Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Book Piracy as Peer Preservation

computationalculture.net

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

101–110 of 163 posts

Re: Book Piracy as Peer Preservation

#101

Post by Nullabillity »

6d6b73 wrote: post #84
zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, and when I don't hire you, that means that you won't have money to buy food, so you will starve. So, I am not murdering you in the sense that I am shooting you, but I am murdering you in the sense that I am not hiring you. Words have commonly accepted definitions, and copyright or contract violation simply does not fall under theft. "I think it's bad, theft is bad, therefore, it's theft" just is an incoherent a…

Oh, so if you go to a dealer and took the car that you never wanted to buy because it's too expensive, only for a one drive, without asking anyone you were not stealing because this would not deprive anyone of any money?

You're getting closer, but for the analogy to work then you had consent from the dealership, and the car manufacturer is suing both of you.

Except you're not actually being sued by the manufacturer either, you're actually being sued by the manufacturer's delivery company.

Re: Book Piracy as Peer Preservation

#102

Post by TheOtherHobbes »

duozerk wrote: post #43
segmondy wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Listen, you have no right to someone's else own work. If you don't want to pay HBO NOW to watch a single TV show. No problem. If you do however pirate their show, then that's stealing and the owner has a right to call you a thief. If HBO decides to charge $1,000 per episode, that would be very outrageous, but that still doesn't give anyone the right to steal their show. BTW, I know the pain, I really want to watch Sh…

No, it isn't "stealing". You're not depriving them of the content, you're copying it. And you're not even depriving them of the price they charge to access that content, unless you would've bought it had it not been available through piracy. And that's I think really the exception, not the rule. I know I download a hell of a lot of movies, tv shows, etc. that I would definitely never watch if they were not available…

Curious that this argument only ever applies to the intangible bit patterns that define creative works, but never to the equally intangible bit patterns that define money.

If I copy the numbers in a very rich person's bank account to my bank account, I haven't stolen anything from them. All I've done is made a copy of some information.

And yet one kind of copying generates rants about the cultural value of free distribution, while the other generates nothing but fear and horror.

It's all very strange. And not particularly thoughtful or consistent.

IMO either you have a free economy, in which case you make every damn thing free, or you accept that rules of ownership are necessary and that the output of labour has value independent of the ease with which it can be copied.

Claiming that rules of ownership are irrelevant for IP you personally want from others, but very important for IP you personally want to monopolise, is the very worst kind of special pleading.

Re: Book Piracy as Peer Preservation

#103

Post by Nullabillity »

zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC wrote: post #100
6d6b73 wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh, so if you go to a dealer and took the car that you never wanted to buy because it's too expensive, only for a one drive, without asking anyone you were not stealing because this would not deprive anyone of any money?

If you use someone's property without authorization, but don't intend to deprive them of it permanently, that indeed in most jurisdictions is not theft, that is criminal conversion. It's really not that difficult, you can simply look up what these terms mean instead of inventing your own definitions. "Depriving someone of money" is not the definition of theft. And it not only isn't, it would be a braindead definition…

> Accidentally dropping your dishes would be theft.

And not dropping them would be, as well!

Re: Book Piracy as Peer Preservation

#104

Post by rhino369 »

frosting wrote: post #96
segmondy wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Listen, you have no right to someone's else own work. If you don't want to pay HBO NOW to watch a single TV show. No problem. If you do however pirate their show, then that's stealing and the owner has a right to call you a thief. If HBO decides to charge $1,000 per episode, that would be very outrageous, but that still doesn't give anyone the right to steal their show. BTW, I know the pain, I really want to watch Sh…

Historically speaking, the only reason anyone "owns" media is due to literally hundreds of years of lobbying. Books, stories, and songs were all once free to copy. This is the nature of religious books, fairy tales, and folk songs. Ethically speaking, "ownership" has a tenuous position. I find it easier to argue that ownership is a construct of society than it is an innate part of anything. That means it's flexible t…

The only reason you own anything is thousands of years of lobbying. Copyright and property rights are both artificial constructs.

Re: Book Piracy as Peer Preservation

#105

Post by [deleted] »

6d6b73 wrote: post #84
zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, and when I don't hire you, that means that you won't have money to buy food, so you will starve. So, I am not murdering you in the sense that I am shooting you, but I am murdering you in the sense that I am not hiring you. Words have commonly accepted definitions, and copyright or contract violation simply does not fall under theft. "I think it's bad, theft is bad, therefore, it's theft" just is an incoherent a…

Oh, so if you go to a dealer and took the car that you never wanted to buy because it's too expensive, only for a one drive, without asking anyone you were not stealing because this would not deprive anyone of any money?

[deleted]

Re: Book Piracy as Peer Preservation

#106

Post by gue5t »

TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #102
duozerk wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it isn't "stealing". You're not depriving them of the content, you're copying it. And you're not even depriving them of the price they charge to access that content, unless you would've bought it had it not been available through piracy. And that's I think really the exception, not the rule. I know I download a hell of a lot of movies, tv shows, etc. that I would definitely never watch if they were not available…

Curious that this argument only ever applies to the intangible bit patterns that define creative works, but never to the equally intangible bit patterns that define money. If I copy the numbers in a very rich person's bank account to my bank account, I haven't stolen anything from them. All I've done is made a copy of some information. And yet one kind of copying generates rants about the cultural value of free distr…

I have no idea what you're talking about. The bit patterns in someone's bank account aren't money, they're just a record of money. If someone has 1000000 dollars, they will have a given bit pattern in their database row. But if two people have the same number of dollars, they aren't sharing money; they just happen to have the same amount at that moment.

Money is the agreement that a given person has a given amount of money. That's why blockchains, which allow distributed consensus, can be used to establish currencies.

If, by "intangible bit patterns", you mean the credentials for someone's bank account, this is also not the same as a copy of a creative work. By having a copy of credentials you have the ability to change how much money the person has. This is very illegal to do without consent. Analogously, nobody is suggesting we should be able to legally break into the author's computer and modify their copies of their book.

Ownership is about control over things. The author has control over their copy, and I have control over mine.

Re: Book Piracy as Peer Preservation

#107

Post by 6d6b73 »

zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC wrote: post #100
6d6b73 wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh, so if you go to a dealer and took the car that you never wanted to buy because it's too expensive, only for a one drive, without asking anyone you were not stealing because this would not deprive anyone of any money?

If you use someone's property without authorization, but don't intend to deprive them of it permanently, that indeed in most jurisdictions is not theft, that is criminal conversion. It's really not that difficult, you can simply look up what these terms mean instead of inventing your own definitions. "Depriving someone of money" is not the definition of theft. And it not only isn't, it would be a braindead definition…

Is it still "criminal conversion" when you decide after that one ride that you want to keep that car in your garage, but not drive it anymore? You will return it some other day.. Maybe in 2020. After all it's just a copy of that prototype that the manufacturer created. It's a copy, and you did not intend to buy it anyway so it's all right, and it's not a theft right?

Re: Book Piracy as Peer Preservation

#108

Post by unethical_ban »

orcdork wrote: post #75
Wildgoose wrote: post #55

I used an App on my old iPod to BUY and read the first in a series of books. I then tried to purchase the second volume, only to have the transaction declined because I don't live in North America. I wrote to Penguin USA to complain about this, pointing out that the book I wished to purchase was freely available on download sites so Why were they refusing to sell it to me? Their response was that I should find a US b…

Someone refusing to sell you something is not a permission to steal it. (I do agree that the situation is ridiculous though)

If they wouldn't have gotten my money anyway, and I am copying the work, it is not theft.

Re: Book Piracy as Peer Preservation

#109

Post by icebraining »

TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #102
duozerk wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it isn't "stealing". You're not depriving them of the content, you're copying it. And you're not even depriving them of the price they charge to access that content, unless you would've bought it had it not been available through piracy. And that's I think really the exception, not the rule. I know I download a hell of a lot of movies, tv shows, etc. that I would definitely never watch if they were not available…

Curious that this argument only ever applies to the intangible bit patterns that define creative works, but never to the equally intangible bit patterns that define money. If I copy the numbers in a very rich person's bank account to my bank account, I haven't stolen anything from them. All I've done is made a copy of some information. And yet one kind of copying generates rants about the cultural value of free distr…

either you have a free economy, in which case you make every damn thing free, or you accept that rules of ownership are necessary and that the output of labour has value independent of the ease with which it can be copied.

Rules of ownership are necessary for rivalrous goods, and not for others. Citing Thomas Jefferson,

"He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper [(candle)] at mine, receives light without darkening me.

That ideas should freely spread from one to another over the globe, for the moral and mutual instruction of man, and improvement of his condition, seems to have been peculiarly and benevolently designed by nature, when she made them, like fire, expansible over all space, without lessening their density in any point, and like the air in which we breathe, move, and have our physical being, incapable of confinement or exclusive appropriation."

Re: Book Piracy as Peer Preservation

#110

Post by rhino369 »

tdsamardzhiev wrote: post #5

There's a huge amount of books/music/movies/games that I have no means of obtaining legally. There's also tons of stuff I don't have convenient way to buy (e.g. no way I'm paying full HBO NOW subscription for watching a single TV show). We are 16 years into 21st century now, it's about time for big-name producers to stop calling people "thieves" and offer them an acceptable service instead.

HBO puts their shows on iTunes as one off downloads a couple months after premiere. If you aren't willing to wait that long you should be willing to pay full price to subscribe.

HBO now is an acceptable service. One pirates demanded for years. The lack of which they used to justify piracy. And now I see pirates have now decided it's too much. Let's face it, your piracy is due to be cheap ass.

Post reply on HN