You can't defend public libraries and oppose file-sharing • Hacker News Board

Re: You can't defend public libraries and oppose file-sharing

#41

Post by dublinben » Wed, Sep 09, 2015, 3:06 PM UTC

librvf wrote: post #17

Yes, it is different. It differs in efficiency. Not an irrelevant difference. A public library is funded and maintained by the same community that uses it. The manual processes required to consume the material are a natural check in the process and the result is a mild shift in equilibrium. Communities benefit and libraries are legitimate customers, so publishers are at least still getting paid. File sharing's equili…

Do you think that peer to peer filesharing communities are not also funded and maintained by the community that uses it? I contend that this is exactly the case.

There must also be an original legitimate customer of the work being shared, so the publisher is still getting paid.

The difference does only lie in efficiency. In a world of ever-increasing efficiency, why do we shackle libraries to 20th Century levels of service?

Re: You can't defend public libraries and oppose file-sharing

#42

Post by scintill76 » Wed, Sep 09, 2015, 3:06 PM UTC

superdude wrote: post #4

What an absurd title and statement. Of course you can defend public libraries and oppose file sharing! It costs almost nothing to share digital files, while libraries have very real physical location costs and costs to maintain physical books (and maybe even to purchase digital books?). Not to mention the local community benefits a physical library offers.

Why should abstract cost matter? You think the authors are saying, "Oh good, at least they're paying the local utility companies to keep their copy of my book air-conditioned!" ?

In both cases, a single copy is paid for and shared with potentially tens of thousands of users. Now, you may have had the cost and physical inefficencies in mind as a rate-limiter on the unpaid (to the IP holder) consumption of media, but Falkvinge called that a quantitative, not qualitative, difference that doesn't matter. Honestly I'm not sure I agree [1] -- but who gets to define "how many" or "how cheap" is too far? I'm pretty sure the IP lobby would kill all libraries, lending, and re-selling if they could. Is that fair?

[1] It's perhaps too much like saying that deploying automated networked license plate scanners in every inch of a city is OK, because it's "just like a cop standing on the public street corner observing which cars are driving by", and I would definitely be against the scanners.

Re: You can't defend public libraries and oppose file-sharing

#43

Post by kethinov » Wed, Sep 09, 2015, 3:07 PM UTC

A related sentiment: http://freepubliclibrary.org

Re: You can't defend public libraries and oppose file-sharing

#44

Post by shripadk » Wed, Sep 09, 2015, 3:08 PM UTC

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #26

moviuro wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is reading a book different of watching a movie? When I'm done, I can return the book/delete the movie. The only difference is outlined in the article: the movie can be watched simultaneously by different people who got it, whilst I'm the only one with the book in my hands.

Confused: you can 'return' the movie AND keep a copy, which you distribute widely thus ruining any chance of the creator profiting by their work. Can't do that with the physical book. Not for free anyway.

You can scan the book and distribute digital copies of it for free. The only investment is time required to scan the books.

Re: You can't defend public libraries and oppose file-sharing

#45

Post by dublinben » Wed, Sep 09, 2015, 3:10 PM UTC

drzaiusapelord wrote: post #38

Lawtonfogle wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More modern libraries also offer ebooks, so the comparison becomes closer as libraries modernize.

Except ebooks come with licensing terms. You can't just buy one copy of a book and give it out infinite times. They have limits on use. Its modeled very closely on the physical book system.

>You can't just buy one copy of a book and give it out infinite times.

You very much can though, that's the beautiful power of digital media. Publishing companies with outdated business models are relying on archaic laws to prevent you from doing this. But it can be done!

Re: You can't defend public libraries and oppose file-sharing

#46

Post by superdude » Wed, Sep 09, 2015, 3:10 PM UTC

jbob2000 wrote: post #37

superdude wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The #1 purpose of file sharing is not knowledge sharing, it's entertainment sharing.

You don't read fiction? Libraries have massive kids sections, I doubt they're reading Applied Chemistry.

I'm responding to your specific argument that this is all about knowledge-sharing when it's not.

Re: You can't defend public libraries and oppose file-sharing

#47

Post by shripadk » Wed, Sep 09, 2015, 3:12 PM UTC

mikeash wrote: post #28

an0nym1ty wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is that not one of the most common analogies used by Pirates, the similarities between file sharing and lending a book or movie to a friend? That argument has failed for file sharing, what makes your argument different?

The fact that file sharing involves copying, not lending existing copies, is significant. If pirates make that analogy then they're being ridiculous. I'm not sure I've seen it made myself.

Lending existing copies does not prevent copying. I have come across plenty of "pirated" physical copies of various literature sold for a fraction of the actual cost.

Re: You can't defend public libraries and oppose file-sharing

#48

Post by gayprogrammer » Wed, Sep 09, 2015, 3:14 PM UTC

librvf wrote: post #33

gayprogrammer wrote: post #20

Many comments here compare the cost of a physical library to near-zero cost of the internet, but that's not a fair comparison itself. The cost of a physical library is physical, not informational. The article describes a situation where information sharing was challenged by the industry that has a physical monopoly on media (books). They were not granted informational monopoly, they only have monopoly on physical man…

It's a one-dimensional argument that relies heavily on rhetoric. It's hard to draw any practical conclusions from such an argument. The point is mostly just to persuade you that file-sharing is good and anyone who opposes file-sharing is dumb.

The only practical conclusion I can draw about file-sharing is that it does not look like it will stop. Information sharing is only going to increase--that's what the internet was designed for. Publishers will probably need to focus on physical means of revenue that the internet can not inherently provide.

Re: You can't defend public libraries and oppose file-sharing

#49

Post by mkozlows » Wed, Sep 09, 2015, 3:14 PM UTC

librvf wrote: post #17

Yes, it is different. It differs in efficiency. Not an irrelevant difference. A public library is funded and maintained by the same community that uses it. The manual processes required to consume the material are a natural check in the process and the result is a mild shift in equilibrium. Communities benefit and libraries are legitimate customers, so publishers are at least still getting paid. File sharing's equili…

The more interesting point, really, is where on the efficiency spectrum it makes sense to place our institutions.

I mean, we all want libraries to continue to exist in the ebook era, right. But the old-style "library buys a single copy, and lends it to one person at a time" model, which made sense for physical books because it was a natural constraint, for ebooks is weirdly inefficient from the borrower's side and seems weirdly non-remunerative from the copyright-holder's side.

Publishers have started pushing toward pay-per-use licensing for libraries, which makes more sense for both copyright-holders (who get paid more for more popular works) and lenders (who aren't held to an artificial scarcity of a "single copy"). That makes sense as far as it goes.

But again, efficiency comes into play: If I know that my library has effectively unlimited selection (because this pay-per-use licensing makes it efficient for it to "carry" all the books licensed under this scheme) and the library is easy to use to check out books from, then there's no reason for me to buy books instead of check them out, because the hassle inherent in the old physical world is gone. And from the publisher's side, every library book loaned is basically a lost sale, so they're going to want near-retail licensing prices.

And that's where the linked essay is relevant: The current state of affairs is that we live in a strong copyright regime where the publisher's desires trump everyone else's desires. If they won't license a book to libraries for less than $10 a lend, then the library either has to pay that (which few libraries have the budget for) or not carry the book. And if you think public libraries are good, then that's a bad situation.

Which tends to point toward a situation in which copyright is no longer the best way to balance our goals of allowing broad access to culture while also recompensing authors, and to think about other ways to meet those goals.

Re: You can't defend public libraries and oppose file-sharing

#50

Post by pbhjpbhj » Wed, Sep 09, 2015, 3:16 PM UTC

mikeash wrote: post #28

an0nym1ty wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is that not one of the most common analogies used by Pirates, the similarities between file sharing and lending a book or movie to a friend? That argument has failed for file sharing, what makes your argument different?

The fact that file sharing involves copying, not lending existing copies, is significant. If pirates make that analogy then they're being ridiculous. I'm not sure I've seen it made myself.

If such sharing were allowed - and I do recall schemes for it, our UK library does [did at least] such a thing and it's used in software (eg Steam allows you to share with a family member but you can't both use the game simulataneously [based on docs not experience]) - then people would embrace it. For example we share our physical DVD collection with any of our friends that ask, we'd be more than happy to have a collection in common of media with a network of friends such that 10 families could purchase items and have them in kind, only being able to use them serially.

The problem with this is that you could get a network of 1000s of households/users and still rarely have clashes in use. Such clashes could be managed such that additional copies are purchased (or the user chooses an alternative item of media) as needed. Then you're probably going to be able to serve 10s of thousands in a group and still reduce overall number of media items purchased.

That's the halfway point between torrent style file sharing and library lending. Imagine you could access the currently used media libraries of all your friends (and "friends") ...