Misleading Metaphors That Drive The War On Online Sharing

[Sil_liS]

Originally Posted by ScalyFreak

Actually, for certain purposes it is. It's called "fair use"in the US.

From here:

Copyright protects the particular way authors have expressed themselves. It does not extend to any ideas, systems, or factual information conveyed in a work.

The safest course is always to get permission from the copyright owner before using copyrighted material. The Copyright Office cannot give this permission.

When it is impracticable to obtain permission, use of copyrighted material should be avoided unless the doctrine of fair use would clearly apply to the situation. The Copyright Office can neither determine if a certain use may be considered fair nor advise on possible copyright violations. If there is any doubt, it is advisable to consult an attorney.

[ScalyFreak]

In other words, you can makes copies if the doctrine of fair use clearly applies. I believe that's what I just said.

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by Quexos

You're all too uptight, come on, relax. The laws were made to protect companies and corporations' interests, not the consumers'. And seeing many of you defend the aforementioned corporations to boot, is the last straw.
Don't worry about them, they are powerful enough, they can lobby to steer new laws in their favor and make you call it "democracy", they can create brainwashing advertising campaigns to teach you their version of right and wrong and most of you will believe it and preach their gospel. bottom line, they can fend for themselves thank you. Just relax and enjoy the weather or take a walk to the park and breathe in the fresh air. Whatever works for you.

And you say we should relax.

[RichL]

Originally Posted by xg4bx

i simply have a hard time seeing a collection of 1s and 0s as a "thing".

shoplifting a paperback? yea thats theft. downloading intangible code? try as i might i cant see it as theft.

So I go to the pokey for breaking into a safe deposit box and taking ten grand but if I take the ten grand by cracking a customer pid and transferring a bunch of one's and zero's, that equate to ten grand, to my account that's okay?

[Greg Anos]

Originally Posted by Steven Lyle Jordan

You're missing the point of the document: Without agreement on what "copyright infringement" means to each of us, there is no agreement on how to treat or enforce it. That's where the metaphors come in, and why everyone has a different opinion on whether CI applies to them, should be enforced by them, should be redefined by them, etc, etc. Use of the wrong metaphors creates improper shading of arguments, misunderstanding and division... what we have at this moment.

Think of the statement: "Curfew after dark." Without a clear mutual understanding of what "dark" means, the statement can't be enforced. How dark is dark? What if there's a light on? How much light? What if it's infra-red light? etc.

We use metaphors to frame an understanding of difficult concepts with simpler, already-understood concepts. We need the proper metaphors applied to the legal arguments in order to come to a mutual understanding of the issues involved. Without that understanding, we will continue to tread the same water we've been treading over ebooks for the past decade.

Steve, I merely want those metaphors to be even-handed. When a copyright is issued, (de facto or de jure), both parties agreed to the terms at the time of the creation/copyright. Those terms, and no others, should apply. Any addition to those terms is as much of an infringment (theft, whatever metaphor you want to use) as somebody downloading a torrent.

Just because powerful entities bribed, (and I won't mince that word), governments to infringe upon the public's right may be legal, but it's just as much a moral crime. No more, no less.

Shucks, a government could vote to shoot me for snoring. That, too, would be legal. I don't think anybody around here would say it's right or moral. (Although, some might cheer the government on in my case...)

[HansTWN]

But aren't we making a big assumption that the majority of the public agrees with us that the lengths of copyright terms are too long? I would venture a guess that the vast majority don't really care and are fine with the extensions. In that case it would be democratic, whether we like it or not.

Anyway, in no case should problems with copyright law be used to justify online file sharing. That should be something for a separate discussion. Two wrongs don't make it right.

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by HarryT

I strongly suspect that it would not be economically feasible to sell eBook for a quarter the price of the printed book. Printing is a relatively small component of the price of a book; the main cost for a book such as this will be in the layout and editing, and that's there for an eBook just as much as for a hardback.

This is a company which has tried eBook sales and concluded that, for their market sector, piracy is too much of a problem. They do appear to be talking with the benefit of practical experience. One should blame the people who have pirated their books for this, not the company.

It's very possible that WotC didn't decide this; they're now owned by Hasbro, which has interests so far outside the gamer-geek market that they're oblivious to the niche industry market forces.

They were making *some* money off PDFs. They are now making *no* money off PDFs. The availability of PDFs has not changed, just the source sites and the quality level.

Gaming books have always been prone to "one sale per gaming group." Not all books are that way, but it's very common for only one player to have a complete set of books, especially for college-age and younger gamers. Players expect to loan and borrow books within their group--and they expect to make copies of commonly-used pages, like character sheets and combat charts. Even groups where everyone has a copy of the hardcover books will run off multiple copies of important combat charts so they don't have to keep flipping to that page in the middle of the game session.

Refusing to release a legitimate digital version just means more pirate copies. And it's a really solid shoot-self-in-foot move, because gaming books are one of the few market niches that *can* effectively sell physical and digital copies to the same people--they want the physical book because no ebook reader is good at reference work & flipping between multiple pages quickly, and they want a searchable digital version to check specific details easily.

[sabredog]

Originally Posted by Elfwreck

It's very possible that WotC didn't decide this; they're now owned by Hasbro, which has interests so far outside the gamer-geek market that they're oblivious to the niche industry market forces.

They were making *some* money off PDFs. They are now making *no* money off PDFs. The availability of PDFs has not changed, just the source sites and the quality level.

Gaming books have always been prone to "one sale per gaming group." Not all books are that way, but it's very common for only one player to have a complete set of books, especially for college-age and younger gamers. Players expect to loan and borrow books within their group--and they expect to make copies of commonly-used pages, like character sheets and combat charts. Even groups where everyone has a copy of the hardcover books will run off multiple copies of important combat charts so they don't have to keep flipping to that page in the middle of the game session.

Refusing to release a legitimate digital version just means more pirate copies. And it's a really solid shoot-self-in-foot move, because gaming books are one of the few market niches that *can* effectively sell physical and digital copies to the same people--they want the physical book because no ebook reader is good at reference work & flipping between multiple pages quickly, and they want a searchable digital version to check specific details easily.

This is precisely what we used to do as students, waaay before digital copies even existed. The DM/referee and perhaps one other player had the full rule set, whilst the remainder of us had either photocopies of relevant information or whole rulebooks.

Later, as we started careers it was required to at least own the players manual (D&D) or the main players rulebooks for the game being played.

These days, everyone owns the full rulesets but but has PDF copies on tablets or net/notebooks for easy access. No one wants to see expensive hardcover books damaged during gameplay.

I see no reason apart from extreme shortsightedness and stupidity why WotC stopped selling PDF copies of the rulebooks for D&D

[Hellmark]

Originally Posted by RichL

So I go to the pokey for breaking into a safe deposit box and taking ten grand but if I take the ten grand by cracking a customer pid and transferring a bunch of one's and zero's, that equate to ten grand, to my account that's okay?

Ah, but there is a difference. With your money example, you then can get a physical analog. Just because the form that you used to gain access to the money was intangible, doesn't mean that the money itself is not, regardless of if you touch it. Also, theft is defined, as pointed out many times in this thread already, theft isn't just taking something, but taking something and depriving the rightful owner of it.

Hell, theft is "the act of stealing; specifically : the felonious taking and removing of personal property with intent to deprive the rightful owner of it". If I download a ebook from someone, I've not deprived anyone of that book. The person I got it from still has their copy, and what ever rights they have to that copy (which could be none, full ownership, or in between like a license to be able to use it with limitations). The only thing that can be argued is that the content owner may not get money from me now if I got it through nonlegit means. But that argument would have to depend on the idea that I wouldn't pay for the item after downloading it, and that I would have paid for it in the first place, which those two completely nullifies the deprivation argument.

So, please, in the future, include a bit more thought into your argument.

[HansTWN]

Originally Posted by Hellmark

Ah, but there is a difference. With your money example, you then can get a physical analog. Just because the form that you used to gain access to the money was intangible, doesn't mean that the money itself is not, regardless of if you touch it. Also, theft is defined, as pointed out many times in this thread already, theft isn't just taking something, but taking something and depriving the rightful owner of it.

Hell, theft is "the act of stealing; specifically : the felonious taking and removing of personal property with intent to deprive the rightful owner of it". If I download a ebook from someone, I've not deprived anyone of that book. The person I got it from still has their copy, and what ever rights they have to that copy (which could be none, full ownership, or in between like a license to be able to use it with limitations). The only thing that can be argued is that the content owner may not get money from me now if I got it through nonlegit means. But that argument would have to depend on the idea that I wouldn't pay for the item after downloading it, and that I would have paid for it in the first place, which those two completely nullifies the deprivation argument.

So, please, in the future, include a bit more thought into your argument.

So, taking something you have no right to is fine in your book?

[mr ploppy]

Originally Posted by mr ploppy

Extra readers?

Just to expand on this, books have always had a high ratio of readers to buyers. That problem doesn't exist with the one reader per sale model of ebooks with DRM. So a certain amount of slippage through unauthorised downloading doesn't really matter.

UK government figures say 25% of the online population downloads unauthorised digital films and music on a regular basis. If that figure remains constant for ebooks, that's still a 75% purchase rate. A lot higher than I would expect the purchase rate for real books to be.

[teh603]

Originally Posted by Elfwreck

It's very possible that WotC didn't decide this; they're now owned by Hasbro, which has interests so far outside the gamer-geek market that they're oblivious to the niche industry market forces.

They were making *some* money off PDFs. They are now making *no* money off PDFs. The availability of PDFs has not changed, just the source sites and the quality level.

That's entirely possible, but from reading some discussion on the WotC boards I doubt it. The reason every single Star Wars Saga Edition book included an ad for Star Wars Minis was not for using them as an RPG aid, but as a separate and competing game. It turned out the brand manager was a SW Minis junkie and was doing everything she could to sell the RPG short.

Gaming books have always been prone to "one sale per gaming group." Not all books are that way, but it's very common for only one player to have a complete set of books, especially for college-age and younger gamers. Players expect to loan and borrow books within their group--and they expect to make copies of commonly-used pages, like character sheets and combat charts. Even groups where everyone has a copy of the hardcover books will run off multiple copies of important combat charts so they don't have to keep flipping to that page in the middle of the game session.

Refusing to release a legitimate digital version just means more pirate copies. And it's a really solid shoot-self-in-foot move, because gaming books are one of the few market niches that *can* effectively sell physical and digital copies to the same people--they want the physical book because no ebook reader is good at reference work & flipping between multiple pages quickly, and they want a searchable digital version to check specific details easily.

Depends upon gamers; I'm one of those guys who feels safest if I can have a print copy of everything, even if it means printing my PDFs and clipping them into a three- ring binder. For actual use at a game site, though, the e- reader is more convenient than carrying around a stack of huge notebooks.

[Sil_liS]

Originally Posted by ScalyFreak

In other words, you can makes copies if the doctrine of fair use clearly applies. I believe that's what I just said.

Actually it doesn't say that. You should always ask the copyright holder for permission.

The case that I mentioned in post #87 for example, I would expect to be under fair use. Showing how one page of a copyrighted ebook looks on a device shouldn't bother the author. But we are not allowed to do that on the forum because they don't want to be taken to court to find out if it really falls under fair use or not.

[Hellmark]

Originally Posted by HansTWN

So, taking something you have no right to is fine in your book?

Just because I specify exactly how it is not theft DOES NOT MEAN I APPROVE OF IT. Don't be so thick. I merely detest when people use the wrong terminology. There is a very clear cut difference, and it is our duty to understand the law. Ignorance is not an excuse when it comes to legal issues.

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by Ralph Sir Edward

Steve, I merely want those metaphors to be even-handed. When a copyright is issued, (de facto or de jure), both parties agreed to the terms at the time of the creation/copyright. Those terms, and no others, should apply. Any addition to theose terms is as much of an infringment (theft, whatever metaphor you want to use) as somebody downloading a torrent.

Just because powerful entities bribed, (and I won't mince that word), governments to infringe upon the public's right may be legal, but it's just as much a moral crime. No more, no less.

Shucks, a government could vote to shoot me for snoring. That, too, would be legal. I don't think anybody around here would say it's right or moral. (Although, some might cheer the government on in my case...)

You and I are in agreement over wanting even-handedness... but I think you mean in the law. Metaphors should be used to create that even-handedness and inspire fair laws. If the laws are not fair, we're using the wrong metaphors.

And I know I haven't directly addressed it, but I agree it's true that we've allowed the metaphor of the Almighty Dollar to trump all other metaphors on the table... and that needs to be addressed. I do believe, however, that there may be some areas in which there is nothing wrong with extending copyright, if the continued charging of a property does not constitute a detriment to or burden on society (which is where I'd place any material created by Disney, for instance). I think it's worth debating. With the right metaphors involved.

Originally Posted by mr ploppy

Just to expand on this, books have always had a high ratio of readers to buyers. That problem doesn't exist with the one reader per sale model of ebooks with DRM. So a certain amount of slippage through unauthorised downloading doesn't really matter.

That's a slippery slope, like saying "a little bit of speeding doesn't matter." The problem is, it doesn't stop there.