antidirt 's Techdirt Comments

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  • On the post: All Of These Works Should Be In The Public Domain, But Aren't

    antidirt ( profile ), 08 Jan, 2015 @ 10:31am

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    X is the same question we've been discussing from the start: why you think that people have a moral right to diminish the rights of others in order to retain unnecessary control of non-rivalrous, non-scarce culture.

    So far, your answers have been pathetic.

    You mean the comment I told you earlier i was in the middle of replying to? I'm happy to finish that reply. Why don't you stop with the personal attacks and give me time. I'm trying to dig up cites for you. Not that you appreciate it.

  • On the post: All Of These Works Should Be In The Public Domain, But Aren't

    antidirt ( profile ), 08 Jan, 2015 @ 10:30am

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    And yet, somehow, you think you hold the moral high ground here?

    I am not scared to state my beliefs. I don't run away when someone asks me about copyright or anything else. I am more forthcoming than Mike. It is a fact. Mike is too scared to answer these same questions I am answering. Mike will never be that honest and direct. Any questions? I will answer them. Ask me what I believe directly, and I will answer you directly. I get that you're only purpose is to attack me personally. Is that all you have? Discuss the merits with me if you can.

  • On the post: All Of These Works Should Be In The Public Domain, But Aren't

    antidirt ( profile ), 08 Jan, 2015 @ 10:26am

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    I have a lengthy response explaining why I totally reject your privacy analogy, your weak appeal to Locke and "enough and as good", your incorrect claims about copyright helping the commons, and your overall flawed understanding of the nature of cultural output and nonrivalrous goods in general. It basically invalidates all your points, and you've yet to respond to any of it -- so in my view, you haven't offered any answers at all yet. Still waiting.

    Link to it. I will answer. Stop not being specific. I am here for you. I will answer question after question after question. Bring it.

  • On the post: All Of These Works Should Be In The Public Domain, But Aren't

    antidirt ( profile ), 08 Jan, 2015 @ 10:25am

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    they are all there -- just scroll up. Still waiting for you to respond to some of the points being made, instead of ignoring them and only replying to the comments accusing you of ignoring them.

    If you think there is another question I'm ignoring. Link to it. I will address that question. Back up your claims. What am I scared to discuss? Be specific. Prove to everybody how scared I am. One day you can say: "People of Techdirt. I have vanquished antidirt. He would not answer this question. He was too scared. I present to you the question by which I have slain the troll. It is X." Now, tell me what X is. I love a good vanquishing.

  • On the post: All Of These Works Should Be In The Public Domain, But Aren't

    antidirt ( profile ), 08 Jan, 2015 @ 10:21am

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    To quote YOU, from two years ago:

    "If you think anyone is going to read this thread and think that you answered the question, you're delusional."

    That's not substantive. Please, name the question I refuse to answer. I will be here for as long as it takes. You ask this question that I will not answer. This thread will become part of Techdirt lore for generations yet to come. You will vanquish me... just as soon as you identify the question I refuse to answer. I'll be here, friend. You let me know when you're ready.

  • On the post: All Of These Works Should Be In The Public Domain, But Aren't

    antidirt ( profile ), 08 Jan, 2015 @ 10:12am

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    I'm not linking you to comments in this very thread, or restating things I already said an hour ago. You can respond or you can not respond -- but your attempt to stall by repeatedly asking me to re-state the question is not fooling anyone.

    You make a list of questions. I vow that I will come back to this thread for days, nay, weeks, to come, and I will answer your specific questions to the best of my ability. I will spend hours citing sources, the fruits of hours of research, just to appease you.

  • On the post: All Of These Works Should Be In The Public Domain, But Aren't

    antidirt ( profile ), 08 Jan, 2015 @ 10:09am

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    No you don't. In fact all morning, all you've found time to do is repeatedly claim that you are answering questions -- you've yet to find time to actually answer any of the open questions in the thread. "Welcome the challenge" indeed -- I suppose you welcome it because you think you can weasel your way out of it with these dumb games.

    You're the one claiming I refuse to answer questions. You have not produced any evidence of any question I refuse to address. Ask me the question right here, right now. I will answer you right here, right now. it's that simple. You can prove to us all how scared I am. Go.

  • On the post: All Of These Works Should Be In The Public Domain, But Aren't

    antidirt ( profile ), 08 Jan, 2015 @ 10:05am

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    My beliefs are explained above. You've yet to respond to them.

    Link to them. Tell us exactly which post you're referring to. Let us read your exact words. List the questions I am not responding to. Be specific. Tell us the exact things I refuse to address. Stop playing games. Put up or shut up.

  • On the post: All Of These Works Should Be In The Public Domain, But Aren't

    antidirt ( profile ), 08 Jan, 2015 @ 10:03am

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    I've made the philosophical underpinnings of my beliefs quite clear -- and I've done it by spelling them out in plain terms, not trying to see how many philosophers I can quote like that lends me some sort of legitimacy. And who quoted Wikipedia?

    You've made them "quite clear"? Can you please link to the comment or comments you're referring to?

    You're the one who seems to be bothered that nobody is agreeing with your beliefs. I'm perfectly comfortable in mine, and quite happy in this community full of people who I know share similar values, so you can stop trying to put the onus on me here. If you want anyone to have any respect for you or be even vaguely interested in what you have to say, maybe stop reporting your comments and treating you like the unruly, disruptive child you normally behave as, then it's up to YOU to give us some honest answers that are actually interesting. Still failing at that, though.

    Again, what question or questions, specifically, have I failed to answer? Be specific. No general claims Back it up. List the questions here. I will answer them directly and honestly. I welcome the challenge.

  • On the post: All Of These Works Should Be In The Public Domain, But Aren't

    antidirt ( profile ), 08 Jan, 2015 @ 09:56am

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    It's amazing how you only find time to reply to the comments accusing you of not giving honest answers -- and rarely find time to pause and give honest answers to all the open questions and rebuttals still sitting here in this thread.

    Keep coming up with every personal attack you can, while never giving us any basis for your beliefs. Sounds about right. I was going to answer Pragmatic, just as soon as I finish my response to you above. I don't have time to field tons of questions, and that's because I have other work to do. It's not easy to carry on several conversations at once, but I did so for hours. I'm sure there are some questions above that I did not answer, and I honestly have neither the inclination nor the time to answer them all. But keep insulting. Insult me. Insult me. Insult me. That's obviously what you're here for. Have at it. But when you're ready to tell us what you believe and why you believe it, I will be here to bask in your gloriousness.

  • On the post: All Of These Works Should Be In The Public Domain, But Aren't

    antidirt ( profile ), 08 Jan, 2015 @ 09:40am

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    I'm not satisfied with your answers. I think they are weak, and don't hold together. And I'm perfectly happy with that assessment. If you think I should change it, it's up to you to convince me.

    What argument of mine does not hold together? Be specific.

  • On the post: All Of These Works Should Be In The Public Domain, But Aren't

    antidirt ( profile ), 08 Jan, 2015 @ 09:39am

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    No, they are empty and flimsy and facile, and once again you sound like a first-year university student who just discovered philosophy.

    Huh? How are they flimsy and facile? These ideas are centuries old and are fundamental to how many things in the real world work. I'm not making these things up. They've been understood and applied for generations. You seem like you've never discovered philosophy of any kind. You were the one quoting Wikipedia and suggesting that things are the way they are because we all just magically agreed on them, right? You haven't offered any philosophical underpinnings for your beliefs. Care to start now? if my ideas are so dumb, then show us your smart ideas. We're all ears. Wow us with your greatness.

  • On the post: All Of These Works Should Be In The Public Domain, But Aren't

    antidirt ( profile ), 08 Jan, 2015 @ 09:32am

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    Detail, frankness and honesty -- just no substance or any interesting ideas.

    So now you're just going with straight up ad hominems. What issue have I not supplied a substantive response to? Be specific. Point out my shortcomings with exactness.

  • On the post: All Of These Works Should Be In The Public Domain, But Aren't

    antidirt ( profile ), 08 Jan, 2015 @ 09:18am

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    So shall we chock this one up as yet another of the several lines of conversation, in this comment thread alone, that you are running away from?

    I am literally in the middle of writing out a response. Give me a break with the childishness. I'm happy to take time out of my incredibly busy day just for you. Reply is coming soon. You keep coming up with questions. I'm happy to answer them, in detail, with complete frankness and honesty. You know, the opposite of Mike.

  • On the post: All Of These Works Should Be In The Public Domain, But Aren't

    antidirt ( profile ), 08 Jan, 2015 @ 07:01am

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    And yet, when Mike says that to you, you accuse him of avoiding the question.

    So why are you avoiding the question?

    You said that you believe that "if a person mixes his labor with something to create something new, he has a moral claim, superior to others, to that thing."

    So it's a simple question. You built the chair. That is your labor. Do you have a moral right to that chair?

    Don't avoid it. Don't equivocate. Do you own the chair?

    Oh, you're playing the "I'm running away card," even though I sat here for hours and hours explaining myself in great detail as I answered question after question--something Mike has never done and will never do. I am quite obviously more forthcoming than Mike. By a mile.

    Yes, I said if you build something, you have a superior moral claim. I didn't flesh out all the possibilities. That was a general claim. It was an oversimplification that did not account for all possibilities.

    I asked for more facts, but you didn't supply them. So I'll supply my own. Using materials that belong to another, without their knowledge or permission, takes those materials from somebody else who has a superior moral claim. So, no, morally speaking, the chair maker does not have a superior moral claim, under these facts.

    I assume you have a point, or some kind of "gotcha!" Why not just jump to the punchline and save us both some time? Thanks.

  • On the post: All Of These Works Should Be In The Public Domain, But Aren't

    antidirt ( profile ), 08 Jan, 2015 @ 09:24am

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    Hahaha. You haven't answered anything

    Now you're back to claiming i haven't answered anything, even though, just above, I crafted a lengthy response citing Locke, Gordon, Hughes, etc. Those are substantive answers that directly answer the questions you've asked. No need to be dishonest.

    That said, if there is some question you think I am too scared to respond to, then tell us all exactly what that question is. What question will I not answer? Be specific.

    And, honestly, why should I sit here and answer question after question for you if you're (1) going to pretend like I have supplied no answer whatsoever, and (2) keep attacking me personally?

    Seriously. Why should I? Can you not act like an adult and have a friendly conversation with me? I am happy to answer your questions. I will be here day after day if need be. I am not running from a single thing. I understand your need to attack me personally. But can you attack the substance of my opinions? That's what I'm here for.

  • On the post: All Of These Works Should Be In The Public Domain, But Aren't

    antidirt ( profile ), 07 Jan, 2015 @ 06:37pm

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    Still waiting. Why are you afraid to answer my question?

    Sigh. It's not a terribly interesting question. Does the neighbor know you're taking the sticks? Do you want me to apply the law of a certain state? Etc. I need more info.

  • On the post: All Of These Works Should Be In The Public Domain, But Aren't

    antidirt ( profile ), 07 Jan, 2015 @ 04:51pm

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    Again totally ignoring the fact that 1 & 2 are interrelated, and the Lockean notion of ownership from labour is nowhere near as obvious or natural when applied to nonrivalrous goods. But you know that, and thus you are attempting to keep them separate because you know you don't have a cohesive overall argument.

    You're right about one thing though: it's the excludability that matters. And one class of goods -- rivalrous ones -- has natural excludability. The other class of goods -- non-rivalrous ones -- has absolutely no natural excludability, indeed that's the very definition of non-rivalrous.

    The case for artificial excludability for non-rivalrous goods is an different and far less obvious moral argument than that for societally reinforcing the natural excludability of rivalrous goods. And you are avoiding making that case, because you know you can't make it very strongly.

    Your argument, I believe, is that there is no moral claim to nonrivalrous information. As a counterexample, I’ll point to your privacy interests. Should there be no privacy since the information is nonrivalrous? I don’t think anyone thinks that. The people on TD generally place great value in their privacy, despite its nonrivalrousness, in my experience. Simply saying something is nonrivalrous does not answer the moral question about granting people rights in it. People are morally justified in their privacy despite its nonrivalrousness. Do you agree?

    The reason the nonrivalrous thing creates a STRONGER moral claim is because of Locke’s proviso about leaving “enough and as good” for others. The idea is simply that everybody has an obligation to leave enough in the commons so that others may appropriate things for their own needs. As long as someone does not fail to leave “enough and as good” for others, there is no moral inequity: “For he that leaves as much as another can make use of, does as good as take nothing at all.” John Locke, Two Treatises of Government, Book II, Section 33.

    This proviso is fundamental to Locke’s theory: When the proviso is satisfied, the acquirer is morally justified in excluding others because he is not impairing the needs of others with his ownership of the thing. (There are other provisos, but I’m simplifying things here.) With rivalrous things, if one person uses it, another cannot. This diminishes the commons, and the “enough and as good” proviso places moral limits on how much one can take.

    But with nonrivalrous things, such as copyrights, the commons are not diminished. An author has a copyright in his work, which protects his particular expression. This does not diminish the commons, that is, the public domain, as this particular expression did not exist beforehand. The “enough and as good” proviso is easily satisfied: The author leaves the public domain as he found it, and he has not taken from the commons.

    Of course, copyright promotes the creation of new works and actually adds to the public domain. It does the opposite of what property rights in rivalrous things do. Thus, it has a stronger moral claim: It not only does not take from the commons, it adds to it.

    There’s a lot more to the argument than that. And there's lots of counterarguments. If you’re interested in this stuff, I highly recommend Prof. Gordon’s article: Wendy J. Gordon, A Property Right in Self-Expression: Equality and Individualism in the Natural Law of Intellectual Property, 102 Yale L.J. 1533 (1993). Source: http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/IPCoop/93gord.html And I recommend Prof. Hughes’ article: Justin Hughes, The Philosophy of Intellectual Property, 77 Geo. L.J. 287 (1988). Source: http://pages.uoregon.edu/koopman/courses_readings/phil123-net/property/hughes_phil_ip.pdf

    Much has been written about Locke as applied to intellectual property. Check it out! The fact is, John Locke himself advocated for a copyright term of life plus 50 or 70 years: “[I]t may be reasonable to limit their property to a certain number of years after the death of the author, or the first printing of the book, as, suppose, fifty or seventy years.” 1 Peter King, The Life of John Locke 375, 387 (1830).

  • On the post: All Of These Works Should Be In The Public Domain, But Aren't

    antidirt ( profile ), 07 Jan, 2015 @ 12:33pm

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    lol okay. Well, I'm not playing this game -- instead of answering questions you're just repeatedly asking me to re-ask them. I mark this down as you running away from offering real answers, you can view it how you like.

    I sat here hour after hour answering question after question, and then it was time to leave. I'm sure some people asked me some questions after I left, but the truth is I haven't had a chance to read them yet. Hard as it is this may be to believe, I have other obligations. After I logged out last night, I ended up staying up very late to make up on the work that I did not do because I was here answering questions. Today, I'm working extra hours to make up for the time that was lost yesterday. I logged in today, and I saw one of the last post was you claiming I'd run away. Give me a break. At some point I have to leave. If you think there are any questions in particular that I'm too scared to answer, then produce said questions. I will give you an answer. It's really that simple. But give me a break with the running away thing. I'm not scared to answer any questions. I think I explaine myself more fully and defend my position better than most people here. And despite the constant abuse, my posts being hidden, and the increasing difficulty of reading nested replies, I stuck with it for several hours yesterday. Give me a break with the running away thing, dude.

  • On the post: All Of These Works Should Be In The Public Domain, But Aren't

    antidirt ( profile ), 07 Jan, 2015 @ 11:50am

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    I'm not re-stating questions from a few comments ago. Stop trying to turn this into a silly game. Start offering up some honest replies to the many threads you've run away from.

    It's easy to claim that I'm running away from questions. But it's much harder to ask me questions I won't answer. Prove to everybody that I'm running away. What are the specific questions I won't answer? Be specific.

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