Should Demonoid Stay Down?

[mrkai]

Originally Posted by jamesdmanley

how often does anyone ever change another's mind?

...it happened to me. It took about...3 years, but eventually the light came on.

At the end of the day this particular thing really is about philosophy, ethics and legality.

All of these things thru out the course of mankind's history have been challenged, and changed.

This is yet another one of those challenges. How do you define a *truly* new "thing" using old words and concepts?

There has never been anything like digital technology in the hands of the masses. How many trekkie/trekker types have you know pine for technologies posited in that milieu, without giving any thought whatsoever as to what would happen if they actually existed?

Digital replication is a lot like replicator technology. That's what you are dealing with. Machines that can make perfect, or near perfect copies of a thing, in perpetuity.

No one puts a dime into a replicator. They tell it what they want and they get it. Its "the future"...say hello.

Now...how do you deal with it? Marx? Rand? Mussolini?

Or do we come up with something else?

There is no other place to have these discussions..because they effect no place else

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by mrkai

How many trekkie/trekker types have you know pine for technologies posited in that milieu, without giving any thought whatsoever as to what would happen if they actually existed?

Maybe, but Star Trek isn't real, it's a TV show, and TV shows can conveniently ignore things like repercussions. (In fact, Trek has shown a lot of inconsistency when dealing with money, so it doesn't make for a good example of any kind of economy.)

Real governments have postulated providing wage stipends to artists, allowing them to create freely.

Capitalists have postulated Patrons of the arts, allowing an artist to create and leave someone else to pick up their bills. They have also postulated Advertising subsidies, allowing a company to pay the artist's way in exchange for an opportunity to hawk their product or service alongside the production. (Television loves the last two scenarios.)

So maybe we're all heading for one of the above, as opposed to having customers pay us directly for our creations.

Artists themselves have postulated keeping costs down and selling low, to make their creations more accessible. This has the virtue of making people more willing to pay, because they do not feel they are being ripped off. (That's my strategy, BTW.)

However, if we become a world in which no one trusts anyone else, everyone feels ripped off, and therefore everyone wants everything for free, clearly we won't be using that model anymore.

[mrkai]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

Maybe, but Star Trek isn't real, it's a TV show, and TV shows can conveniently ignore things like repercussions. (In fact, Trek has shown a lot of inconsistency when dealing with money, so it doesn't make for a good example of any kind of economy.)

Again...most of these responses are "coulda-shoulda-woulda" in nature...

So the idea you have is that you charge what the market will bear. OK. Fine.

So what's the complaint? This is what i just do NOT get. All businesses have loss thru out the chain. Why is it that digital folks seem to believe their loss is so much a greater tragedy when it is balanced by the reduction of manufacturing and transport in the first place?

And you can continue to go on about government-granted false monopolies of non-material resources (Ha!) all you like, but I'm telling you...that is not a forever solution. Perhaps you'll be dead before it is undone, but it will be undone.

I personally believe that there is a market based solution to the issue, likely in the form of some sort of digital cartel...

[mrkai]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

Maybe, but Star Trek isn't real, it's a TV show...

...but replicators in every home are VERY REAL in the context that we are discussing right now...aren't they?

[bingle]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

I've convinced myself that I've spent entirely too much time debating legality, philosophy and morality in the same thread as anything related to computers...

Just out of curiosity, why does the thread having something to do with computers make you less interested in debating these topics? The computer age has given us some very interesting conundrums in the philosophical realm. I find it fascinating, personally. How will society deal with these changes that are happening, faster and faster? I think a lot of people feel that the way it is now is the way it's always been and the way it has to be. I see nothing but promise in change!

[RWood]

Originally Posted by DaleDe

Hey, this thread has gone on for 10 pages now. Has anyone convinced anyone of anything?

I'm convinced that I should have stopped reading after page 1.

[mrkai]

Originally Posted by bingle

Just out of curiosity, why does the thread having something to do with computers make you less interested in debating these topics? The computer age has given us some very interesting conundrums in the philosophical realm. I find it fascinating, personally. How will society deal with these changes that are happening, faster and faster? I think a lot of people feel that the way it is now is the way it's always been and the way it has to be. I see nothing but promise in change!

Right but philosophy is often limited in its discourse by dishonest debate. For people who are touched by the empowering promise of technology as well as its amazing ability to "devalue" something that lives within the digital domain by removing scarcity and exclusivity...it can be a very scary thing.

The funny thing about history is people can always look back on the past and say "well...that was an awful silly notion! Why would people think that made ANY sense at All?" about events past.

The trick is to notice it while it is happening. Its hard to separate one's self from a situation they are in the middle of and look in at it from the outside.

If nothing else, you get perspective...at the high end of the benefit scale...peace.

I could not see myself living another day tortured over some nameless person using software that I created without paying me for it. It was pointless.

More than enough people do pay. It is my job, my only job....so if they did not, I would not be able to live. What's more, that...obsession was inhibiting my ability to even DO the job.

I deal with the world, this world as it exists, right now. Pondering "what to do" I came to the conclusion that there is no acceptable "solution" to the problem that would not create bigger problems...nearly of a dystopian proportion.

The way I see it, digital products are one of the most amazing "things" man has ever made in the fact that while they are things, they are not real. They move near instantaneously from one side of the planet to the other. If you destroy one, or destroy many, as long as there is one left, there can be many...forever.

A great many minds have burned a great many hours and dollars trying to essentially, change the essence of what a digital product is, trying to chain them and constrict how they move, or even how they are created, by completely artificial means. It almost like trying to get rid of air without draining the oceans and killing all the trees. If you don't do those two things...there will always be air. Always.

Content people are asking folks to take part in a consensus hallucentation...to agree that digital things to not have the abilities they have and are of another nature...that they are analog, when it is perfectly clear and obvious to them that they are not.

Its not working.

They are asking that creators maintain the benefits of these digital things but consumers pretend they don't exists, these benefits.

They aren't buying it.

A house is not a man any more than an eBook is a pBook or an mp3 is a CD or a jpg is a painting.

They are different things. Until this is dealt with..truly dealt with, no solution posited by anyone that hasn't come to grips with this reality will be acceptable or implementable.

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by bingle

Just out of curiosity, why does the thread having something to do with computers make you less interested in debating these topics?

I was just tired of debating the idea that computers somehow make it okay for people to expect commodities to be free.

So, g'night, Gracie.

[Trenien]

mrkai, out of curiosity, under what kind of license is your software nowadays?

I mean, pretty obviously you started of with a proprietary license, but ever since your change of heart, have you modified it? Have you considered going open source?

If not, why? If I understand properly you've decided you don't care if people use your software without paying for it, but you only offer support to paying customers.

If yes, have you got any interesting feedback from whoever?

[mrkai]

Originally Posted by Trenien

mrkai, out of curiosity, under what kind of license is your software nowadays?

Commercial. Very old or unsupported apps, we give away. We've also written utilities for free.

Personally, for "because I was bored" I've done a lot of ports for the convenience of others and given them away or had an employee on downtime whip them out.

I mean, pretty obviously you started of with a proprietary license, but ever since your change of heart, have you modified it? Have you considered going open source?

I have not. If ever that were to happen, it certainly would not be under the GPL.

If not, why?

It is still a supported and sold high quality commercial product. There are less than a handful of products that are GPL'd that I consider high quality...and I do not believe any of them run on Linux.

It does quite well and there is really no need for a collective developer pool

As for the GPL, I find it abhorrent and offensive. I understand what it tries to achieve however it devalues forward contribution in a way I don't like or agree with.

If I understand properly you've decided you don't care if people use your software without paying for it, but you only offer support to paying customers.

I've decided that I'm not going to spend my time chasing people around that don't purchase a license, but I most certainly care if they do not. I'm just not obsessed with that aspect of it anymore. I make an OK living.

I consider people that use the software w/o licensing part of "the cost of doing business".

[Trenien]

Originally Posted by mrkai

There are less than a handful of products that are GPL'd that I consider high quality...and I do not believe any of them run on Linux.

Well, at the very least, there's Linux.

I do think there are others I could name, but I know this one can't be disputed...

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by mrkai

I've decided that I'm not going to spend my time chasing people around that don't purchase a license, but I most certainly care if they do not. I'm just not obsessed with that aspect of it anymore. I make an OK living.

I consider people that use the software w/o licensing part of "the cost of doing business".

I suspect that most teenagers grow out of the "it's OK to be a freeloader" attitude when they have to start making a living for themselves in the real world. It's the small number of adults who persist in that attitude when they should know better that I have issues with.

[Penforhire]

Mrkai's vision is NOT inevitable. His type of outside-the-box value thinking led to the last internet stock crash. People woke up and noticed that giving stuff away did NOT add value and was unsustainable. It will happen again. A generation of non-producers is self defeating or leads to communism, which has not yet proven sustainable (nor desirable to me).

[mrkai]

Originally Posted by Penforhire

Mrkai's vision is NOT inevitable. His type of outside-the-box value thinking led to the last internet stock crash.

I was there. What led to that were businesses with no method whatsoever of generating revenue.

It wasn't about "giving stuff away"...it was about ridiculous business "plans" that didn't remotely have any chance of working. It was about burning thru other people's money.

It was about marketing products that did not exist or could not be made.

Originally Posted by Penforhire

People woke up and noticed that giving stuff away did NOT add value and was unsustainable. It will happen again. A generation of non-producers is self defeating or leads to communism, which has not yet proven sustainable (nor desirable to me).

Oh Please...I'm the biggest capitalist out there. At no point did i mention or endorse anything like that. In fact, I get paid...everyday.

Again, for the people that just won't pay attention...digital content has value.

The problem is, the market has decided that value...and that decision is that it is worth less than physical product. Artificial "locks" on the unlockable and moralistic chest-thumping aside, IT IS THE REALITY WE FACE today...even if it is not the ideal.

And whenever I ask "what do we do?" no one that is being "stolen from" or "ripped off" can come up with anything viable that *addresses the actual market as it exists*...which is why there is failure.

And this notion that its just "teenagers" or "slackers" or whatever? Do not delude yourselves.

I mean seriously...do you think ANYONE in the real 10 hour workday world gives a damn if a bunch of soft people that sit on their butts all day clicking "send" to make a buck loses a buck from time to time?

The "communist" notion here is "right to work/right to compensation". The fact is, if no one pays you...your work is worth nothing on the free open market...is it?

There is a serious disconnect here between intrinsic and extrinsic value.

Look. I get it. Everyone that uses anything electronic and didn't fatten someone's pocket deserves to be beaten and raped in prison for 10 years as they are a fetid, horrid waste.

Good luck selling that one, guys

[JSWolf]

Lets say there is a book I want to read that is not available as an ebook. This book is available in my library and I can borrow it for free and read it. I can also download an electronic copy. Would either action cause anyone any loss of revenue? I know downloading the electronic copy is not legal. But the real question is, who is getting hurt by this action of downloading this book or borrowing it from the library? Nobody. Nobody is getting any money from my doing either. Now if there was an official ebook available, then my downloading it would be causing a loss of revenue. But since there isn't, it doesn't cause any harm since if I didn't download it, I would borrow it from the library instead. Now this is all hypothetical. But it does give one pause to think when we think about what damages our actions have on others.