Why fund a cure for cancer when you can fight piracy?

[JetreL]

Originally Posted by tmiranda

Untrue. Theft of intellectual property is no different from theft of tangible property.

Theft of Intellectual is a big difference than theft of a physical property. It's much more complicated in defining exactly what is the intellectual property, who owns it, what is the value of the property, how to prove losses existing an potential and so on.

[stuckless]

Originally Posted by sic0048

What if I didn't actually create anything, but simply decided to distribute the formula across the internet for anyone to download and use for free? Would you still be so generous, or would you try and stop me?

Again, you are probably asking the wrong person Basically the questions boils down to this, which has nothing to do with copyright, would I be opposed to you sending my "magic cure" across the internet so that people could cure themselves. I'd be ok with that. Now, if any of those people are setting up shop and selling my cure... i'd shut them down, under the current laws. Granted, my personal feelings, is that people should have a fundamental right to medicine. That medicine is not only for people that afford to pay for it. I guess since you somehow infer that because I don't think that downloading equals loss at a 1-1 to ratio... it's ok for me to infer that you somehow only think that rich people should get access to medicine, or that when there is cure for cancer, that only those that can pay for it, should get it... and the rest should die... you know, survivial of the wealthiest...

Your point about "cures" does raise an interesting side debate. On one hand, it is argued that without strict IP laws there is no incentive for a company to actually find a cure for cancer, if another company can just rip it off. (they are covered today, without any changes)... But the interesting thing here, is that because of how the IP laws work, there is no incentive for a private company to market a cure for cancer that originates outside of their own research. ie, if some university lab finds a magic cure for cancer... then a drug company can't actually monetize that, and so, it may never get produced. Or if a university finds an "almost cure", but it still needs some extra research in order to make it work... then private drug companies still have no incentive to actually make a cure, because when they do make a cure, then need to sure, that they are the only ones that can make that cure.

BTW... the drug analogy is a little off... since you are sending my "recipe" for a cure instead of the cure itself.... so I guess it's more like someone sending the guitar tab for a song across the interent, instead of the song intself... but, that unfortunately is not legal either... we certainly don't want young kids learning how to play those latest trendy songs... they might start playing them in their livingroom in front on other people.... and that would be depriving the artists of several song sales (one for each person that listens to the person playing it)

My position on allowing people to use my "magic cure" for personal use, is not unlike some artists that feel that people should be able to share music... but they shouldn't be allowed to sell it.

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by sic0048

What if I didn't actually create anything, but simply decided to distribute the formula across the internet for anyone to download and use for free? Would you still be so generous, or would you try and stop me?

You're missing the point, actually a few. First, something like a cure for cancer would be Patented, not "Copyrighted". But more importanly is that it's already illegal. It's been illegal for years.

If Greg hacked into your computer and copies your cancer cure and distributes it on the internet for free, there are a number of existing laws already on the books that were broken in that process for which charges could be brought up and resulting in massive fines and jail time. All of which would be justified.

Now the question is is more needed. Should your ISP or Greg's ISP be held responsible for Greg's act? Should Greg's ISP be responsible (or even allowed) to monitor his use and proactively stop or report such activity?

Or take it a step further, what if you're looking for info, trailers, etc, some perfectly legal information about the next be blockbuster film that's just coming out in theaters and you accidentally find yourself on some website that is hosting illegal screeners rather than just trailers. Should you be reported by your big brother ISP for seeking out illegally distributed Copyrighted content?

If we want to take a bite out of Piracy, by all means lets have a public discussionabout it. Let's put things on the table like stepping up enforcement of current laws. Let's not sneak thing through in secret back room negotiations.

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by stuckless

But the interesting thing here, is that because of how the IP laws work, there is no incentive for a private company to market a cure for cancer that originates outside of their own research. ie, if some university lab finds a magic cure for cancer... then a drug company can't actually monetize that, and so, it may never get produced. Or if a university finds an "almost cure", but it still needs some extra research in order to make it work... then private drug companies still have no incentive to actually make a cure, because when they do make a cure, then need to sure, that they are the only ones that can make that cure.

Way, way OT, but absolutely there is incentive. If a university lab accidentally finds a cure for cancer, they have incentive to sell/license that to a pharmecutical company, and in turn the pharmecutical company to make and market it. It's win, win, win, the university gets a great source of funding, the pharmecutical company gets to make money (with little or no development cost) selling the drug, and cancer patients get a cure.

Just because you're a university doesn't mean you can't make money. When I was in college it was brought up that yes any invention created during a class (for example) or research belonged to the university, but that definitely didn't mean it couldn't be sold/licensed to private companies, quite the contrary.

[Djc208]

Originally Posted by sic0048

So if you find a cure for cancer and have the "magic formula" saved on a hard drive somewhere, I can copy that formula and use it without your permission and you would be OK with that? After all, your "inventory" hasn't been reduced any and I didn't steal the actual medicine after it was manufactured, so according to your arguement I've done nothing wrong.

It depends. If you have a patent filing on the cure then that data is publicly available anyway and he can make a million copies of it if he wishes. If you are allowed to use that information to produce the cure, even if only for your own purposes (assuming you could), is a different issue. Obviously you cannot sell that cure to other people.

Now if it was private data on a computer inside the business and you stole a copy physically or electronicaly then that is theft and there are already laws for that. However if that data is spead all over the internet do you still have the right to sue me for having or using it if there were no official documentation of it being protected?

The argument isn't that a person copying an MP3 or movie from another person isn't piracy, it's if you copying that file from your computer to your MP3 player, or sharing it on your private home network is also piracy. The media companies say yes, and they want the government to spend large amounts of manpower and money to find and punish those people.

I think the best resistance we have is that this agreement is basically trying to get other countries to enact and enforce the same IP protection requirements as the US, where the media companies do not have the pull they do here.

[sic0048]

Originally Posted by stanger89

You're missing the point, actually a few. First, something like a cure for cancer would be Patented, not "Copyrighted". But more importanly is that it's already illegal. It's been illegal for years.

I realize this topic has morphed a little since it started, but if you look at my original comments, my argument was directed towards those that said the government shouldn't be involved with any attempt to curb piracy. I think we are beginning to split hairs here when really we are trying to say effectively the same thing......

[tmiranda]

OK, last time I'll bite on this.

Originally Posted by JetreL

Theft of Intellectual is a big difference than theft of a physical property. It's much more complicated in defining exactly what is the intellectual property, who owns it, what is the value of the property, how to prove losses existing an potential and so on.

Are you kidding or are you trying to justify theft to yourself? If I write a song and decide to sell it for $x and you download it and listen to it for free, you have stolen it. How can that be any more clear?

The real question is how serious of a crime is it and to what extent should to government go to stop "casual" piracy. I'm actually with stuckless and many others on that point, the government has bigger fish to fry and should not spend my tax dollars setting up agencies and "secret police" to stop my 10 year old daughter from downloading Hannah Montana songs.

[sic0048]

Originally Posted by Djc208

The argument isn't that a person copying an MP3 or movie from another person isn't piracy, it's if you copying that file from your computer to your MP3 player, or sharing it on your private home network is also piracy. The media companies say yes, and they want the government to spend large amounts of manpower and money to find and punish those people.

While I will again go on record that I am against this treaty, that type of "piracy" isn't what this treaty would combat. Even if every portion of this treaty goes into effect, companies and the government would not be in any better position to find, charge, and prosecute those individuals.

Originally Posted by Djc208

I think the best resistance we have is that this agreement is basically trying to get other countries to enact and enforce the same IP protection requirements as the US, where the media companies do not have the pull they do here.

Like this article about India. I agree. I think some of the ideas from the proposed India laws are better; like the ones that better define "fair use" and specifically say that copying media for personal use is legal.

[PGPfan]

Originally Posted by tmiranda

Untrue. Theft of intellectual property is no different from theft of tangible property.

As stanger89 has tried to explain as well, there IS a difference - and I stand by my statements that downloading isn't the same as stealing from a bank. I do believe that IP should be enforced (which there are already laws to do, again as has been pointed out) but casual copyright infringement (a more politically correct description) isn't at all like stealing from a bank. Sorry, that logic just isn't....logical.

-PGPfan

[sic0048]

Originally Posted by PGPfan

As stanger89 has tried to explain as well, there IS a difference - and I stand by my statements that downloading isn't the same as stealing from a bank. I do believe that IP should be enforced (which there are already laws to do, again as has been pointed out) but casual copyright infringement (a more politically correct description) isn't at all like stealing from a bank. Sorry, that logic just isn't....logical.

-PGPfan

I guess there are just two "world views" in play here.

Personally I believe in the wikipedia definition of theft. "In criminal law, theft is the illegal taking of another person's property without that person's freely-given consent. "

There are others here trying to argue that there is some "scale" that comes into play when dealing with theft. If the item taken is small or perceived as invaluable, then that doesn't count as theft or perhaps it is some justifyable form of theft.

[Djc208]

[QUOTE=sic0048;419315]While I will again go on record that I am against this treaty, that type of "piracy" isn't what this treaty would combat. Even if every portion of this treaty goes into effect, companies and the government would not be in any better position to find, charge, and prosecute those individuals.

They did remove the ability to do random searches of your personal electronic devices for pirated media, but that had been part of the earlier versions that would have done just that.

True, this is more defining fair use than stoping piracy. But I would argue the "immenent intent" portion of the proposed ruling is more than vauge enough to allow for this type of enforcement, and the ISP monitoring could easly rat you out.

"You have a program which lets you record and transmit video content content to other computers [Sage TV], media devices, or burn it to media that could be illegally distributed. We know because the ISP showed us your internet traffic and we saw you using placeshifter." They could demand legal action be taken. Sure it could be thrown out of court but you probably wouldn't financially survive the case.

[stuckless]

Originally Posted by stanger89

Way, way OT, but absolutely there is incentive. If a university lab accidentally finds a cure for cancer, they have incentive to sell/license that to a pharmecutical company, and in turn the pharmecutical company to make and market it. It's win, win, win, the university gets a great source of funding, the pharmecutical company gets to make money (with little or no development cost) selling the drug, and cancer patients get a cure.

Just because you're a university doesn't mean you can't make money. When I was in college it was brought up that yes any invention created during a class (for example) or research belonged to the university, but that definitely didn't mean it couldn't be sold/licensed to private companies, quite the contrary.

I agree with you (on both counts , ie way OT, and there is still value). I was just stating, in a nutshell, the arguments that I've heard on both sides.

[stuckless]

Originally Posted by sic0048

There are others here trying to argue that there is some "scale" that comes into play when dealing with theft. If the item taken is small or perceived as invaluable, then that doesn't count as theft or perhaps it is some justifyable form of theft.

I guess I don't see it that way. I personally think that downloading is breaking the law, and is wrong, in the same way that speeding is breaking the law and is wrong. From there we can diverge into all sorts of moralistic discussions on how downloading is more or less wrong than speeding... or how downloading is more or less wrong than ripping a dvd your bought to your computer. Even more interesting is trying to determine whether or not the song my child infringed, resulted in a loss of revenue, whereby 1 downloaded song equals 1 lost sale... that some people subscribe to.

Again, it's still wrong, but if we state that infringing a song at 1 dollar is the same as stealing 1 dollar from the bank, then that's the real debate on copyright infringement... not whether it's right or wrong. I would argue that most people that download stuff or rip dvds (in countries where fair use has eroded), would agree that it's wrong, but they probably won't agree whether or not it resulted in loss of revenue.

Since the argument the content providers make, in order to lobby the govt, is not that downloading is wrong, but instead that it results in a direct loss of a 1-1 sale, then it's valid to focus on this within a debate.

[JetreL]

Originally Posted by tmiranda

Are you kidding or are you trying to justify theft to yourself? If I write a song and decide to sell it for $x and you download it and listen to it for free, you have stolen it. How can that be any more clear?

How is someone downloading music or a movie off the Internet any different than recording broad casted videos or radio and using it later?Think about what forum we are in?? The only difference that I see is the fact that it is not an authorized outlet granted by the copyright holder and if the copyright holder had their way they would DRM and lock down absolutely everything to a point that their content was practically impossible to use on more than one medium at a time. What do you think is one of Sage's biggest selling points is? A DVR that offers DRM-less content that has tons of features.

Originally Posted by tmiranda

The real question is how serious of a crime is it and to what extent should to government go to stop "casual" piracy. I'm actually with stuckless and many others on that point, the government has bigger fish to fry and should not spend my tax dollars setting up agencies and "secret police" to stop my 10 year old daughter from downloading Hannah Montana songs.

The real culprit is sharing the data and loss of revenue not to mention bootlegging . Years ago when I worked an an ISP the FBI would not investigate an issue unless it reached a certain dollar amount. I am sure this is still true.

I am really not trying to argue with you I was just saying:

Originally Posted by JetreL

Theft of Intellectual is a big difference than theft of a physical property. It's much more complicated in defining exactly what is the intellectual property, who owns it, what is the value of the property, how to prove losses existing an potential and so on.

[sic0048]

Originally Posted by stuckless

I guess I don't see it that way. I personally think that downloading is breaking the law, and is wrong, in the same way that speeding is breaking the law and is wrong. From there we can diverge into all sorts of moralistic discussions on how downloading is more or less wrong than speeding... or how downloading is more or less wrong than ripping a dvd your bought to your computer. Even more interesting is trying to determine whether or not the song my child infringed, resulted in a loss of revenue, whereby 1 downloaded song equals 1 lost sale... that some people subscribe to.

Again, it's still wrong, but if we state that infringing a song at 1 dollar is the same as stealing 1 dollar from the bank, then that's the real debate on copyright infringement... not whether it's right or wrong. I would argue that most people that download stuff or rip dvds (in countries where fair use has eroded), would agree that it's wrong, but they probably won't agree whether or not it resulted in loss of revenue.

So we both agree that downloading stuff is wrong.

But to those that say that stealing a $1 song doesn't necessarily result in a $1 loss of revenue, I say it doesn't matter. The point is that people download illegal material from the internet because they want it. Sure, they probably wouldn't ever buy the material anyway, but that has no place the in argument.

Would any other type of thief go out and buy every item they steal? Of course not, but we don't claim that stealing a bike isn't wrong because the thief would have never gone out and bought the bike themselves. If you steal a bike, it is wrong whether or not it resulted in a loss of sale or not. The same applies to digital media. What I don't understand is why it is so hard for some people to come to this same conclusion.

[sic0048]

Originally Posted by JetreL

How is someone downloading music or a movie off the Internet any different than recording broad casted videos or radio and using it later?Think about what forum we are in??

I am really not trying to argue with you I was just saying:

Not to argue either, but the answer is because the courts have already decided (in the big Sony betamax suit) that a user is legally allowed to record broadcast material and view it later for personal use. Now if you decided to further distribute the material, then there would be a problem.

If you are downloading the material from the legal owner (like viewing a show on NBC.com) then that isn't illegal either because the legal owner consented to that use.

[MeInMaui]

The problem here isn't the downloading part, it's the redistribution. That is where the copyright infringement occurs, and what the ridiculously huge civil awards are for.

If you want to treat downloading as theft, then it should be governed by the same laws, subject to the same rules of evidence and have commensurate penalties. But that doesn't address the issue of redistribution at all.

There was no real point here. I just felt like jumping in and stirring the pot.

Aloha,
Mike

[JetreL]

Originally Posted by sic0048

What I don't understand is why it is so hard for some people to come to this same conclusion.

It's simple popular opinion is that downloading music/videos off the Internet is an acceptable crime because the benefits out weigh the risk. Same goes for speeding. I am pretty sure that I do it everyday, I don't want a ticket but I really don't care if I get a ticket The increase in insurance and cost of the ticket while hurts it doesn't out weight the fact that I want to get somewhere quicker. The people passing me on the interstate are probably subconsciously thinking the exact same thing.

I agree with this:

Originally Posted by MeInMaui

The problem here isn't the downloading part, it's the redistribution. That is where the copyright infringement occurs, and what the ridiculously huge civil awards are for.

[brainbone]

Originally Posted by sic0048

Personally I believe in the wikipedia definition of theft. "In criminal law, theft is the illegal taking of another person's property without that person's freely-given consent. "

Copyright infringement != theft. This doesn't mean it isn't wrong, but it is different from theft. IP is not physical property, and is treated differently than physical property (nothing to "believe" or "disbelieve" here, it is just the way it is.) With copyright infringement you are using the IP in a way you are not licensed to. Theft, you are physically taking something that does not belong to you. A copyright holder does not own the electrons, paper, or other media that holds the IP -- instead they control how the information contained may be used, how many copies you may make, etc.

Say you physically made an exact duplicate of your neighbors lawnboy lawn mower (yes, I know, but stay with me.) Have you now stolen from lawnboy? No. You certainly may have violated patents that lawnboy holds on that mower, but you are not guilty of theft.

Again, I'm not saying copyright infringement isn't a bad thing, but to avoid confusion, it should be called what it its.

[stuckless]

Originally Posted by sic0048

So we both agree that downloading stuff is wrong.

I agree that downloading stuff in the US is probably wrong In Canada we actually pay a blank levy tax, which sort of allows us to download music onto that media, since we have already paid a levy to the content creators. It hasn't been tested in court, but it's the primary reason that customers are not being sued in Canada... yet.

Would any other type of thief go out and buy every item they steal? Of course not, but we don't claim that stealing a bike isn't wrong because the thief would have never gone out and bought the bike themselves. If you steal a bike, it is wrong whether or not it resulted in a loss of sale or not. The same applies to digital media. What I don't understand is why it is so hard for some people to come to this same conclusion.

Agreed stealing a bike is wrong, and it's theft, since there can be only one instance of the bike. But if you used you star trek replicator, and replicated a bike (you know you want one, replicator that is, my bike is crap), then I still have my bike... and well, so do you

Originally Posted by MeInMaui

If you want to treat downloading as theft, then it should be governed by the same laws, subject to the same rules of evidence and have commensurate penalties. But that doesn't address the issue of redistribution at all.

There was no real point here. I just felt like jumping in and stirring the pot.

We are always glad to have you join in and stir And I totally agree with your sentiments.