Ethics and Legality of Copyright and Online Distribution

And the early adopters who put the stuff on blogs/youtube/etc? Where do they go for information?

I also don't think that a central repository is watertight. I mean, take this site for example. Rant didn't have an entry until a couple months ago. The Things They Carried still doesn't.

I mean, pooper scoopers didn't exist on wikipedia until 2007.

Overall, you also gotta remember that heavy internet users are a demographic of their own that doesn't necessarily have interests aligned with 100% of people. I mean, just look at your parents. And if you happen to have tech savvy parents, look at your grandparents. How much time do they spend looking at their computer monitors as opposed to not?

Hell, how much time does your outdoors-y friend of the same age spend looking at her monitor instead of hiking? And no, she's not irrelevant because she spends lunch on the trail reading a book. (granted, books are heavily reliant on word of mouth, but that's not the point of this hypothetical—then again, look at how well books do versus other industries with more in-your-face advertising)

edited 22nd May '12 11:15:10 AM by ch00beh

The point of the database isn't to be airtight. It's so that, the market that is lost as a result of a loss of protectionism is compensated by the site. If the public still insists on getting entertainment from passive media, then passive media-despite the loss of protectionism-will still be profitable.

I really feel like you're not making a legitimate effort to understand what I'm proposing here. It doesn't help that it's still abstract, but you're nitpicking about things that haven't been nailed down.

Obviously, the people on Kotaku search the site, which is organized. Yes, presumably, you'd have to pay people to organize things. But the costs involved in doing so are astronomically smaller than the costs incurred by advertisers and distributors that are phased out.

What are you even trying to prove? You're not making a point. Yes, there is a hiker. She will likely have to get a kindle, because authors are unlikely to spend money printing paper books. That's how it works. No one plays those giant records from the 50s anymore either.

edited 22nd May '12 11:35:45 AM by TheyCallMeTomu

Well, for the hiker thing, I prefer paper books, since I'm not looking at a computer screen. Looking directly at screens isn't pleasant for me to do all the time I consume any media, as screens are themselves light sources. I'm not sure what the point is, though.

edited 22nd May '12 11:56:14 AM by ThatHuman

the point I'm trying to make is that given how reality currently works, and given a proper study of various cases, I don't think a socialized system is ideal, nor do I think it's within the realm of responsibility of the government.

It's very easy to say "well this system would be perfect for me and everyone who agrees with me" without actually taking into account everything else.

^e-ink technology alleviates the problem of staring at a bright computer screen by emulating paper using colored beads rather than backlit crystals.

edited 22nd May '12 12:03:53 PM by ch00beh

It's strictly superior in utilitarian terms. You get more real "worth" for the same amount of inputs. It's not about who gets that worth and who doesn't. People can argue against socialized medicine with the same arguments-and yeah, if all you care about is an abstract sense of fairness (rather than building the optimal society), then sure, don't go for the wildly more efficient system.

But the argument "it's not the government's job" is a non-starter, because the government is intervening by creating property rights in the first place.

edited 22nd May '12 12:37:16 PM by TheyCallMeTomu

I'd say the abstract idea of fairness for the individual is more important than a perfectly optimal society. After all, it would be much more efficient to let old people die and cremate them than to take care of them.

But there's negative utility involved in letting people die. The problem with anti-utilitarian arguments is that they always miscast what utilitarianism means. The old people's views don't suddenly not count, you know.

The problem with socialized entertainment is that, while money and investment are really awful ways of determining what gets made and how much effort it gets, the alternatives are often worse; government funded things tend often to become about favoritism and influence, not any measure of quality.

Now, it's possible to set up an organization that does a reasonable job of resisting those impulses — the BBC comes to mind — but I suspect it would be harder to do that in the US, and even the BBC is regularly screwed with by politicians.

That's a reasonable objection, I suppose.

On that Philosopheraptor thing, I have two theories.

The first is that the rappers are very territorial. When it's not their property, they don't mind, but when it soon becomes their problem, they feel entitled to defend it, since it's their property.

The second could be Poe's Law. These rappers are just playing the roles of criminals, but in reality, they're just normal people. When they address their feelings towards bit-torrent, they're not in their rapper character, but rather, their true self. Sort of like an actor or whatnot.

Okay, so, a webcomic has just informed me what the hullabaloo about the game company in Rhode Island was about. Two things:

1.) The government loaning money to a company so the company can succeed in the private sector is totally different from the government compensating companies based on releasing products, and then giving bonuses based on how much those products are enjoyed by the consumer base. The situation here was "the firm didn't get anything released."

2.) It's an argument that rather reminds me of the whole Solyndra fiasco.