«

On Wednesday, 30 January 2013 20:59:45 UTC, sobriquet wrote:

> Generally speaking, people who engage in filesharing don't break
> into people's houses to obtain information, in order to share that
> information on the internet.
> They tend to share things that have been published voluntarily by
> their creators and dispute the claims that these creators retain
> a monopoly on the reproduction and distribution of their creations
> despite their deliberate choice to enable others to gain access to
> these creations.

How about the ones ripping DVDs? And the ones cracking software?

DanP

On Wednesday, January 30, 2013 9:46:28 PM UTC+1, Eric Stevens wrote:
>
> Describing intellectual property as 'bit strings' comparable with
>
> describing the works of Shakespeare as "ink on paper".

It's a factual description. Are you denying that people are exchanging
bitstrings via p2p networks? Or are you denying that some people claim
that some of those bitstrings constitute their purported intellectual
property?

>
> >
>
> >>
>
> >> If you carelessly leave money hanging out of your pocket, according to
>
> >> your point, I then have a right to help myself to as much of it as I can
>
> >> take.
>
>
>
> You will find most judicial systems will not agree with you.

That's irrelevant. Try it out. Scatter your money out on the streets and
then go to the police to see what they have to say when you ask them to
help you prevent people from collecting your money.
I can assure you they will tell you that you need to take better care of
your possessions or they will refuse to assist you in guarding your
possessions.

That's a very different scenario from you having your money stored in a
safe at home and calling the police to ask their help when you find people
are breaking into your home and trying to collect your money from the safe
where you had stored it. In that case they will be very helpful in assisting
you to prevent others from unauthorized access to your money.

On Wednesday, January 30, 2013 10:07:07 PM UTC+1, DanP wrote:
> On Wednesday, 30 January 2013 20:59:45 UTC, sobriquet wrote:
>
>
>
> > Generally speaking, people who engage in filesharing don't break
>
> > into people's houses to obtain information, in order to share that
>
> > information on the internet.
>
> > They tend to share things that have been published voluntarily by
>
> > their creators and dispute the claims that these creators retain
>
> > a monopoly on the reproduction and distribution of their creations
>
> > despite their deliberate choice to enable others to gain access to
>
> > these creations.
>
>
>
> How about the ones ripping DVDs? And the ones cracking software?
>
>
>
> DanP

Well, in my opinion that's still fundamentally different from
someone having their possessions stored at home and someone
breaking into their home to gain unauthorized access to
their possessions.

Ripping a DVD is merely an synonym for duplicating a DVD and it doesn't necessarily imply breaking any kind of copy protection.

But the nature of copyprotection is such that it is intended to impose
a monopoly on the reproduction and distribution of information and there
are many people out there who feel that this is a fundamentally flawed
notion which is incompatible with contemporary information technology.

Not because they think that creative people are not entitled to financial
compensation for their efforts, but because they feel that a monopoly on
the reproduction and distribution of information is a very idiotic way to
achieve this otherwise sensible goal.

The ultimate goal is to ensure there is a financial incentive for people
to create new content and there can be numerous ways to try and implement
a system that encourages people to create new content to contribute to the
shared wealth of human culture.

The ultimate goal is not to ensure that creative people have a monopoly on
the reproduction or distribution of their creations.

Neither is there necessarily a causal relationship between creative people
having a monopoly on the reproduction and distribution of their creations
on the one hand and those creative people being able to make a living from
their creative skills on the other hand.

In analogy to the way a public library works, we might tax information and
employ that money to finance people who contribute content that is popular.
That way people can enjoy free access to information, while still paying
taxes (in a way that takes into account their socioeconomic status) to
ensure there is a financial incentive to encourage people to create new
content.

In a public library, anyone can consume information for free. Yet that
doesn't detract from the fact that the authors who's books are available
for free consumption at the library still get paid.

So in case there would be no copyright whatsoever and people would be free
to share information online indiscriminately, that doesn't preclude us
from ensuring there is a financial incentive for people to create new
content. Furthermore, having free access to information provides a great
benefit for creative people, especially those with a poor socioeconomic
status.

On Wednesday, January 30, 2013 11:44:18 PM UTC+1, Eric Stevens wrote:
>
> So is describing gthe work of Shakespeare as ink on paper.

Sure. I don't see any problem with that description.

>
> You are again trying to evade the issue. Taking money just because it
>
> was accessible in someone's pocket is most definitely frowned upon.
>
>
>
> Even if you scatter money on the street, it still remains your money
>
> unless there is evidence that you are trying to give it away.
>

You're the one who is evading the issue. I'm talking about someone
who makes a habit of scattering his money or possessions out on the streets,
as opposed to someone who takes good care of his possessions by storing them
in a way that makes it feasible to guard those possessions.

My point being that the notion of property can not be considered to be
completely independent from an ability to guard one's possessions.

If there would not be such a condition, you could seriously expect the police
to help you guard your possessions, even if you deliberately and habitually scatter your possessions out on the streets wherever you go.

>
> Are you trying to say that the police don't try to discourage
>
> pickpockets?

I'm saying the police will not assist you in guarding your property
if you insist that you have the right to be careless with your property,
for instance, by scattering your property out on the streets habitually
and intentionally.


>
> --
>
>
>
> Regards,
>
>
>
> Eric Stevens

On Wednesday, January 30, 2013 11:58:00 PM UTC+1, Eric Stevens wrote:
> [..]

I snip things, because those morons at groups.google have managed
to come up with the most idiotic way to quote things (inserting empty
lines every other line, cumulatively bloating quoted sections) and
hence I assume that people are able to look up previous parts of the
discussion elsewhere in the thread.


>
> Monetary value is what people are prepared to pay for an item.

Ok, so if I point a gun at you and force you to pay 100 $ for
a piece of chewing gum, that means that that piece of chewing gum
has a monetary value of 100 $?

>
> If the item is reproducible in the hands of the creator or the
>
> creator's agent, the value of the item is the sum total of all the
>
> copies people are prepared to buy. Someone who goes around handing out
>
> illegally created free copies is diminishing the value of the item in
>
> the hands of the creator.

Perhaps in the delusional mind of a creator who has issues with
wishful thinking.
For people who have a functioning brain, they will dispute this patent
nonsense.

>
> As you said above, the value of an item is diminished by copying and
>
> that's what owners of copyright object to.

You have problems with your language comprehension skills?
I've told you before that there is no monetary value associated with
an abstraction like a bitstring.

Sure, you can scam clueless people and you might get some of them to
pay for abstractions like bitstrings, but that doesn't mean they
magically attain a monetary value in a sensible fashion.

>
> >Hence a unique oil painting is very valuable, because it is a unique
>
> >item. But if you create a digital artwork and you put it online, there is
>
> >no sensible way to associate a monetary value with that artwork.
>
>
>
> There is if you can control the nature of the access to that artwork.
>

But the whole point of this discussion is that I'm arguing there is
no way to effectively impose a monopoly on the reproduction and
distribution of information.

On Thursday, January 31, 2013 12:18:25 AM UTC+1, Savageduck wrote:
> [..]
> Not quite, that is not "found" money, that is lost cash which belongs
>
> to the rightful owner, and the police will, or should provide
>
> assistance in recovering any of the "lost" money which is "stolen" and
>
> not recovered:
>

Ok, so you go to the police and they ask you about your lost money
and you say to them, "No, you misunderstand, I didn't lose my money.
I habitually and intentionally scatter my money out on the streets
wherever I go."

I can assure you, the police will not assist you in trying to guard or
recover your money.

"sobriquet" <> wrote in message
news:8c574bc8-aeaa-407f-a05b-...
> On Wednesday, January 30, 2013 3:41:19 AM UTC+1, NotMe wrote:
>> "sobriquet"
>>
>> <snip>
>>
>> > So it seems people don't really have to worry about sharing an image
>>
>> > that is supposedly copyrighted (potentially in modified form), since
>> > it seems unrealistic to expect that all those countless copies one
>> > can find on the web are all properly licensed.
>>
>>
>>
>> Matters not if YOU don't own the rights then you have no business using
>> the
>> work product.
>
> Matters not if people have the slightest clue about the nature of
> information technology.
>
<snip>

I'm a retired engineer and creative designer (artist) that has made a good
living from IPR (including information technology) and copyright.

The information I've posted is the result of court actions. It's called
case law. Look it up.

"sobriquet" <> wrote in message
news:1abd8b64-ad0c-4164-96e1-...
> On Wednesday, January 30, 2013 1:24:28 PM UTC+1, Whisky-dave wrote:
>>
>> What about the human right not to have to share things?
>>
>
>
> If you keep your pictures of the internet, they won't end up being
> shared, copied or modified by others.
>
> But it would be rather silly for you to claim that you have the right
> to upload your pictures so they are available online while
> simultaneously claiming that they remain your intellectual property and
> that you get to decide that people are not allowed to share these pictures
> with others.
>
> If you don't believe me, try it out. Put one of your pictures online and
> I will show you that once you've put your pictures on the internet,
> it's beyond your control to decide who is or isn't allowed to copy
> those pictures (potentially in modified form) or upload them
> elsewhere.
>

Keep believing that.

http://www.lib.purdue.edu/uco/Copyri...penalties.html

With few exceptions dealing with copyright we've settled based on a simple
demand letter from our attorney. The few cases were we have good to court
the judge (at summery) tapped the bench and said 'pay up'.

Patents typcially take a bit more work and expense.

On Thursday, January 31, 2013 12:42:02 AM UTC+1, NotMe wrote:
> [..]
> Keep believing that.
>
>
>
> http://www.lib.purdue.edu/uco/Copyri...penalties.html
>
>
>
> With few exceptions dealing with copyright we've settled based on a simple
>
> demand letter from our attorney. The few cases were we have good to court
>
> the judge (at summery) tapped the bench and said 'pay up'.
>
>
>
> Patents typcially take a bit more work and expense.


http://tinyurl.com/apblbys

No torrents have been removed because of spurious legal threats.

So it seems all that legal mumbo jumbo isn't really very convincing
for the millions of piratebay users out there (not to mention p2p
filesharing in general).

On Thursday, January 31, 2013 12:44:03 AM UTC+1, Savageduck wrote:
> [..]
> Who said anything about "habitually and intentionally"?
>
> Only you.
>

So you're not denying the fact that the notion of property can't be
seen independent of an ability to guard your property.

Or are you saying that even if you do habitually and intentionally
scatter your possessions out on the streets, you can still realistically
expect the police to assist you in trying to guard or recover your
possessions?

>
>
> Your philosophy is that anything that you see unattended in anyway,
>
> whether online or on the street, is freely available for you to take.
>
> While it might be simple enough to take such unguarded items, that does
>
> not make the taking of them in anyway right. It is still relieving the
>
> rightful owner of their property, and that is theft.
>
>
>
> So if you find a wallet on a sidewalk, you believe that you are within
>
> your rights to empty it of cash and to use any credit cards you might
>
> find until they are cancelled?

You're trying to subvert my point. My point was that you need to take
care of your possessions and if you are intentionally careless with your possessions, that has implications for your ability to consider those items
to be your possessions.

>
> Somehow I have a feeling that even Dutch law enforcement might consider
>
> that to be a criminal act. Whereas the morally and legally correct
>
> thing to do is make an effort to locate the rightful owner, and if
>
> unsuccessful advise authorities of your find. Then you might discover
>
> that a grateful owner might provide a finder's fee, and you would have
>
> the satisfaction of having behaved within civic expectations.
>
>
>
> However, it seems likely that you would exploit such a scenario given
>
> all you have told us regarding your particular philosophy.
>

The scenario you sketch is completely irrelevant with respect to the
question of a moral imperative to respect a monopoly on the reproduction
and distribution of information.

My philosophy is that all information belongs to the public domain.

My philosophy is not that all physical items can be freely appropriated by
anyone who feels like taking possession of something.

Property as a concept can be sensibly applied to physical objects, but it
can't be sensibly applied to abstractions like a bitstring.


>
> --
>
> Regards,
>
>
>
> Savageduck