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

Antigua could hit U.S. with copyright-free downloads

reuters.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 41 posts

Re: Antigua could hit U.S. with copyright-free downloads

#31

Post by tedunangst »

ahallock wrote: post #29
ajross wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What boundaries exactly got overstepped? It's a legal collision. US law says no online gambling. Antigua law says "Gambling is great, we welcome US consumers!". US tries to enforce its law via sanctions (I think). WTO law says you can't do that and awards Antigua $21M US in "equivalent sanctions" or somesuch (i.e. it's not a cash award). Yawn. I mean, I think the US law here is dumb, but it's the law. I think the enf…

> I think the US law here is dumb, but it's the law. It is what it is, huh? 'It's the law' is a dose of propaganda so you don't feel bad about being forced to do something stupid. A legal collision sounds so polite. To me, this resembles gang behavior. People want to gamble, so fuck the State. Statists are the hypocrites who let you buy lottery tickets at every corner store. I agree with you that this isn't limited t…

If people want to gamble, they should vote for representatives that will repeal the gambling ban.

Re: Antigua could hit U.S. with copyright-free downloads

#32

Post by majormajor »

_delirium wrote: post #25
gameshot911 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>What's the price of something that has no incremental cost? Whatever the market is willing to pay.

Absent a government-granted temporary monopoly, the market would be willing to pay very little. So it ends up a bit circular when debating government IP policies.

The "people who download the most also purchase the most" stories that pop up every six months or so disagree. Even many of the people with the most awareness of the fact that they could get stuff for free are willing to pay the current market rates for a lot of it. It's been almost 14 years since Napster. A decade since suprnova and widespread availability of torrents for movies and TV shows. And yet the floor still hasn't fallen out of market prices. Things are changing in the creation and distribution world, but I see little indication that some substantial part of the population has decided that we're paying content creators too much, and that a song, show, movie, book, or game is only worth very little.

Re: Antigua could hit U.S. with copyright-free downloads

#33

Post by AnthonyMouse »

icebraining wrote: post #26
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess it depends what you mean by "pirating." If you mean some thing based on morality or justice, the copyright holder is not getting their promised share of the revenue, so (regardless of how much you actually care about that) the site is in the same boat as The Pirate Bay there. If you mean "legal" then the immediate question becomes, legal where? Rojodirecta was "legal" too, remember? Didn't stop the U.S. from…

promised share of the revenue Promised by whom?

Congress?

Re: Antigua could hit U.S. with copyright-free downloads

#34

Post by politician »

ajross wrote: post #22
grecy wrote: post #10

It's interesting to see Antigua's reaction to America ignoring the WTO. I think America is on shaky ground here, as many countries are getting sick of America overstepping their boundaries. In theory, every country aligned with the WTO should back Antigua on this. In reality, America will threaten trade sanctions against them too, so it will be a question of who has big enough balls to stand up to the world's bully.…

What boundaries exactly got overstepped? It's a legal collision. US law says no online gambling. Antigua law says "Gambling is great, we welcome US consumers!". US tries to enforce its law via sanctions (I think). WTO law says you can't do that and awards Antigua $21M US in "equivalent sanctions" or somesuch (i.e. it's not a cash award). Yawn. I mean, I think the US law here is dumb, but it's the law. I think the enf…

No, see, this is wrong. The WTO ruling hinged on the argument that the US specifically allows gambling (horse, dog, state lotteries) but its prohibition Internet gambling amounts to restraint of trade and that Antigua was harmed by this. The only meaningful remedy was to give Antigua the "rights to violate" a certain amount of US copyrights (could you imagine the US actually paying a fine?).

Re: Antigua could hit U.S. with copyright-free downloads

#36

Post by betterunix »

67726e wrote: post #4
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #3

I don't see how this would actually work. If you set up a pirate website in Antigua, congratulations, good luck competing with the million other ones that already exist. How does it hurt the U.S. in any significant way to go from a million to a million and one? On top of that, it's not like the U.S. is going to sit around and allow it. Expect payment processors to be pressured not to process payments for the service,…

So if they setup a service to, let's say stream new movies, the US would have a hard time blocking a website. As for payment processors, why not bitcoin?

"As for payment processors, why not bitcoin?"

...because only a tiny minority of anarchists trust Bitcoin? Oh sure, you can point to a few "forward thinking" (also known as "gullible") businesses that accept it, but it is not even a blip on the radar of money. The overwhelming majority of black market drug sales in the USA are done in -- you guessed correctly -- US Dollars.

If you can convince me that (a) Bitcoin is something a court will recognize as money, and not require me to convert it to dollars first, (b) that I can repay any debt with it, including taxes, and (c) that it's value today will even remotely reflect its value tomorrow, then maybe I'll accept Bitcoin payments from you. Otherwise, you'll have to give me my country's currency, because frankly, nothing else is useful to me (unless I am in another country, in which case you'll have to give me that country's currency).

Let's put it this way: it doesn't take a bunch of people commenting about the exciting US Dollar or British Pound Sterling to keep those currencies valuable. How long do you think Bitcoin would last if people stopped playing it up as the next big thing?

Re: Antigua could hit U.S. with copyright-free downloads

#37

Post by betterunix »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #17
chx wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are not pirating movies, see. This would be a legal site where you are paying a lot less...

I guess it depends what you mean by "pirating." If you mean some thing based on morality or justice, the copyright holder is not getting their promised share of the revenue, so (regardless of how much you actually care about that) the site is in the same boat as The Pirate Bay there. If you mean "legal" then the immediate question becomes, legal where? Rojodirecta was "legal" too, remember? Didn't stop the U.S. from…

"If you mean some thing based on morality or justice"

We must have stopped talking about copyrights. Copyright is a system for promoting the progress of science and useful arts, according to my country's constitution (assuming we still care about that).

"promised share of the revenue"

So much for a market-based system where businesses are not "promised" revenue.

"the site is in the same boat as The Pirate Bay there"

On the forefront of using a revolutionary communication system to deliver creative works to people, despite constant attacks by greedy anachronistic businesses who failed to adapt to a changing market?

Re: Antigua could hit U.S. with copyright-free downloads

#38

Post by fnordfnordfnord »

betterunix wrote: post #36
67726e wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So if they setup a service to, let's say stream new movies, the US would have a hard time blocking a website. As for payment processors, why not bitcoin?

"As for payment processors, why not bitcoin?" ...because only a tiny minority of anarchists trust Bitcoin? Oh sure, you can point to a few "forward thinking" (also known as "gullible") businesses that accept it, but it is not even a blip on the radar of money. The overwhelming majority of black market drug sales in the USA are done in -- you guessed correctly -- US Dollars. If you can convince me that (a) Bitcoin is…

I wouldn't say internet users "don't trust Bitcoin" I, for example don't use Bitcoin (much) for the same reason that I don't walk around in sketchy places with lots of cash. It's not that I don't trust cash. It's that I don't trust internet randoms to leave my Btc alone.

Re: Antigua could hit U.S. with copyright-free downloads

#39

Post by tsotha »

ynniv wrote: post #19
mdasen wrote: post #15

The article is very sensationalist. WTO penalties are meant to be a proportional penalty, not some sort of carte-blanche. The sensationalist aspect here is the idea that Antigua might set a far below-market price on intellectual property items. Ah, we'll charge $0.000000000000000000000000000001 per song/movie! Functionally unlimited songs and movies for $1! They'll have to negotiate since we now have a legal way for…

The sensationalist aspect here is the idea that Antigua might set a far below-market price on intellectual property items What's the price of something that has no incremental cost? We've been trained to think it's ~ $15, but there's no real basis for that.

What is something that always loses money worth?

Re: Antigua could hit U.S. with copyright-free downloads

#40

Post by tsotha »

Xylakant wrote: post #18
zokier wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

WTO sanctioning wouldn't prevent MPAA, or even the US government labeling it as a pirate website. US probably could ban importing IP from Antigua, thus making downloading stuff from there as illegal as conventional pirating.

Sure. However, we in Europe care little about what the mpaa says and German judges tend to be independent from the US government as well. I'd love to get legal and timely access to high hd content and would be more than happy to shell out some bucks. Europe has a financial crisis, but there's still a market here.

>However, we in Europe care little about what the mpaa says and German judges tend to be independent from the US government as well.

They don't need to win over the German government. If the US Congress passes a law to the effect of "No US bank can do business with a bank that does business in Antigua" even European banks will stay clear.

I'm American and I would love to see a major country stand up to the US when it comes to this crazy patent and copyright stuff. But there are a lot of financial levers, and export-driven countries like Germany, Japan, and China are particularly vulnerable.

Post reply on HN