Anarchy is not this society

[Raize]

@Maxliberty

Here is where we differ. I believe contracts are fundamental to a society. Not only do I have the right to decide who I give my music too but I can contract with them and impose restrictions on the use of that information. That contract is no different than any other contract. I can sell you a hammer with the contractual restriction that you only pound nails with it. The hammer is still your property but has agreed upon restrictions for its use. I can sell you a piece of land with building restrictions.

If I sell you a pencil and we contractually agree that you will only use the pencil to write on white paper then that is the agreement you have made and the use of the pencil is restricted to that. I have not forced you to buy the pencil, your rights have not been violated.

Kinsella even spoke of this in his piece.

Imagine you give me that pencil, tell me that I can’t use it to write on white paper. I then break the contract and write on 50 pieces of white paper, sending 49 to friends and holding on to the one piece of paper. Kinsella made the point that, sure, you can hold the original copyright violator, me, accountable in a practical manner, but how are you going to pursue the 49 other fraudulent pieces of paper?

In a modern computer-affluent society, the practical application of enforcement becomes even more unlikely, because you’re not just looking at a determinable number of copies anymore, you’re now looking at an indefinite number of copies on the computers of an indefinite number of people.

Let me ask you this: How many people have pirated the computer game Fallout 3? You could look at the number of seeds for a torrent of the game, you could even potentially determine the likely downloaders from an IRC channel. Hell, you could search for an MD5 checksum on all the computers in the world if you had the right tools and everyone in the world somehow agreed to trusted computing. But the fact of the matter is, one individual can change a single bit and keep the entirety of the “practical theft” outside your knowledge even in such a draconian society. And I haven’t even covered the people who mod their Xboxes to pirate the console version!

Making this example more relevant, go back to the pencil. Imagine I died of natural causes. You don’t know if there are 4, 49, or 499 pieces of white paper I’ve written on. What do you tell the person who sold me the pencil?

If you’re an enforcer of IP, there will come a point where you tell the copyright holder “that’s all I can do.” While it may seem like you’ve gotten some vindication going after the original contract violator, there’s a point where you will come to realize that IP isn’t scarce, and thus cannot be property.

This is a debate that probably harkens back to the first cave paintings depicting how to take down an antelope while putting one’s self in the least harm and one clan using the knowledge gained from such a painting to outsurvive the rival clan, of which the original painter was a member. The clan that won wasn’t necessarily the brightest, but it most certainly was the better at adopting the advice of the painting. Evolution won.

Arguments since then in favor of IP have merely been from clans trying to prevent other clans from obtaining the same knowledge. This is protectionism, racketeering, and other vile things that we only associate with a statist government. To see an anarchist propose that we should have enforcement of intellectual property is quite ridiculous.

[CurtHowland]

@PeterWellington

But this model just isn’t as profitable in many cases.

Yes, we’ve been over that before. Since you’re repeating your prior point, I will also repeat my prior point: Just because someone makes lots of money utilizing copyright and patent, it doesn’t change my opinion that copyright and patent are generally destructive.

Ah, but you didn’t say copyright or patent, you said “commercial”.

Which brings me back, again, to yet another repetition: I’m not arguing with you. I’m not contradicting you. I’m not even addressing your assertion that, for whatever reason, “commercial” software generates more money than “OpenSource”.

I consider the entire argument irrelevant to the point: Without copyright and patent, software will still get written. Anarchy works, every day.

Now if what you want to do is argue the merits of proprietary vs. OpenSource software development, there’s a Google Video of one of the Google Tech Talks you might want to look for, entitled something like "Rate of change in the Linux kernel"… Ah, here it is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2SED6sewRw

I’m not a developer, I’m a user. I’ve done a lot of technical support, helpdesk and such. I agree that people just want their stuff to work. I also know what works for me, and I’m very happy to let other people use what works for them. The limits of my “argumentation” concerning relative development model efficiencies are extremely limited, and if you’ve read the published works of Eric S. Raymond and seen the video above, you’ve already heard anything I might come up with.

What method someone uses to release their code is up to them. I object to coercion, and copyright and patent are coercion because they are forced on *un-*willing parties, unlike contracts and licenses. Telling someone else they have to release their code one way or another is also coercion, which is my fundamental and irreconsilable difference with Stallman.

@PeterWellington

Take a look at all of the software products you have installed on your computer. How many of them have you needed to use customer service for, and how often?

Many, although after 13 years of running Debian Sid, far less now than before. My “customer service” has been the Debian-User and other community mailing lists and resources. Before that, and even now, my major support network is other users.

No one I know has ever paid for a call to Microsoft, although I did work for technical support at Apple and know some other folks who still do.

What I can say is that if I were in a position where downtime was money, I would pay for service gladly. Whether that service was the commercial software company or ad-hoc team that wrote the software, a contract service company or an in-house programmer is again irrelevant to the issue of copyright and patent.

Irrelevant, except that without restrictive copyright and patent (whether by lack of those laws or the use of OpenSource) my options as to what service I choose to use increases. I like that increase, which is why my preference is to use OpenSource code and either pay the original developers for changes I need or have an in-house nerd.

@PeterWellington

They’re even starting to embrace open source (http://www.microsoft.com/opensource/) and have even left their own source code open for debugging (Visual Studio). I see it as providing for the demand of open and free, and at the same time providing for users who want more and are willing to pay more.

And I see it as nothing but a scam. As a long-time user of actual OpenSource code, Microsoft’s overtures are obvious for their single overriding purpose: Vendor Lock-In. Oh sure, they say they like open code, but they only like it running on Windows. Their examples of “good” OpenSource code are limited to middle-ware, running on Windows and using Microsoft’s protocols. They have made this abundantly clear to anyone looking.

Microsoft is a sinking ship in a sea of change that they cannot keep up with. Either they will change themselves, or they will fail. So far, I see a lot of chairs flying but no substantive change. Where is MS-Office for *NIX?

The Microsoft example is excellent, if what you’re trying to do for me is present me with yet more examples of why I left proprietary code far behind years ago. I like my free software actually free as in libre, thank you.

[Maxliberty]

@Raize

Kinsella even spoke of this in his piece.

Imagine you give me that pencil, tell me that I can’t use it to write on white paper. I then break the contract and write on 50 pieces of white paper, sending 49 to friends and holding on to the one piece of paper. Kinsella made the point that, sure, you can hold the original copyright violator, me, accountable in a practical manner, but how are you going to pursue the 49 other fraudulent pieces of paper?

I have never written anything suggesting that the other 49 people have violated anything. What I have consistently said is that the contract that is made with the original buyer is valid and enforceable. If we agree on that then there is no disagreement and we would expect that contracts will be one tool used in a free market to protect IP.

@Raize

If you’re an enforcer of IP, there will come a point where you tell the copyright holder “that’s all I can do.” While it may seem like you’ve gotten some vindication going after the original contract violator, there’s a point where you will come to realize that IP isn’t scarce, and thus cannot be property.

Here you contradict yourself. You seem to say that by defintion the contract would be invalid because it is not property. If it is not property why are people paying for it? If it’s not scarce that would imply that you already had access to the information which would make me ask why are you buying something you claim to already have? The only logical conclusion is that you are buying something you do not have, so by definition it is scarce. That is why price is such an excellent indicator that something is property.

@Raize

Arguments since then in favor of IP have merely been from clans trying to prevent other clans from obtaining the same knowledge.

How are your rights being violated by me trying to keep you from having a certain piece of information that I have? Information/knowledge either has to be created internally or provided by an external source. If you create the knowledge internally or it is given without restriction it is yours to do with as you please. If you purchase the knowledge via contract then you are bound by the terms and penalties of the contract. If you agree with this then we have no disagreement.

[Maxliberty]

@CurtHowland

What method someone uses to release their code is up to them. I object to coercion, and copyright and patent are coercion because they are forced on *un-*willing parties, unlike contracts and licenses.

From what I undestand of Peter’s arguement then you are in complete agreement. The free-market is free to try and establish ways to protect their IP and contracts can be one valid form of doing so. Thats it, that is the whole point.

[CurtHowland]

@Maxliberty

That’s it, that is the whole point.

12 pages of fuss for that?

[liberty_student]

@PeterWellington

This is where our opinions diverge. I buy a ton of books. I would say that for 95% of them, the only thing I really want is that book, and I can’t really think of anything else the publisher could do to get me to buy their version over a basic copy for half the price. The core content of the book represents most of the value, at least to me, but I’m sure I’m not alone in that.

I think Jeffrey Tucker has made the point that Mises sells more books by having online and ebook copies available. If you are like me, it is hard to read ebooks, I prefer the physical thing, and will pay for it.

Sure you can’t think of what the publisher could offer you. Except feeding the author and giving them the rewards and resources to produce more books.

You already know what the incentives for buying from the creator are, you’ve been arguing it in this thread. Now suddenly you’re saying that without law, you would act in an opposite manner to your current position? You would buy the cheap no-name book rather than reward the creator? Come come now.

[CurtHowland]

@liberty student

I think Jeffrey Tucker has made the point that Mises sells more books by having online and ebook copies available.

Yep. He said that every time they put a title online “gratis”, sales of the dead-tree versions increase substantially.

There’s also the example of the Baen Free Library, easily reached from Baen.com. I’ve bought several books from them after finding that I like them by downloading.

Shareware, “listener supported radio” like WCPE.org, examples abound.

[Raize]

@Maxliberty

I have never written anything suggesting that the other 49 people have violated anything. What I have consistently said is that the contract that is made with the original buyer is valid and enforceable. If we agree on that then there is no disagreement and we would expect that contracts will be one tool used in a free market to protect IP.

We don’t agree on that, I just wanted to get that point out there. If you’re not going to punish the other 49, it matters because now they’ll “sell” the same item or give it away for free, which means we’re not even talking about intellectual property anymore, we’re taking about contract law.

@Maxliberty

Here you contradict yourself. You seem to say that by defintion the contract would be invalid because it is not property. If it is not property why are people paying for it? If it’s not scarce that would imply that you already had access to the information which would make me ask why are you buying something you claim to already have? The only logical conclusion is that you are buying something you do not have, so by definition it is scarce. That is why price is such an excellent indicator that something is property.

First off, it’s not property, what you’re talking about is a contract for a service. There is information gained just by the very nature of the transaction. The transaction COULD NOT happen without this information being passed. Whatever restrictions you put on the service taking place is moot because by the very nature of performing the service you’re giving these away.

Imagine buying goods at a grocery store where the goods all came with the requirement that you cannot reveal the price of the goods to anyone. Such a store wouldn’t get very many customers you might say, which is why we don’t have such stores now. You’d be correct, which is why I don’t see why the government (or corporation) should enforce such an arrangement. There are inseperable attributes associated with the purchase of the goods or services that are simply unenforceable to keep private.

To argue that there should be a market for these inseparable attributes is to make scarcity where there is none.

@Maxliberty

How are your rights being violated by me trying to keep you from having a certain piece of information that I have? Information/knowledge either has to be created internally or provided by an external source. If you create the knowledge internally or it is given without restriction it is yours to do with as you please. If you purchase the knowledge via contract then you are bound by the terms and penalties of the contract. If you agree with this then we have no disagreement.

Because you just sold it to me. You’re saying I don’t have the right to distribute, but I do and I can and I will. You can’t just limit someone’s liberty because you want to, even if you do have a contract. Why else do you think we argue against the institution of government?

Imagine this, you sell me that pencil and one of the 49 people gives you a copy of the white paper I wrote on. You come arrest me. I never wrote that, I say, and besides his word against mine, you really don’t know if I did write it. What if my son wrote it? His intent wasn’t to violate the contract. What if someone stole the pencil from me? But maybe I’d be responsible because you put the clause in there that I was responsible under any circumstances. Now you’re getting into types of contract law that are essentially a recreation of the government you’d argue shouldn’t exist.

We simply cannot have intellectual property laws, the only way scarcity exists for it is because an enforcing body deems it so.

[PeterWellington]

@Raize

Imagine you give me that pencil, tell me that I can’t use it to write on white paper. I then break the contract and write on 50 pieces of white paper, sending 49 to friends and holding on to the one piece of paper. Kinsella made the point that, sure, you can hold the original copyright violator, me, accountable in a practical manner, but how are you going to pursue the 49 other fraudulent pieces of paper?

This is the exact problem I believe the free market will come up with more effective solutions for. They don’t need to (nor can they) stop this type of thing completely. The only thing they can do is try to find the protection scheme(s) that maximize their long-term profits. You brought up the XBOX but I think that’s actually a great example of what I’m talking about. Sure, there’s modding and copying going on, but for most users it’s just not worth the cost, inconvenience, and risk. If MS spent billions more on ridiculously restrictive hardware/software then they’d start losing money. But what do you think would happen to their profits if anyone could just copy cds and run them without any mods?

It seems that most people on this thread are fixating on the copyright and patent laws (which I also disagree with), but aren’t really looking at how antitrust and anticompetitive laws restrict the way in which companies can cooperate with one another. Companies would be prosecuted for collusion, monopolistic practices, etc. in many cases if they tried to come up with cooperative solutions.

The main focus of a company should be adding value to the products and services they offer their customers. But to ignore the effects of pirating is to diminish the return on the value you’re providing.

[Maxliberty]

@Raize

First off, it’s not property, what you’re talking about is a contract for a service. There is information gained just by the very nature of the transaction. The transaction COULD NOT happen without this information being passed. Whatever restrictions you put on the service taking place is moot because by the very nature of performing the service you’re giving these away.

You are not making sense here. If I am selling you a piece of information then the other information you may gain from the transaction for example the price is not the information being restricted.

@Raize

Because you just sold it to me. You’re saying I don’t have the right to distribute, but I do and I can and I will.

Then contracts don’t mean anything. What your saying is that no one is capable of following the terms of a contract that require them to take some sort of physical action or in some cases not take a physical action.

@Raize

Imagine this, you sell me that pencil and one of the 49 people gives you a copy of the white paper I wrote on. You come arrest me. I never wrote that, I say, and besides his word against mine, you really don’t know if I did write it. What if my son wrote it? His intent wasn’t to violate the contract. What if someone stole the pencil from me?

This all irrelevant with regards to the priniciple of enforcement of contracts.

[liberty_student]

No one is ignoring the consequences of government regulation.

@PeterWellington

But to ignore the effects of pirating is to diminish the return on the value you’re providing.

It’s only piracy if you can establish that IP is property. Non-property cannot be stolen. We’re talking in circles here.

[PeterWellington]

@CurtHowland

Without copyright and patent, software will still get written.

I’ve never disagreed with that.

I could also say that without today’s police and courts, there would be order in anarchy, but we’d still have police and courts in some form. The implementation would be different, but the functions they perform would still be there. In the same sense, companies will still want to protect their investments in a free market.

@CurtHowland

And I see it as nothing but a scam. As a long-time user of actual OpenSource code, Microsoft’s overtures are obvious for their single overriding purpose: Vendor Lock-In.

Of course they’re trying to attract and lock in customers, but they’re not using force to do it, and this isn’t unique to the software industry. It’s up to the customer, and many have freely decided it’s in their best interest. I wouldn’t call it a scam, there’s nothing fraudulent about it.

[Raize]

@Maxliberty

You are not making sense here. If I am selling you a piece of information then the other information you may gain from the transaction for example the price is not the information being restricted.

Then contracts don’t mean anything. What your saying is that no one is capable of following the terms of a contract that require them to take some sort of physical action or in some cases not take a physical action.

Here, let me sell you this banana, but you can’t throw away the peel.

@Maxliberty

This all irrelevant with regards to the priniciple of enforcement of contracts.

Wait a minute now, I brought up a point and you just cast it aside? Care to explain why? Who is at fault and what is the point of contracts that limit liberty if not protectionism and racketeering? Isn’t it you that is trying to make the point that there can be intellectual property in an anarcho-capitalist society?

[Raize]

@PeterWellington

Of course they’re trying to attract and lock in customers, but they’re not using force to do it …

Litigation of copyright violations on customers and third-party vendors isn’t using force? That’s news to me.

[PeterWellington]

@liberty student

I think Jeffrey Tucker has made the point that Mises sells more books by having online and ebook copies available. If you are like me, it is hard to read ebooks, I prefer the physical thing, and will pay for it.

I do too, but I was talking about physical copy vs. physical copy. I’m sorry if I didn’t make that clear.

@liberty student

Sure you can’t think of what the publisher could offer you. Except feeding the author and giving them the rewards and resources to produce more books.

You already know what the incentives for buying from the creator are, you’ve been arguing it in this thread. Now suddenly you’re saying that without law, you would act in an opposite manner to your current position? You would buy the cheap no-name book rather than reward the creator? Come come now.

A publisher like the Mises Institute is near and dear to my heart, so I’m willing to shell out the extra cash. But this is the exception, not the rule. Most of the time I just don’t have any personal attachments to the author or publisher. Honestly, I’d rather save hundreds or even thousands of dollars now than worry about the long term success of those companies, and the value they may or may not provide me with in the future. I’m definitely not alone in this. Now you can say that’s foolish of me, that’s it’s not in my best interest, but I would say you can’t really calculate that for me. You can’t know that the present value of the long term benefits I’d receive from buying from the publisher is any greater than the value I’d receive by getting it for free or buying from a cheaper source.

The better test would be, have the Mises Institude give me full rights to freely reproduce any of their works (digital or physical). I’ll re-create them at my own expense but I don’t owe them any type of royalties. Let me sell them or give them away and see what happens to their revenues.

[PeterWellington]

@Raize

@PeterWellington

Of course they’re trying to attract and lock in customers, but they’re not using force to do it …

Litigation of copyright violations on customers and third-party vendors isn’t using force? That’s news to me.

You’ve taken that out of context. I’m talking about free software offerings Microsoft has made available that customers have chosen to use. As an example, you can get basic versions of Visual Studio (a development environment) for free. Developers have voluntarily decided to agree to the terms of the license and use the software. Where is the force in that? I’ve never said that Microsoft has never gone to court for coypright violations, but that wasn’t what I was talking about.

[Maxliberty]

@liberty student

It’s only piracy if you can establish that IP is property. Non-property cannot be stolen. We’re talking in circles here.

You have ignored this arguement as an explanation for this was already provided. Anything of value is property and has the ability to be owned.

So if IP is not property what exactly are you buying and why would you pay for something that you claim has no value and or you claim you already have?

What actually occurs in the marketplace demonstrates that people think of IP as property.

[liberty_student]

@PeterWellington

A publisher like the Mises Institute is near and dear to my heart, so I’m willing to shell out the extra cash. But this is the exception, not the rule. Most of the time I just don’t have any personal attachments to the author or publisher. Honestly, I’d rather save hundreds or even thousands of dollars now than worry about the long term success of those companies, and the value they may or may not provide me with in the future. I’m definitely not alone in this. Now you can say that’s foolish of me, that’s it’s not in my best interest, but I would say you can’t really calculate that for me. You can’t know that the present value of the long term benefits I’d receive from buying from the publisher is any greater than the value I’d receive by getting it for free or buying from a cheaper source.

All I am saying, is that this sounds very hypocritical. And I don’t mean that pejoratively, but you argue for the protection and then admit you would buy strictly based on nominal price. How can you in good faith argue that a creator should fight to maintain control, when you admit if there was less control you would exploit it and that authorship is irrelevant to you?

As far as Mises, their digital content is distributed freely. I recently bought a CD archive from another firm, which had loaded all of the Mises digital content into a searchable database. Value added.

I think I’ve made my points, now it’s just chasing our tails around.

[kiba]

PeterWellington: It is ill-advised to use such term “commercial” when you mean proprietary software. “Open source” and “free software” are not hostile to commercial activities.

I wager why free software havn’t succeed as much as they do because they don’t have enough development time yet. Given time, I am sure that they will slay the goliath, which they are already starting to do. For example, Firefox gained 20% of the browser market in 4 years. “Free software” and “open source” software is a growing sector of the software industry. I don’t think you can called these guys underperformers yet

A business model’s success is not judged about on just how much ridiciulous profit they make but also whether they survive long-term. Sometime a business model’s chance to shine might take decade down the road just because of the lack of resource, user momentum, etc.

Free software has come a long way now…it only seem recently that they’re starting to really shine… Now I am seeing new bold direction in projects like KDE.

[liberty_student]

@Maxliberty

You have ignored this arguement as an explanation for this was already provided. Anything of value is property and has the ability to be owned.

Incorrect. I have already responded to your self-contradictory definition of property.

@Maxliberty

So if IP is not property what exactly are you buying and why would you pay for something that you claim has no value and or you claim you already have?

Why did I claim it has no value? That is a strawman. You claim that value is tied to property. I do not. It’s the part of your fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants definition that is contradictory. Maybe you should go back to arguing that trade is restrictive. [8-)]

@Maxliberty

What actually occurs in the marketplace demonstrates that people think of IP as property.

But it’s not a free market. People also vote Democrat or Republican in the marketplace. People also pay taxes in the market place. People also advocate bombing innocent civilians in the free market.

Argumentum ad populum is just another in a long line of logical fallacies.