Wikipedia supports piracy

RegEdit said:
How do YOU know what the government plans to do?
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I don't think I ever claimed to, but you did.
How? You hear this all the time. For example, following 911, new search policies at the airport brought out the hysterical "my rights are being violated" crowd.
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This is hysteria. The sky is not going to fall. The government is going to block the blatant offenders like PirateBay. They're not going to shut everything down.
For all of the injustice that's been going on with PirateBay for so many years I'd be nice to see some reverse-injustice. Shut them down without "due process". Eventually the courts will find a middle ground, but for now I'd like to see some of these sites shut down over night.
You guys obviously have no intellectual property to protect. Maybe if you experienced seeing someone sabotage your hard work and money by posting an illegal torrent you'd feel a lot differently.
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In any case, why would you give a government that kind of power, when you've no idea of their intentions, now or future?

With any decision/policy/regulation/law, whether it concerns only a decision you make for your own business, or a Federal law that will affect the entire country, shouldn't we be opening our minds to think of as many ramifications as possible, rather than just accepting what normally comes to mind? Ever hear of "unintended consequences"?

Rick
 
@Regedit

Weren't you asking about Verizon and land line phones vs VOIP. Now think about having a law like this before VOIP became popular. Before companies that are big players now could establish themselves. Now think of a giant like AT&T or Verizon making a clever argument to the U.S. Government to shut down that site. What if AT&T and Verizon structured it in a way so those companies would fail. Either by making false accusations and forcing small startups to hire expensive lawyers just to keep the doors open. Now you have no choice but to pay Verizon $60 for a landline. But wait its $120 because the VOIP guys never existed driving down the price. Ever heard of a car called "the tucker. "

Imagine Best Buy found out you used a Hirens Disk, or maybe you didn't, and they made a claim and sneakily found a way to temporary shut you down. LOL Due process is a joke right!

They don't care about you, your a small fish in a giant pond. Nobody is going to stop piracy for you. If anything the giants are going to crush you and me and another open frontier is lost to regulation and corporate tyranny.

"Tucker:A man and his dream." I haven't seen it in forever but I think the concept still applies.
 
red12049 said:
Opinion: Piracy has *some* effect on profit. How much effect is very open to debate. Do you really believe the BSA figures on software piracy costs? Even some software industry leaders have cast doubt on those figures.

As to bands, many of us have to make do with earning less. Maybe the record companies could decrease their cut if they feel so terrible about that.

Going a ways back, buggy makers tried to have ludicrous laws passed to regulate early automobiles, to restrict their progress in the market. Didn't work, and neither will this. The entertainment industry will simply have to find a new distribution model.

Please don't expect me to cry, wail and feel sorry for the industry that tries to protect an outmoded business model by pushing bad law.

/rant

Rick
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Fair enough. I'm against SOPA myself. Not because I think the music industry make too much and not because I think they have a responsibility to alter their business models. All that seems to me to be irrelevant. What I don't like is the potential downsides of the bill which are wide-ranging and dangerous.

As it happens I also don't think that personal downloading of music file is "piracy" as such. I think piracy is selling other peoples work for profit. Illegal downloading is something else entirely. It's not even stealing really as it doesn't deprive the owner of the object. We all know that nicking some lady's bad is quite different to downloading a tune from Rapidshire. But clearly it's not fair either and if we could come up with laws or systems that protected the IP, didn't land end-users with stupidly large fines, didn't damage the internet and so on then I'd be for it.
 
RegEdit said:
How do YOU know what the government plans to do?
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Nobody does yet, not even the government I would guess because these things evolve. After a while people start to work out what they can and cannot do with a new law and it takes on a life of its own.

Here in the UK the anti-terror laws have been abused by the police time after time. They famously ejected an old man shouting at the Labour Party conference under terror laws: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/4291388.stm

Councils have used them to spy on people using their rubbish bins inappropriately: http://londonphotographers.org/2010/05/abuse-terror-laws-continues

Photographers are regularly stopped from taking photos: http://londonphotographers.org/2010/05/abuse-terror-laws-continues/

There are many, many more examples of this. I'm sure the government had no intention of any of this happening when they drafted the laws. But the people who use the laws (police, authorities, private firm etc) find ways to use them. I don't generally support the "thin end of the wedge" argument but when it comes to this sort of thing you have to overcautious.
 
MobileTechie said:
Fair enough. I'm against SOPA myself. Not because I think the music industry make too much and not because I think they have a responsibility to alter their business models. All that seems to me to be irrelevant. What I don't like is the potential downsides of the bill which are wide-ranging and dangerous.

As it happens I also don't think that personal downloading of music file is "piracy" as such. I think piracy is selling other peoples work for profit. Illegal downloading is something else entirely. It's not even stealing really as it doesn't deprive the owner of the object. We all know that nicking some lady's bad is quite different to downloading a tune from Rapidshire. But clearly it's not fair either and if we could come up with laws or systems that protected the IP, didn't land end-users with stupidly large fines, didn't damage the internet and so on then I'd be for it.
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I really wanted to keep all the externalities out of it (music industry, etc) to show the OP that:

a: Protesting a bad law does not mean that you approve of what the law was against (Title of the thread).

b: Cause does not necessarily equal effect. Ie, piracy may or may not be responsible for the music industry's lower profits.

c: Giving anyone or any institution too much power is a bad thing for those not associated with that institution.

d: Open his eyes and brain and take a look at as many consequences as possible, not just the one(s) that affects you directly.

e: Not to make statements that he cannot support ("no one here needs IP protection." How could he possibly know if that is true?)

And so on.

Rick
 
Wow. I must say that I am disrurbed by your failure to see the big picture, red. We have rights, and while they may not always be convenient, are ther to protect us. To protect us from what? Our government.

Freedom of speech can certainly be an issue at times, but you cant censor some things and not others. Its an all or none situation, take the good with the bad.

People kill people with guns, but should we prosecute the gun manufacturers or the store that sold it? Prosecute the criminals, not the media used to distribute.

I find it hard to believe that you think the governments intentions are pure. History is filled with government corruption and abuse of power. Take the whole piracy thing out of it, does our government have the right to decide what we see online? Before you answer that, remember that its an all or none thing. Yes they do, or no they dont?
 
NeutronTech said:
Wow. I must say that I am disrurbed by your failure to see the big picture, Red. We have rights, and while they may not always be convenient, are ther to protect us. To protect us from what? Our government.
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NeutronTech said:
I find it hard to believe that you think the governments intentions are pure. History is filled with government corruption and abuse of power. Take the whole piracy thing out of it, does our government have the right to decide what we see online? Before you answer that, remember that its an all or none thing. Yes they do, or no they dont?
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Your post contradicts itself. You start off saying our rights protect us from government abuse, but then end with the power of government to abuse us by taking rights. And for the record, Red has never said the governments intentions are pure, actually the opposite. The OP is the one all in love with the government and happy to welcome fascism if it protects his intellectual property.
 
Wow, RegEdit just has absolute faith in the good will of the U.S. Gov't.

While it's adorably naive, our (the U.S.) Gov't doesn't like to ease off on power it's granted. [who does?]

When we give them the power to circumvent due process, we're just supposed to TRUST them to never abuse that ability?
When have we been able to TRUST our Gov't?

(I'm not an anti-Gov't conspiracy theorist, but I'm not an idiot. They need a well-defined leash just like everyone.)
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OPEN A HISTORY BOOK and you'll see why SOPA is a bad idea!
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Cornerstone Technologies said:
Your post contradicts itself. You start off saying our rights protect us from government abuse, but then end with the power of government to abuse us by taking rights. And for the record, Red has never said the governments intentions are pure, actually the opposite. The OP is the one all in love with the government and happy to welcome fascism if it protects his intellectual property.
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Typo, i meant Reg. My apologies if i offended. I am in agreement with Red

And the contradiction was intentional. Its up to us to keep the government in check. This means not just standing idly by when a bill is proposed that removes or circumvents those rights..... no matter how much you might personally agree with it. In OP's case here, he agrees that something needs to be done about piracy, and is all for this new law. However, the fact that due process is circumvented makes it his (and the rest of the US citizens) duty to challenge that law, regardless of the fact that he wants it to pass. A bill can have 100 positive points and positive changes, but just one single violation of our constitutional rights is enough to veto it.

Hope I cleared my point, and sorry Red once again. Wikipedia does not support piracy, they just feel violating our constitution is the wrong way to fight it........ they are right.
 
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Not really, just goes to show that the current laws can work. Doesn't mean we need to screw up the way the Internet works to accomplish the same effect.
 
Piracy isn't a legal issue, it's a supply issue.

It's also not theft, it's infringement of someones imaginary privileges that can be revoked by the government.

I'm pretty convinced that you can either have Copyright, or the internet. You can't have both.

There isn't going to ever be legislation that "fixes" piracy.
 
Another thing is that the power to take down copyrighted or illegal content is already in place. There is nothing that SOPA or PIPA fix in the "pirate" world that is already available to authorities.

Here is a very good read from someone smarter than me!
http://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=200832

It's already illegal to market counterfeit and stolen materials in the United States. It has been since, well, the founding of the country. The medium used to do the marketing is immaterial. The Internet isn't new in this regard -- it's simply another means of transport.

In other words, the claimed purpose of SOPA has already been met -- for the last 200 years.

The problem with SOPA isn't the goal. It's the method of enforcement -- or rather, the lack of enforcement.

Sites inside the US that are engaged in these acts can be seized and shut down after and in accordance with due process of law. That's called justice, and it is sometimes applied. It should be applied more often, in fact.

The problem with foreign sites is that the US has no jurisdiction and court orders from the United States are unenforceable. But this does not mean that the United States has no options available to it, or that it should then attack third parties!

SOPA is bad law because it does not stop the production of stolen material, it does not punish those nations that intentionally look the other way at these activities or even explicitly enable and support them and it will do exactly nothing to actually resolve the problem.

The fact of the matter is that the United States could apply punitive tariffs and other trade sanctions against nations that do not respect intellectual property rights.
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Ccomp5950 said:
Piracy isn't a legal issue, it's a supply issue.

It's also not theft, it's infringement of someones imaginary privileges that can be revoked by the government.

I'm pretty convinced that you can either have Copyright, or the internet. You can't have both.

There isn't going to ever be legislation that "fixes" piracy.
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I presume this was sarcasm, because if not, you can pretty much justify ANYTHING with that philosophy.

Rick
 
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