A Counterpoint to "The Piracy Situation"

by D351

This is going to be even more controversial, for sure, but I want to urge the hacker community to actively advocate piracy.  We all think we know the moral issues, so I'm totally going to go there.  However, I'm going to start with some other aspects first.

The Law is Out of Control

"Our" lawmakers have already passed a metric crap-ton of copyright laws.  A lot of this happened long before online piracy.

For a great example, search "Mickey Mouse Protection Act," and see what happened there.  When the law was going to put Mickey in the public domain, Disney screwed the law so hard that we haven't had anything come into public domain since.

Copyright laws have been driven to the point of insanity because corporations that own content want to do everything in their power to stifle competition.

If somebody is watching your daughter sing along to pop music, they aren't watching TV.  Therefore, you are competition.  These businesses are well aware of the fact that the vast majority of art is derivative.  They are well aware that the works that an artist is most likely to be inspired by are those that they grew up with.  These are the bare basics of culture.  They know this, and they want to keep you from distracting their audience.  Were it not for their greed, culture could evolve organically, to everyone's benefit, and independent artists would be more viable as competition.

BitTorrent could have a good reputation.  It's often the fastest way to download legitimate stuff... like our own culture.  But nooooo...  Now our ISPs work with these corporations to screw us out of the service we pay them for if we try to use BitTorrents... or Tor.

The Malware

The average luser these days is a joke.

We (those with common sense) know obvious techniques for avoiding viruses.  Still, how many hours have we wasted reinstalling a (pirated) copy of Windows (usually quicker than trying to fix it) on a relative's computer, while trying to explain that Winblows is a virus in itself and that Linux is better in every imaginable way, all because they opened an email, clicked an ad, or didn't install an update?

People don't understand that Microsoft has no sense of security and that their products are ticking time bombs for Trojans.  But leaving alone the fact that the Internet is full of things just waiting to destroy Aunt Gertrude's Dell, what if there were more viruses by percentage in pirated files?

Who's really at fault?  "You can't expect safety among criminals" may be a BS statement in the first place, but if it were the case, who put criminals in these positions?  Or, more correctly, who turned people who share into criminals?  Timothy Leary warned that if LSD were made illegal, people would resort to dealers with potentially tainted product.  It turned out that he was right.  Why are pimping and drug dealing so dangerous and profitable?  Because only a criminal can provide these services (in most places).  Because they've been criminalized.  We should by now understand that.  Your average legal and consenting prostitute does.

The Debate

Okay, when I said that I'd bring up the moral issues, I meant it.

That is because I'd like to offer what I hope is a compelling argument against the idea that information is property or that shoplifting is inherently bad... or (bonus argument) that the capitalist system that is the underlying basis for all arguments against sharing is either just or natural.  Perhaps if you agree with me that capitalism needs to stop, then I hope to help you explain it to others with these arguments.

Look, if I were to shoplift a CD or DVD, I'd be well aware of the fact that all of the hardware devices used to make that disc were manufactured in exploited third-world countries using resources (((stolen))) from other third-world countries, then transported, unpacked, and shelved by exploited wage slaves domestically.  So, when you shoplift, you're striking a blow against the system that traps us in dead-end jobs, struggling to pay rent to some prick whose only work is "owning" the place (and we're the lucky ones).

The idea that sharing is stealing because the "owner" isn't making any money just doesn't hold water.  What standard defines copyright "ownership?"  The same corrupt laws that we all are complaining about.  If I get the government to say that I own the rain, does that make it right?  No, but it's happening all over the world right now.

A physical product can be "owned" because for one person to have possession of it, others must be excluded, even if only temporarily.  Information only works that way in the form of secrets.  Culture is not secret, and secrets that could only be justified by their own profitability are just only in the eyes of greed.

Without copyright, artists in today's society would not be able to fund their work, but how is that the fault of the people who appreciate their work?  Would it not be more logical to place the blame on those that extort them (as well as all of us) out of their labor so that they can simply feed, clothe, and shelter themselves?  Perhaps the problem isn't that we're not paying for their survival but that they must pay to survive.

A Call to Action

In the states, we constantly hear of the rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

Why is it that all of these things must depend first on our pursuit of profitability?  Consider (the lilies) all of the life-affirming works these artists might produce if so much of their efforts weren't squandered in the name of profitability.

Take a critical look at the garbage that the mainstream film industry produces, and ask yourself "Is the profit system working here?"  Great works are achieved, not for profit, but for the sake of the works themselves, and great works are meant to be shared.  This isn't just applicable to art.

This goes for science and industry... and hacking.  Hackers hack for love of the hack.  A hacker will continue hacking if it drives them broke or gets them imprisoned.

This is because humans are meant to do what they enjoy, not what others will pay money for.

What we need, as a species, is to reevaluate the system we live in.  If there is enough food, why do some go hungry?  If we have the technology to automate, why do some do dangerous and/or tedious work?  If technology has made so much work obsolete, why do we work more hours than at any other time in human history?

If we love hacking so much, why don't we spend more of our time hacking what we want to hack?  I can't speak for the rest of us (or even a sizable percentage of us), but I know what I want to spend my time hacking: capitalism and government.

And if I have to start by probing and exploiting weaknesses in copyright, I'm just fine with that.  We could all be spending more of our time hacking.  As icing on the cake, imagine what it would do to all that hard work trying to clarify what a hacker really is all about if the media were to catch wind that the hacker community is coming out anarcho-socialist!