I wouldn't be so sure. This particular guy may be gone to retire on his private island or whatever, but the industry still will be there. And so far they are winning and the rest of the internet is losing. Right now they already acquired capability to take any site off the internet merely by sending a message to the services provider, and take any content off a popular site like YouTube by using an interface specially built for them, often without any human intervention or consideration for real rights. They are completely exempt from any due process and from the concept of "innocent until proven guilty". When it comes to copyright, it's shoot first, sort out later, and they're holding the biggest guns ever.
So the industry confidence that internet users will get tired and with relentless pressure the industry will succeed to take more and more rights from them is completely founded. This is what happened repeatedly up until now, and winning one instance doesn't change it. There will be more laws like SOPA, and if past experience predicts anything there is a very big chance that they will succeed in sneaking it in one way or another. At least that's exactly what happened till now and we don't have an effective solution for that - so far they had only a handful of failures, and they found new ways of doing the same. For example, they failed with SOPA that was to give them DNS control - but they effectively control big parts of DNS already, see recent HN stories about Godaddy and Verisign domain takedowns. And they won't stop until they will have same as SOPA and more.
The SOPA/PIPA debacle revealed a few interesting things.
1. The public can be roused to fight bills like this... at least once. What about the next ten times these bills, or parts of them, are reintroduced under different names or tacked onto other bills? Sherman is probably right when he says that lobbyists will win in the long term.
2. Hollywood's economic importance is literally dwarfed by that of internet companies like Google. Even ignoring the rights of citizens, the mere cost of implementing SOPA/PIPA would cause far more harm to the U.S. economy than it could possibly prevent. SOPA/PIPA was like shooting your horse in the head in order to thwart horse-thiefs you only think you saw.
3. Why does Hollywood get preferential treatment? A long history of lobbying. When Hollywood was threatened with federal content regulation laws in the 20's they responded by adopting a self-imposed production code (half-heartedly at first) and also by lobbying. Although the code is long dead, Hollywood has never slackened their lobbying efforts.
4. Hollywood has been getting a free ride. While Hollywood was once happy just to avoid falling under federal regulation, now they seek (and have gained) regulatory capture. Copyright life seems to be forever tied to the age of Mickey Mouse. Laws like DMCA have forced taxpayers to pay for protection of Hollywood content. Tax laws are written so that wildly successful movies that earn far more than they cost can be losses on paper, while the profits are siphoned off through tax loopholes without a penny going to the government except as campaign donations. If Apple was run by Hollywood, they'd be reporting a loss every quarter and laughing all the way to the Cayman islands.
The big conclusion:
Net companies are bigger than Hollywood and have a lot more capital to spend lobbying. SOPA/PIPA was a declaration of war by Hollywood on internet companies. The MPAA tried to have legislature passed that would shore up their own interests at the expense of Google, Yahoo, etc. while doing more harm to the U.S. economy than good. Even if the grass roots movement that stopped PIPA/SOPA was a one time thing, it likely will not be necessary the next time. Big Net money is rolling into Washington as we speak.
The other weekend I somehow ended up seeing "Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance 3D".
Worst movie I ever saw in my life, but watch it, because the Ghost Rider considers illegal downloads a sin (line from the movie, can't reproduce the exact quote).
Hollywood has been brain-washing people for years and we shouldn't underestimate their power of persuasion.
"Render unto Caesar that which is due Caesar", etc. Most religions stress adherence to the laws of the land, except where those laws conflict with the edicts of the religion.
Biblically, obeying the authorities set over you is a command from God, not a guideline. Disobeying God is sin, so disobeying the law is sin. The exception is when this obedience conflicts with other commands from God.
Exactly where the line between respect for the law and conflict with God's commands lie is a favorite topic for Christian ethics debates, but probably not relevant to the linked article. ;)
It appears you are correct. [1] I was always taught that it was Jesus' way of telling his followers to obey the earthly laws (pay yo' taxes) only inasmuch as they do not conflict with the laws of Heaven.
Up here in the Socialist Republic of Canada, the counterfeit drug criminals are so entrenched in power that when you fill a prescription, the pharmacist is required by law to offer you the counterfeit drug alongside the brand-name drug, usually at about 25% of the brand name drug’s price.
Worse, the spin-masters in power have taken control of the conversation, everyone in Canada calls them “generic” drugs, as if molecules and atoms were identical to each other and there’s no difference besides the logo stamped on the pill and the label glued on the bottle.
And we’re prisoners of the system, trapped in the endless nightmare of free health care.
>And we’re prisoners of the system, trapped in the endless nightmare of free health care.
As a fellow prisoner of Soviet Kanuckistan, I feel I must rebel against the Department of Truth and point out that we pay, dearly, for health care. Interestingly, however, we spend only slightly more than our free brethren to the south: 7% vs 6.7% GDP (this is only public, not private spending).
Is the generic model enough to fund actual R&D for new medicine? Eg, if generic were legalized everywhere, including the US, and it undercut pharmaceuticals so much that they went out of business, would new drug development cease?
Not that I'm a fan of intellectual property, but I do recognize that there are a few areas where the upfront investment to produce the product is so massive, and copying the final product so easy, that it might make sense to guarantee the profits for a period of time.
Does the pro-generic side have any data or counterpoint to that?
Back in the day before "big pharma", medical advances came out of Universities, many of them publicly funded. I think if the big pharma were cut off at the knees funding-wise, we'd see a resurgence in academic research.
Which I personally think is far better, because typically (not always of course) academics will share and collaborate, instead of being in walled gardens.
Ah, thanks, didn't know that. I suspect that would be far better for another reason as well - less funding and brain power spent on Viagra and 'quality of life' drugs, and more on cancer, AIDS, and other major but perhaps less profitable epidemics.
If medicine came from R&D sponsored by the government, I think we'd live in a better place.
That's because big-pharma companies love to focus on treatments, not on prevention and they also like to focus on controlling the disease instead of curring it.
Like in the case of allergic asthma, why treat a patient once when you can take money from him monthly?
To play devil's advocate, the moment the government gets involved, so do politics.
Contraception and sexually transmitted diseases - will the religious right / moral majority voters turn against a representative who supports medical research for these?
What about diseases associated with lifestyle - smoking, alcohol, obesity. Will a parent group ask why X million is going to emphysema research when it could have gone to childhood cancer research instead? What about the anti-vaccine groups? Vegan/Vegetarian groups? Whatever other special interest group or political viewpoint?
I really don't want to see Bill O'Reilly or Rosie O'Donnell on tv expressing their outrage at why funding is going to curing the wrong diseases/disorders.
Why is it that a pharmaceutical company spends billions upon billions on R&D and only gets to patent it product for 20 years, but some poxy artist/record label gets paid royalty for a cajillion years.
There's something very wrong there...
I'm in 2 minds about the whole medicine patent thing. One the one hand, as you say, new medicines would not be developed but on the other hand the patents drive the prices so high that people in 3rd world countries cannot afford them. It also means medicines for 3rd world diseases are not worthwhile for the large pharmas. There really needs to be a better balance, maybe spending 5-10% of their R&D on medicines they know will never see it's return on investment but will save many more lives than their high profit products.
Generic medicines aren't available until the 20-year patent period runs out. Some of the profits from the patent period go to more research to make new drugs and obtain new patent rights. (Pharma is one of the exceptional few fields in which patents promote innovation instead of taking their usual role of blocking it.)
The additional profits that come from lobbying after year 20 to keep out generics don't get reinvested into more research, they get reinvested into more lobbying.
What makes the entire industry possible is that Canada only grants drug patent protection for five years, while America grants drug patent protection for twenty. Therefore, there’s a fifteen-year period during which Canadian companies can legally manufacture generic drugs that are illegal to import into the USA.
I suspect a lot of the talk about counterfeits and generics misses the third category, generics that are contraband in the USA because they are still under patent protection.
Counterfeit is different than generic: it was explicitly defined in Section 202 of SOPA as "falsely representing the source, manufacturer or distributor." As I wrote in a previous essay "You can still buy your overseas boner pills; they're just less likely to say Viagra on them."
The USDA can identify the source of bad pork; the FDA similarly needs to investigate bad batches of medicine.
Interesting - that means if I manufacture & package my own pills, with my own logo, but print "contains Sildenafil" on the box when it doesn't, that does not qualify as counterfeiting?
In that case, you'd likely be charged under a fraud statute (misrepresenting a product) versus counterfeiting (misrepresenting the source of a product). Selling a sugar pill isn't a trademark violation. Stamping Viagra on it is.
That's like saying you're skeptical of the Rolex business because "it advertises itself mostly through spam". Don't be silly, there are a number of vendors of pharmaceuticals online that are legitimate businesses, they are separate from the people who send you spam.
It seems you probably don't have a condition that would lead you to need to know about their services. I wish you continued good luck on that front.
OK. I watched the whole interview and, I have to say, Sherman seems to understand technology better than I had figured. He even appears tolerable, approachable and maybe even someone who would listen to reason. Is it a front? We have every reason to think it is.
Personally, I never would have thought I'd hear the RIAA talk about millions of songs for $10/month. Question of course is, did the RIAA kill the subscription model and then announce it's failure? Still, $10/month is pocket change in exchange for never having to hunt for music.
There is an invisible sheath of social truth. The elephant in the room. We've all pirated music, software or movies at some point. None of us openly admit it, and if asked we all say "Ya, the artist should be compensated". Then we pirate more music and movies, proclaiming, "They're the thieves! They give artists X% of the profits!". True. But I still don't see an argument for pirating music - or at least, pirating music but pretending you think it is wrong.
I don't think anyone wants to pirate music. What people want is convenience. If the incentive for route X is greater than route Y, route X is destined to be the popular route by default. $10/month vs. searching the pirate bay every time I hear a new song I like? $10/month wins.
The RIAA is generally evil, don't get me wrong. But I imagined a complete jack ass at the helm, and I am surprised to see something different.
I openly admit it. When I hear a song I like I immediately download the artist's entire discography. And then when they come to town, I go to their shows.
The point's been made that artists make so little from downloads and streaming that it literally isn't worth it for you to purchase from iTunes or Amazon downloads compared to, say, buying one out of five albums on CD or vinyl. And maybe also purchasing merchandise directly from the artists website.
Why? Give me a good reason. This is exactly what tomkin, the top-level commenter, meant (or at least my understanding of it). It's just "politically correct" to say/do that, but rarely does anyone ever ask why. So let me do just that.
Because it's "illegal" to acquire it by other means?
The law is not a moral authority by any means. At least it shouldn't be. Ideally, things are against the law because they are considered to be morally wrong. The other way 'round (something is morally wrong because it is against the law) is a similar fallacy as confusing correlation with causation. It just doesn't follow.
There's a quite nice saying in Germany, frequently attributed to Berthold Brecht, that roughly translates to "When injustice becomes law, resistance becomes obligation.". That's essentially the current situation - injustice is law. Piracy is but one of many forms of resistance.
To calm our conscience?
I don't think downloading music is wrong. In fact, I don't think sharing anything can be considered wrong in any way, and I must actually commend the content industry for managing to twist and pervert the public's perception of morality to such a degree. It's the most natural action a human being can undertake. And digital data isn't scarce - there's absolutely no reason not to share it. It's the refusal to share (and the active battle against it) that should be considered highly unethical.
To support the artist?
There're better ways that don't involve dead and obsolete business models (distribution of information, which is virtually cost-free today), such as going to see a show, or maybe buying their merchandise. I know some people who frown on donations because they argue that would make artists beggars, but I prefer to liken donations to tip money. Crowd-funding is slowly becoming more accepted and might face wide-spread adoption in a few years. I like this approach because it's essentially a service based model - the artist gets paid once to create something, and it can be freely used by everyone when it's complete - there's no monopoly rent on something that's not inherently scarce.
And finally, accept the fact that not everyone is able to live off their art, and that's fine too. No one is entitled to succeed in a given job, and no one is entitled to protection of their business model if something comes along that makes it obsolete.
Piracy isn't a moral resistance 'code'. It is just a way to get things for free with a (very small) chance of any repercussions. If some new magic technology was invented overnight, and the risk of being sued went up to 99% every time you tried to download something in violation of copyright I think this 'moral code' would disappear quite quickly. This is a cover up for 'I want free shit, and I am not going to get in trouble, so I do it'.
How about going to each and every artist you believe you should be able to download for free and get their permission to copy their art first? They created their work for your entertainment, it should be their decision to say weather you can have it for free, or for a price.
>It is just a way to get things for free with a (very small) chance of any repercussions. If some new magic technology was invented overnight, and the risk of being sued went up to 99% every time you tried to download something in violation of copyright I think this 'moral code' would disappear quite quickly. This is a cover up for 'I want free shit, and I am not going to get in trouble, so I do it'.
What I'm saying is that these repercussions are completely unjustified and morally wrong. Appeals to (imaginary, and quite frankly, impossible) force don't change that. You're essentially saying the same as "If being gay was against the law and we had the power to crack down on gay people, that would make being gay wrong".
>How about going to each and every artist you believe you should be able to download for free and get their permission to copy their art first?
I must present you with a counter-question instead: based on what moral authority should an artist (or anyone else) be allowed to forbid me to copy art?
Let me say it again: there's nothing more inherently good and natural than sharing. If you are opposed to sharing (of a truly non-scarce resource, at that), then it's you who's arguing against one of, if not the most universally accepted ethical practice of humanity.
Take note that nobody can be forced to share. The opposite, however, holds true as well: you can't force people to stop sharing. Or to put it in another, polemic way: if you don't want people to share your art, lock it up in your basement and never show it to anyone.
>They created their work for your entertainment, it should be their decision to say weather you can have it for free, or for a price.
I don't see why. Sure, they can charge people for distribution done by themselves if they so chose. That doesn't mean they have any authority to tell people who acquired a copy to further share said copy, with or without compensation.
You believe it is your right to get someone elses hard earned work for free, just because it is only a few clicks away and without consequence, and also ignore their wishes if they ask to be compensated?
Logical conclusion: We can consider whatever you do 9-5 to pay the bills also as your 'art'. I as your boss now decree that you are entitled to $0 compensation this month.
You are extremely happy now yes, because 'art wants to be free'?
Don't be ridiculous. There is an employer/employee contract about getting paid what you were promised. Has nothing to do with what you did. They could have had you do absolutely nothing but sit in a chair and wait for a week because there was no job to do and you still get paid.
But if you shovel a walkway the adjacent store gets to use it without paying a dime.
The artist is promised a cut of a sale of an album when it is purchased, since it is being copied (which is still illegal if I'm not mistaken) and not purchased he isn't getting paid either. Hence he should be getting paid for his work.
It seems the sentiment has become one of: since music and movies are easy enough to copy online without me getting in trouble, and for free, the price of art should also drop to zero as a whole. This doesn't look like something anyone in the music or movie industry would think is a good thing would it?
But nobody at all promised to purchase the album. That's the difference. An employer agreed upfront to purchase your work. I could promise you a cut of just about any action, and you wouldn't ipso facto be morally owed people performing that action.
What matters is not what an industry thinks, but what is best for society. I personally think a couple decades of copyright is a good thing but it does not equate to employment.
I don't really equate the fact that music has become easy to copy that the expectation is you shouldn't have to pay for it anymore if you don't feel like it, and that is best for society.
I'm sorry, it's impossible to argue rationally with you. You make fallacious assumptions, jump to (illogical) conclusions and I feel that you are just one step short of accusing me to be a petty thief. You aren't even trying to understand what I am arguing.
I get things for free that were made for free. Seems like a pretty good deal on both sides to me.
by made I mean manufactured, or in this case, duplicated digitally. I'm not talking about the artist's efforts actually creating the music. I'd be happy to send them a 10 spot if I like their music and they asked for it.
Then by all means from now on do not download a single album from an artist until you've located their home address and written them a check for $10. Or are you just posturing? I'd like to think so.
Speaking as a musician with a small body of work, I want people to download my songs, pirated or otherwise.
If you want to give me money, send me some or come to one of my shows. I was involved with a label/mngt. company in the 90's and they just ripped me off. Don't give them any money by buying "official" records.
Kill Hollywood: Pirate...download and direct your dollars directly to the musicians. Ignore the agents and the middlemen. They're parasites.
How about letting each artist decide his/her own policy on if they want you to download their music for free or not? I see artists signed to major labels tweeting that they want you to buy their music. It isn't black or white.
But you're not understanding - the artist can't decide because piracy is unpreventable. It's over, just stop with them moral battle. The floodgates are open, and it will never close unless we all agree to compromise the internet. So it's either adapt or get a real job.
I'm not saying at all that the industry shouldn't make it easier to acquire works digitally at a decent price, but it still doesn't make it any moral issue, or inherently an 'art wants to be free' issue just because in the last 20 years you've been able to easily copy entertainment without fear of repercussion. People still deserve to be paid for their time and hard work, plain and simple.
Note the followup post will be: 'Just go to their concerts! All is well!'. Since Ticketmaster screws me out of about 30 bucks for each pair of tickets I buy, should we be trying to sneak into concerts for free because 'the man' is doing things we don't like even though the artist is receiving some of the profits from a legal sale?
I imagined a complete jack ass at the helm,
and I am surprised to see something different.
Don't let the show put by him distract you. Of course he's competent. These things are never pulled off by incompetents.
I still don't see an argument for pirating music
I still don't see an argument for punishing people for pirating music. Sharing is in our genes, just as sex. Preferring free stuff is also in our genes. Wanting convenience is also in our genes.
The model of selling tapes or CDs was based on scarcity. Now that scarcity is gone, because with a few clicks and key-presses you can find anything.
And really, punishing users for pirating content is just like punishing them for having sex.
Even some of the normals around me are start are starting to get how broken SOPA/PIPA were and how wrongheaded the "content provders" actions have been.
Mmmm. Self-serving vitriol. I would really like to be able to see step-by-step these 'advocates' thinking processes and sidesteps over any (if any remaining) moral qualms.
As long as it's easier to pirate than get stuff through legitimate channels, people will pirate. And people will always fight having to jump through hoops and being treated like they are criminals all the time.
My current pirating usually has to do with books that I've signed out using Overdrive and are then unable to read! Instead of fighting with Overdrive and reinstalling it, hunting down passwords, or finding out I can't read it on device X, I usually have a pirated copy within 2 minutes. Then when I'm done I return the Overdrive book. (That's the one function that seems to work on the damn thing.)
The RIAA has one of the biggest misnomer names in the lobbying business. They serve the interests of record labels and the plutocracy who maintains control and legislation of that control.
The sad thing is that even at that angle, their real motivation is to shut down foreign pharmacies selling generic drugs (often made on the same production line as their branded equivalent) directly to Americans without the price-gouge they're able to inflict with their market dominance.
If freedom limitations applied only to people that I consider to be bad, and that authorities agree with me, I'd support it wholeheartedly. After all, bad people don't need same rights to due process as good people, and since I'm one of the good people, it could never happen that my rights would be infringed because somebody thought I'm bad and authorities sided with him and not me. Sounds about right.
this is exactly the sort of attitude that gets exploited to pass bad laws. A law restricting free speech or violating privacy should not be specific to any sort of behaviour, whether it's child porn or counterfeit drugs or pirated movies.
producing or selling counterfeit drugs is already illegal. the importation of those drugs is also illegal, if somebody is importing them customs already has the legal authority to stop it. it might be difficult to enforce, but that doesn't mean that more laws are the answer. passing more laws isn't going to make it more illegal, those laws are just going to be abused to infringe upon the rights of people who aren't actually producing or selling counterfeit drugs.
Cary Sherman, the RIAA CEO, has a degree from Harvard in law. Sherman's compensation package from the RIAA was $3.2 million. In 2010, Sherman helped the RIAA secure a $105 million settlement from LimeWire for copyright infringement. The guy is a self described lobbyist and he has the guts to challenge google and wikipedia of demagogy? (a strategy for gaining political power by appealing to the prejudices, emotions, fears, vanities and expectations of the public).
He's probably smart enough to realize the typical "you're a hipocrite" backlash, I wonder what his goal in this piece is? If we are going to win the internet censorship, internet ownership, and intellectual property legal battles we have to find a way to make it financially unwise to launch campaigns to sustain business models that can't tolerate freedom to transmit any data we want with uncensored internet connections.
I think it's important to realize that we (the general public) are not the intended audience for statements like this. The RIAA/MPAA are lobbyist Organizations that are failing to pass legislature. They are legal teams that are losing steam in the court room. Their "customers"/investors are the various studios that have banded together to find means to sustain a dying business model.
Make no mistake, these are the death throes of the RIAA/MPAA
These statements lack the confidence of secure financial backing. These statements are basically saying, "We are doing what you asked of us, it's not our fault it isn't working", and the studios aren't amused.
Spot on. There's no other reason for a NYT op-ed other than to send the message that: "Hey we're doing what you paid us to do; what do you want from us?!"
HN need a "Reddit indicator" for users, if too many of your posts reek like Reddit or 4Chan, then your comments are kept, just moved to a new thread on Reddit/4Chan. Need it soon, Reddit trolls users are flooding into HN last 6 months.
Sure and I agree on that point, but if I go by your HN profiles for who gets the most benefit the doubt, your track record beats his by infinity (we're dividing by zero here).
Here is an idea..since RIAA and MPAA like closed deals so much lets every 6 months stage the same protest to remind them that its still somewhat WRONG!
I think they probably were. Copyright holders can just keep trying to pass the same law, people will get tired of resisting, and it'll happen. In light of that, the complaint that they were unable to get out their side of the story strikes me as canny and disingenuous. They'll get what they want.
If Wikipedia and other sites tried to do the blackout thing again, my bet is it would garner quite a backlash from users. People can care, but only so much and only for so long.
Lets give Hollywood censorship rights at the dns level on one condition. The government absorb mpaa, riaa and hollywood as an unholy appendage of all the other slow moving buracratic nightmare agencies sucking tax dollars from the people.
We've been doing this since 1998. He'll get sick of it and quit like the rest of them before him.