Kovnik Obama wrote:
Y'all know the next step, right? Ban porn.

Clearly, you should replace your legislators.

 KalashnikovMarine wrote:
Once you get big any way, for the majority of the music industry apparently you actually can lose money from having your disk published and distributed

US Trade Office Calls ACTA Back From the Dead and Canada Complies

Major announcements from the US and Canada today give a clear indication that the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) is coming back with a vengeance. ACTA is an agreement negotiated and signed by 11 countries, carrying intellectual property (IP) provisions that would negatively impact digital rights and innovation by ratcheting up IP enforcement measures beyond existing international standards. It will not take effect until six countries ratify the agreement, and Japan is so far the only country to have done so.

The Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) posted its 2013 Trade Policy Agenda and 2012 Trade Policy Report, which covers all of its ongoing negotiations over trade agreements. It reports that the US is working with Japan and other negotiating parties “to ensure that ACTA can come into force as soon as possible,” and encourages Canada “to meet its [ACTA] obligations.”

Canada did not miss a beat to satisfy this demand. The Canadian government introduced a bill today to make Canada compliant with provisions of ACTA, paving the way for its eventual ratification. Among the provisions outlined within the 52-page bill are increased criminalization of copyright and trademark law as well as a new authority for Canadian customs officials to seize and destroy goods they can determine to be “counterfeit or pirated goods” without any judicial oversight.

As we’ve seen in the US, this power has often been abused. US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) have seized domain names for allegedly hosting infringing content without a court ruling. Extrajudicial takedowns of websites violate our rights to free expression by presupposing guilt and enacting punishment where legitimate content and speech is suppressed. Overall, this new bill is a glaring indication of how willing Canada is to cave to US pressure on intellectual property enforcement.

The USTR’s apparent renewed confidence in ACTA is deeply concerning, especially in light of its ambitious goal to conclude the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) by the fall of this year. The TPP and ACTA are two of the USTR’s main avenues for writing stronger IP enforcement into international law at the behest of Hollywood and other content industry interests.

 Seaward wrote:
For a while there I thought you were making absurd arguments with zero supporting evidence.

Now that we've gotten to your insider information revealing that modern copyright law is the product of a vast network of bribed legislators, I've seen the light.

 Ouze wrote:
It also has been my experience that people who hit adolescence post-internet (or post-Napster, anyway) generally do not feel they should have to pay for music, period. It's simply an alien idea to them, it's like a water fountain that you have to slide a dollar into to have a drink - not only outlandish, but sort of offensive.

 Monster Rain wrote:
I remember the good old days, passing gigabytes of music back and forth on cassettes.

Be serious, sir.

 Howard A Treesong wrote:
It's only an extension of people before them passing around cassette tapes to copy, this 'not wanting to pay' wasn't invented by the post-internet generation, just adapted. Similarly the music industry very vocally claimed then the home recording was going to kill them, and similar things have been said of the VCR and CD-burner.

 Seaward wrote:

And, for about the fifth time, whether it's actually going to kill them or not is irrelevant. It's illegal.

 Kovnik Obama wrote:
So is sodomy, in many states. Substitution of moral values by legal edicts isn't very effective.

 Seaward wrote:

 Kovnik Obama wrote:
So is sodomy, in many states. Substitution of moral values by legal edicts isn't very effective.

Do you believe it's moral to illegaly download and play any game you want without having to pay anyone for the privilege?

 Seaward wrote:

 Kovnik Obama wrote:
So is sodomy, in many states. Substitution of moral values by legal edicts isn't very effective.

Do you believe it's moral to illegaly download and play any game you want without having to pay anyone for the privilege?

 Seaward wrote:

 Kovnik Obama wrote:

 Seaward wrote:

And, for about the fifth time, whether it's actually going to kill them or not is irrelevant. It's illegal.

So is sodomy, in many states. Substitution of moral values by legal edicts isn't very effective.

Do you believe it's moral to illegaly download and play any game you want without having to pay anyone for the privilege?

 Kovnik Obama wrote:
The morality aspect of it isn't that it's illegal, or that I haven't paid anyone to play the game. The immorality of it comes from denying someone an expected reward for their work, and that the work did indeed have a value worth the reward. Which explains why it's so easy for those who illegaly obtain the software to justify the illegal downloads. I could, for exemple, say that the downloaded game is no longer a popular sale item, or that the item was way overpriced, or that it was overall crappy so they didn't deserve anything (doesn't work well with games but better with movies). You could even go as far and say that the producer shouldn't even expect a reward (an argument I've seen made about music).

Mind you, I'm not waying that those justifications are still valid upon closer look. Just that they are so easy to make, that it be very surprising that if a law could curb the phenomena.

 Ratbarf wrote:

Circular argument Seaward.

That's a catchy nickname now that I think about it.

Before I begin, I would like to wholeheartedly thank all those people, and you are in a fantastic moral majority, thankfully, who have paid for my book. Whether you loved it or hated it or fed it to the dog, thank you. Loving message ends. Rant begins.

What’s up with Western civilisation right now? A burning sense of entitlement. That idea we have rights and expectations of reward just for breathing. Yeah, of course I mean the dole cheats and the folk who never work, the chaps that claim disability allowance and get caught doing backflips. I don’t have an issue with the government wanting to cap benefits (unemployment payments, American people. Not your rights to holidays and sick pay). The social safety net is one of the greatest moral achievements of Western democracy, and marks the human race out for being if not individually even-handed, at least somewhat corporately. But benefits and rights have gone too far, it’s doing stuff it never was intended to do, like trapping people, like giving people an excuse not to get off their lazy arses, like bankrupting the continent.

The SF community is left-leaning, so I expect some bother for that. But before you cut up your The Guardian to send me anonymous hate mail, hang on, here’s a digression. Author Neal Asher, whose books I really enjoy, tweets a lot of stuff that is deemed right-wing. I retweet it not because I agree wholeheartedly with him, but because I want to see the other side aired. One thing that winds me up about politics and people is that both are wholly partisan. I hear dross peddled from all sides by folks who don’t question their political convictions, convictions often inherited from their parents. (No, of course I don’t mean you, you are much too intelligent to be taking things at face value just because they accord with your micro-cultural preprogramming).

I’m also saying this: The super-rich at the top, the plutocrats, also have a ludicrous sense of entitlement, an entitlement to massive bonuses they don’t deserve, to not pay a fair amount of tax, and to squander money and resources because they can. I’m sure many SF types will agree with that, so flame off? ‘Kay?

But then, I’m also going to say, it’s me and you too. I assume you’re in the squeezed middle. SF is, after all an overwhelmingly bourgeoise pursuit. Pardon me if I’m wrong.

I grew up expecting to live in a big feth off house. To effortlessly get a good job, to be able to piss around and do what I damn well please provided it didn’t impact on anyone else (this last standpoint I clung to for a very long time, but even that kind of watered down moral relativism — leave me alone, and I’ll leave you alone — doesn’t help societies work, so I’m re-evaluating). A lot of people like me spent a good part of the 90s and noughties living high off the hog on fake money. Credit cards and profits from house sales buoyed me through endless drunken nights, hallelujah and pass the beer. All non-money enabled, in the main, by New Labour’s economic miracle, which was miraculous in that it conjured money out of thin air by the very bankers we purport to so loathe now. Don’t blame them, we were all at it.

In the “middle class” (whatever the hell that is these days), we get do much hand-wringing, without thought as to how we can pay for all the good, honest, well-meaning services and so forth we wish to provide our fellow men so we can get on with our privileged lifestyles guilt free. An argument you’ll hear in the right-wing press, but it goes much further than that. We might complain about our slipping standards of living, but compared to some poor dude working on a dump in Lagos stripping wire from junk, and the hundreds upon hundreds of millions of others like him the world over, we’re frankly still having a ball. As much as the hippies I know make me grind my teeth sometimes (I grew up among hippy refugees, fleeing the end of the sixties, I know a lot of neo-hippies now. I must be attracted to them), at least they’re trying to do something about their outmoded 20th century lifestyles with their pigs and ducks and druids in their orchards. Never mind that they proselytise this lifestyle in a somewhat patronising manner, and overlook the fact that you have to be loaded to be able to afford to do what they say we should all be doing. At least they try.

Somehow, I can’t see all we hand wringing pseudo-liberals (I am one too, from time to time) wanting to give up our multi-room houses, cars and regular meals so we can all equally enjoy the bounty of Mother Earth any more than bankers want to give up their obscene bonuses. We’re all hypocrites, just a little bit, if you think about it.

Which brings me on to my real point here: Illegal downloads. We’re so damn entitled, we think we should get stuff for free, all the time! Hooray! I have people who are related to me (I won’t say who) who insist on giving my son copied DVDs, despite the fact that I tell them not to. They maintain copying is not illegal in their country of residence (it most certainly is, but sadly it is so culturally acceptable it has destroyed the arts industries there. A further note – I am not saying all copyright laws are the same worldwide. But the differences in the territories I am talking about are not that great), and they can’t see who they’re hurting. In fact, they’re often congratulating themselves on how much money they have saved, and on the great quality of whatever movie they have ripped off.

The gentleman of this couple was most offended this Christmas. He had produced an illegal copy of a famous animated movie to watch, and he said “Good isn’t it? It did really well in its day, made $30million dollars!” To which I said, “Well, they won’t be getting any money for that copy, will they?” Cue shocked look, and mouthed upset. I don’t see Mega-Entertainment inc being fleeced of a few pennies here, I see some poor ex-kid actor or struggling screenwriter living off his residuals who ain’t going to be having Christmas next year because of people like you. (Yeah, I know most of the money goes to Mega-Entertainment inc, but the people at the bottom won’t be getting what pittance is due them either).

I tell you who else they’re hurting, through their furtherance of the acceptability of stolen entertainment, they indirectly hurt their own family. They’re hurting me, they’re hurting my kid.

I’ve found several illegal copies of Reality 36 knocking about on the web. Every time I do, I tell my publishers and they shut it down. These copies are usually tailed by dutiful thanks from all the mendacious, thieving bastards who were too damn tight to prise open their wallet to pay the £2.00 it costs to get it legitimately. On one forum, I found a lady thanking the person who had provided the copy to copy, saying “the epubs I use are usually my own, but…” What?! That’s not your book, that’s my book. It’s not yours to give away. You didn’t write it.

Another note – I don’t expect to make my living from this book, nor I am not out to get rich. It stands on its merit on lack thereof alone. What I do expect is to be paid for goods I provide.

Am I being precious? Someone’s getting rich, aren’t they?

I’ve spent twenty years trying to get published. I’ve had dozens of rejections. I’ve written hundreds of thousands of words. I’ve had my work demolished over and again, and I kept doggedly coming back for more. Why? Because one day I wanted to get a book published. Because I wanted to be writer. Writing of any kind, unless you are lucky or really good, or both doesn’t pay well. I am hugely in debt. I live in a small terrace house, I don’t have an office. I work in a gap on the landing between the bannisters and my bedroom wall. I spend hours writing this blog to publicise my work and provide a point of contact for those lovely folks who do pay to read my stories. Seeing as my old job went when Death Ray closed, what I earn from writing fiction is more important than ever.

I get 8% of every sale price of each book. So, each time someone downloads it illegally, I lose 16 new pence, give or take, at the current discounted price for the e-version (really! You can get it in the Angry Robot sale for two quid! Go on, buy it). You might say, so what’s the big deal? It’s only 16 pence (give or take, remember). But I say, every 16 pence I lose is a 16 pence more I have to earn twice, effectively, as I tread the slow road to paying off my (small) advance.

More importantly, every illegal download goes uncounted by publishers who use sales figures to determine if they commission more books from an author. At the early stages of a writer’s career, like now for me, every tick in the box is crucial, one more penstroke in the flimsy wall of ink between me and a job behind a till at a supermarket.

You’re not entitled to my work for free, just like you’re not entitled to unemployment payments while you are working a job, and I’m not entitled to make you carry my bags around and give me pedicures for nothing. I assume that the people who do look for free copies are intelligent. I also pray then that they are moral. Here’s a message for you: You are literally taking food out of my kid’s mouth. Literally. He’s three. I might be an angry fether worthy of your contempt, but he’s an innocent casualty in your quest for free gak. (Okay, I admit, I’m overegging it there. Sorry. He never goes hungry).

And you do yourself a disservice. A lot of people who download Reality 36 for nothing might love the book. They might well want to see more Richards & Klein adventures. But if enough people pinch it, there won’t be any more. Not because I’m sulking, but because I’ll be processing your shopping at the supermarket, if I’m lucky enough to find a job.

Or I’ll be chasing you out of the door as bacon slides out from under your coat and skids all over the floor. Downloading stuff is exactly the same thing as shoplifting. Exactly the same thing.

I paraphrase a quote I read the other week, I can’t find the original, but it went something like this:

“A society that is unwilling to pay for art will have to learn to live without it.”

For art also read Star Trek, and novels about cyborg detectives.

It’s pennies over £2.00. For God’s sake, don’t be a gakker.

The post I made on 27 January certainly got a lot of people stoked up, that’s for sure. Which is really good, because I want people to read this blog, because I want people to know who the hell I am and consider buying my books, but more on that later. And now, some more on the subject. You’ve had emotive me, now here’s something a little more reasonable.

I warn you, there are more questions than statements in today’s blog. The topic is: Pirates – evil sea-rapists who terrorised shipping for a century, or lovable cultural memes and suitable subjects for children’s parties?

1. Entitlement
Referring to the first part of my previous blog, it seems that an awful lot of people feel entitled to download free things off the internet. From a strictly “Thou shalt not steal” point of view, that’s baaaad. But is it as simple as them being very naughty, amoral villains, and me being a poor little author? Shall we see? Okay then.

2. Try before you buy
There’s suggestion (not just you lot, but research and that) that some pirates are super-consumers, ie, they’ll consume creative stuff, and if they like it enough, they’ll pay for it. If they like it a lot, they’ll pay for a lot of it. They just might try it for free first, or pay for it when they feel like it, but enough of them generally contribute money to a creative venture to make it worthwhile.

The problem is for creators and publishers is that this removes all control (control is a loaded word, I choose it deliberately). How do I know if my book will be paid for by the majority of people who try it for free, or none of them at all? This is frightening for me, and my mortgage.

3. This is not a new problem, and is it a problem?
Copied tapes, bootleg videos, unauthorised reprints of Dickens – this has been going on forever. Is it, even, a necessary corollary of the distribution of entertainment? (Let’s leave other idea “sharing”, like patent infringement, out of this). One comment on my other post suggested pirated copies should be regarded as shrinkage/wastage. Maybe it should.

Here’s a positive example, again inspired by a comment – the entire anime SF subculture in the west might never have been as big as it is were it not for those bootlegged, home-translated videos of Japanese shows doing the rounds in the 80s and 90s. I’m no otaku, but I’ll bet there are still self-taught anime freaks translating the latest Naruto before the official DVD comes out and banging it on the web. Without that, there’d be no action figure, spin-off/original manga or dodgy little schoolgirl cosplay costume sales. Or even legit Naruto sales. Is anime an entire geek subculture, a lucrative one at that, founded in piracy? I don’t know, answers in the comments box please.

4. Someone is making money
Whether it’s the operators of upload sites coining it in off advertising (have you seen how many advertisements are on those site?) or it’s the more obvious villains selling copied DVDs at a car boot sale, someone is generally making some money off the distribution from illegal copies. You might do it because it’s free, if you’re of a particular mindset you might think you’re getting one over on “The Man” – those Hollywood coke-snorting whoremasters, or Wicked Publishers Inc, but instead you’re giving money to criminals. At the lower, non-internet, car-boot (yard-sale) end, a lot of this cash goes into more serious crime. So, er why not just give the money to the person that made it?

I’m not for a second suggesting upload sites should all be shot down in a cyber-orgy of digital destruction while we all wave the Stars and Stripes (why the hell would I do that? I’m English) and hit people offenders in the face with rolled up SOPA manifestos. Upload sites do have legitimate uses, I use them for such. However, I don’t have the facts, but I’d be really surprised if the majority usage is legit… Still, they do have legitimate uses. Like guns, yeah. You can shoot targets with them, not just people! (I’m joking, chill out). And the people who run them can stop it dead themselves: Don’t allow illegal crap on your sites. Easier said than done, but if there’s enough legal threat, they’ll employ people to do just that. Enough legal threat to outweigh the ad revenues, at any rate.

On the other hand (there’s a lot of hands in this post), the advent of the digital age actually cuts out revenue for baseline crims. A copied physical book sold on by Mr Dodgy does not the same social impact as Joe Average getting my book for free.

I still don’t get paid mind, but I’m thinking bigger. Isn’t that big of me?

5. This is not just you
I’m no psychologist, but a large number of the responses I’ve had (except for the one in Spanish that told me to have sexual congress with my dear old ma – funny, I didn’t approve that one) have come from people who are attempting to justify copying. I use justify, because they kind of sound like they know they’re doing something a bit wrong. But it’s not just you. What about those corporations who advertise on upload sites which have a large amount of illegal content – they know that site has a large audience because of its illegal content. Do they care? Um, not really.

6. Fair usage
“But I loan books!” Yep, so do I. And DVDs, and I copy my CDs onto my computer, and I buy second-hand books. So what? But, someone, originally paid for even that secondhand book. That’s the killer difference. And it’s legal.

My industry relies on sharing, it’s called word of mouth. More on this later. It’s the killer question, I’m saving it for last. Is potentially millions of people not paying for something the same as lending a book to your sister? No, but then I ask myself, is it really “millions” of people downloading this stuff?

7. The nightmare scenario
This is the thing that keeps scaredy pants like me awake at night: What if we get to a situation where NOBODY EVER PAYS FOR ANYTHING EVERY AGAIN. And I don’t mean in a Captain Picard “Oh, hero Cochrane from the past, we do not have money anymore, we’re all communists now, and it works!” kind of First Contact way. I mean in a culturally inculcated, why should I pay when I kind have it for nothing,?kind of way. It doesn’t matter if it’s still there when it’s been taken, if no one pays, no art, and no job for me. This is happening in some countries/ cultures.

8. What will happen
But honestly, do I think this will happen? No. I think people are in the main too moral. I think people who enjoy the kind of stuff I write aren’t that stupid. I think people are of this mentality: “Hey guys, if we like oranges, let us pay the orange growers to grow oranges and we can all have yummy oranges forever and a day.” And not the “BURN ALL ORANGE TREES AND STEAL THE FURNITURE!” Viking-types (heck, even the Vikings were more of the former, not the latter, unless you were a monk. I don’t think they ever really saw the point of monks).

People do pirate, have pirated, and always will pirate. But it’s important it does not get out of hand. SOPA and the rest are not the answer, that’s a 20th century solution to a 21st century issue.

People pirate not just for free stuff, but for flexibility, to try things out, to experience new, foreign stuff. The solution to the “Oh Christ, they’re downloading my crap for free!” is one of accommodation. The current situation has arisen from an imbalance between what people expect, the technology that enables them to do what they want, and the slow response by the industry. The equation’s a complex one, but it can add up for everyone. Rock stars might not be living it up quite like they used to, but then I don’t see many begging on the streets either.

And “free” can work. Spotify? Artists get money per play. Libraries? You actually get money every time someone takes your book out. Very cheap and instantly available works even better. iTunes? I buy a ton more music than I ever did and funny, all of it is legitimate. Do I think Ebooks are overpriced? Absolutely. Would I rather sell ten million books for £1.00 (at my 8% I’d get £800,000) or ten thousand for £7.99? (I’d get £6392) What the hell do you think?

9. Publicity and exposure
The internet is a very powerful tool, that’s for sure. I was advised by my publishers to start this blog. I use it as a kind of diary, and an archive of work I’ve done –there’s a fragment of my journalism here, but when I have chance, I put more up. (By the way, the copyright on that I do not own, but I asked permission to reprint it). On average, I’d say I get about one hundred hits for every post.

By deliberately choosing something contentious, like piracy (heartfelt though, it’s not fake, I wouldn’t do that, but I did think about it), I’ve had well over six hundred hits. I’ve sold books. A lot of people who have no idea who I am have at least glimpsed me, even if some of them think me a jerk. That’s me exploiting the internet, not the other way around.

By that extension, is the wide availability of my book for free on the internet actually good for someone like me? Or is stealing simply wrong?

I give work away for free for publicity. Here is a sample from Reality 36. Here from Champion of Mars, here’s a free Richards & Klein short story. Here’s another free short, and another. There’s plenty on this site, I’ll be putting more here over time. But that’s my right to do so, it’s not a pirate’s right, because it’s my frigging stuff.

And I will say, people do expect to have everything given to them for nothing. And I will also say, when my book is available as cheaply as you want, as conveniently as you want, when there are free samples of it here and on my publisher’s site and it meets all the other halfways and market forces we’ve been discussing and you still choose to download it for free? Then you really are ripping me off.

It’s all going to change. New encryption systems and bigger computers will eventually put the lid on this (mostly). I wouldn’t be surprised if every piece of entertainment in the world has free elements, but then quantumly encrypted, embedded programming demands payment every time you get past that. Whatever, I reckon this whole debate will be of far less importance in a few years time. Seeing my work given away for free by people who have no right to do so upsets me right now, though. Still, creators and consumers will meet halfway.

Thanks for reading, and commenting.

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An award-winning Spanish novelist claims that the illegal downloading of ebooks has forced her to give up writing and start looking for a new job.

"Given that I have today discovered that more illegal copies of my book have been downloaded than I have sold, I am announcing officially that I will not publish another book for a long time," Lucía Etxebarria announced on her Facebook page.

Etxebarria told the Guardian that Spanish authors faced a difficult future as online piracy spreads from music and film to literature.

She pointed to Spain's position at the top of the world rankings for per capita illegal downloads. "We come after China and Russia in the total number of illegal downloads but, obviously, there are a lot more of them so we win on a per capita measure," she said.

"People are making millions out of online piracy by setting up in places like Belize, which is where the money goes," Etxebarria said. "They are a powerful lobby and our government doesn't dare legislate."

The outgoing socialist government of the prime minister, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, ditched a proposed anti-piracy law this month. "They were too scared," said Etxebarria.

She said she was not convinced that the new conservative People's party government of Mariano Rajoy, who became prime minister on Tuesday, would be any braver.

Etxebarria, who has won several of Spain's best-known literary prizes, said she could no longer justify devoting three years of her working life to producing a book.

Her latest novel, The Contents of Silence, was published in October and although previous books have been bestsellers, this one is ranked low down the sales list on Amazon's Spanish site.

It is not available as a legal ebook but can be downloaded in pdf format from numerous websites. The print edition costs more than €20.

"We decided against publishing it as an ebook because that is easy to pirate. It would have been like throwing it straight to the lions," Etxebarria said.

She said she was now considering a job offer, and was also thinking of allowing her books – which have been translated into 20 languages – to be published only in French and German, as the laws in France and Germany offer greater protection to authors.Her vow to stop writing provoked a torrent of abuse from downloaders who filled her Facebook wall with insults. Some said they did not earn enough to buy her books.

"Literature is not a profit-making job, but a passion," said Kelly Sánchez, one of the least vitriolic critics. "If you had a real vocation then you wouldn't stop writing."

Others wanted to know how Etxebarria had spent one of the world's richest literary prizes, the Planeta prize, now worth €601,000 (£502,000), which she won in 2004. She has also won the Primavera prize, currently worth €200,000, and the prestigious Nadal prize.

Writers currently near the top of the Spanish-language illegal downloads list include the British novelist Ken Follett and John Gray, author of Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus.

 reds8n wrote:

I get 8% of every sale price of each book. So, each time someone downloads it illegally, I lose 16 new pence, give or take, at the current discounted price for the e-version (really! You can get it in the Angry Robot sale for two quid! Go on, buy it). You might say, so what’s the big deal? It’s only 16 pence (give or take, remember). But I say, every 16 pence I lose is a 16 pence more I have to earn twice, effectively, as I tread the slow road to paying off my (small) advance.

 Howard A Treesong wrote:

 Ouze wrote:
It also has been my experience that people who hit adolescence post-internet (or post-Napster, anyway) generally do not feel they should have to pay for music, period. It's simply an alien idea to them, it's like a water fountain that you have to slide a dollar into to have a drink - not only outlandish, but sort of offensive.

It's only an extension of people before them passing around cassette tapes to copy, this 'not wanting to pay' wasn't invented by the post-internet generation, just adapted. Similarly the music industry very vocally claimed then the home recording was going to kill them, and similar things have been said of the VCR and CD-burner.

 Ouze wrote:
It also has been my experience that people who hit adolescence post-internet (or post-Napster, anyway) generally do not feel they should have to pay for music, period. It's simply an alien idea to them, it's like a water fountain that you have to slide a dollar into to have a drink - not only outlandish, but sort of offensive.

But that's the world we live in, I guess.

 dogma wrote:
When I was a kid I owned the data on the CD I bought. Now I own a license to use the data on the "CD" I bought, at the discretion of the entity issuing a license. As it is at discretion this license can be revoked at any time, for any reason; including a contract dispute with an entity issuing a license to the entity issuing a license to me.

Given this chicanery, why would I not pirate media?

 Seaward wrote:

Is there something preventing you from going with an open source alternative or simply making do without?

 Seaward wrote:

Why does disliking the licensing terms allow you, in your mind, the right to illegally acquire the software for free?

 Ouze wrote:

 Monster Rain wrote:
I remember the good old days, passing gigabytes of music back and forth on cassettes.

Be serious, sir.

Well, the principle still remains sound, I suppose. I certainly remember taping lots of songs off the radio.

Seaward wrote:

 Ratbarf wrote:

Circular argument Seaward.

That's a catchy nickname now that I think about it.

What's circular about it?

And yes, it's from Arrested Development.

Seaward wrote:

Sir Pseudonymous wrote:
You also clearly aren't reading what I'm saying, or you would have jumped on that last post with "correlation != causation" and just to head you off: no, it doesn't, but when y and x increase side by side, while deciding it could just be coincidence is fair enough, trying to claim that x is actually decreasing y, when y is, quite noticeably, not decreasing, is justsuch a leap in logic it's not even funny.

Stealing Warren Buffett's wallet wouldn't ruin Warren Buffett, but it's still illegal. That seems to be the part that you have a hard time addressing.