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Kim Dotcom: US Government Is Protecting An Outdated Monopolistic Business Model

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Re: Kim Dotcom: US Government Is Protecting An Outdated Monopolistic Business Model

#41

Post by jonhendry »

hnhg wrote: post #4
J3L2404 wrote: post #3

From the article comments: "This is the bottom line. Whether or not the business model is out-dated or not has absolutely no effect on whether what Kim was doing was either immoral or illegal. In the Governments eyes, what Kim was doing illegal. I can't just steal something from an Amish person's business because "their business model is out-dated." It doesn't matter. Unless Kim can prove that MegaUpload was actively…

Not to the artist. There's the vendor and then the publisher first.

Self-published artists, with their own labels, don't exactly catch a break. Filesharers don't care about anything but their own entertainment.

Re: Kim Dotcom: US Government Is Protecting An Outdated Monopolistic Business Model

#42

Post by ssebro »

jonhendry wrote: post #34
sophacles wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. It is not stealing. This is well established. Stop using hyperbolic language to hysterically whine and force your moralistic crap down our throats. 2. Your Amish analogy is a strawman. 3. Whether Kim is breaking a law or not is not the point of this dicussion (another strawman here): the discussion is does the (il)leagailty of it make sense? Laws are not permanent nor are they absolute. We theoretically live in a…

"Stop using hyperbolic language" The main perpetrators of hyperbolic language on this topic are the people who act as if there is some necessity and moral right behind downloading some crap CD or movie or TV show, as if that was the same as stealing bread to feed a family. Guess what, you won't perish if you don't watch that TV show everyone is talking about, or if you have to wait six months for that new movie to sh…

Death and physical injury aren't the only ways someone can be harmed. Trust me - if you're the only kid in highscool without cable who isn't able to talk about that show from last night, you miss opportunities to bond. Those missed bonds are worth quite a lot, since they directly impact your future.

Re: Kim Dotcom: US Government Is Protecting An Outdated Monopolistic Business Model

#43

Post by angersock »

jonhendry wrote: post #41
hnhg wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not to the artist. There's the vendor and then the publisher first.

Self-published artists, with their own labels, don't exactly catch a break. Filesharers don't care about anything but their own entertainment.

Yes, because there couldn't possibly be people who handle their own distribution while still supporting the artists.

Re: Kim Dotcom: US Government Is Protecting An Outdated Monopolistic Business Model

#44

Post by chrisbennet »

Couldn't damages be gauged by comparing the injured party's income stream before and after MegaUpload was shut down? If the parties suing are really losing 13 billion in a 20 billion dollar industry, they should see an obvious upward spike in profits now that that MegaUpload is shut down.

Re: Kim Dotcom: US Government Is Protecting An Outdated Monopolistic Business Model

#45

Post by consumersurplus »

jonhendry wrote: post #36
kiba wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if that's correct, that doesn't mean that what Kim did wasn't illegal or wrong. Kim wasn't simply engaged in "file sharing" he ran a multimillion dollar parallel distribution system. He wasn't sharing, he was basically using file sharers as a Mechanical Turk to scrape the Internet for content which he then monetized at a large scale. What he did was illegal, but not necessary wrong. If you think Kim was in the r…

"What he did was illegal, but not necessary wrong." He wasn't stealing food to give it to the starving poor, he was helping immature people get access to entertainment when waiting or doing without would do them no harm at all. There's no moral high ground there. What he did was illegal, and wrong.

Jesus didn't feed 5,000 with five loaves and two fish, he entertained 5,000 with five mp3s and two mp4s.

Re: Kim Dotcom: US Government Is Protecting An Outdated Monopolistic Business Model

#46

Post by ssebro »

jonhendry wrote: post #40
vibrunazo wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please separate illegal from immoral. And try to consider both sides of the argument, instead of assuming it's either good or bad because there is some good our some bad in it. There's both pros and cons to piracy, so w have to measure both instead of blindly ignoring one side. While it's really sad that many lost their jobs breeding horses when automobiles were invented, it was a total net positive to humanity. You…

"Please separate illegal from immoral." It does someone no harm to do without watching Transformers 3 for a year. There's no moral high ground in lacking discipline. Therefore, it's immoral and illegal. Get a new hobby, and some perspective.

Not true. Please see http://news.ycombinator.org/item?id=3653006

Re: Kim Dotcom: US Government Is Protecting An Outdated Monopolistic Business Model

#47

Post by wisty »

VonGuard wrote: post #31
alan_cx wrote: post #29

What I perceive from over here in the UK is that when the US government protects failing business with money, its called "socialist" and evil. However, when it protects failing business with law, that's just fine. Despite the fact that these laws also cost a lot of money. I would like to see the cost of policing and enforcing these laws over time, compared to bailing out, say, General Motors. In fact, wont GM have to…

If even a small portion of the US' population had any idea what socialism actually was, maybe we wouldn't all be going bankrupt from our asinine health care system.... This country....

Yeah, McCarthyism has a lot to answer for.

Re: Kim Dotcom: US Government Is Protecting An Outdated Monopolistic Business Model

#48

Post by wanderingstan »

consumersurplus wrote: post #45
jonhendry wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"What he did was illegal, but not necessary wrong." He wasn't stealing food to give it to the starving poor, he was helping immature people get access to entertainment when waiting or doing without would do them no harm at all. There's no moral high ground there. What he did was illegal, and wrong.

Jesus didn't feed 5,000 with five loaves and two fish, he entertained 5,000 with five mp3s and two mp4s.

Jesus was clearly stealing from the bakers and fishermen, who were robbed of over 5000 bread and fish sales that day. Damn socialist.

Re: Kim Dotcom: US Government Is Protecting An Outdated Monopolistic Business Model

#49

Post by kiba »

jonhendry wrote: post #36
kiba wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if that's correct, that doesn't mean that what Kim did wasn't illegal or wrong. Kim wasn't simply engaged in "file sharing" he ran a multimillion dollar parallel distribution system. He wasn't sharing, he was basically using file sharers as a Mechanical Turk to scrape the Internet for content which he then monetized at a large scale. What he did was illegal, but not necessary wrong. If you think Kim was in the r…

"What he did was illegal, but not necessary wrong." He wasn't stealing food to give it to the starving poor, he was helping immature people get access to entertainment when waiting or doing without would do them no harm at all. There's no moral high ground there. What he did was illegal, and wrong.

He wasn't stealing food to give it to the starving poor, he was helping immature people get access to entertainment when waiting or doing without would do them no harm at all. There's no moral high ground there. What he did was illegal, and wrong.

You didn't say how it was wrong and what harms it cause.

Re: Kim Dotcom: US Government Is Protecting An Outdated Monopolistic Business Model

#50

Post by njs12345 »

huggyface wrote: post #38
Zirro wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"I can't just steal something from an Amish person's business because "their business model is out-dated." It doesn't matter." It doesn't justify piracy, but it is a way for the media industry to solve the "piracy-issue" themselves. In short: Give the people what they want and they will pay you.

In short: Give the people what they want and they will pay you. If only it were so simple. Today you can buy virtually any media electronically. Services like Netflix, Rdio, Spotify, iTunes and others allow for enormous content enjoyment at a very reasonable price, with a couple of mouse clicks. Steam and Origin, App Stores and Android Markets exist with countless software options for incredibly low prices. Yet pirac…

Let's assume you keep spending the thousands you do spend per year on buying the same games, movies and music, but that you also pirate things where you feel the value does not justify the price. Who's lost out? You've got something for nothing.

There is a significant body of academic work demonstrating that much piracy has this form: it does not displace a sale. Piracy may therefore be providing a net benefit to society.

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