Ticked Off

Ruby
61

On 5/16/06, Michael G. [email protected] wrote:

provide me simply so you can make a profit.

Charging what the market will bear is simply fair, assuming you’re free
to buy from who you want and I’m free to sell to who I can.

Then why is is “unethical” for the author of the book to charge what
the market will bear? Why is it not “simply fair” then? Maybe your
argument is that the only price the market will bear for PDF e-books
is free, but that doesn’t preclude the author’s right and prerogative
to charge more than that. If the market doesn’t bear the author’s
asking price, then it’s the author’s loss in that he doesn’t make
sales. This doesn’t give the “market” the right to take his material
and force it to be “sold” at a lower price.

Jacob F.

62

Jacob F. wrote:

On 5/16/06, Michael G. [email protected] wrote:

provide me simply so you can make a profit.

Charging what the market will bear is simply fair, assuming you’re free
to buy from who you want and I’m free to sell to who I can.

Then why is is “unethical” for the author of the book to charge what
the market will bear? Why is it not “simply fair” then? Maybe your
argument is that the only price the market will bear for PDF e-books
is free, but that doesn’t preclude the author’s right and prerogative
to charge more than that. If the market doesn’t bear the author’s
asking price, then it’s the author’s loss in that he doesn’t make
sales. This doesn’t give the “market” the right to take his material
and force it to be “sold” at a lower price.

Jacob F.

My argument wasn’t that it was unethical for an author to use the
systems that society has created it was that society errored in creating
this system.

63

“Keith L.” [email protected] writes:

If I print a PDF out and put it on a news stand for sale, and you come by
and take it without paying for it, is this copyright violation or
theft?

This is theft.

If it is theft, are you saying that all you are stealing is paper,
and the content does not play a role?

Yes. You have committed a crime against the news stand owner, not the
author of the work.

How is the printed version logically different From the electronic
in this case?

“The peculiar character of an idea is that no one possesses the less
because everyone possesses the whole of it. He who receives an idea
from me receives without lessening me, as he who lights his candle at
mine receives light without darkening me.”

– Thomas Jefferson

(Note that what he’s saying doesn’t make it legal or justified, just
different from theft.)

In the end, I do not care one whit whether the activity discussed (ie,
taking a pdf without paying the author), is technically stealing or
copyright violation - I find it wrong, as at least I think do you. As
others have written, most of the applicable laws were written before
electronic copying was possible.

In the end, you’re allowed to be imprecise on mailing list
postings. I’d just like to state that there is an error being made,
and the great frequency at which people make this error bothers me.

I agree with you on the morality of the issue, but I think it is
better to discuss the issue using accurate terms so that when the
morality is disputed, (as per the fair use example I mentioned in a
previous post) we will have some common understanding from which to
work.

Call me a pedant, but I’ve seen too many discussions hopelessly
degenerate into people talking past each other for no reason other
than the terms were not clearly defined at the outset.

Perhaps it is time that the laws catch up with the technology.

I vehemently agree, though I hold little hope for this.

-Phil H.

64

On May 16, 2006, at 8:54 AM, Bill G. wrote:

I think Chris P.'s ‘Learn to Program’ is probably the best example
of free distribution leading to increased sales. He started out by
publishing a free tutorial, people found out that it was well written,
and was a great intro for beginners, and it eventually became a book.

Web comics make for a number of good examples.

http://www.megatokyo.com/ became a paper book after getting popular
enough. the paper copy says in it that you can view them all, for
free, at the website. it sells anyway.

another is http://www.exploitationnow.com/

– Elliot T.

65

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On Monday 15 May 2006 23:06, Austin Z. wrote:

A lot has been said about this but just a couple of points:

  1. I fully agree with Austin

  2. The Pragmatic Programmers have a really good approach on this:
    include
    your name in the PDF. Everybody nows Paulo J. Dias is a moron: his PDF
    copy
    of “Behind closed doors” is everywhere. I was really surprised Manning
    did
    not adopt the same policy about PDFs including the name of the buyer.

that some pissant little freak would advocate this action at all. I
was similarly annoyed that people reacted as badly to Dave T.'s
announcement that the Rails 2nd Edition would be the same price. These
people have done a lot for the Ruby community.

They deserve your financial support. Don’t be a pissant thief. Even
temporarily. There are “sample chapters” for a reason.

-austin

Pau Garcia i Quiles
http://www.elpauer.org
(Due to the amount of work, I usually need 10 days to answer)
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66

From: “Michael G.” [email protected]

:slight_smile:

Regards,

Bill,
Your Friendly Evil Communist Overlord

This is poorly written and just stupid.

Awww. And I was having so much fun.

Charging what the market will bear is simply fair, assuming you’re free
to buy from who you want and I’m free to sell to who I can.

So there’s no ethics problem and you can name your price, provided what
you produce is a commodity? But if you are the only person who can
solve
my problem, or you produce a resource that is unique, then it becomes
unethical for you to want to profit?

I’m just trying to understand what you mean by, “It’s unethical to
artificially
limit a resource simply so that you can profit,” as it seems like a
fairly
general statement.

Regards,

Dr. Stupid

67

On 5/16/06, Bill G. [email protected] wrote:

I agree that it works that way, I just don’t agree with the
perspective that you’re viewing it from. What if you change the scope
from ‘books about all programming languages’ to ‘books about ruby
and/or rails’? In the world of Ruby, and Rails, David Black is hardly
a ‘niche player’.

Yes, actually, he is. The mainstream book is Agile Web Dev with Rails.
“Ruby for Rails” appeals to people who actually take the time to
figure out what they’re doing in intricate detail so they can do it
much better than average. Unfortunately, such people will always be a
niche, by definition.

It might help to own a copy of ‘Ruby for Rails’ to understand why I
think that way. I’m about half way through it, and I highly recommend
that all Ruby users buy a copy. It’s an excellent book, and helps
build a stronger understanding of Ruby in general (ie: it’s not just
for Rails users).

I do own a copy, as it happens. I bought both the PDF and the physical
edition, which I am looking forward to receiving. It is indeed a very
good book.

But I do not think the quality of the book makes any difference.

Downloads are reshaping copyright, and this is very emotional for some
people. I am not one of those people. I don’t care. I just look at the
numbers and make rational decisions. The numbers are very clearly in
Dr. Black’s favor. Illegal downloads increase sales for niche players.

All these moral arguments are empty words – full of sound and fury,
signifying nothing. The reason is simple: illegal downloads of your
book will give you a better reputation and better sales. When people
are improving a man’s reputation and increasing his sales, telling
those people that they are doing that man harm is not entirely
logical.

I guess it comes down to who is a niche player, and personally, I
don’t think it’s right to use that subjective decision to determine
that it’s ok to download any author’s pdf, because I think they’re a
niche player, and by downloading it, I’m going to help them down the
road.

I really don’t think it has anything to do with who is or isn’t a
niche player. The reason illegal downloads in music hurt mainstream
artists and help everybody else is because mainstream artists suck.
The music is designed to get in your head and stay there irresistibly
for six weeks, after which time it disappears from your consciousness
forever. The sales for these fools fall off because their whole
business model is based on planned obsolescence and marketing
oversaturation – in short, because their product is crap. You can see
similar things happening with Tom Cruise movies. Dr. Black’s product
is not crap, so this danger is a nonissue for him.

68

yah. the idea that some dude in India should have to choose between
feeding his family and reading this book is ridiculous. if you have to
make that kind of choice, just steal the motherfucker. if it means
you’re a bad person, fuck it, be a bad person with fat kids. it works
for most Americans.

69

I’m just trying to understand what you mean by, “It’s unethical to
artificially
limit a resource simply so that you can profit,” as it seems like a
fairly
general statement.

Conspiring to misrepresent the avilability of a resource so that you can
profit is not ethical. Copyright laws create a limitation where there
would not otherwise be one.

70

On 5/16/06, Michael G. [email protected] wrote:

I’m just trying to understand what you mean by, “It’s unethical to
artificially
limit a resource simply so that you can profit,” as it seems like a
fairly
general statement.

Conspiring to misrepresent the avilability of a resource so that you can
profit is not ethical. Copyright laws create a limitation where there
would not otherwise be one.

So in your opinion, authors who create content and then desire to sell
it instead of giving it away are “conspiring”, “misrepresenting”, “not
ethical”, and “creating a limitation”. Even though it is regarding
their own work, which would not exist if it weren’t for them?

Please correct me if I’m wrong; I hope I am.

Jacob F.

71

On 5/16/06, Jacob F. [email protected] wrote:

So in your opinion, authors who create content and then desire to sell
it instead of giving it away are “conspiring”, “misrepresenting”, “not
ethical”, and “creating a limitation”. Even though it is regarding
their own work, which would not exist if it weren’t for them?

Please correct me if I’m wrong; I hope I am.

Earlier in this thread, Michael G. clearly stated his problem was
not with the authors who use the copyright system to their advantage,
but with the copyright system itself, which is an artificial creation
of society.

Stop twisting his words.

Ryan

72

Not to add fuel to the fire… but…

On 5/16/06, Paul B. [email protected] wrote:

I try not to call it theft either. Whilst some people equate copyright
infringement with theft, they are substantively and legally different.
Whether they are morally equivalent is a different matter, though.
Confusing the vocabulary doesn’t help to advance the debate.

There’s significant jail time in a federal prison as well as up to $250K
per
incident for copyright infringment. This compares with little or no
jail
time for petty theft… stealing a book off a shelf. So, you are
correct
that the law takes a different view of violating Intellectual Property
rights and petty theft. The law views violations of IP rights (e.g.,
illegally sharing the PDF of a book) as much worse offenses.

I see no debate about flagrantly violating the law by illegally
distributing
the PDF of David’s book. While there might be a fair use justification
for
emailing a friend a copy so he/she can evaluate it before buying it,
there’s
no legal justification for putting the PDF on a P2P system. Such
actions
are violations of the law and deprive an author of earning a legitimate
fee
for a valuable offering.

If you don’t like the price for the PDF don’t buy it. It works the same
way
for a virtual good as it does for a physical good.

73

On 5/16/06, Ryan L. [email protected] wrote:

but with the copyright system itself, which is an artificial creation
of society.

Stop twisting his words.

I was not attempting to twist his words. I apologize if I did. Since I
obviously can’t make myself understood, I’ll just stay out of this
conversation.

Jacob F.

74

On 5/16/06, Jacob F. [email protected] wrote:

I was not attempting to twist his words. I apologize if I did. Since I
obviously can’t make myself understood, I’ll just stay out of this
conversation.

Sorry I came off so snappy, but it seemed people were unfairly jumping
on Michael’s case.

This thread is very off topic for this mailing list and can be a very
heated topic, so I suggest we politely let it die.

Regards,
Ryan

75

On 5/16/06, Michael G. [email protected] wrote:

Copyright laws create a limitation where there
would not otherwise be one.

All property laws do this. Real property, chattle (physical, but not
land), and Intellectual Property laws create limits and boundaries.

I own a house and the yard around the house. This “ownership” is just a
state sponsored limitation of the use of the particular piece of land.
It
creates a limitation where there would not otherwise be one. However,
that
limitation is valuable to society as a whole. All forms of property
ownership and the associated balances between the rights of the
title-holder
and the rights of non-title-holders allows us to have safety in our
homes,
invest in others’ ventures, and do a whole lot of other things that
allow us
to grow as a society and a civilization.

If you look at Darfur where the only law is “I have a gun and I’m going
to
take what I want,” there is no society, no investment, and no quality of
life. There is only horror and devistation. That horror and
devistation
comes because there is not set of rules that people agree on.

IP laws protect the investment of authors and inventors. IP laws are
part
of the US Constitution. The Framers and dozens of generations of
lawmakers
have worked to strike a balance between the rights of authors and
inventors
and the marketplace.

If you don’t like the way the laws work, lobby to have them changed or
do
what Richard Stallman did… create a revolution. But remember, RMS
created
a revolution by creating excellent software and convincing the world
that
Open Source is a better way. He didn’t steal from others.

76

On 16-May-06, at 6:08 PM, David P. wrote:

While there might be a fair use justification for emailing a friend
a copy so he/she can evaluate it before buying it,

Just to clarify, “Fair Use” does not cover redistribution in its
entirety (be it performance, literary, or otherwise); it merely
allows for limited use of sections of the work in various
circumstances. (i.e., I can take a few lines of
and use it in satire, which would be protected under the “Fair Use”
provisions of US and Canadian law (and presumably others
internationally).

77

On May 16, 2006, at 5:58 PM, Ryan L. wrote:

Earlier in this thread, Michael G. clearly stated his problem was
not with the authors who use the copyright system to their advantage,
but with the copyright system itself, which is an artificial creation
of society

So let’s assume that copyright didn’t exist. Could an author produce
a book and then offer access to it via standard contract law? If
that contract prohibited the duplication and/or distribution of the
work would we consider violation of that contract (i.e. illegal
sharing of the work) to be ‘wrong’ or ‘unethical’?

It seems to me, and I’m just thinking out loud here, that the ethical
question exists independent of our current copyright framework as
long as you still have the concept of contract law. IMNAL but
copyright seems to me to be like a pre-packaged contract between the
creator of a work and its users. You could get rid of the pre-
packaged nature but the restrictions could be recreated by an
explicit contract and I think all the same ethical issues would re-
assert themselves.

In reading and participating on this thread I found it very
interesting that there was not much consensus on the usefulness of
copyright, on the concept of market based prices, on the ethics of
free trade, in fact the entire range of economic theories and
contract/real/intellectual property law seemed to come out of the
woodwork for this discussion.

Very interesting.

Gary W.

78

I
was similarly annoyed that people reacted as badly to Dave T.'s
announcement that the Rails 2nd Edition would be the same price. These
people have done a lot for the Ruby community.

They deserve your financial support. Don’t be a pissant thief. Even
temporarily. There are “sample chapters” for a reason.

-austin

I think it should be more due to succsess sure it is expanisve now but,
if you were him wouldn’t you WANT to RAISE it? those ppl are idiots. LOL

79

Phil H. wrote:

“Keith L.” [email protected] writes:

Really? Can you touch a PDF? What does an MP3 smell like?

Teen spirit?

Hal

80

Really? Can you touch a PDF? What does an MP3 smell like?

Teen spirit?

bwaahahahaha