were the paranoid sort, I’d think that the bus company knows when I have an appointment and intentionally makes me late.
I got out of the doctor’s office just slightly after the return bus was due. There’s no place to sit down, so I walked down about a block and sat on the steps of a nearby church. Oh, did I mention that it was about 40 degrees out? Finally, I see a bus coming and the front says that it’s going to the next major stop on the route home, so I board it. It stops at the little shopping complex about half a mile from my home and the driver yells “Last stop!”. Yup, I got on the wrong frigging bus! Stupid me for getting on a bus from the same line that had listed as its destination the next stop on the same exact route as the bus that actually does go past my street. So, faced with the prospect of waiting possibly half an hour for the next bus and paying a second time, I elected to walk home from there. When I got home it was about 3:30pm and my ankle was killing me.
So basically it took me three and a half hours for a 40 minute appointment at a doctor who is about ten minutes from my house by car.
Yeah, public transportation is great!
An older generation grew up with music, movies and television programs beamed directly to their televisions and transistor radios at no charge. Those consumers can’t understand why saving content onto some medium and enjoying it again or later should suddenly transform a strongly-encouraged behavior into a felony.
It’s legal to record TV shows. It’s also never been ruled illegal to keep those copies. The courts have always ducked the question. I also don’t think there’s any actual law against editing out the commercials from a recording you’ve made. Additionally, if you have an antenna, you can watch all the network shows for free. So, I can record a show, off the air, onto my computer and then edit out the commercials and save it, all without breaking any laws, but if I download a copy of that same show off the net, suddenly I’m a criminal?
Blame Game
I make music. Sometimes I make music good enough that people share it with others and they want to download it for free. I let them. Hell, I *want* them to.
What was your point again?
“you are all apparently creative enough to make your own music and film, so why take ours without our permission?”
Now that doesn’t make sense. You’re assuming that people would never want anything but their own stuff?
Re:
And moist.
Blame Game
“If you were right I could share your car”
Not the same thing.
If you can share my car by making copies of it and giving those away you’re perfectly welcome to do so.
Myths
actually, everyone personally chooses which laws they will obey and which they will not.
I ignore many imaginary property laws. They do not have any positive effect for me and deserve nothing.
I follow almost every real-property law and bodily-integrity law. These laws actually have a positive effect when they are followed and i am happy to be a part of their effect on society.
It is meaningful when most people ignore/unknowingly-break imaginary property law while at the same time most people follow real property law.
Thomas Babington Macauley, 1841
The sad story is, they’ve been warned more than 150 years ago.
And you will find that, in attempting to impose unreasonable restraints on the reprinting of the words of the dead, you have, to a great extent, annulled those restraints which now prevent men from pillaging and defrauding the living. — Thomas Babington Macauley, A Speech delivered in the House of Commons on the 5th of February, 1841
There has never been any moral ethical imperative to respect copyright. As long as it has been technically feasible, people have made copies of media both for themselves and their friends.
Myths
“Copyright law hasn’t been rejected.”
Sure it has. What do you think widespread copyright infringement is? The people are, in steadily growing numbers, rejecting copyright law by ignoring it. Copyright holders who benefit from copyright laws may not have rejected them, but they are somewhat outnumbered.
“You don’t get to personally CHOOSE which laws you obey and which you don’t.”
Of course I do, and the government gets to choose to punish me if I do. Dumb statement.
“You get to vote at elections and have your say then.”
Repeated once again for the slow: Democracy does not begin and end at elections.
“Secondly, I think you’d find most people agree parking meters benefit society.”
I made no comment on parking meters, but since you ask, parking meters can benefit society, or they can be misused by those in power to society’s detriment. Much like copyright law.
Re:
That’s a little dumb. The city can issue a ticket for your own private property? Isn’t the ‘patriotic american’ thing to do to either sue the city for trespass, or install machine-gun emplacements?
Here in the UK, we have to pay an annual road tax. So long as it’s paid, you can park on any public road, subject to local parking ordinances. On private property, you don’t even need to have the car taxed, although you are required to declare it as ‘off-road’.
Re: Re:
In the city I live near, you can even get a ticket for parking in your own driveway, and not in your garage (if you have one). The police can to my friend’s house because this (nosey neighbor called them).
Re: Re: Re:
> In the city I live near, you can even get
> a ticket for parking in your own driveway,
> and not in your garage (if you have one).
So it’s illegal to own more cars than you have garage spaces for?
Re:
That’s the trouble, it’s the dumb laws that make people not respect them, and reduce respect for other related laws.
“I can’t park outside my own apartment without paying massive amounts for a service that’s already paid for in (road) taxes whilst two streets away you can park for free” is exactly the idiocy we get that leads to people going “sod this”. Copyright laws are just as dumb in their totality, and especially in their spread.
Myths
Then some enterprising businessman would have the amazing idea of buying some land, building a concrete floor and some pillars, putting another concrete floor with some more pillars (repeat as many times as you like), put ramps joining all these concrete floors, and a tolbooth out front and voila! A solution that I shall call “multi-floor traffic parking problem cure”!
Seriously, if that’s your best argument…
Re:
That’s the example of broken public transport, in a country where everything is built assuming you have to drive. Try that in a country with good public transport where things are planned around that and you’ll have a many totally different experiences.
The rest of your complaint is solved by the simple process called ‘learning’. We all have to do it. A little planning helps as well. There is also this little thing called a ‘bike’ that can have panniers for those heavier loads. Or even a backpack.
In an ideal semi-urban environment, no-one should ‘have’ to learn to drive, or need a car.
Re:
But public transportation only works in major cities.
It doesn’t work in any place outside of California’s major cities, New York or other major metropolitan areas.
So, for someone like me, who lives in a more rural area, you need to drive. And if someone like me goes to a major city, well, the parking problem is still there.
Re:
The problem with your post lies with its premise, that the internet as a whole, mysteriously, is subject to the (self-granted) authority of the legacy players.
“The internet is new, and therefore new ‘conditions’ apply.”
Says who? Do you own the internet, the ISP providers, web hosts, and so forth? No, you don’t. Nor does the RIAA, MPAA, government agencies, and assorted legacy players for that matter.
So explain: what gives you authority over it? Does every technology medium have to compromise itself to suit the agenda of the corporate elite? That’s quite a presumption of entitlement.
Myths
“You get to vote at elections and have your say then. “
I think you’re missing the fact that representatives for the poor, struggling Hollywood executives (not artists, mind you because artists have to sell away their creative rights for a key to the gate) have attempted to insert legislation with small print under a different law to extend copyright, and even include works not previously covered.
So, no we don’t get a say when they try to sneak in laws under our very noses.
Wow
Ok this was just funny…
“You don’t get to personally CHOOSE which laws you obey and which you don’t. You get to vote at elections and have your say then.”
Ummm yeah you do get to choose which laws you obey and which you don’t. Breaking any law is an example of that choice.
I think he meant to say that you we do not get to personally choose what is legal and what is not, but had some trouble expressing himself.
Criticism
While the gist of the article rings true, that people just don’t feel they are breaking the law when they infringe on copyright, I think it misses an important point.
Copyright law and the ridiculous statutory damages were created to protect a business model. Basically copyright law was something that only companies had to deal with, so the public didn’t really care about it. Now that we have companies waging legal wars on consumers, the public, has taken offense at the idea of being sued by companies they have long supported.
Corporations want control of the internet now and they just can’t have it and that is bringing things to the boiling point.
Blame Game
If you were right, I could share your car whether you liked it or not.
Leaving aside the physical-vs-imaginary property issue, the closer analogy in this instance is that if I want to share my car with you I can do so whether Volkswagon likes it or not.
Parking Today?
I paraphrase George Carlin from his Jammin in New York show:
Any activity engaged by more than four people has got a magazine *!%&@ devoted to it
Blame Game
I never said it was easy, I said it was a process. It’s a process that anyone can perform if they want to make the effort, but by no means does that imply that it’s “easy”. Not everyone is going to want to focus the majority of their time making content because they have other occupations that attract their passion.
Explain to me what is “quality” content? If you say content made by a “professional”, then you’d be wrong. Quality is entirely arbitrary to the observer. What is “quality” to you may not be so to others and trying to set up a special class of content is elitist and arrogant. Content is content, only I can determine what I think is “quality” to me. What is quality to you is entirely your own opinion. It’s not universal.
It makes perfect sense, you just don’t want to admit that artists aren’t something special and set above “uncreative” people. Artists are just people that have committed to investing their cognitive effort and the majority of their time into creating. We all have disciplines we gravitate towards, but it doesn’t mean that we are somehow destined to follow that path. Artists weren’t born creative, they had to practice it until they could produce work that people want to pay for. Everyone has the capacity to be creative. That doesn’t mean everyone should be creating their own content, but anyone can if they really want to. Creativity is a skill, like any other. It just takes time and patience to hone it.
Creating content for yourself would be pointless. When you work on your content, it’s impossible for you to experience it the way your audience does because you have perfect information of the whole work, there are no mysteries, no surprises, and no speculation for you, because you know the work inside and out. But if you want to suggest that people make their own content and share that, then I say go to Youtube. They have tons of user generated content and some of it is very good. I enjoy a selection of works there myself. It covers a very broad range of tastes that mainstream content fails to address due to being niche, and therefore unprofitable.
Creativity is a process. You start with the roughest most obvious version of your expression and you refine little by little until it becomes something new.
Re:
I do so for two reasons.
First, I don’t support copyright infringement in concept, although I equally don’t support the more extreme changes to copyright laws in recent times.
Second, because those who take an opposing position have default ad-hom attacks of claiming that we just want undeserved free stuff and that if we weren’t pirates we wouldn’t care about this issue.
That I fall into neither of those categories is therefore important to point out if for no other reason than to preemptively rebut an attack that is certainly coming.
Also, I hope that perhaps some of my loyal opposition will notice that we, their opponents, are not a monolithic stereotype.
Re:
In theory, I suppose, but in practice you don’t have to worry about it unless you’ve pissed off your neighbor. This type of parking is not actively monitored by the city. Nothing happens unless someone complains, and even then it takes a while.
I once moved into a house where the prior owners had abandoned a car on the street. I called the city, and all in all it was about two months before the car actually got towed away.
Re:
Good luck with that, it would involve them actually being open to more than one idea…
Re:
Look at me still talking when there’s Science to do.
When I look out there, it makes me GLaD I’m not you.
Blame Game
Leaving aside the physical-vs-imaginary property issue, the closer analogy in this instance is that if I want to share my car with you I can do so whether Volkswagon likes it or not.
I routinely share my car with others that are family or close friends. Just this last week a friend asked if he could borrow my truck to grab some firewood. The only third party I am concerned about is my insurance company, but luckily they haven’t had a problem with it because the use is incidental and the person has their own insurance. My truck manufacturer can take a long walk off a short bridge, ever since they proved to me that they couldn’t maintain my truck correctly and I took it to another mechanic that could.
Fascinating analogy
It rings true. Food for thought, I like it!
Blame Game
“Sharing with consent is great. But many times the seeding and sharing is against the wishes of the content producer.”
So what you’re saying is that children shouldn’t share toys against the wishes of the toy manufacturer? Weird little word you live in.
Blame Game
“Sharing is not, and never has been, taking something against another person’s wishes.”
It’s a good thing then that when someone shares a file with me, I don’t take it against their wishes, as they’re freely offered to me.
Likewise, if I put files I legally obtained on BitTorrent, I’m giving my consent for others to “take” them from me. Everybody wins! Everyone who is actually involved, obviously.
Blame Game
Sure, by your definition, any text that is shared with others is pirate text.
Blame Game
I told the fed that when I was arrested for copying $100 bills. They didn’t buy it.
Blame Game
I told the fed that when I was arrested for copying $100 bills. They didn’t buy it.
Blame Game
Read the Constitution. That is not why there are laws to protect copyright, trademark and patents
Re:
There is also this little thing called a ‘bike’ that can have panniers for those heavier loads. Or even a backpack.
I have a bike, but I’m not the best at riding it. I’m not confident enough to ride it on main roads during the day when there’s a lot of traffic. I’ve managed to crash and swerve all over the place on empty streets, doing that on a road with traffic on it could be fatal.
Riding on the sidewalks is only an option part of the way since there are long stretches of the route that don’t have sidewalks, or require crossing traffic. Or the sidewalks don’t have slopes at the cross streets leading to a 1-2 inch height difference that I have to walk the bike over.
Even then, a bike won’t carry nearly as much as a car can. Not to mention the problem of bad weather. Getting soaked in the rain, or frozen in the winter is no fun.