Nothing, but the person he was responding to had said “Our patent process biting us in the ass again.” Mysterr was taking about that argument and proving it wrong
I noticed this too. There really is no shame, is there?
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Well, given the hostility to the idea of intellectual property that is not uncommon around here, shouldn’t people be cheering this on?
Or is it only okay if we’re the one’s doing the stealing? 
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Well that is how the system works. The idea is 10%, execution is 90%. That is how Apple made its fortune. Idea without ability to execute it is pretty much worthless.
Anything not patented or copyrighted is free to be copyed. This is the purpose of the whole concept of patents in the first place. Patent without ability to enforce it is worthless. This probably is the key problem with the system in this case.
Emotions have no place in business and sense of fairness depends on your point of view.
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I think there is a big difference between disagreeing with a company stealing an individual’s original idea, and disagreeing with a corporation like Disney who made the bulk of their money from stories in the public domain spending untold millions to put an end to the public domain.
In terms of this example, there’s a stifling of innovation and creativity. People will be less apt to devise new things and offer them on Kickstarter if this becomes the norm. In the same light, the entertainment industry, all the various patent trolls, etc., intend to stifle innovation and creativity so that they may be the gatekeepers of it.
I don’t think anyone on Boing Boing espouses the elimination of owning one’s own intellectual property, rather they simply don’t believe such ownership was ever intended to be held until the end of time, or used as a tool to make them the eternal arbiters and brokers of such innovation.
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Well said. Supporting intellectual property protections and supporting creative freedom doesn’t need to be mutually exclusive.
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Good points, but I have to say I see a lot of “I disagree with trying to lengthen copyright so I’m justified pirating recent movies…” littered around the net.
The Entertainment industry is interested in one thing: maximizing sales of their IP, and I suspect the more profitable IP is, the more of it will be produced (pretty much like everything else in existence).
I will say that the measures they push do nominally stifle a little bit of IP production, but I’d be greatly surprised in a world where our legislators had kept the old copyright lengths, we’d see a noticeably different cultural landscape. (Still, it’s a pity they lengthened them.)
So no-one here pirates less than <10 year old IP?
You know, I think there’s a chance you are diluting the nuance of discussion here around this topic.
It would probably help if you came up with some specific examples of the kind of arguments you are trying to characterise here, so your claim can be addressed in context.
Otherwise it’s very straw man-y.
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yep. I agree with your assessment @robulus. seems like someone doesn’t understand the common position that they see around so often. the position in this thread is consistent with many of the views i’ve seen expressed around here.
there is a HUGE difference between selling bootleg dvds (aka profiting off of anothers work without sharing the profit) and watching a movie you’ve downloaded for personal enjoyment, or checked out from the library, or borrowed from a friend. the aliexpress knockoff sellers are like the former, not the latter.
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Well I also think a lot of the discussion here revolves around the proposed penalties for downloading copyrighted material, termination of internet services, prison time, these things are disproportionate and often advocated by powerful lobby groups.
It’s just hard to argue with these sorts of “you all think this around here” comments because people making those comments can shift the goal posts as much as they want.
Nail it down to a specific argument that’s actually been made somewhere and then there’s a conversation to be had.
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Consistency is that a crime is a crime regardless of who is the victim and who is the victimizer. The only difference between someone who profits off another’s work monetarily, and someone who profits off another’s work for non-monetary benefits is scale. in either case, the victim loses some ability to exploit his property for gain.
What I see a lot of is “if I can identify with the victimizer, then it’s not a crime. If I can identify with the victim, then it is.” (And yes, I’m using the word crime loosely as in ethical violation - let’s leave criminal penalties out of it, since I will likely agree with your about their absurdity.)
Taking a penny from a change plate is a small crime. But it is a crime. (And if a million people feel it’s ethical to do so, the store goes bankrupt.) Likewise, IP theft for personal gain is pretty small potatoes crime. But it is a crime.
I am not seeking to stop piracy. What I am seeking is to have people to admit that their piracy is an ethical violation OR declare that having their work pirated by anyone or anything else is not an ethical violation. Consistency demands that. The rest of the debate is just a matter of how scale.
you really don’t understand do you? damn those libraries victimizing all the huge media corporations.
duplicating != stealing. if you were never going to purchase something, viewing a copy of it isn’t taking away any money from anyone…if i borrow a shitty dvd from a friend i haven’t ripped of the actors or screen play writers even though i’ve viewed the movie without purchasing it. same thing if i check it out from the library, i can view it without buying it.
A lot of IP is stealing from the commons, it isn’t as clear cut as you naively believe.
If you have that goal, you best understand the points they make. You aren’t going to convince anyone if you don’t understand their viewpoint. It really isn’t either of those extremes in most cases.
No. We are consistent with our views, they just don’t fall into either of your predefined extremes. If you understand them, they make sense and are internally consistent. You are free to disagree with them, but thinking they aren’t consistent is simply a lack of understanding…
speaking strictly to the consumerism and profit model…people who pirate on average purchase MORE media, go to more shows, and vocally spread their enthusiasm for the things they appreciate. when media companies provide a value on par with what is being received, purchasing goes way up and pirating goes way down. what was the biggest thing to ever impact movie piracy? Netflix, because they understood the value proposition.
of course there are much bigger and deeper arguments being made then that, like the cost of IP to society versus the benefits. who sees those benefits. the proportionality of the punishments. length of time before IP expires. if IP is transferable or not. dual arising thoughts/creations. derivative creations. remixed creations. if IP is increasing or blocking innovation. is IP global or country specific? alternate models for compensating creators. fair use. content format shifting of purchased works. etc. the bigger discussion is even more interesting then the consumer/profit discussion.
cheers.
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If the guy didn’t want anyone to copy his idea, he shouldn’t have put it on the Internet before building it.
Sheesh.
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I wish! Business has no place in science and engineering for the very same reason. The whole idea that it matters how many units are made, or who gets the “profits” is itself an entirely emotional problem. Business, at its most fundamental, is based upon wishful thinking and subjectivity.
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First, I am more than supportive of libraries. I’m quite willing to see the government abrogate IP ownership for social good (for example: libraries and copyright length limitations.) It’s part of the social contract.
But notice once again that your idea of harmless has to be made by making the victim a “huge media corporation”. Selective justice is hideous when our opponents do it. It’s scarcely more attractive when we do it.
Oh please. There are dozens of examples of duplication that you’d scream about is stealing (counterfeiting anyone? Duplicating your hard written script before you could sell it?) What it comes down to is "if the duplication hurts me, then it’s bad.
The government decides when IP ownership ends, as it should. (And unfortunately, it has been extending that length, but then the government’s conduct is my responsibility as a voter as I’m fortunate enough to live in a democracy.) When IP is no longer owned, it seems odd to call it “stealing”.
Always good advice.
When does an ethical crime “disappear”? Doesn’t it simply become smaller? Likewise, can your ethics be equally applied from the individual to the largest corporation? Or does your sense of justice vary depending upon the affiliation of the parties.
(I’ll agree that much of the world operates on such tribal lines, but I don’t think it’s a healthy basis for a set of ethics.)
That’s great. I’m curious how you view the difference between checking an item out for viewing from your local physical library, and checking a copy out for viewing from the greatest common public library of all, the internet? In both cases you are viewing the item without purchasing it yourself, the entity that purchased it shared it with you free of charge and continue to share it with as many people as want to view it.
you read a lot into that wording choice, unfortunately you jumped to the wrong conclusion. i chose those words to emphasize that the creators are hurt just as frequently by current IP laws as consumers. the rights holders are more often then not, not the creators or innovators, they are media conglomerates. this is an important distinction when discussing IP impact.
counterfeiting isn’t stealing. they are separate distinct crimes. it is important to understand this. copyright infringement isn’t stealing, which is why it is its own crime and can’t be prosecuted as theft. the law doesn’t classify it as theft, that is marketing spin, pure industry bullshit.
nope. it is a much more nuanced and intelligent distinction then “hurt me bad, help me good”.
that isn’t what is being said at all. when you remove something from the commons so it can become property of an individual, that has a cost to the commons. the hope with copyright law and the argument behind it ,if you study it and its history, was that this cost would be outweighed by the incentivizing of innovation. unfortunately current copyright law hurts innovation and doesn’t reward creators as intended, it often hurts them too, which is why most people argue for copyright reform, including some of the worlds largest copyright holders such as samsung and apple. others argue for alternate compensation models.
you are trying to make it an argument of scale, when no one here has ever argued that. that isn’t the argument being made at all. as @robulus pointed out that is straw man territory because that is your own injected misunderstanding, not the augments being presented to you. I’ve explained the difference, and my explanation is not a difference in scale as you keep trying to over-simplistically make it.
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I’d be pleased if the Chinese would make this; I’ve almost never seen so many nerds screaming "Shut up and take my money!"
p.s. It was an April Fool joke a couple of years back, but still…
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Wow. I’d buy that in a second, especially if you could load different settings from various ships/cultures/shows.
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Coming soon to a Kickstarter Alibaba outlet near you… just add a flash drive port for changeoutability.
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