

Why the free software community cares about The Pirate Bay - brl
http://news.northxsouth.com/2009/05/16/the-pirate-bay-free-software/

======
DanielStraight
So what about when a group like Pirate Bay decides to start using GPL'ed
software without following the GPL rules because they don't care about
copyright?

I'm sorry, but I think music theft is about one of the lamest things you can
do. If you really like music, you'll support the artists. I don't want to hear
the BS line, "oh, they don't get any money from the record sales anyway."
Sure, so when the record companies collapse and there's no one to distribute
their albums or pay the recording costs, then what? They may not get much
money DIRECTLY from record sales, but that's really not the point. If you
steal music, you are completely and utterly useless to the music community,
and it would be better off without you. You are a short-sighted mooch, and
you're just bringing people down for your own temporary benefit.

~~~
jimmyjim
> Sure, so when the record companies collapse and there's no one to distribute
> their albums or pay the recording costs, then what?

What a ridiculous thing to say. What would happen then? The middlemen would be
cut out. Artists will distribute their creations themselves. If they're not
savvy enough for that, optimized CMS will sprout about that'll make it easier
for them to do so. The best thing is that record-chosen records won't come to
top, the best and most preferred things will (to use a crude example, they'll
find their way to the top in a Digg-like fashion). This is exactly what needs
to happen. This is exactly the turn that needs to be taken. As for the
recording costs -- well, the only people that can afford it at the moment are
the artists that are ALREADY at the top. Musicianship is a risky business to
get into in the first place, and it's just really their responsibility to make
smart and systematic decisions themselves in the circumstances they're in.
Beside that, the matter of the fact is that it's becoming very possible to do
more 1) with less people, and 2) with less money. Case in point:
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q1UPMEmCqZo> \-- a HQ video, that anyone
reasonable would have to admit beats professionally-created movies in terms of
quality (I'll myself admit that the acting isn't the best it could have been).

When this happens, a new connection will be born between the artists and the
customers. And I think this newfangled connection might encourage a few more
people to purchase music (which, hopefully, will go at a cheaper cost than
before due to this new, middleman-less, direct artist-to-customer
relationship).

~~~
pj
I think you really underestimate the difficulty in distribution.

~~~
amalcon
Distribution isn't difficult at all. It's happening without artists' consent
as we speak.

The hard parts are marketing and monetization. It's possible that someone
might come around and fix those problems if the record labels weren't holding
it back.

That said, the best way to bring such a state about isn't to infringe their
copyrights. It's to listen to music that they don't have copyright to in the
first place.

~~~
seertaak
> It's happening without artists' consent as we speak.

No, that's not "distribution". Suppose I own a shop in a lawless city where
police are known not to enforce property rights. I place my fruit on baskets
just outside the shop, and a significant amount of people steal fruit from the
front of my shop. I think you'll agree that it would be trite to call this
"distribution", for the simple reason that I'm not _in control_ of the
distribution.

> The hard parts are marketing and monetization. It's possible that someone
> might come around and fix those problems if the record labels weren't
> holding it back.

While I agree that marketing is "hard", I don't think it's "the problem". The
problem is monetization: first, there is rampant piracy, and this canibalizes
sales in both the physical and digital domains, and second, average prices in
the digital domain are much lower than CDs. The first problem _can_ be solved
-- though it's doubtful that the average consumer will like the solution
because the end result will be for his net wealth or time to diminish! --
through a mixture of carrot (hulu.com, Spotify, and iTunes come to mind) and
stick (the three strikes law in France comes to mind). The second problem is
not so much a problem as a new reality. The equilibrium price of music is
probably somewhat above its current price (due to the effect of piracy and the
"everything for free" culture prevalent online in the last ten years [which
appears, to my mind, to be drawing to a close]), but it is certainly below CD
prices. In addition, buying patterns have changed and products like iTunes
make it easy to purchase individual tracks, further eroding revenue for the
record companies. I don't think this is a trend you can reverse, because any
attempt to restrict the buyer to purchasing the entire album will be met with
increased piracy. Record companies will have to, and are, adjusting to this by
emphasizing other revenue streams, e.g. merchandising, 360 degree contracts,
licensing revenue maximization, etc.

------
alain94040
I strongly disagree with the premise of this article.

There is a major difference between free software, which obeys and even relies
on copyright to enforce its rules, and this generalized pirate movement which
wants the right to copy anything, anytime, freely.

~~~
Herring
Or you could listen to the FSF. They disagree & they're responsible for the
gnu & the gpl.

[http://torrentfreak.com/the-war-on-sharing-why-the-fsf-
cares...](http://torrentfreak.com/the-war-on-sharing-why-the-fsf-cares-about-
riaa-lawsuits-090513/)

~~~
triplefox
Or if you want a strictly economic explanation: The law is a cosmetic blemish
upon what could be a top-to-bottom free system.

The high level would be original free software and media - tools and
inspiration.

The medium level is derivatives; things made using the tools and media built
upon other media.

The low level is the consumer level, where the best things are filtered and
distributed to the public.

The system takes the lowest-cost option at each step: remixing material and
building on open source is easier than starting from scratch. Digital
distribution is easier than physical distribution.

But it is entirely dependent upon the source material being permissive-use.
When it isn't, derivatives become illegal material, and people will
subsequently choose not to make value-added derivatives because any profit
motive that would have existed is gone; settlement and legal fees are likely
to wipe out any gains.

This doesn't affect the consumers of media, however, because consumers are
largely anonymous and hard to target by the legal system. Thus you get
widespread piracy, but few derivatives.

------
jacoblyles
If you're going to opine about the virtues of the public commons, then why not
support artists who produce copyright free content? There are plenty out
there. The hypocrisy of the pirate movement is seen when the lion's share of
the content they consume is the high-budget stuff produced in big studios.
This is in stark contrast to the free software community, in which genuinely
free software is used far more than pirated commercial software.

Content pirates are parasites that are killing their host. They take and offer
nothing in return. They certainly don't add the magnitude of value to the
world that is offered by the free software movement.

~~~
greendestiny
I think piracy actively harms free content producers, and without it free
copyright would be a lot more prevalent and of higher quality. I wrote this
blog post elaborating on it a bit, but didn't think I made the point all that
well: [http://greendestinyonyc.blogspot.com/2009/04/if-piracy-
didnt...](http://greendestinyonyc.blogspot.com/2009/04/if-piracy-didnt-exist-
then-riaa-would.html)

------
quoderat
In a war of large corporations with nearly-unlimited resources against someone
who just wants to listen to some music, I'll take the someone who just wants
to listen to some music every time.

I'm a fan of the underdog, especially one who's had progressively more power
removed from their bailiwick -- fair use? Almost gone. Time-shifting? They'd
take that away if they could. DMCA? What a travesty.

Time the balance shifts the other way for a while.

~~~
gustavo_duarte
You mean 'just wants to listen to some music' _without paying for it_.

Regarding the DMCA and fair use restrictions, I agree it's something we must
fight against, but I don't think piracy is an effective way to go about it.

~~~
anigbrowl
Arguably not: [http://arstechnica.com/media/news/2009/04/study-pirates-
buy-...](http://arstechnica.com/media/news/2009/04/study-pirates-buy-tons-
more-music-than-average-folks.ars)

One reason that people listen to music for free online (which I usually do via
YouTube) is because the selection of music on radio is dreadful - most
commercial radio is owned by the same handful of companies, and it's the same
greatest hits mixed in with the latest heavy rotation day-in day-out. I don't
even own a radio any more - and as an ex-DJ, I am pretty sure I have spent far
more on music than you will in your whole lifetime.

~~~
gustavo_duarte
I wouldn't make personal assumptions like this. I might be a DJ myself. ;)

Regarding the study, the results are in line with my expectations. Several of
my friends are DJs and other art-loving people, who all download and buy
massive amounts of stuff. The correlation between P2P downloads and buying
strikes me as natural.

There's no doubt the major labels have played a pretty rotten game and also
got the Internet completely wrong.

I want to see services that allow us to sample and listen to music without
paying for it, allowing people to sample a large number of tracks and
hopefully buy a fraction of those. I'd love to see decentralized distribution
in such a way as to pay artists more and encourage creativity.

But I don't think piracy is the answer.

------
daeken
This article, IMO, exemplifies a lack of understanding by members of the free
software community. You can't say "The international free software movement
has decisively placed themselves in opposition to laws which restrict
information freedom by prioritizing intellectual property and the ownership of
information by corporations over the civil right to information and software."
while supporting licenses like the GPL which depend solely on copyright law to
restrict the way software is distributed.

~~~
anigbrowl
Indeed, but there are two qualitative differences: the GPL's terms are fair,
and those who get sued for violation are actively making money out of the
copyright infringement. So are some music and video pirates, but many more are
just inclined to share, same way I used to put songs on cassette tape for
friends in the 1980s.

