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CopyrightCopyrightPosted Dec 11, 2008 23:25 UTC (Thu) by josh (subscriber, #17465)In reply to: Copyright by dskoll Parent article: Free Software Foundation files suit against Cisco for GPL violations
Impressive hyperbole. Some people also say that Free and Open Source Software will destroy the software industry, but I don't believe that either. I think all of those industries will thrive just fine without artificial restrictions. It seems quite clear that the software industry can function just fine with software that everyone can share and build on, and most of the money in the software industry lies in custom software development anyway, so software seems quite safe without copyright. The other industries you mentioned have similar properties: they rely on skills that not everyone has, and people who don't have those skills will pay for people who do. Photographers seem like a perfect example: how much of the money in photography really relies on restricted copying? People pay a photographer to take pictures, and regardless of what they can do with those pictures afterward they need to pay to have them taken in the first place. So yes, I really want to go there.Nothing is safe as long as copyright exists. You want safety, advocate the removal of copyright laws entirely!That would destroy many industries, including the software industry, the music industry, the film industry, newspapers, magazines, photographers... you really want to go there?
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Copyright Posted Dec 12, 2008 2:51 UTC (Fri) by elanthis (subscriber, #6227) [Link]
Yes, Open Source / Free Software still lets the software market survive because people are paid to write custom, in-house software or modify publicly available code. Aside from the fact that "in-house software" is just "proprietary code that you just don't know about" and that the FSF is actually against that stuff too, you're apparently confused about the differences between being paid to make something work and being paid for creating something that has no function on its own.
Novels, art work, movies... these are not software. People do not get paid to create novels just for the sake of having a novel -- they get paid because the novels sell, and they sell because people have to buy them to get a hold of them. That's not like software, where having the software exist is an economic advantage in itself, even if others can get a hold of it for free. Free Software destroys the market for selling software -- that is a fact. The software industry as a whole survives because software -- as a tool, rather than as a creative work -- is still worth good money even if you can't sell it. A novel isn't. Nor is a painting, or a movie, or any other purely creative work. Outside of things that a company needs in order to create some still-sellable product (training videos, manuals, and advertising artwork, mostly), the creative output of the world will vastly decrease. Even a lot of the "hobbyist" art is still made with the assumption that at least a _little_ profit can be made off of it; enough to recuperate costs if nothing else.
Corporate greed and copyright abuse really suck. Anarchy is also a source of suck. Moving from one extreme to the other just means that we go from creative works being too locked down to creative works being drastically reduced in number.
Frankly, you're a fucking idiot. Thank God people like you don't get to actually determine the laws... or lack of laws, as the case may be.
Copyright Posted Dec 12, 2008 4:32 UTC (Fri) by martinfick (subscriber, #4455) [Link] Aside from the fact that "in-house software" is just "proprietary code that you just don't know about" Proprietary only because it is implicitly unless declared not by copyright law. None of it would be discouraged or not written without copyright protection, so how is it relevant?Free Software destroys the market for selling software -- that is a fact. Yeah!! That would be delightful. It would still get created though! :)The software industry as a whole survives because software -- as a tool, rather than as a creative work -- is still worth good money even if you can't sell it. How is it worth money if you can't sell it? I suppose you meant is was worth paying money to create it.Nor is a painting, or a movie, or any other purely creative work. I guess all those movies were made for free before they had VCRs to sell them, no one ever thought of showing them in a theater for money! Do you suppose it took copyright for the Greeks to build amphitheaters to have plays in? I guess all those masterpieces sitting in museums, housing worship and many businesses, commissioned and created without copyright are just a figment of our imaginations. :) Your wild hyperbole is wildly contradicted by history. It always amazes me how authoritarian propaganda has just as strong a resistance to facts in people's minds as religion does.the creative output of the world will vastly decrease Even if this speculation were true, it hardly justifies the loss of freedom. Your speculative end does not justify the copyright means. Even a lot of the "hobbyist" art is still made with the assumption that at least a _little_ profit can be made off of it; enough to recuperate costs if nothing else. Assumptions or not it would probably still get created. I might assume that the cute chick will sleep with me because I write a great song, but I hardly think I should be entitled to enforce that, do you?Anarchy is also a source of suck. Hardly, I dream for it. The worst anarchy ever would not likely involve someone stealing 30% of my annual income. It takes a large government to commit large crimes... And, even as an anarchist I refrain from cursing at people on such a respectful forum, relax brother. I think we need more anarchists, come join us in peace and love and stop screaming at people who are not trying to force you to do anything. ;) We just want to be free!
Copyright Posted Dec 12, 2008 14:03 UTC (Fri) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link]
I've long found anarchy curious, because it's self-evidently unstable. As
an anarchist how would you stop people from stealing the entire contents of your house? You could hire men with guns to stop it (-> paying for police), but how would you stop them from doing exactly the same thing? Relying on their reputation sounds all very good until you realise that you'd have to do that *every single day* and the first day you're unlucky, you've lost everything.
(I had a discussion with a libertarian a while back in which it was
Copyright Posted Dec 12, 2008 14:50 UTC (Fri) by angdraug (subscriber, #7487) [Link] I can't speak for anarcho-capitalism brand of libertarians (the kind that would charge you for using streetlights), but if you're really curious, proper (i.e. anti-capitalist) anarchists do have a plan or two for the problem of crime, among many others. To keep this Linux-related, just
Copyright Posted Dec 12, 2008 14:53 UTC (Fri) by angdraug (subscriber, #7487) [Link] to read that FAQ online should read as "to read that FAQ offline", of course.
Copyright Posted Dec 12, 2008 15:19 UTC (Fri) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link]
Actually...
What happens around my town is that building corporations come in, buy up a farm on the edge of town, then build a cluster of houses. They build the streets, provide for gas/water/sewage/electricity. (The electricity is provided by another private company working under contract from the state, but the gas/water/sewage, is city provided, but not city built.)
So for things like streetlamps, garbage collection (which is another entirely private company), street cleanup and maintenance for those communities then everything is paid for by individuals who buy the houses and join the housing community.
All it all it works out quite well and even though your dealing with relatively small numbers of people the services are usually cheaper then what you pay in additional city taxes and the services are higher quality.
Dividing up street lamp into a individual ownership thing is a bit extreme, but that's one thing that can at least be taken care of fairly obviously without much need for high-levels of government.
------------------------------------------
Anarchy is a idealized society.
In a perfect society there is no need for any government or law or whatever because everybody behaves themselves. If they were to break any laws in todays society it would because they had a good and sound reason to.
Of course we both know that would never happen.
----------------------------
One thing though.... If you had a private police force that worked for the members in a community and had their paychecks come from those people directly and could be fired for pissing them off...
then they would be spending a great deal more of their time patrolling neighborhoods, investigating crimes, and protecting private property then going around and writing traffic violation tickets and essentially terrorizing motorists. (in a mild way, not a 'blow up your family' way)
It wouldn't be much different then what you have in small communities were you have a sheriffs that is elected and hired by the town to protect it, then that sheriff then selects deputies to assist him.
Of course in larger towns this sort of concept goes to shit. Stuffing millions of people into a relatively small area has always been a terrible idea, but it's just how things happen. And it destroys most of the justification for things like private police forces and whatnot.
Copyright Posted Dec 12, 2008 17:42 UTC (Fri) by sepreece (subscriber, #19270) [Link]
"What happens around my town is that building corporations come in, buy up a farm on the edge of town, then build a cluster of houses. They build the streets, provide for gas/water/sewage/electricity. (The electricity is provided by another private company working under contract from the state, but the gas/water/sewage, is city provided, but not city built.)"
In many places (like those around where I live), the infrastructure is typically built by the developer, but to specifications negotiated with the city/township/county, and ownership and operation of that infrastructure is passed to the government at completion of development (typically in phases as the development is built out).
Copyright Posted Dec 12, 2008 19:02 UTC (Fri) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link]
Well ya. Everythings built to standards.
And usually the small communities are built with a expectation that they'll get absorbed by the city as the city extends it's boundries every decade or so.
Quite often these communities try to resist getting absorbed legally through lawsuites and whatnot once they realise the drop in quality of services and increased costs that are associated with getting absorbed into the larger city. That and the drop in quality of education with the combined increase in cost per child that you get by being tied into a larger school district is one thing that people tend to especially go to arms about.
A few places have successfully resisted, but it's a minority.
Copyright Posted Dec 12, 2008 19:11 UTC (Fri) by sepreece (subscriber, #19270) [Link]
My experience is that there are people who do resist annexation, usually strictly because of taxes. There are also typically people who want to be annexed, usually because they want the enhanced services that the city provides.
Obviously, specific circumstances will affect how people feel. I don't personally know of situations where annexation represented a downgrading of services, but I'm sure they exist. Usually the resisters claim that they don't want the enhanced services (often including better-funded schools, access to park districts and libraries, etc.).
But, again, circumstances vary...
Copyright Posted Dec 12, 2008 19:54 UTC (Fri) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link]
Probably you have a better city government. Ours sucks.
Copyright Posted Dec 15, 2008 0:20 UTC (Mon) by xaoc (guest, #54140) [Link]
>How is it worth money if you can't sell it? I suppose you meant is was worth paying money to create it.
Don't you think software is worth money because it helps getting something done eventhough it cannot be sold for money?
Copyright Posted Dec 15, 2008 4:44 UTC (Mon) by martinfick (subscriber, #4455) [Link]
I wasn't actually debating the value of software, which is I assume what
you really mean: "value", not "worth money". I was just trying to be point out an obvious verbal contradiction.
By definition: something is "not worth money" if you cannot sell it for
You probably mean that it has value which is not monetary, make sense?
Copyright Posted Dec 15, 2008 7:17 UTC (Mon) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
another way of looking at it is how much would you be willing to pay for software that would give you the equivalent functionality.
something that you cannot sell can be worth quite a bit of money if it would cost a lot of money to replace it.
Copyright Posted Dec 12, 2008 13:56 UTC (Fri) by DonDiego (subscriber, #24141) [Link] Frankly, you're a fucking idiot.For a moment I feared I had to sit down and take the time to argue against some of your points. Thankfully you've already done a superb job of discrediting yourself and my efforts are no longer needed.
Frankly... Posted Dec 12, 2008 16:25 UTC (Fri) by corbet (editor, #1) [Link] I hate to complain, but this is heading into the sort of discussion that I would really rather not see on LWN. We can disagree without being vulgar and insulting. Any chance of reining it in just a little bit?
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