[LAU] ASCAP Assails Free-Culture, Digital-Rights Groups

[Hartmut Noack]

Am 07.07.2010 22:05, schrieb Mark Knecht:
> On Wed, Jul 7, 2010 at 11:28 AM,<martin.peach at sympatico.ca>  wrote:
snip
>>> Why is this any different than taking two trips to the salad bar when
>>> the menu said only one was OK with the restaurant?
>>>
>>
>> I think it's more like taking two photos of the salad bar...
>>
>> Martin
>
> I'll grant you the salad bar analogy suggests the consumption of
> physical resources, but that's the easy way out.
>
> Other analogies:
>
> 1) Musicians are playing a live show with assigned seats. You sneak in
> the door and take a seat your didn't pay for. No one shows up claiming
> the seat so you it and enjoy the concert. Right or wrong?
>
> 2) Musicians are playing a live show for a standing audience. You
> sneak in and stand in the room. No one notices you are there and no
> one hassles you. Right or wrong?
>
> 3) Musicians are playing a live show for a standing audience. You
> sneak in and stand in the room. No one notices you are there and no
> one hassles you but people who would like to pay are turned away
> because the room's capacity has been reached. Right or wrong?

All 3: wrong if you really wanted to see the show. If it would be the 
Rolling Stones I would sneak in if I can, out of couriosity but I would 
not complain, if someone would come and throw me out. If I want to see a 
concert, I pay for it. If the venue/artist charges too much money for my 
taste I loose my interest in the concert...

> 4) A friend purchases a DVD of a movie that cost $1M to make but
> brought in $1B at the box office. You rip a copy. Right or wrong.
> 5) A friend purchases a DVD of a movie that cost $1B to make but
> brought in $1M at the box office. You rip a copy. Right or wrong?

Both acceptable. If "a friend" is someone from my hood there is nothing 
wrong in that. It is not illegal in Germany to make up to 6 private 
copies and if it would be illegal it would still be OK and the law would 
be subject to be changed. Because helping a neighbor is more important 
for the civilisation than keeping virtual properties untouched. And by 
doing this you do not establish a world-wide anonymous infrastructure to 
distribute copies to people, you dont know.
This may sound like cheap semantics but it is not.

> 6) Some bad guys rob a bank but in fleeing the scene of the crime
> throw money out the window to put people in the way of the police
> chasing them. You are standing on the sidewalk when $1000 lands at
> your feet. You pick it up and don't turn it in. Right or wrong?
>
> 7) Some bad guys rob a bank but in fleeing the scene of the crime
> throw money out the window to put people in the way of the police
> chasing them. You are standing on the sidewalk when $1000 lands at
> your feet. It is raining and you see lots of money getting washed down
> the storm drain where it will likely never be found. You pick it up
> and don't turn it in. Right or wrong?

Both wrong. Everybody knows, that most banks are semi-criminal, 
antisocial organisations. They are, because they exist in a system that 
is utterly broken -- the same as broken as ASCAP and GEMA. So at first 
glance it looks like: take the darn money and run! And this idea has 
some appeal to me too. But in the end: if I take the money and run, I am 
not that much better than the capitalist crooks that live by the rule: 
"take what you can, by any means, allways, never give anything back!". 
This antisocial quasi-darwininistic philosophy is exactly the very 
foundation of most of the problems, we have today.
And on the other hand it would feel just great to see the faces if I'd 
walk into the bank to return my catch. A person, they do not trust 
enough to hand out a credit-card that pushes 1000,- at the table saying: 
"Take it, its yours. I found it in the gutter the other day, right after 
the robbery."
Maybe I would keep the money anyway - it depends on the actual state of 
my own account. But I would feel a bit like corrupted, if I would keep 
it....

best regs

HZN


> - Mark
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