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Rainer Deyke
Demon Hunter
Joined: 05 Jun 2002
Posts: 672
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 Posted: Tue Jun 09, 2009 9:45 pm Post subject: open source, piracy, economy (Where did the thread go?) |
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| RampantCoyote wrote: | | Hmm - then by your definition, is the labor that goes into a stage play, rock concert, or giving aid to an elderly woman soon to die therefore of less worth because it "disappears?" Not sure I grok your value system. |
I can't believe you're seriously comparing advertising to a concert.
When I go to a rock concert, I get enjoyment. That's value in its most direct form.
When I see advertising, it annoys me. That's negative value. The advertisement may also cause people to buy product X instead of product Y, but that's hardly a net gain.
| Quote: | | I guess before we go around in circles too much, we might have a fundamental disconnect in belief systems. I believe necessity is the mother of invention, and therefore progress and innovation most frequently evolve from competition. |
I think you're confusing the means for the ends here. Poverty causes people to work harder, and hard work causes people to become richer, but poverty does not lead to wealth. Poverty is a bad thing, wealth is a good thing, and hard work may be good or bad depending on how enjoyable the work is.
I also think you're being confused by money. Money has no value in itself; it's just grease to ease the creation and distribution of value. From this perspective, buying and stealing are basically the same thing. Person A loses X, person B gains X, some useless pieces of paper may or may not change hand. Value is created when person B value X more than person A.
A moderate amount of theft can be beneficial to society. Let's say farmer Bob had a good harvest and farmer Fred had a poor harvest. Driven to desperate measures, farmer Fred steals food from farmer Bob. The next year, farmer Fred has a good harvest and farmer Bob has a poor harvest. This time, farmer Bob steals from farmer Fred. Now, both farmers have lost something of little value (food in a time of plenty) and gained something of great value (food to survive in a time of hunger).
However, copyright infringement is not theft. When person A gives a copy of software X to person B, person A loses nothing. Therefore, this transaction creates value even if the value of software X to person B is very little.
The total value of software X is the sum of the value of X to each user of X. Therefore, assuming that the net value of X to each of its users is positive, X becomes more valuable the more widely it is distributed.
| Quote: | | If the ability to be compensated in a field is rendered null (as would be the case if piracy was allowed to run fully unchecked), I would expect very little growth, innovation, or even work being done in that field. You'd get a few exceptions, of course, but most of what advances you'd get in that field would be done under lock and key as proprietary technology. |
Oh, that's just silly. There is no evidence that a moderate level of piracy is bad for the company producing the product being pirated. Pirates include:
1. People who can't afford the product.
2. People who can afford the product, but are not willing to pay the full price.
3. People who pirate because it's more convenient than buying the product.
4. People who pirate to save money, even though they would otherwise have bought the product.
5. People who pirate the product to try it out and later buy it.
Categories 1 and 2 are mostly irrelevant because they wouldn't have bought the product anyway, although they also provide a small amount of free advertising. Category 3 is almost legitimate competition, because it encourages the company to make it more convenient to purchase their product. Category 5 is actually good for the company. Only category 4 is actively bad. There is no evidence that the negative impact of category 4 outweighs the positive impact of category 5.
If all else fails, the company can always copy the model used by many open source companies, give their product away for free, and charge for support.
But even if piracy did remove all compensation, it would not stop innovation. People write software without compensation all the time. See: freeware, open source.
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BadMrBox
Bringer of Apocalypse
Joined: 26 Jun 2002
Posts: 1022
Location: Dark Forest's of Sweden
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Rainer Deyke
Demon Hunter
Joined: 05 Jun 2002
Posts: 672
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| Posted: Thu Jun 18, 2009 8:28 pm Post subject: |
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At the time when I posted the above (nine days ago), the other thread was missing. Then this thread disappeared, only to reappear a later.
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tcaudilllg
Dragonmaster
Joined: 20 Jun 2002
Posts: 1731
Location: Cedar Bluff, VA
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| Posted: Sat Jun 20, 2009 1:52 am Post subject: |
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I wonder what happened to cause the error?
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