It's now illegal to turn on your computer

[Craig White]

On Sun, 2007-12-30 at 21:22 -0700, Joshua Zeidner wrote:
> On 12/30/07, Alan Dayley <alandd at consultpros.com> wrote:
> > Joshua Zeidner wrote:
> > --[clip good stuff]--
> > >   I haven't been appreciating Lawrence Lessig as of late, he appears
> > > to have sold out to some kind of academic or corporate interest.  A
> > > lot of relevant issues have been propping up, and Lessig hasn't said a
> > > word, instead he now concentrates on some kind of vague crusade
> > > against 'corruption'.  And he's supposed to be the vanguard of
> > > copyright issues on the net.
> > >
> > >   -jmz
> >
> > Lessig is still doing good things, he is just backing away from being
> > the "Free Culture poster child."  I think it is wise for him to do so.
> > The movement has to learn to go on without him.  Better now when they
> > can still get advice from him than after he is dead, or worse.
> >
> > Alan
> 
>   Fair enough, Alan.  At this point, I think the Free Culture
> advocates should have the basic issues pinned down: DRM, Cryptography
> rights, etc.  There is clearly a right-wing and left-wing emerging as
> well.
> 
>   left-wing:  all information and data is free to reproduce and has no
> ownership properties associated with it.  There are no natural rights
> to impose technological or legal restrictions on users or consumers.
> 
>   right-wing:  it is the responsiblity of the citizen and consumer to
> protect the 'natural' rights of the publisher with respects to
> copyright, patent, etc.
> 
>   I think that the issues tend to really heat up when it is examined
> /quantitatively/.  As most in the software world have experienced any
> idea you may have is probably already being worked on by someone,
> somewhere.  Claiming right of patent or copyright is almost an act of
> selfishness these days.  Because ultimately, whatever laws we put in
> place are presumably for the greater good, and that groups like the
> RIAA ultimately take the stance that what they are arguing for is a
> more productive and efficient society.  After all enforcing property
> rights does have a positive effect in some milieu.
----
forgetting the politics for a moment (and this is admittedly difficult
to do), the fact is that you can buy an awful lot of movies for a lot
less than you can buy most any CD. This is despite the fact that the
movie has to cost factors more to create and factors more to bring to
market (cd vs dvd).

The music industry is corrupt and few musicians get to reap the
financial rewards anyway...just ask John Fogerty

Craig