"Information wants to be free" is a terrible argument from the naturalistic fallacy. Cars want to break down, your body wants to get cancer, and ebola wants to spread.
I agree.
The question is whether information having to be free is good for us.
Eliminating copyright doesn't the information has to be free. As a producer of copyrighted works which are freely distributable, my paycheck is an example of that.
If all information is free, your salary is $0 unless you are making content for indirect monetization -- which means propaganda, surveillance based marketing, etc. A world where information is free is a world where only content with an indirect manipulative agenda gets financed
After the Sony rootkits, I don't know how anyone can still claim with a straight face that paying protects you from that.
Content producers have introduced propaganda and manipulative advertising decades before widespread copyright infringement was even possible. From Donald Duck campaigning for WWII involvement, trials with subliminal ads, decades of product placement, really, it's everywhere.
And why shouldn't it be? Why would we expect the major studios and labels who end up owning most distribution rights to forgo those extra sources of income? "Our customers pay, we're morally bound to treat them well"? Yeah, right.
It benefits ultra-capitalists who own large channels of communication
Unlike the previous model? Yeah, no capitalists in the MPAA and RIAA!
"As a producer of copyrighted works which are freely distributable, my paycheck is an example of that."
So if I pull your OSS archive and take it closed and found a new company based on it, you're totally okay with that?
I work on OSS too, but that's a choice. If I don't choose to release something OSS and you make a tool designed to rip me off, that's the same thing as taking your OSS project and stripping your name off and taking it closed. If I did that I'd be violating your terms and generally abusing you, which is what Popcorn Time is explicitly created to do to movie makers. It says "we don't care what you think about how you want your work to be used... we get to decide that for you."
Edit:
... and the RIAA is essentially a union. They look like buffoons because historically their understanding of technology is awful, but their stated purpose in life is to protect the income of working professionals in the recording industry. That includes but is not limited to musicians, since it takes a lot more than musicians to make a good album. Like most unions they are paranoid and reactionary, seeing any change as an attempt to devalue the labor of their members, but that's sort of what trade unions do. I know it's become fashionable to hate on unions, but look at what it's doing to the wealth distribution in this country. I think that's something that needs to be reconsidered. If the RIAA/MPAA are morons and reactionaries, then the tech industry could have stepped up and suggested a better alternative. "We ain't gonna pay you sheeeit" is not a good alternative.
Yeah, music and movie studios can be jerks, but at least they paid the artists something. The new model is to pay the artist nothing (or close to it) and monetize their work indirectly via advertising and customer surveillance.
The general attitude of tech people toward artists is disturbing. If you can program, you can fall out of bed and into a job making more than the vast majority of musicians can ever dream of making. I mean... six figure salaries are the stuff of fever dreams to most artists. They will never make what a low-skill JavaScript hacker makes right out of college. Benefits? What are those? Then you go and use your free personal time to build tools to yank the bottom out from under that industry even further? It just makes us look like a bunch of entitled, spoiled brats that get our kicks from rubbing our comparative privilege in everyone else's face.
EDIT: I have no idea what is this new model that you're talking about, or why do you assume I support it. If anything, it's you who are taking the side of the tech giants, since they're all reliant on copyright and patents too.
EDIT2: I make $15k/year. And I don't really care what artists think of the "tech industry". That's mostly an US thing.
I agree.
The question is whether information having to be free is good for us.
Eliminating copyright doesn't the information has to be free. As a producer of copyrighted works which are freely distributable, my paycheck is an example of that.
If all information is free, your salary is $0 unless you are making content for indirect monetization -- which means propaganda, surveillance based marketing, etc. A world where information is free is a world where only content with an indirect manipulative agenda gets financed
After the Sony rootkits, I don't know how anyone can still claim with a straight face that paying protects you from that.
Content producers have introduced propaganda and manipulative advertising decades before widespread copyright infringement was even possible. From Donald Duck campaigning for WWII involvement, trials with subliminal ads, decades of product placement, really, it's everywhere.
And why shouldn't it be? Why would we expect the major studios and labels who end up owning most distribution rights to forgo those extra sources of income? "Our customers pay, we're morally bound to treat them well"? Yeah, right.
It benefits ultra-capitalists who own large channels of communication
Unlike the previous model? Yeah, no capitalists in the MPAA and RIAA!