Copyfascism Watch - All Comments

re: Do Churches Have Copyright?

aheram — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 06:24:29 GMT

Thank you, Charlie, for that correction. It seems that it is only Wikinews, and not Wikileaks, that have any connection with Wikimedia.

re: Do Churches Have Copyright?

Charlie — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 02:15:52 GMT

Wikileaks has no connection with Wikimedia. It is an independent whistle-blowing site that merely uses wiki technoloogy.

re: Google Allows Corporations to Claim Copyrights on Public Domain Works

aheram — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 22:01:20 GMT

@David Johnson: Forcing companies to host content they do not want in their servers would be immoral. But that is not the case here.

The victim was the original content-creator who had released his own work to the public domain.* Google then allowed Huffington's company to make a fraudulent copyright claim that affected the victim's perfectly legal use of Google's services.

Yes, the bank has the moral right to refuse to store anyone's money in their vaults... but I doubt anyone will agree that the bank has any right to transfer ownership of the money to someone else.

re: Google Allows Corporations to Claim Copyrights on Public Domain Works

David Johnson — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 21:41:23 GMT

Sigh. Deciding what content to host on your own private webserver is not equivalent to supporting IP! But regardless, I would much sooner support IP then support a police state that forces Google to host all possible content.

Google is not enforcing IP laws against anyone. All they are doing is choosing which content to host or not. If they were finking on people to the government that would be a different story. They might be doing that elsewhere, but in this area of hosted content they are not.

To make this as clear as possible: Google is not violating your copyright by not hosting your content!

re: Google Allows Corporations to Claim Copyrights on Public Domain Works

Cork2 — Sat, 31 May 2008 16:06:01 GMT

"I know the trendy leftist thing is to always bash corporations"

Opposing corporations for their violation to the non-aggression principle is a right-libertarian principle, because non-aggression is a "universal monopoly ethic", as it applies to all levels.

IMO, I think that supporting corporations is a leftist libertarian principle because some leftists sometimes justify non-aggression such as "state-socialist communes in a market anarchist society."

My beliefs are the reverse as the usual. Because it seems contradictory for rightists to wholeheartly support non-aggression universally and also support corporations that violate non-aggression, at the same time.

David, you have the right idea of only dismantling the government that initiates aggression. But blame is to all agents that violate non-aggression.

Suppose if someone tells you to murder someone? Would you deserve the blame if you murder? What if you told someone to murder someone. You also deserve the blame. If you told a robot to murder someone, you deserve the blame. If you told the government to murder someone, you also deserve the blame. If Google told the government to violate property by placing IP, they deserve the blame.

But I know that it is impossible for corruption to be zero. There will always be bad guys that corrupt the government, as there will always be bad guys that murder. The bad guys that corrupt the government will always out-compete their competitors. So it is impossible to educate the bad corrupt guys to avoid corruption, since new bad guys would outcompete the educated ones.

What is you definition of "blame"? People have different interpretations on what "blame" is. I interpret "blame" as "a non-aggression violation." Other people interpret the word as "using violence to defend the person deserves the blame." So you cannot argue if an agent deserves blame or not unless we have the same interpretation of the word.

Similarily, words such as "hate" is ambiguous. Some left-libertarians "hate" corporations. But that does not mean that they would abolish all corporations. This is similar to minarchists "hating" government but they do not want to abolish government. People have different definitions of "hate." I hate corporations, but that does not mean I want to abolish them (as it obviously would make our standard of living much worse). I just hate the corporate structure, and I want to abolish these specific aspects of government intervention.

re: Google Allows Corporations to Claim Copyrights on Public Domain Works

Cork2 — Sat, 31 May 2008 15:28:32 GMT

Also, there is not a distinction between government and corporations, as they are a giant collusion. Corporations can influence the government to steal and vice versa.

re: Google Allows Corporations to Claim Copyrights on Public Domain Works

Cork2 — Sat, 31 May 2008 15:25:44 GMT

"All Google is doing is deciding what content is allowed on their OWN PRIVATE PROPERTY. If we are to blame Google for this, then we must blame every other site owner in the world for not hosting every possible content."

It appears that you support IP. IP is a violation of the non-aggression axiom because they prohibit the implementation of their ideas on your own private property. So IP is equivalent to theft. If the government allowed Google to legitimize theft, such as steal your house, would you blame Google? The non-aggression axiom applies to every level, not just the government. I, however, do not blame Google for their peaceful ways of making profit, nor corporations in general, per se. I only blame their actions that violate the non-aggression principle, as it applies to every level.

re: Google Allows Corporations to Claim Copyrights on Public Domain Works

David Johnson — Fri, 30 May 2008 23:16:50 GMT

All Google is doing is deciding what content is allowed on their OWN PRIVATE PROPERTY. If we are to blame Google for this, then we must blame every other site owner in the world for not hosting every possible content.

If you don't like Google's policy with regards to their OWN PRIVATE PROPERTY, then go find someone else to host your content.

re: Google Allows Corporations to Claim Copyrights on Public Domain Works

Cork2 — Wed, 28 May 2008 22:57:57 GMT

"Don't blame Google for this."

If the government allowed Google to kill people, would you blame Google? Copyright is a violation of the non-aggression axiom, but not to that extent as murder. So the must blame both the government and corporations.

re: Google Allows Corporations to Claim Copyrights on Public Domain Works

David Johnson — Wed, 28 May 2008 19:50:28 GMT

Don't blame Google for this. Google isn't the government, they are only deciding which works to allow on their property. When they have the real possibility of being sued by Huffington for hosting this work, they are merely being pragmatic in keeping it off their property. I know the trendy leftist thing is to always bash corporations, but that's the intellectually dishonest road. The true villians are the DMCA, which was imposed on us by congress, and Huffington who is using it as a cudgel.

re: Is Copyright Infringement Theft?

Cork2 — Sat, 24 May 2008 22:01:11 GMT

There are many other ways to promote innovation instead of copyright. It would be far better if the government just reward one million dollars to every patentee instead restricting the idea on everyone for 20 years. For the 20 years, products would become so expensive that it hinders competition and it would sometimes be much more expensive than to buy these expensive products than to pay the patentee $1 million dollars for the innovation.

Because 90% of our innovations depend on subsequent improvements, setting the term limit to zero years would encourage subsequential buildup of innovations, which results in exponential growth. So limiting the term to zero years and instead rewarding every patentee $1 million would greatly benefit innovation in the long run. This encourages subsequent would-be innovators to buildup and improve the existing inventions instead of waiting 20 years until the patent expires. So the benefits of of rewarding every patentee $1 million would by far outweigh the costs of a 20 year patent restriction.

If the government wants to promote innovation, they must think of creative ways to achieve innovation. Copyright and patents are just one way. They are not perfect. Long term projects cannot be even be motivated by patents. Patents is juat a means to achieve an end. It's not the only way.

Many options are available to improve innovation, without the hazardous consequences of IP. Government funding, eugenics, education, etc. are equivalent ways to speedup innovation. Eugenics is very effective. It just require killing of the supposably "mentally challenged" people as in the Nazi regime, and encouraging the reproduction of geniuses. Also, we should build a very authoritarian state-regulated education system that encourages innovation. The possibilities are arbitrary. If you support copyright and patents, why wouldn't you just go also support a totalitarian fascist state forcing innovation? Copyright and patents are just equivalent state-creations like eugenics. Indeed, IMHO, it would be cheaper if the government just directly fund the sciences and the arts instead of IP. (not that I prefer any government intervention)

As shown, copyright and patents are just "means" to achieve the "ends". They are not the only means to encourage innovation. Government advocacy of "means" to achieve some ends failed, such as applicating socialism as a "means" to achieve a properous "end".

re: Is Copyright Infringement Theft?

David Johnson — Fri, 23 May 2008 22:59:27 GMT

Copyright should properly be called "copyprivilege", as it is not a right but a privilege granted by the government. As such, infringement violates no one's right, but it does violate a privilege.

In popular parlance, violating privilege is frequently called "theft". Thus, I have no problem with using that word, despite the fact that I am generally opposed to government grants of such privilege. Here is an example: a salesman is given an exclusive territory by his company. This is his privilege. If another salesman encroaches on his territory, he will cry out "don't *steal* my customers!". This may not be the exact dictionary definition, but the English language is dynamic and changing.

The law does indeed gives people the exclusive privilege to control the distribution of their creative works, but arguing semantics does nothing to change this state of affairs.

re: Is Copyright Infringement Theft?

Cork2 — Fri, 23 May 2008 02:41:11 GMT

these leftist libertarians that oppose copyright without equivalently opposing other bureaucracies are vulgar libertarians

classical economics involve production of labor, not creativity

conventional accounting methods applies to labor

but not to innovation

because a majority of humans are ignorant, human actions

must be able to be voluntary controlled, in addition to

the quality of goods and services produced

because human actions can be directed by the entrepreneur,

human actions are scarce resources and must be made

efficiently by the entrepreneur.

our current form of patent protection is illegitimate

because our state is a monopoly. however, if our state was

not a monopoly (low barriers to succede from the state)

then it would be a voluntary association, so it can

do anything it want such as protecting copyrights

our state monopoly prevents all non-agreers to the state

must obey their patent laws

trade secrets are clearly legitimate. they should be enforced

if it is a voluntary association

anyway entrepreneurs can voluntary make a contract to restrict

people working with their trade secret to move out of the

association.

but territoriality of the circumstance is trivial.

they can restrict some contracts even if the person is outside

the territory, such as video cameras

therefore, entrepreneurs can legitimately restrict human

actions prohibiting the copying of works by using video

cameras in the people who voluntarily agree to the

entrepreneur

what if the user just remembers and then move out?

well, they can use gadgets that make them forget

about these stuff before they are opting out

but "knowledge redistribution" would promote innovation,

as we STAND ON THE SHOULDERS OF GIANTS ;-)

re: Do Churches Have Copyright?

aheram — Sat, 17 May 2008 15:36:20 GMT

@Cork2: That is the thing. Copyright is nothing more than mere regulation of information.

re: Do Churches Have Copyright?

Cork2 — Sat, 17 May 2008 13:43:09 GMT

Taxes, regulations, etc. are a more significant infrigement of rights than copyright.