Pirate Bay founders found guilty

[sirbruce]

Originally Posted by kad032000

That was just an example. There are countless more. The most popular films (the ones that make the most money) are routinely pirated the most.

I've seen them. That's why I said "at best" you can demonstrate a correlation; you can't go beyond that.

Originally Posted by kad032000

I wasn't concerned with causation. I'm not saying high piracy causes movies to do better (although it might). I'm saying high piracy doesn't mean it will hurt movies. Causation is irrelevant for this argument.

Causation is entirely relevant because you're saying there isn't any. If the two correlate because of some independent variable (say, the popularity of the movie) that doesn't mean the two don't effect each-other. People who exercise more have increased HDL and lower risk of MI, but that doesn't mean HDL levels have no effect on MI independent of exercise level.

[kad032000]

Originally Posted by sirbruce

Causation is entirely relevant because you're saying there isn't any.

Bad statement on my part. Causation is relevant to your side of the argument. And there isn't any on your side. I'm not trying to prove causation. I'm trying to prove the causation you believe exists (or will exist) is not there. Correlation is often enough to prove this.

Person 1: A causes B.
Person 2: No it doesn't. Proof? There is no correlation between A and B.

[bhartman36]

Originally Posted by zerospinboson

No, it's fighting against an oligopolic industry, that is able to behave surprisingly like a cartel, without ever having really been investigated for that.

What are you basing that on?

The nature of publishing itself is monopolistic, in a certain sense: A publishing house signs a deal with an author, and then the author's books are produced and distributed through only that house. The publisher has a monopoly on the author's work, in that sense. But that's not very different from the way it works with other products. If you want a new Viper, you have to either get it through Dodge. There's nothing monopolistic about that, in a legal sense.

Originally Posted by zerospinboson

There was a recent judge that was very annoyed that the RIAA kept dropping cases after discovery of the names that were subpoena'ed in RIAA vs. Does cases, and then filing individual suits against those people.

Could you explain that a little bit more? Why would they need to "discover" the names of the people they were suing themselves? Or were they being sued by John Does, and trying to find out the names of those suing them so they could countersue?

Originally Posted by zerospinboson

See the working paper by Pamela Samuelson for more.

Okay, thanks. The way you described it, I'm having trouble seeing it as illegal. Brutish, perhaps, but not illegal.

Originally Posted by zerospinboson

Whatever you may think of "pirates", their existence does not warrant the behavior of the RIAA towards basically defenseless people, as no individual in his right mind will take the risk to be forced to pay the costs the RIAA can force on them just by suing them. Those extortionist practices are absolutely pathetic, and only reinforce the "class justice" stereotype that is already dominant in some circles. And you will not be able to convince me that an industry that happily hires lawyers like that deserves any pity whatever.

The behavior of the RIAA, while I might find it heavy-handed, does not in any way justify intellectual property theft. The justice system isn't based on the principle of "equal protection under the law for nice people". It's possible to detest some of their tactics (e.g., suing junior school students) while still believing that they should have protection under the law. Regardless of what you think of the deals they make with artists, the fact of the matter is that they have made deals with artists, and they're therefore entitled to the rights that the artists sign over. And of course, the other big issue is that, for the most part, their interests are the same. What hurts the RIAA also hurts the artists they have signed. That's unfortunate, but it's true.

I would also say that you have to make a distinction between the people using TPB and the people running it. If you use TPB to download a movie, that's quite a bit different from someone hosting the links to thousands of such movies, and making money off of it, besides. I would have a very different reaction if it was some 17-year old kid who was being taken to court and found guilty.

[tirsales]

Originally Posted by sirbruce

No data stating "piracy is bad", therefor no reason to "do anything against it."

Well, thats the fundamental problem with regard to a world view - I am a liberal, I strongly believe (reasoning OT) that a prohibition has to be justified - not the other way round.

I countered if there's no data stating "crime (specifically burglary) is bad", therefor no reason to "do anything about it" by the same logic. But I still lock my door; I still "do something about it" so I reject your logic.

Well, theres a difference between "no data stating crime is bad" and "no data stating that there is crime", isnt it?

Still, we all have our pet beliefs, or at least suspiscions.

OT - but I agree (with the quoted sentence, I dont have enough data to comment on the other part).

[tirsales]

Originally Posted by bhartman36

The nature of publishing itself is monopolistic, in a certain sense: A publishing house signs a deal with an author, and then the author's books are produced and distributed through only that house.

This is actually not true - many authors have deals with quite a number of publishers, sometimes even multiple ones for the same book (e.g. hardcover, softcover, ebook, audiobook, etc).
And this is still not the same as a monopole - a monopole would mean that a single publisher holds the complete market (which is ATM not the case).

If you want a new Viper, you have to either get it through Dodge. There's nothing monopolistic about that, in a legal sense.

Nope. But if Dodge was the only (major?) car producer on the market, this would be different.

The behavior of the RIAA, while I might find it heavy-handed, does not in any way justify intellectual property theft.

Well, file sharing does not fit the normal definition of theft. I do not argue "piracy should be legal or fine" I am arguing "its the fault of the industry and their ridiculous fight is doing them no good".
Whenever I watch an original DVD in Germany, I have to go through several minutes of videos telling me that "copying a video is illegal" and announcing harsh (and in most cases totally false) results (e.g. imprisonment for multiple years). This annoys me - I pay for a DVD and then I get insulted and threatened? Nope, sorry. Wont buy DVDs any more (not downloading them either).

What hurts the RIAA also hurts the artists they have signed. That's unfortunate, but it's true.

Not neccassarily.

If you use TPB to download a movie, that's quite a bit different from someone hosting the links to thousands of such movies, and making money off of it, besides.

I agree.

[zerospinboson]

Originally Posted by bhartman36

The nature of publishing itself is monopolistic, in a certain sense: A publishing house signs a deal with an author, and then the author's books are produced and distributed through only that house. The publisher has a monopoly on the author's work, in that sense. But that's not very different from the way it works with other products. If you want a new Viper, you have to either get it through Dodge. There's nothing monopolistic about that, in a legal sense.

Oh, sure. I'm basing it on the fact that so little price variation exists between labels, if nothing else. (talking about the music business, anyway) Why wouldn't they want to compete on price? Because the artists are all unique? Because every company is already maximally efficient? All that seems rather unlikely. At least with publishing houses you have MMPs competing with regular/trade pbacks etc.

Could you explain that a little bit more? Why would they need to "discover" the names of the people they were suing themselves? Or were they being sued by John Does, and trying to find out the names of those suing them so they could countersue?

Original suits filed in order to ascertain the names that belonged to the IPs, then individual suits for all "found" people. I'm told it's not a proper use of the "discovery" procedure.

The behavior of the RIAA, while I might find it heavy-handed, does not in any way justify intellectual property theft. The justice system isn't based on the principle of "equal protection under the law for nice people".

I always find these "none whatever" statements odd.
In any case, neither were court costs meant to be used as an incentive for people to settle out of court, I suspect, on so large a scale, and with so little evidence.
Otherwise, what is to prevent someone with lots of money to spend, and lawyers on retainer, from threatening to sue everyone for, say, 200$? The point isn't that some of these people might be guilty, the point is that those who aren't still don't have a reason not to settle. The amount of money they might be forced to pay involved makes the risk they would run too great.

It's possible to detest some of their tactics (e.g., suing junior school students) while still believing that they should have protection under the law. Regardless of what you think of the deals they make with artists, the fact of the matter is that they have made deals with artists, and they're therefore entitled to the rights that the artists sign over.

Sure it's possible, but why on earth would you? "Detesting" won't get them a slap on the wrist, you know. They could care less what you think of them. Capone also had "deals" with shop owners (if not notaried ones).. the legality of the document doesn't make the practice right. Also, from the things I hear about it, the "Deals" they cut artists are becoming shabbier and shabbier, as paying off-shore daughter companies for "services rendered", thus siphoning off the obvious profits, has become more and more prevalent. Sure, it's not their fault that most artists are fiscally retarded, and are willing to sign, but that hardly makes their behavior one I would want to endorse by paying them.

And of course, the other big issue is that, for the most part, their interests are the same. What hurts the RIAA also hurts the artists they have signed. That's unfortunate, but it's true.

So what if a few artists don't sell well. Artists come and go, while the practice will live on unless challenged. The institution is the problem, not the suffering of its members.
Consider that, for instance, Toni Braxton, (whose single "unbreak my heart" made 160m worldwide) or TLC (" the group was taking home less than $35,000 a year") had to file for bankruptcy because they got to see almost none of it. (Given, that is, that it is highly dubious that Toni would've spent even a substantial portion of that money in 5 years time if she'd gotten a reasonable part of it..) Sure artists will go broke sooner than the record companies; small wonder if they only get a dime for every album while the company keeps the rest. It doesn't make fiscal sense that artists have to "suffer" even though the company that sells them runs at a substantial profit, from those same artists. The explanation for that isn't "piracy", it's "extortionate practices".

[bhartman36]

Originally Posted by Sonist

It isn't so black and white. The body of law is an evolving one. And the evolution is often effected through disobedience and challenges to existing law. This goes from Prohibition, to civil rights, to intellectual property.

When the law runs against common sense, it becomes widely ignored (think state sodomy laws.)

I'd say, some of the aspects of recent intellectual property legislation, do indeed run against common sense, and stifle innovation.

Sure. I never meant to imply that copyright law hasn't changed since 1793. Obviously, it has evolved. Disobedience plays a part in that (especially, as you said, in the case of Prohibition). But take Prohibition as an example: Were the people violating Prohibition within their rights to do so? Was it actually an unjust law, or merely an easy one to violate?

I think the same thing is in play here. The current copyright laws are stupid in some respects (e.g., protecting a work for far too long), but I think you'd be on very shaky ground if you said the authors and publishers didn't have a right to be protected at all. That's the position that The Pirate Bay represents.

It's one thing to free your own information, if you created it. It's quite another to declare "Information wants to be free!", and to free someone else's information without their consent. That's what The Pirate Bay has been willfully -- even merrily -- facilitating.

[tirsales]

Originally Posted by bhartman36

Sure. I never meant to imply that copyright law hasn't changed since 1793. Obviously, it has evolved. Disobedience plays a part in that (especially, as you said, in the case of Prohibition). But take Prohibition as an example: Were the people violating Prohibition within their rights to do so? Was it actually an unjust law, or merely an easy one to violate?

Well - what to do against an unjust law that still gets protected by most governments?

[delphidb96]

After all, they excluded one juror for being associated (an advocate of) copyright protection. And yet the judge swears that HIS membership in two copyright-protection advocacy groups (he's one of the board members of one) did NOT influence HIS ruling. Yeah. Right. (I was wondering why my other leg has been jangling so loudly these days - it' been getting pulled too much!)

Derek

[kad032000]

Originally Posted by sirbruce

That's not my position, that's me feeling

That wasn't a statement of what *will* happen, but a statement of what I *believe* could happen.

Well I still feel that as people shift from pbooks to ebooks, ebook piracy is going to grow and become significantly more of a threat.

So as pbook sales shift to ebook sales, a growing percentage is "lost' due to ebook piracy.

To me, it sounded like it was what you believed will happen, not what you believed could happen. Your belief is your position. I believe otherwise, and that is my position.

If you are truly only saying that something could happen, then there is no point in discussing it further. Anything could happen.

I gave you reasons showing that if ebook piracy grows, it does necessarily mean it will have a more harmful impact

That certainly sounds like you believe something will happen.

I wasn't arguing 1 download = 1 lost sale, I was arguing 1 ebook sale = 1 lost pbook sale, and more ebook sales = more piracy, so converting from pbook sales to ebook sales = lost sales.

A = original ebook sales
B = original pbook sales
C = original effect of piracy
D = original total sales
=>
A + B - C = D

x = additional ebook sales
x1 = lost pbook sales
y = additional effect of piracy
z = total effect of piracy

You start with
x1 = -x
(C+y) = z

=>
(A+x) + (B-x) - (C + y) = D - z

You conclude
(D - z) < D

Problem? For z > 0, you must assume at least one of either C or y is > 0. To know that at least one of either C or Y is > 0, you would have to know z > 0. It's circular.

I ignored the circumstance which you made in detail earlier because I didn't recognize it as support for your "belief". It's pure speculation:

But now you have a lot more readers willing to read ebooks. And maybe they think ebooks shouldn't cost as much as pbooks, or they resent the DRM (you'll find many of them here). They'll also become more savvy to the nature of ebooks. And a lot more of them will learn that they can just get pirated ebooks for free. After all, they paid $300 for their reader!

So as pbook sales shift to ebook sales, a growing percentage is "lost' due to ebook piracy.

It sounds to me like you believe piracy will harm sales because of a scenario that could happen. Whereas I believe piracy will not harm sales because of similar situations in other industries. Which is the stronger position?

This is a discussion, not a debate.

Semantics. I am posting with the explicit reason to show anyone reading that there is more reason to believe in my position than in your position.

[sirbruce]

Originally Posted by kad032000

Bad statement on my part. Causation is relevant to your side of the argument. And there isn't any on your side. I'm not trying to prove causation. I'm trying to prove the causation you believe exists (or will exist) is not there. Correlation is often enough to prove this.

Person 1: A causes B.
Person 2: No it doesn't. Proof? There is no correlation between A and B.

Once again:

1. This is not an argument, this is a discussion.

2. There is a correlation between A and B. The Dark Knight is more popular than other movies. The Dark Knight made more money on DVD. The Dark Knight was also pirated more. Did pirating reduce the amount of money The Dark Knight made on DVD? Impossible to know without a time machine or lots of data from lots of movies under statistically controlled conditions.

3. The movie industry is *irrelevant* ebook because the adoption rates of DVDs is much higher, movies have box office revenues independent of DVDs, consumers have found an acceptable price point for DVDs, and so on. The same goes for music, etc. There are so many other factors it's not even funny.

4. Nearly all of this has been said before, and should be pretty obvious to you.

[sirbruce]

Originally Posted by tirsales

Well, thats the fundamental problem with regard to a world view - I am a liberal, I strongly believe (reasoning OT) that a prohibition has to be justified - not the other way round.

I didn't make the argument. It was provided to me as valid, and I asked if I agreed. I said no, because of an equivalent situation. If you believe one is true for ebooks, then you must also believe the same is true for locks - it's wrong to lock your doors in an area where crime can't hurt you.

Originally Posted by tirsales

Well, theres a difference between "no data stating crime is bad" and "no data stating that there is crime", isnt it?

Yes, but I have no way of knowing (or keeping track when 10 people are talking at once) if you are a "piracy has minimal impact" or a "piracy has no impact" position. Someone else followed up with a clarification and I made it clear my position was the same in either case.

[kad032000]

Originally Posted by sirbruce

2. There is a correlation between A and B. The Dark Knight is more popular than other movies. The Dark Knight made more money on DVD. The Dark Knight was also pirated more..

This has nothing to do with the causation/correlation point.

You said (basically) that more piracy will cause lost sales.

I showed an example where higher piracy showed no correlation to lost sales.

If that's not enough for you, fine, there are tons of other examples which you said you were aware of. And these exist across than more than just the movie/music industries. Examples exist of authors becoming more popular and making more money once one of their books was pirated. Examples exist of people who made programs for the iPhone app store who made more money once the app was cracked. If all of these examples cannot sway your mind, fine; it will still provide anyone else who reads this more reason to believe my position than yours.

[sirbruce]

Originally Posted by kad032000

To me, it sounded like it was what you believed will happen, not what you believed could happen. Your belief is your position. I believe otherwise, and that is my position.

Then you missed the much earlier post where I said "maybe I'm just being pessimistic."

Originally Posted by kad032000

If you are truly only saying that something could happen, then there is no point in discussing it further. Anything could happen.

I'm stated I either *believe* it could happen or that I'm *worried* it could happen. Both warrant discussion as to the likelyhood of the scenario and why or why not it might happen.

Originally Posted by kad032000

A = original ebook sales
B = original pbook sales
C = original effect of piracy
D = original total sales
=>
A + B - C = D

x = additional ebook sales
x1 = lost pbook sales
y = additional effect of piracy
z = total effect of piracy

You start with
x1 = -x
(C+y) = z

=>
(A+x) + (B-x) - (C + y) = D - z

You conclude
(D - z) < D

Problem? For z > 0, you must assume at least one of either C or y is > 0. To know that at least one of either C or Y is > 0, you would have to know z > 0. It's circular.

No, your math is wrong. It's D - y, not D - z, otherwise you're subtracting C twice. I assume that (D - y) < D. You're already including the -C in the D. Nice try, though.

But more importantly, I'm saying that piracy C is a function of A, not B. I'm also assuming that as A increases in the future, it's primarily coming at the expense of B; people switch from pbook to ebook, rather than having a lot of newer pbook or ebook readers entering the system. Thus, C *must* increase, even if it's constant; frankly I expect that C will increase even more with a rising A because more of the B people (as I argued before) will have problems with ebook prices and DRM than the A people do now. So you can't avoid the fact that D will decrease as a result.

Originally Posted by kad032000

It sounds to me like you believe piracy will harm sales because of a scenario that could happen. Whereas I believe piracy will not harm sales because of similar situations in other industries. Which is the stronger position?

Neither is a stronger position. I believe piracy will harm sales because of a self-consistent theory; you believe piracy won't harm sales because you don't see supporting data in other industries. I say your data in other industries is neither complete nor relevant; you say my theory is unsupported because there's no data at all. Either one of us could be correct! It's most exciting, isn't it? But likely whatever happens neither one of us will know who was right, because there are a dozen other unknowns that aren't even listed in the equation that we can speculate on after the fact endlessly. (If only they'd done this; it was because they also did that, etc.)

Originally Posted by kad032000

Semantics. I am posting with the explicit reason to show anyone reading that there is more reason to believe in my position than in your position.

Well good luck with that but we're going around in circles here.

[sirbruce]

Originally Posted by kad032000

This has nothing to do with the causation/correlation point.

You said (basically) that more piracy will cause lost sales.

I showed an example where higher piracy showed no correlation to lost sales.

The example does not show that. You don't know what sales would have been without piracy.

One way that it MIGHT be analyzed would be:

1. Find two movies of the same genre, that came out at roughly the same time in their respective years, and sold roughly the same number of box office tickets. (Straight revenues wouldn't work unless you adjusted for economic factors.)

2. Those two movies also must have their DVDs come out at roughly the same time in their respective years. Price, features, and marketing budget must be the same. You must make sure there are no other factors like awards, changes in actor popularity, etc.

3. Compare DVD sales numbers.

4. Compare pirating of those two DVDs. Not sure how you'd do that, but there are ways to make estimates.

5. If piracy hurts sales, DVD sales should be lower for the DVD with higher piracy. Normalize for growth in Internet population as well.

6. Rpeat this for lots and lots of movies.

7. Think of a dozen factors I haven't even listed above.

See? It's a virtually intractable problem. Too many variables changing to know exactly what's going on.