No. I'm not trying to say that making a copy for convenience then selling on the original is in any way moral or justified - you're distorting the argument. By selling an original CD, you forfeit your right to listen to the recording, simple as that.
The change in the law was a much needed one from the days people made tape copies of vinyl records to listen to in the car, and then went on to ripping CDs to MP3 players to listen to more conveniently. It had nothing to do with legalising piracy; it was simply saying that you keeping a copy of something you already own is not a crime.
The legal challenge is that the entertainment industry thinks everyone should pay separately each for a copy of the same recording on LP, tape, CD and MP3, and on that basis that legalising personal copies for personal use is tantamount to a loss of revenue. Whilst at the same time hypocritically claiming that you don't own the recording, you simply own a license to listen to it, by which logic the format, or your choice to duplicate it, is irrelevant, as you can only listen to one at a time.
In most cases I agree with what you are saying, the practical problem here though is that once these CDs have been ripped, they tend to end up on torrent sites.. It is not an easily solvable problem for all involved really.
Some would suggest it is better to keep 'home taping' or its modern day equivalent illegal to ensure major infractions are prosecuted and keep the threshold high so that it is frowned upon but not legally enforced, as has been the historical situation.
I guess to whichever degree, we are in agreement rather than not, and my point was aimed more at the freeloaders who take a high moralistic position to basically justify theft and accuse the people who put in the mental work as being the underserving bad guys ripping everyone off for wanting them to pay for the privilege.
We all agree that there are publishers that are crooks, there are judges who are bent, but that doesn't mean that justice as a concept is wrong, likewise for copyright protections, but those who would like to see a free for all would be motivated to make that argument nonetheless.
Since I decided to get rid of my stereo system a couple of yrs ago my laptop's cd player has been the only cd player ive got. Subsequently ive ripped a lot of my cds to my laptop so i dont have to go through the hassle of loading them into the cd drawer and waiting for them to come up in windows media player each time.
...apparently that makes me a music pirating thief freeloader, enemy of artists and the industry?
I've done a similar thing, but then in a way you're not the target, or at least shouldn't be, it's complicated, but then I think more should be done to actually explain to people where they stand in the great scheme of things, that clarity would be beneficial for all I think.
So the argument you are making is that your perceived creative saturation has made any new works and, not only that, all current and previous works too, worthless? A future with no new movies, books, songs, video-games is acceptable to you so you can justify taking everything for free?
No. No argument. I was just pointing out that the analogies used in these oh-so-productive copyright discussions on WoS are worthless.
I don't need to justify taking anything for free. If I want to, I will copy it, and won't be posting excuses online.
Human civilisation, and life itself, is based on copying and modifying ideas and information. This is my opinion. I am aware of all the arguments and other opinions, god knows we have seen them all enough times on WoS forum. I've never seen anyone change their stance / mind on either side, but seen plenty throw their toys out or flounce about it.
Stating that there would be 'no new movies, books, songs, video-games' without copyright protection, is a rather naive and under-thought one to enter into a WoS copyright debate. If that was just a back reference to my flippant dismissal of your analogy, then read what I said again.
I am pretty happy with copyright law in general. There is enough protection that genuinely good creative folk can make a living on repeat fees. Anyone who disagrees is free to copy anything for personal use, and know they will never face prosecution. It just amazes me that there can be so much arguing about it.
There's plenty of genuinely free music, books and films on the internet to demonstrate exactly how bl**dy awful the arts and media could be without any guaranteed revenue. How long exactly do you think a cinema would last just showing all the YouTube clips that don't have adverts on?
Or maybe I can put it in terms everyone can understand. You steal sweeties from the shop down the road - I don't care. I might have done so when I was a kid; though I admit nothing. You steal sweeties from my shop? I break your legs.
>and accuse the people who put in the mental work as being the underserving bad guys ripping everyone off for wanting them to pay for the privilege
With all due respect, it is my firm belief that one is most certainly going to find the whole thing to be somewhat less of a problem overall provided their idea of creative effort doesn't, in fact, amount to trivial copypasta process like oh, I don't know, taking a decade long classic and adding wub wub sounds/facebook drama/whatnot
All in all, it is a good way of telling whether or not you've actually made something worthwhile I'd say
Human civilisation, and life itself, is based on copying and modifying ideas and information. This is my opinion.
It's not black and white, that I agree, I'm also very much for artistic freedom to use samples, which would seemingly be a hypocritical position - although I'm for compensation when there's a substantial sum gained from the reasonable use - for me it speaks to what you say about inspiration/modifying ideas.
Stating that there would be 'no new movies, books, songs, video-games' without copyright protection, is a rather naive and under-thought one to enter into a WoS copyright debate. If that was just a back reference to my flippant dismissal of your analogy, then read what I said again.
I think then we both misunderstood both of our responses or worded them ambiguously :)
I am pretty happy with copyright law in general. There is enough protection that genuinely good creative folk can make a living on repeat fees. Anyone who disagrees is free to copy anything for personal use, and know they will never face prosecution. It just amazes me that there can be so much arguing about it.
Well, there never really was until technology advanced to the point where a cheap PC could host entire decades of music albums and singles etc. and the resulting sales figures falling off a cliff of nearly all media.
A large part of the problem is that back in 90s, this degree of copying wasn't possible so we really didn't mind paying for the games, unless you had an Amiga, although you still couldn't copy anywhere near today's potential. But now the genie is out of the bottle, and people are wondering how to either put it back in or figure a way to circumvent it in some way..
I think personally that now it really lies in the power of the individual to choose right from wrong, and companies should be trying to reward 'good' behaviour rather than alienating with draconian law, but as I say, there are some for whom only draconian laws will serve as prevention, and it's them who should be faulted for it when things go that way rather than defended as is more the case at the moment.
You're about to unleash a huge post all about how the law should change to suit one persons morals...
Here we go. Time after time you refused to justify your opinion, whereas I explained mine in detail. But go on, explain to me how writing a book somehow entitles you to much more money than a fireman who saves fifty lives, or why copyright should extend for three quarters of a century, or why a song writer should get money every time someone plays the song, but someone who builds a bridge gets isn't entitled to a payment when someone walks over the bridge.
You're about to unleash a huge post all about how the law should change to suit one persons morals...
Here we go. Time after time you refused to justify your opinion, whereas I explained mine in detail. But go on, explain to me how writing a book somehow entitles you to much more money than a fireman who saves fifty lives, or why copyright should extend for three quarters of a century, or why a song writer should get money every time someone plays the song, but someone who builds a bridge gets isn't entitled to a payment when someone walks over the bridge.
Because they are all completely different scenarios that are totally unrelated. BTW - going by your logic, a fireman should only be paid when he puts out a fire.
To be fair, the legal system has to have something to fill up it's time, it's not like burglaries are worth investigating, is it?
Not trying to add too much air to the fire, but when someone is trying to sell their novel or song for a living, having someone come along and copy it for free is in a sense theft in a similar way to burglary, at least those who get burgled earned the money to have the things to burgle in the first place. However, the closest analogy I can think of is a farmer, he owns a field that grows carrots, he didn't do anything really, they would have grown anyway and he doesn't even own the IP on carrots, why should he get anything more than the cost of seeds for the next season, or better yet, he should take the seeds from the crop he just planted and give the rest for free, right? He should allow us to go into his field and take what we want, that way we can feel good that we didn't really steal as it wasn't physically picking them up out of the store and walking out without paying..
The example of Douglas Adams making nothing on an LP is not a sound (no pun intended) position to argue that no-one should get paid at all, or to put it another way, everything should be free.
Is it really your opinion that it is immoral that someone wants, nay, expects, to be paid for the fruits of their (physical/mental) labour?
Eh? You've completely misunderstood my post. I mentioned burglaries as last week the British police said that they'd not be attending the majority of burglaries, due to budget cuts. This is despite the fact that for more than a decade they've frequently not bothered investigating many burglaries other than turning up once (and not finger printing, or actually going to see the people who the victims claim to be sure committed the burglary, etc). The real surprise is that now they've admitted it, and also (and very stupidly) told the burglars in effect that they are much less likely to be caught now.
And I mentioned Douglas Adams and co. getting ripped off over the album merely to support Joefish's point that the record industry is hugely corrupt. I certainly didn't mean either that Adams and co. deserved it, or that people shouldn't be paid for their work.
I do have disagreements with the copyright laws in some ways, but I do believe that everyone should be paid fairly for their work.
Ripping a cd onto your computer does not = mass copying though
Since I decided to get rid of my stereo system a couple of yrs ago my laptop's cd player has been the only cd player ive got. Subsequently ive ripped a lot of my cds to my laptop so i dont have to go through the hassle of loading them into the cd drawer and waiting for them to come up in windows media player each time.
...apparently that makes me a music pirating thief freeloader, enemy of artists and the industry?
I agree. I've bought music, films, ebooks, and games, and to me it's your moral right to use/view/play etc whatever you've honestly paid for, on any machine you like. That's why I love GOG (gog.com), as any game you buy is unprotected and you don't need to be online to play it (unless it's on an online game, of course!), so I can play the games at home on my desktop, and offline at work on my laptop. I also won't buy ebooks that have DRM, as I want to be able to view them on my PC or tablet. Same with other media that I pay for.
There's plenty of genuinely free music, books and films on the internet to demonstrate exactly how bl**dy awful the arts and media could be without any guaranteed revenue. How long exactly do you think a cinema would last just showing all the YouTube clips that don't have adverts on?
You're right of course, though perhaps using music and films as an example of quality when it's big budget is a bit of a stretch (rap and Hollywood, respectively...). A better example I think would be computer games. There are lots of free or shareware games, and most of them are simplistic 2D games (nothing wrong with that, of course, I'm just saying), often made by just one or two people. At the other end of the scale, you have games like the Arkham Series, the Grand Theft Auto series, the Elderscrolls series, etc, which give extremely detailed game world, which need a lot of people (a lot of talented people) devoting a lot of their time to. And nothing on that scale has been done, as far as I know, by unpaid volunteers.
There have been some large scale mods of other games, made by a large(ish) group of fans, who do it purely for love of the game, and don't make a penny from it. But most of these never get finished (or even properly started), and even then they mostly build on pre-existing work by using the game's engine/assets/world framework/etc.
Thankfully good quality 8 bit games made by small groups (or even one person) and released for free are not rare, partly since 8 bits can't support things such as real-time texture mapped open world cities, so the games don't aspire to that, but also because people who write for 8 bit games are naturally great! They don't have the "If it won't run at full speed, then no problem, the player can just buy a faster CPU/GPU or more RAM" mentality of modern programmers!
You're about to unleash a huge post all about how the law should change to suit one persons morals...
Here we go. Time after time you refused to justify your opinion, whereas I explained mine in detail. But go on, explain to me how writing a book somehow entitles you to much more money than a fireman who saves fifty lives, or why copyright should extend for three quarters of a century, or why a song writer should get money every time someone plays the song, but someone who builds a bridge gets isn't entitled to a payment when someone walks over the bridge.
Because they are all completely different scenarios that are totally unrelated. BTW - going by your logic, a fireman should only be paid when he puts out a fire.
No, I'm not saying that. I don't know how the present system should be improved. I just know that it's unfair at the moment and should be changed. You don't have to know how to fix something to be able to recognise when it's broken.
Based on whos morals? I guess that's why there is a difference between what the law says and what freeloaders want.
Is that aimed at my ""it's your moral right to use/view/play etc whatever you've honestly paid for, on any machine you like."? If so, then do you really think that if, for example, I own an album (an original physical copy, which I bought from Tesco), and I decide I want to listen to it on my mp3 player, that I should have to pay for the album again to buy it as mp3 files?
Based on whos morals? I guess that's why there is a difference between what the law says and what freeloaders want.
again, ripping a CD to your computer is not the same as freeloading/pirating/distributing
it makes about as much sense as Sellotape deciding that if you need to wrap 3 xmas presents you must buy 3 rolls of tape, otherwise you're breaking the law
I do have disagreements with the copyright laws in some ways, but I do believe that everyone should be paid fairly for their work.
Fairly according to your definition of course, because all artists/authors/actors/actresses are multi-millionaires and they should really get paid once for a book and then the rest given away for free. No, I think I understood your post and previous ones to understand your position.
I'm curious from a moral standpoint. What's worse me nicking an obscure album off the internet from 1981 that I will never ever be able to find a physical copy of in the shops, but because of "freeloading", "dirty thieving bastardry", "Piracy that's funding the criminal underworld" it's been preserved and many who missed out or may have never even heard of it have had a chance to enjoy it, and possibly been able to learn a little something about the music scene back when it came out through further research of the band and scene after listening to the title they've so disgustingly stolen.
The original author gets no money.
Or some some little twat on ebay who has a physical copy knows how rare it is and sells it for 150x what it was originally worth purposely for pure profit without ever enjoying the content.
The original author gets no money.
Now I understand regardless that the guy with the physical copy didn't break the law, because the disc/tape/vinyl was his to sell on, but I said moral standpoint not legal, what is right in this situation?
I'm more worried about the carrot situation. The poor farmers were on the news this morning protesting against supermarkets selling imported milk. Now their carrot's are going to be cloned.
I'm curious from a moral standpoint. What's worse me nicking an obscure album off the internet from 1981 that I will never ever be able to find a physical copy of in the shops, but because of "freeloading", "dirty thieving bastardry", "Piracy that's funding the criminal underworld" it's been preserved and many who missed out or may have never even heard of it have had a chance to enjoy it, and possibly been able to learn a little something about the music scene back when it came out through further research of the band and scene after listening to the title they've so disgustingly stolen.
The original author gets no money.
Or some some little twat on ebay who has a physical copy knows how rare it is and sells it for 150x what it was originally worth purposely for pure profit without ever enjoying the content.
The original author gets no money.
Now I understand regardless that the guy with the physical copy didn't break the law, because the disc/tape/vinyl was his to sell on, but I said moral standpoint not legal, what is right in this situation?
tbh if people want to pay silly amounts for out of print/deleted/rare records from a private seller then that's their decision so I don't see the problem there except for the seller being a tight-arse. I watched a mate bid £230 for a rare 12" a couple of yrs back, which probably cost a fiver when it was released. (it ended up going for something stupid like £300 and not to him), but it's his decision
with stuff that cannot be purchased at all because it is not for sale anywhere e.g. some obscure bolivian psychedelic reggae album from 1972 of which 50 copies were made, I reckon downloading it from a blog is not morally wrong. (especially if you make an effort to try and find somewhere selling it first)
I'm curious from a moral standpoint. What's worse me nicking an obscure album off the internet from 1981 that I will never ever be able to find a physical copy of in the shops, but because of "freeloading", "dirty thieving bastardry", "Piracy that's funding the criminal underworld" it's been preserved and many who missed out or may have never even heard of it have had a chance to enjoy it, and possibly been able to learn a little something about the music scene back when it came out through further research of the band and scene after listening to the title they've so disgustingly stolen.
The original author gets no money.
Or some some little twat on ebay who has a physical copy knows how rare it is and sells it for 150x what it was originally worth purposely for pure profit without ever enjoying the content.
The original author gets no money.
Now I understand regardless that the guy with the physical copy didn't break the law, because the disc/tape/vinyl was his to sell on, but I said moral standpoint not legal, what is right in this situation?
It's quite likely that the author got no money in the first place, that is something that is common to a lot of early-mid 80s hip hop. But the thing is, while it is true that they may not have gotten paid like Run DMC, there's not a lot to be made on a 500-1000 pressing, when you factor in manufacturing, studio time etc.. I don't think that some of the accusations leveled at record labels are always the result of greed etc., some stuff is rare because it didn't sell like Walk This Way, so you can't expect to become a millionaire by selling 1000 records, and neither is it likely that the label owner did either, in many cases they are the one's out of pocket. But now, with the things the way they are and attitudes as they stand, there's not even really much chance of that song selling a 1000 copies of anything with worldwide distribution as people will just grab it from Soundcloud or from a friend..
Before Serato/Virtual DJ/Ableton (google if unfamiliar), there was a brief renaissance of artists finding out, via the internet, that there was a demand for their thought to be forgotten music, so they would press up x-amount of copies on vinyl/CD and sell them as reissue/collector's items and they'd get bought by dj's, listeners and collector's alike, nowadays, you just have to find a vinyl rip at 320k or FLAC and you're good.. Sure the artist wasn't going to get rich from the rerelease, but that doesn't change the fact that maybe it was the first opportunity for them to actually make a bit of money from their work.
But your above example is basically why Sony & MS want to destroy the second hand market for games, it's become lucrative for certain retailers to keep buying back new old (old new?) stock for pennies and then resell it for more than their take on a new release is, and the second hand market is as old as antiques, but somehow things worked for all this time… I think the role of the price of new software needs re-evaluating, but as long as stuff gets torrented right off the bat software houses are going to just point to piracy as a justification for not bringing prices down, it is a bit of a stale mate and as I've said before, there is legit justification on the side of the consumer and provider.
The first part of the example is interesting and does show that preservation is a valid reason to make an exception to the rule, I think that WOS handles it well, it seeks permission and respects the 'no'. I don't see how much fairer it can get really, and the onus (note the 'o') should remain on those who seek to distribute copyright works to get permission.
>and accuse the people who put in the mental work as being the underserving bad guys ripping everyone off for wanting them to pay for the privilege
With all due respect, it is my firm belief that one is most certainly going to find the whole thing to be somewhat less of a problem overall provided their idea of creative effort doesn't, in fact, amount to trivial copypasta process like oh, I don't know, taking a decade long classic and adding wub wub sounds/facebook drama/whatnot
All in all, it is a good way of telling whether or not you've actually made something worthwhile I'd say
That depends, I'm not sure what you're talking about honestly, where does this sit with you in relation to your description?
But go on, explain to me how writing a book somehow entitles you to much more money than a fireman who saves fifty lives, or why copyright should extend for three quarters of a century, or why a song writer should get money every time someone plays the song, but someone who builds a bridge gets isn't entitled to a payment when someone walks over the bridge.
Simple - you make your own case.
If someone is paid by the council to build a bridge, at the end of it he hands it over to the council, they pay him out of the public purse, and allow the public (who paid for it) to walk over it freely all day and every day. If the bridge builder doesn't like those terms, then he doesn't take the contract and doesn't do the work. Just like you can commission someone to write or record a piece of music for you, then it's yours to do with as you please.
Alternatively, the bridge builder (with appropriate license) can fund the building of that bridge entirely himself, and then charge a toll for everyone who crosses it, and take the risk personally of ever making his money back. Just like any musician making his own recording and offering it for sale.
Are you going to argue that you have the right to run or drive over that bridge without paying the appropriate toll, simply because it's there?
'Entitlement' has nothing to do with the matter. Each party enters into production on the understanding that either a contract or the law will protect his intention to collect the appropriate revenue. You simply do not have the right to alter the terms under which he provides his services after the fact.
There's no obvious analogy to format-shifting there, so forget about that for the moment, but when you're talking about 'rights' and 'entitlements' that don't seem to fit with copyright law, you're mis-construing that you're trying to breach what is an inherent contract between provider and consumer. What you're actually doing is trying to assert 'rights' and 'entitlements' that you don't have.
As for who makes 'more' or 'less' money, that's irrelevant. If you take the risk, you reap the rewards. A fireman who hypothetically agrees to be paid on a per-fire basis is taking a risk he'll never be paid for years, or that he'll hit some irregular but massive bonuses. But most would rather take a steady income for being on watch. Just as any musician can take a semi-steady (but low) income as piano-player in a hotel or session musician to a recording studio, or can instead risk it all on a few big hits as a songwriter or in a band.
I do have disagreements with the copyright laws in some ways, but I do believe that everyone should be paid fairly for their work.
Fairly according to your definition of course, because all artists/authors/actors/actresses are multi-millionaires and they should really get paid once for a book and then the rest given away for free. No, I think I understood your post and previous ones to understand your position.
I never once implied that all artists are millionaires, as you'd know if you'd actually read my posts. Skimming through something then trying to post a clever reply really isn't a good idea, is it?
But since you feel the need to mock my opinion (even though you evidently don't understand it), then please explain to me why a singer deserves more money for recording one song (which they didn't even write, or play the music for) than a soldier gets for ten years of risking his life and then having his legs blown off?
As you'd know if you'd read my posts (a novel idea, I know), I'm not saying that the artists should not get paid, nor that a fairer method than the one we have now would be easy to implement, just that the present way is unfair. I'd be happy if copyright only existed for ten years, and afterwards the song/book/film/etc became public property. Surely ten years is enough for an artist to get repeated payments for something that they only did once?
Comments
In most cases I agree with what you are saying, the practical problem here though is that once these CDs have been ripped, they tend to end up on torrent sites.. It is not an easily solvable problem for all involved really.
Some would suggest it is better to keep 'home taping' or its modern day equivalent illegal to ensure major infractions are prosecuted and keep the threshold high so that it is frowned upon but not legally enforced, as has been the historical situation.
I guess to whichever degree, we are in agreement rather than not, and my point was aimed more at the freeloaders who take a high moralistic position to basically justify theft and accuse the people who put in the mental work as being the underserving bad guys ripping everyone off for wanting them to pay for the privilege.
We all agree that there are publishers that are crooks, there are judges who are bent, but that doesn't mean that justice as a concept is wrong, likewise for copyright protections, but those who would like to see a free for all would be motivated to make that argument nonetheless.
Maybe not for you personally, but it does open the doors for those who would engage in that activity, and that's the point.
I've done a similar thing, but then in a way you're not the target, or at least shouldn't be, it's complicated, but then I think more should be done to actually explain to people where they stand in the great scheme of things, that clarity would be beneficial for all I think.
No. No argument. I was just pointing out that the analogies used in these oh-so-productive copyright discussions on WoS are worthless.
I don't need to justify taking anything for free. If I want to, I will copy it, and won't be posting excuses online.
Human civilisation, and life itself, is based on copying and modifying ideas and information. This is my opinion. I am aware of all the arguments and other opinions, god knows we have seen them all enough times on WoS forum. I've never seen anyone change their stance / mind on either side, but seen plenty throw their toys out or flounce about it.
Stating that there would be 'no new movies, books, songs, video-games' without copyright protection, is a rather naive and under-thought one to enter into a WoS copyright debate. If that was just a back reference to my flippant dismissal of your analogy, then read what I said again.
I am pretty happy with copyright law in general. There is enough protection that genuinely good creative folk can make a living on repeat fees. Anyone who disagrees is free to copy anything for personal use, and know they will never face prosecution. It just amazes me that there can be so much arguing about it.
Or maybe I can put it in terms everyone can understand. You steal sweeties from the shop down the road - I don't care. I might have done so when I was a kid; though I admit nothing. You steal sweeties from my shop? I break your legs.
- IONIAN-GAMES.com -
The law is an ass in many ways.
With all due respect, it is my firm belief that one is most certainly going to find the whole thing to be somewhat less of a problem overall provided their idea of creative effort doesn't, in fact, amount to trivial copypasta process like oh, I don't know, taking a decade long classic and adding wub wub sounds/facebook drama/whatnot
All in all, it is a good way of telling whether or not you've actually made something worthwhile I'd say
Argument in the logical sense, not the Jerry Springer sense :)
It's not black and white, that I agree, I'm also very much for artistic freedom to use samples, which would seemingly be a hypocritical position - although I'm for compensation when there's a substantial sum gained from the reasonable use - for me it speaks to what you say about inspiration/modifying ideas.
I think then we both misunderstood both of our responses or worded them ambiguously :)
Well, there never really was until technology advanced to the point where a cheap PC could host entire decades of music albums and singles etc. and the resulting sales figures falling off a cliff of nearly all media.
A large part of the problem is that back in 90s, this degree of copying wasn't possible so we really didn't mind paying for the games, unless you had an Amiga, although you still couldn't copy anywhere near today's potential. But now the genie is out of the bottle, and people are wondering how to either put it back in or figure a way to circumvent it in some way..
I think personally that now it really lies in the power of the individual to choose right from wrong, and companies should be trying to reward 'good' behaviour rather than alienating with draconian law, but as I say, there are some for whom only draconian laws will serve as prevention, and it's them who should be faulted for it when things go that way rather than defended as is more the case at the moment.
shush it booze, trying to have a serious adult conversation about carrots here! :)
Here we go. Time after time you refused to justify your opinion, whereas I explained mine in detail. But go on, explain to me how writing a book somehow entitles you to much more money than a fireman who saves fifty lives, or why copyright should extend for three quarters of a century, or why a song writer should get money every time someone plays the song, but someone who builds a bridge gets isn't entitled to a payment when someone walks over the bridge.
Because they are all completely different scenarios that are totally unrelated. BTW - going by your logic, a fireman should only be paid when he puts out a fire.
Eh? You've completely misunderstood my post. I mentioned burglaries as last week the British police said that they'd not be attending the majority of burglaries, due to budget cuts. This is despite the fact that for more than a decade they've frequently not bothered investigating many burglaries other than turning up once (and not finger printing, or actually going to see the people who the victims claim to be sure committed the burglary, etc). The real surprise is that now they've admitted it, and also (and very stupidly) told the burglars in effect that they are much less likely to be caught now.
And I mentioned Douglas Adams and co. getting ripped off over the album merely to support Joefish's point that the record industry is hugely corrupt. I certainly didn't mean either that Adams and co. deserved it, or that people shouldn't be paid for their work.
I do have disagreements with the copyright laws in some ways, but I do believe that everyone should be paid fairly for their work.
I agree. I've bought music, films, ebooks, and games, and to me it's your moral right to use/view/play etc whatever you've honestly paid for, on any machine you like. That's why I love GOG (gog.com), as any game you buy is unprotected and you don't need to be online to play it (unless it's on an online game, of course!), so I can play the games at home on my desktop, and offline at work on my laptop. I also won't buy ebooks that have DRM, as I want to be able to view them on my PC or tablet. Same with other media that I pay for.
No I'm angry you lot were all listening to my old band for free on the radio the other day and I gained no revenue what so ever.
Although come to think of it....Maybe I should've paid you lot to listen to it ;)
these are your options:
DO NOTHING
SUE THE SCUM
SEND THE BOYS ROUND
BUY THE %^&*S OUT
)
yeah the whole argument in a nutshell basically!
Nah I'll just copyright the word Oaf, because apparently you can copyright a word you didn't invent these days, and I'll sue everybody who uses it.
I'll be rich I tells yer' RICH!!!!
You're right of course, though perhaps using music and films as an example of quality when it's big budget is a bit of a stretch (rap and Hollywood, respectively...). A better example I think would be computer games. There are lots of free or shareware games, and most of them are simplistic 2D games (nothing wrong with that, of course, I'm just saying), often made by just one or two people. At the other end of the scale, you have games like the Arkham Series, the Grand Theft Auto series, the Elderscrolls series, etc, which give extremely detailed game world, which need a lot of people (a lot of talented people) devoting a lot of their time to. And nothing on that scale has been done, as far as I know, by unpaid volunteers.
There have been some large scale mods of other games, made by a large(ish) group of fans, who do it purely for love of the game, and don't make a penny from it. But most of these never get finished (or even properly started), and even then they mostly build on pre-existing work by using the game's engine/assets/world framework/etc.
Thankfully good quality 8 bit games made by small groups (or even one person) and released for free are not rare, partly since 8 bits can't support things such as real-time texture mapped open world cities, so the games don't aspire to that, but also because people who write for 8 bit games are naturally great! They don't have the "If it won't run at full speed, then no problem, the player can just buy a faster CPU/GPU or more RAM" mentality of modern programmers!
No, I'm not saying that. I don't know how the present system should be improved. I just know that it's unfair at the moment and should be changed. You don't have to know how to fix something to be able to recognise when it's broken.
Is that aimed at my ""it's your moral right to use/view/play etc whatever you've honestly paid for, on any machine you like."? If so, then do you really think that if, for example, I own an album (an original physical copy, which I bought from Tesco), and I decide I want to listen to it on my mp3 player, that I should have to pay for the album again to buy it as mp3 files?
it makes about as much sense as Sellotape deciding that if you need to wrap 3 xmas presents you must buy 3 rolls of tape, otherwise you're breaking the law
Fairly according to your definition of course, because all artists/authors/actors/actresses are multi-millionaires and they should really get paid once for a book and then the rest given away for free. No, I think I understood your post and previous ones to understand your position.
The original author gets no money.
Or some some little twat on ebay who has a physical copy knows how rare it is and sells it for 150x what it was originally worth purposely for pure profit without ever enjoying the content.
The original author gets no money.
Now I understand regardless that the guy with the physical copy didn't break the law, because the disc/tape/vinyl was his to sell on, but I said moral standpoint not legal, what is right in this situation?
tbh if people want to pay silly amounts for out of print/deleted/rare records from a private seller then that's their decision so I don't see the problem there except for the seller being a tight-arse. I watched a mate bid £230 for a rare 12" a couple of yrs back, which probably cost a fiver when it was released. (it ended up going for something stupid like £300 and not to him), but it's his decision
with stuff that cannot be purchased at all because it is not for sale anywhere e.g. some obscure bolivian psychedelic reggae album from 1972 of which 50 copies were made, I reckon downloading it from a blog is not morally wrong. (especially if you make an effort to try and find somewhere selling it first)
It's quite likely that the author got no money in the first place, that is something that is common to a lot of early-mid 80s hip hop. But the thing is, while it is true that they may not have gotten paid like Run DMC, there's not a lot to be made on a 500-1000 pressing, when you factor in manufacturing, studio time etc.. I don't think that some of the accusations leveled at record labels are always the result of greed etc., some stuff is rare because it didn't sell like Walk This Way, so you can't expect to become a millionaire by selling 1000 records, and neither is it likely that the label owner did either, in many cases they are the one's out of pocket. But now, with the things the way they are and attitudes as they stand, there's not even really much chance of that song selling a 1000 copies of anything with worldwide distribution as people will just grab it from Soundcloud or from a friend..
Before Serato/Virtual DJ/Ableton (google if unfamiliar), there was a brief renaissance of artists finding out, via the internet, that there was a demand for their thought to be forgotten music, so they would press up x-amount of copies on vinyl/CD and sell them as reissue/collector's items and they'd get bought by dj's, listeners and collector's alike, nowadays, you just have to find a vinyl rip at 320k or FLAC and you're good.. Sure the artist wasn't going to get rich from the rerelease, but that doesn't change the fact that maybe it was the first opportunity for them to actually make a bit of money from their work.
But your above example is basically why Sony & MS want to destroy the second hand market for games, it's become lucrative for certain retailers to keep buying back new old (old new?) stock for pennies and then resell it for more than their take on a new release is, and the second hand market is as old as antiques, but somehow things worked for all this time… I think the role of the price of new software needs re-evaluating, but as long as stuff gets torrented right off the bat software houses are going to just point to piracy as a justification for not bringing prices down, it is a bit of a stale mate and as I've said before, there is legit justification on the side of the consumer and provider.
The first part of the example is interesting and does show that preservation is a valid reason to make an exception to the rule, I think that WOS handles it well, it seeks permission and respects the 'no'. I don't see how much fairer it can get really, and the onus (note the 'o') should remain on those who seek to distribute copyright works to get permission.
That depends, I'm not sure what you're talking about honestly, where does this sit with you in relation to your description?
If someone is paid by the council to build a bridge, at the end of it he hands it over to the council, they pay him out of the public purse, and allow the public (who paid for it) to walk over it freely all day and every day. If the bridge builder doesn't like those terms, then he doesn't take the contract and doesn't do the work. Just like you can commission someone to write or record a piece of music for you, then it's yours to do with as you please.
Alternatively, the bridge builder (with appropriate license) can fund the building of that bridge entirely himself, and then charge a toll for everyone who crosses it, and take the risk personally of ever making his money back. Just like any musician making his own recording and offering it for sale.
Are you going to argue that you have the right to run or drive over that bridge without paying the appropriate toll, simply because it's there?
'Entitlement' has nothing to do with the matter. Each party enters into production on the understanding that either a contract or the law will protect his intention to collect the appropriate revenue. You simply do not have the right to alter the terms under which he provides his services after the fact.
There's no obvious analogy to format-shifting there, so forget about that for the moment, but when you're talking about 'rights' and 'entitlements' that don't seem to fit with copyright law, you're mis-construing that you're trying to breach what is an inherent contract between provider and consumer. What you're actually doing is trying to assert 'rights' and 'entitlements' that you don't have.
As for who makes 'more' or 'less' money, that's irrelevant. If you take the risk, you reap the rewards. A fireman who hypothetically agrees to be paid on a per-fire basis is taking a risk he'll never be paid for years, or that he'll hit some irregular but massive bonuses. But most would rather take a steady income for being on watch. Just as any musician can take a semi-steady (but low) income as piano-player in a hotel or session musician to a recording studio, or can instead risk it all on a few big hits as a songwriter or in a band.
- IONIAN-GAMES.com -
I never once implied that all artists are millionaires, as you'd know if you'd actually read my posts. Skimming through something then trying to post a clever reply really isn't a good idea, is it?
But since you feel the need to mock my opinion (even though you evidently don't understand it), then please explain to me why a singer deserves more money for recording one song (which they didn't even write, or play the music for) than a soldier gets for ten years of risking his life and then having his legs blown off?
As you'd know if you'd read my posts (a novel idea, I know), I'm not saying that the artists should not get paid, nor that a fairer method than the one we have now would be easy to implement, just that the present way is unfair. I'd be happy if copyright only existed for ten years, and afterwards the song/book/film/etc became public property. Surely ten years is enough for an artist to get repeated payments for something that they only did once?