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Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

theguardian.com

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Re: Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

#911

Post by ninetyninenine »

matheusmoreira wrote: post #905
ninetyninenine wrote: post #900

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well you’re an outlier. Your refusal to participate in society makes almost everyone on earth disagree with you. You’re suffering from the blowback of your own choices. If society adopted your philosophies, then society would be the one suffering.

I didn't refuse to participate in society. I refused to participate in activities I personally believe are wrong. I don't really plan to take advantage of monopolies if I can avoid it. Whatever privileges I have that allow me to make this choice, I hope I can maintain them indefinitely. I'm suffering nothing. There is no "blowback". I'm merely explaining to you why I don't believe in intellectual property. Because yo…

>I didn't refuse to participate in society. I refused to participate in activities I personally believe are wrong. I don't really plan to take advantage of monopolies if I can avoid it. Whatever privileges I have that allow me to make this choice, I hope I can maintain them indefinitely.

If you refuse to participate in activities that you personally believe are wrong then based off of what you told me, you in actuality refuse to participate in society from an OVERALL perspective.

>I'm suffering nothing. There is no "blowback". I'm merely explaining to you why I don't believe in intellectual property. Because you asked.

This is the blowback:

>I do have a GitHub Sponsors. For about a year, I had exactly one sponsor. Now I have zero.

Negligible economic gain for your open source work. You may choose to personally not classify that as blowback, but my language is not referencing your personal opinion. You can think of it as saying: separate from your own opinion, basically everyone on the face of the earth things you suffer from "blowback".

Not that it means anything of course. Only your opinion really matters. I'm just communicating my thoughts. Like you.

Re: Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

#912

Post by [deleted] »

tzs wrote: post #883
const_cast wrote: post #858

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the worst no you I've ever seen. I'm not concerned about my files being leaked because that's stealing. I'm concerned because they hold sensitive information that can be used for actual stealing, like for example with money. Malware isn't bad because it's stealing. That's stupid. I know you know it's stupid, so I don't know why you said it.

The point is that earlier you described a zero-day copying files as stealing the files, but now you say that copying data cannot be theft.

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Re: Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

#913

Post by the_af »

ninetyninenine wrote: post #910
the_af wrote: post #904

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't mean us two. I meant the collective consensus. You didn't win. You lost. Read Free Culture by Lessig. > My point is. Nobody cares about your conversation especially when ALL of those conversations you're referencing are utterly wrong. Who the hell is "nobody"? Everything you've said so far is "not even wrong", it's utterly nonsensical. Go read what's been said about the topic for the last two decades, then c…

>I didn't mean us two. I meant the collective consensus. >You didn't win. You lost. Read Free Culture by Lessig. Who you had a conversation with is meaningless. The winner is what most of the world follows. Not who you personally define who "we" is. >Who the hell is "nobody"? Most of the modern world. Most readers on HN. The overwhelming majority of people on this earth are against your opinion. This "we" you're refe…

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Re: Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

#914

Post by keeda »

matheusmoreira wrote: post #884
keeda wrote: post #877

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So now we have established that not all numbers are "just numbers" that can be copied victimlessly. Consider that maybe it is because some numbers represent something more than just numeric values. Maybe they represent economic value . Said economic value having been generated by your hard work. Now maybe you can see how that line of thought leads to the concept of intellectual property. Information covered by IP is…

We've established nothing of the sort. Secrets can be copied just as trivially as any other information. That's why numerous measures are taken to avoid their revelation. If I tell people my bank credentials, I have nobody but myself to blame when money is transferred out of my accounts. If I upload my secret encryption keys to some cloud service, I have nobody but myself to blame when others gain the ability to decr…

>We've established nothing of the sort.

Oh no we have. Your original these was based on the premise that "just copying numbers" is not "victimless". So now why is there even a concern that money is being transferred out of bank accounts or data being decrypted without consent? Aren't they "just numbers"?

>The effort invested into creation of value is often completely irrelevant, even in copyright law. Many countries do not subscribe to the "sweat of the brow" doctrine, USA included. The ones that do seem to reserve its application for specific contexts.

I know. But even if you had inherited the money in your bank account through no effort of your own, you would prefer to not share your credentials.

So maybe you want to think about why you're OK with others' "numbers" being copied around but why you're so concerned about your numbers being copied around. I mean, "just numbers," right? :-)

You also seem to be misunderstanding what "publish" means. I hate that it has come down to dictionary meanings, but here's what https://www.dictionary.com/browse/publish says:

"1. to issue (printed or otherwise reproduced textual or graphic material, computer software, etc.) for sale or distribution to the public."

Note the bit about "for sale". Just because it's made available does not mean it's available for free.

Re: Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

#915

Post by keeda »

the_af wrote: post #902
keeda wrote: post #880

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As I said, we already had this conversation ages ago and your side lost. Repeating that does not make it true. > A lot of the rest use an informal (not legal, and highly subjective) definition of the word "theft" -- but you knew this. Yes, all the examples I gave are exactly of that. I think we are in violent agreement here. > It's exhausting to keep repeating this. I do agree it's exhausting, because neither you n…

You are not "taking" anything. It's not theft. This conversation was settled, whether you like it or not. It's as frustrating as debating whether slavery is moral or D&D is satanic. We've had this conversation, it's settled. Piracy is not theft.

Wait, I thought we decided we were using the word "theft" informally. Like all those examples I posted above and you agreed with. What is being "taken" in "wage theft" or "identity theft" or "joke theft"?

> This conversation was settled, whether you like it or not.

Ignoring salient points does not settle a conversation. I laid out the case point-by-point for why not returning fair value when taking something of value (remember: services are not a "thing" and yet provide great value!) is immoral and illegal and often considered "theft". (Again, if you want to nitpick over the word "theft" look at the long list of examples I posted above.) I notice you have not shown any flaw in that logic.

Maybe this conversation frustratingly never ends because this point has never been refuted.

Re: Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

#916

Post by zzo38computer »

godelski wrote: post #366
ryandrake wrote: post #153

Piracy offers: 1. Unrestricted access to an absolutely huge library of movies, music and TV shows, nearly unlimited. Certainly not limited by opaque "licensing deals" between various companies. 2. Highest resolution/bitrate/quality that was available at the time of the work's original release. 3. No arbitrary device/OS limitations. 4. Can watch/listen/download from any location on earth with sufficient bandwidth. I d…

Piracy also offers: 0. Ability to watch offline! 1. Ability to fix subtitle issues with minimal tweeks like change size or moving location. 1.2 Ability to get subtitles if they aren't offered (or offered in your language) 2. Ability to normalize audio. 3. Ability to buffer videos when on a poor connection. 4. Ability to create collections, organize, and track your movie as you wish 5. Arbitrary number of user account…

In addition to these and what you replied to, there is also the ability to downgrade the video quality in case you do not need the highest quality (e.g. in case you want to reduce the disk space and bandwidth requirements), and you might have a better UI (and otherwise use your own implementation of various software).

About subtitles, something else I sometimes want to fix is adding an outline to the text and adding a translucent background (many use a opaque background (making it hard to see the picture) or a transparent background (making it hard to see the text)).

Re: Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

#917

Post by keeda »

matheusmoreira wrote: post #896
keeda wrote: post #880

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As I said, we already had this conversation ages ago and your side lost. Repeating that does not make it true. > A lot of the rest use an informal (not legal, and highly subjective) definition of the word "theft" -- but you knew this. Yes, all the examples I gave are exactly of that. I think we are in violent agreement here. > It's exhausting to keep repeating this. I do agree it's exhausting, because neither you n…

> So when someone takes something of value > it is essentially taking something of value Intellectual property is not "taken". It is not a tangible good that can change hands. Copies are made instead. Copyright refers to the right to make copies. Having a copyright means having the right to make copies. To infringe someone's copyright is to make copies despite the right to make copies belonging to someone else. The w…

Sigh, I knew the word "take" would invoke pedanticity...

So when you "take interest" or "take advantage" or "take a look" or "take your time", what tangible good is being "taken"?

When you "take pleasure in something", like say a TV show, you are deriving value from it. What tangible goods are involved here?

When somebody provides you a service -- say washing your car -- you are still taking value from it even without a single tangible good being given. Or would you not pay the person because no "tangible good" has been given to you?

English is a rich language and pedanticity does not help this debate. Instead, you may want to address the core argument: when someone provides value (again: goods AND services) to another party and does not receive acceptable value in return, it is considered immoral, which is why society has made it illegal.

And yes, the word "theft" is prefectly suitable in this case. Otherwise you should explain why all of these involve some loss to party and are immoral / illegal without a single tangible good being "taken": https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44917565

Re: Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

#918

Post by ninetyninenine »

the_af wrote: post #913
ninetyninenine wrote: post #910

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I didn't mean us two. I meant the collective consensus. >You didn't win. You lost. Read Free Culture by Lessig. Who you had a conversation with is meaningless. The winner is what most of the world follows. Not who you personally define who "we" is. >Who the hell is "nobody"? Most of the modern world. Most readers on HN. The overwhelming majority of people on this earth are against your opinion. This "we" you're refe…

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Re: Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

#919

Post by birn559 »

GlitchRider47 wrote: post #489
birn559 wrote: post #364

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Prime Video keeps starting the wrong episode when I click on "Continue Watching". That's infuriating in particular because that often makes me watch advertising 2-3 times: When starting, when clicking into the middle of the episode to confirm I indeed have watched it already and then again when switching to the correct episode.

It blows my mind what slow momentum Amazon has for a company with such vast resources. Kindle, for example, lacks so many features to enhance the reading experience. Jailbreaking my kindle and installing KOReader was a game changer.

They just don't care enough. User experience only needs to be "good enough", mostly determined by the question of users will tend to terminate the subscription without the feature or with the bug.

Re: Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

#920

Post by the_af »

keeda wrote: post #915
the_af wrote: post #902

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are not "taking" anything. It's not theft. This conversation was settled, whether you like it or not. It's as frustrating as debating whether slavery is moral or D&D is satanic. We've had this conversation, it's settled. Piracy is not theft.

Wait, I thought we decided we were using the word "theft" informally. Like all those examples I posted above and you agreed with. What is being "taken" in "wage theft" or "identity theft" or "joke theft"? > This conversation was settled, whether you like it or not. Ignoring salient points does not settle a conversation. I laid out the case point-by-point for why not returning fair value when taking something of value…

> Wait, I thought we decided we were using the word "theft" informally.

Nope. We were discussing with someone else (before you chimed in) who argued it was exactly theft.

When shown this was false, the person argued it was morally equivalent (this was also false).

> Again, if you want to nitpick over the word "theft" look at the long list of examples I posted above

I'm not nitpicking, you're factually wrong.

Have you read important works about the distinction, such as Lessig's "Free Culture"?

It's frustrating because this is akin to discussing, yet again, the moral panics of the olden days, long settled but (apparently) brand new generations without an understanding of the past want to resurface them.

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