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Z-library founders arrested in Argentina

justice.gov

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Re: Z-library founders arrested in Argentina

#361

Post by ckw »

DoingIsLearning wrote: post #21

A small thought experiment: - Book sales in 2021 were about _9_ billion dollars. [0] - Wage theft in the US is estimated at _50_ billion dollars. [1] Can you imagine if the resources of the justice and labour departments would prioritize citizen wage over publishers' revenue? Would you rather have funds allocated towards social justice or have them spent on intimidating foreign nationals completely outside US jurisdi…

So copyright is incentivizing only $9 billion of spending on books… This seems suboptimal. You’d think it’d be possible to design a different government scheme that yielded say, twice as much book publishing, but with no restriction on copying. Same thing for music.

Re: Z-library founders arrested in Argentina

#362

Post by munk-a »

akira2501 wrote: post #360
woodruffw wrote: post #350

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This would run counter to the "starve the beast"[1] strategy that's formed the core of conservative governance in the US for the last 50 years. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starve_the_beast

If you believe in small government then you're going to enact policies that accomplish this. Re-branding this as "starve the beast" seems nothing more than a propaganda exercise. Further.. almost every business employing people in a State must be setup with that State's authorities. Is there some reason States can't handle wage theft? Is this naturally a federal problem, or even best solved at that level?

I strongly disagree. If you're in favor of small government and in control you would, absent political concerns, simply shutter government organizations you don't believe in. "Starve the beast" is an entirely different tactic where you don't want to be seen as destroying popular services and so, instead, undermine their ability to function efficiently until they become unpopular enough to cancel. It comes with an understanding that the majority of the political will in a country appreciates these programs when they're well funded and that their cancelation is only politically actionable when they've been starved to ineffectualness.

"Starve the beast" is also really only a realistic strategy in a corrupt duopoly like America has since the defunding of popular programs is generally political suicide - unless you can reduce everything to "Us vs. Them"ism.

Re: Z-library founders arrested in Argentina

#363

Post by shakezula »

akira2501 wrote: post #360
woodruffw wrote: post #350

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This would run counter to the "starve the beast"[1] strategy that's formed the core of conservative governance in the US for the last 50 years. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starve_the_beast

If you believe in small government then you're going to enact policies that accomplish this. Re-branding this as "starve the beast" seems nothing more than a propaganda exercise. Further.. almost every business employing people in a State must be setup with that State's authorities. Is there some reason States can't handle wage theft? Is this naturally a federal problem, or even best solved at that level?

It's a term that was _coined by_ fiscal conservatives, it's not a "rebranding as a propaganda exercise".

Re: Z-library founders arrested in Argentina

#364

Post by ironfootnz »

theandrewbailey wrote: post #333
lc9er wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have family that works for DOL's Wage & Hour division. The amount of wage theft is _staggering_. They are chronically understaffed and overworked. Plus, every time a Republican administration comes into power, their enforcement power gets severely limited, except in the most egregious cases.

When people get paid more, the government gets more tax revenue. Smart government would double this division's resources, but governments are anything but smart.

In theory yes, but if you don't pay and use the money for Lobby, you get power, which equals to more rights. That's the foundation of a democracy or let's say society from the times of Pharaos.

Re: Z-library founders arrested in Argentina

#365

Post by woodruffw »

akira2501 wrote: post #360
woodruffw wrote: post #350

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This would run counter to the "starve the beast"[1] strategy that's formed the core of conservative governance in the US for the last 50 years. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starve_the_beast

If you believe in small government then you're going to enact policies that accomplish this. Re-branding this as "starve the beast" seems nothing more than a propaganda exercise. Further.. almost every business employing people in a State must be setup with that State's authorities. Is there some reason States can't handle wage theft? Is this naturally a federal problem, or even best solved at that level?

That's not my branding, or a re-branding at all: the first known use of the term was by a Libertarian party member. It's the term of art for this style of financial governance, one that is used somewhat proudly by its disciples.

It's a problem for both state governments and the Federal government: wage theft might span from state tax fraud, federal tax fraud, unemployment insurance fraud, federal contract falsification, etc. Making it into a states' issue is overly simplistic.

Re: Z-library founders arrested in Argentina

#366

Post by Auracle »

deafpolygon wrote: post #91
reisse wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but e-books can be purchased pretty much anywhere in the world. I'm in Sweden Sorry, but by "pretty much anywhere in the world" you clearly mean "first world". If you live outside of US/Canada and EU it is much harder to obtain books legally. Publishing agreements usually cover specific countries, and no-one cares about, for example, selling books in English in Central Asia. So even if you have means to pay for the…

> allowed Steam to overtake piracy Let's not forget the pricing, as well. Older games are actually priced lower than most books and movies, which are still being artificially inflated by their respective distributors.

To be fair, I’m guessing books have a longer tail than games. The vast majority of game sales for AAA games are at release.

Re: Z-library founders arrested in Argentina

#367

Post by Calamityjanitor »

lezojeda wrote: post #284
reisse wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but e-books can be purchased pretty much anywhere in the world. I'm in Sweden Sorry, but by "pretty much anywhere in the world" you clearly mean "first world". If you live outside of US/Canada and EU it is much harder to obtain books legally. Publishing agreements usually cover specific countries, and no-one cares about, for example, selling books in English in Central Asia. So even if you have means to pay for the…

>Interesting that Steam solved most of that problems for game distribution though. They have worldwide publishing agreements, regional prices AND good support of local payment providers in many countries. I think a lot of people underestimate how these factors allowed Steam to overtake piracy. Sadly it is being ruined by people from first-world using VPNs. Many AAA stopped using regional prices and we're stuck paying…

From the other side it feels just as unfair. When I lived of ~AU$200 a month, $100 towards rent, a new game was ~$100 in Aus. It was often much cheaper to buy physical copies from Asia and import.

Re: Z-library founders arrested in Argentina

#368

Post by Vt71fcAqt7 »

jamiek88 wrote: post #341
Vt71fcAqt7 wrote: post #303

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for that link. It also shows medicare as increased to $1.5 T

Yeah but we paid into a social fund for Medicare and social security. It’s not tax revenue it’s our savings.

Is that what they told you? You don't "pay into" social security, you _pay for_ other old people's current social security. And you certainly do not "pay into" Medicare. Also the "social fund" of Medicare and social security certainly benefit "the little guy" more than anyone else, which was the whole point I was making. Also, who is "we?" Some people would rather have that cash for themselves or invest it on their own. And technically all taxes can be called a "social fund" so I don't see hiw this point even begins. If you go to jail for not paying into a "social fund" it's tax revenue.

Re: Z-library founders arrested in Argentina

#369

Post by mxschumacher »

theandrewbailey wrote: post #333
lc9er wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have family that works for DOL's Wage & Hour division. The amount of wage theft is _staggering_. They are chronically understaffed and overworked. Plus, every time a Republican administration comes into power, their enforcement power gets severely limited, except in the most egregious cases.

When people get paid more, the government gets more tax revenue. Smart government would double this division's resources, but governments are anything but smart.

not quite - you have to think like a government. If people get paid less, the people who finance a given company get to keep more money, it might also be cheaper for consumers. The government has its hands in every stage of every economic interaction. What's "lost" in one area is made up in another. Even a drug dealer has to go to the gas station for example.

Re: Z-library founders arrested in Argentina

#370

Post by mxschumacher »

rg111 wrote: post #238
phpisatrash wrote: post #167

Me and my colleagues will be affected by the end of Z library and co related projects. Here in Brazil and for sure in most second and third world countries, people don't have money to spend in books. You can argue that people can go to the library, but in most cases it's even expensive to take a bus or taxi even a Uber. I'm a law student at an university in brazil. Law books are really expensive. Even though my unive…

> You can argue that people can go to the library, Where I grew up, my town library did not have any tech or programming books. Forget new jornal issues or cutting edge science books. "Just go to the library" is such a first-world-and-megacity thing to say.

i sometimes go to my local library (in a big European city). The computer science section has a lot of "for Dummies" books or titles that are very specific to a certain language version or framework (java 6, Symfony 3). Most of those can go straight to the trash. The many timeless books that exist are far and few between.
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