Just when we think it can't get any worse, we see this sort of crap:
From the article:
File-swappers who distribute a single copy of a prerelease movie on the Internet can be imprisoned for up to three years.
Nice. Our President lies to us about weapons of mass destruction and drags us into an unjust war that has cost thousands of Americn lives, but I'm the felon.
And look how they got this thing passed...it rode in on the coattails of this:
Whichever side you're on in the copyright debate, you have to agree this legislation is draconian and excessive, to say the least."
I am on the side of reducing copyright to a more reasonable time-frame. Five years after the death of the author would be plenty, IMHO.
Were I a King of the US, I would declare that getting rid of copyright entirely would be even better. People wrote some pretty good stuff before the concept of copyright existed, so I disagree that it would all disappear after it was wiped o
So, unless everybody wants to agree to my kooky libertarian ideal...
You do know that "libertarian ideals" is what allowed things like the RIAA and MPAA, along with Halliburton and Diebold, to form in the first place, right? Libertarianism is all about the non-intervention of government. That means that the government doesn't interfere with what companies want to do; it espouses the Laissez-faire economic system, which is a total travesty of human thought. The idea that we should be ruled by the dollar is,
Such corporations couldn't exist at all without the government giving them the legal right to exist. As a libertarian, the idea of giving a corportation any of the rights of a person is completely disgusting to me.
Why should corporations have the rights of people? They don't behave the way we expect people to behave, and they aren't accountable to society the way people are expected to be accountable. They aren't capable of moral action (only an individual can have *moral* values) and they are entirely self-serving.
In fact, this documentary [thecorporation.com] shows that they fit the clinical definition of a psychopath to a T.
Really? I thought that corporations were just around in order to have limited liability. That is the basic extent of how they're considered a person.
Basically, unlike proprietorships or partnerships in which liability of the firm is distributed to its owners, a corporation has its own legal identity separate from the people who own shares of its stock; if a corporation suffers losses, it has to pay debts, not its owners. By doing this, stockholder liability is only limited to what they've invested in the firm (not their entire fortune) whereas proprietorships and partnerships can potentially have unlimited liabilities (someone makes a big mistake) meaning that entire fortunes can be collected to pay debts.
The catch is that corporations, existing as a legal identity are taxed whereas proprietorships and partnerships are not... This means that owners are taxed on corporate income in addition to the corporation being taxed on the same income (or double taxation).
So this is the extent to which a corporation is considered a person... it's purely financial. So how exactly does a purely financial construct resemble a psychopath? I mean, if you're embracing an abstraction of that degree, why not extend the argument to basically anything centered around a theoretical basis? I'm curious, what would be the psychological evaluation of the/. copyright opposition crowd (considering that it seems to oppose the RIAA/MPAA, but supports copyright enforcement concerning GNU efforts)?
Go ahead and call me a capitalist, republican, conservative, bible-thumping pig as that seems to be the common response here (to opposing opinions of open minds of course).
Note: I did not make any statements in the hopes of diminishing open source efforts (as I would be quite the hypocrite considering I made this post using Linux and Mozilla). I just get tired of the whole faceless corporations are evil and that's that argument. Corporations have problems (such as the issue of corporate governance) but absurd comparisons to psychopaths have got to go.
Here is an interesting article about how corporations became 'Persons' [uuworld.org]
Perhaps you won't agree with some of the conclusions the author has drawn, but the basic point that corporations have a lot more rights/powers than what is needed to allow for limited liability is pretty obvious. And comparing them to psychopaths really isn't absurd. They are treated, legally, as another person like you and me, but they don't act like normal people. Perhaps you don't want to say they act like psychopaths, but I'd like to hear a better description of why they act how they do, and and explanation why their behavior would be ok for a person with the same rights.
As I said in response to another poster, corporations, being a purely financial identity, have no moral obligations or feelings because they have no identity beyond a financial basis. Now, their actions are tied to the public because their existence is dependent on receiving financial support from the public. This means that the actions of a corporation fall under the responsibility of the public (society). If the public ceases to support the corporation, it will fail, if it continues support of the corp
Well, I think the argument goes something like this:
First off, you have to think of the corporation as an entity. In reality it is a collection of individual people with different values serving many different roles but generally trying to accomplish the same thing. For the purposes of this discussion, though, we think of a corporation as a single entity owned by the stockholders.
As an individual, you make many decisions every day. Most of their decisions are mundane. Some of them, though, have ethical an
Indeed, I would qualify what you wrote as a more compelling argument, but I would still have issues with some of your arguments:
There is a certain sentiment that says that a corporation has a responsibility to produce maximum return for its shareholders. If they don't, the shareholders can sue the company and collect. That means if an employee falls down a mineshaft and the rescue effort would cost more than the settlement to the next of kin, the company is NOT ALLOWED to do the "right thing". The sharehol
My point wasn't that society created corporations, it was that society actively supports corporations. This is due to the simple fact that by contributing economically to a corporation despite any actions performed by the corporation, society is in effect endorsing the actions (regardless of how questionable) of the corporation. This is inherently different from a psychopath which (as you can argue) may be the result of society, but is not actively supported by society. So my answer to the question of wh
So my answer to the question of whether society wants DVD region coding, a monopolistic Microsoft, and sweatshop labor would be a resounding yes. If social consensus was against such actions, then there would be no way that a corporation embracing such acts could survive.
I don't believe that this argument takes into account corporations supporting corporations. Arguably the corporations doing the most evil are either supported by a monopoly (SBC) or supported by
Corporations have one purpose and one purpose only. Profit. They exist only to enrich the shareholders.
Since the shareholders are safely insulated from the day to day actions of the corporation they feel no guilt when the corporation does something immoral. They don't go to jail when the corporation does something illegal. Only recently, and only in certain circumstances, have corporate officers been held legally and financially responsible for the actions of their corporation.
Since the shareholders are safely insulated from the day to day actions of the corporation they feel no guilt when the corporation does something immoral.
Actually, they aren't safely insulated from the actions of the corporation, they are just less susceptible to excessive losses on the corporation's part (read limited liability). As I stated, the price of this limited liability is that the rewards are also smaller (you get taxed on income and so does the corporation). Since excessive immorality would (
>I'm curious, what would be the psychological evaluation of the/. copyright opposition crowd (cons
I judge a religion as being good or bad based on whether its adherents
become better people as a result of practicing it.
- Joe Mullally, computer salesman
Free Thinkers Declare War on the RIAA (Score:4, Insightful)
Just when we think it can't get any worse, we see this sort of crap:
From the article:
Nice. Our President lies to us about weapons of mass destruction and drags us into an unjust war that has cost thousands of Americn lives, but I'm the felon.
And look how they got this thing passed...it rode in on the coattails of this:
Also from the article:
Re:Free Thinkers Declare War on the RIAA (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Free Thinkers Declare War on the RIAA (Score:4, Interesting)
I am on the side of reducing copyright to a more reasonable time-frame. Five years after the death of the author would be plenty, IMHO.
Were I a King of the US, I would declare that getting rid of copyright entirely would be even better. People wrote some pretty good stuff before the concept of copyright existed, so I disagree that it would all disappear after it was wiped o
Re:Free Thinkers Declare War on the RIAA (Score:0)
You do know that "libertarian ideals" is what allowed things like the RIAA and MPAA, along with Halliburton and Diebold, to form in the first place, right? Libertarianism is all about the non-intervention of government. That means that the government doesn't interfere with what companies want to do; it espouses the Laissez-faire economic system, which is a total travesty of human thought. The idea that we should be ruled by the dollar is,
Re:Free Thinkers Declare War on the RIAA (Score:4, Interesting)
Corporations are psychopaths (Score:0)
In fact, this documentary [thecorporation.com] shows that they fit the clinical definition of a psychopath to a T.
Corporations are psychopaths? (Score:4, Insightful)
Basically, unlike proprietorships or partnerships in which liability of the firm is distributed to its owners, a corporation has its own legal identity separate from the people who own shares of its stock; if a corporation suffers losses, it has to pay debts, not its owners. By doing this, stockholder liability is only limited to what they've invested in the firm (not their entire fortune) whereas proprietorships and partnerships can potentially have unlimited liabilities (someone makes a big mistake) meaning that entire fortunes can be collected to pay debts.
The catch is that corporations, existing as a legal identity are taxed whereas proprietorships and partnerships are not... This means that owners are taxed on corporate income in addition to the corporation being taxed on the same income (or double taxation).
So this is the extent to which a corporation is considered a person... it's purely financial. So how exactly does a purely financial construct resemble a psychopath? I mean, if you're embracing an abstraction of that degree, why not extend the argument to basically anything centered around a theoretical basis? I'm curious, what would be the psychological evaluation of the /. copyright opposition crowd (considering that it seems to oppose the RIAA/MPAA, but supports copyright enforcement concerning GNU efforts)?
Go ahead and call me a capitalist, republican, conservative, bible-thumping pig as that seems to be the common response here (to opposing opinions of open minds of course).
Note: I did not make any statements in the hopes of diminishing open source efforts (as I would be quite the hypocrite considering I made this post using Linux and Mozilla). I just get tired of the whole faceless corporations are evil and that's that argument. Corporations have problems (such as the issue of corporate governance) but absurd comparisons to psychopaths have got to go.
Re:Corporations are psychopaths? (Score:4, Insightful)
Perhaps you won't agree with some of the conclusions the author has drawn, but the basic point that corporations have a lot more rights/powers than what is needed to allow for limited liability is pretty obvious. And comparing them to psychopaths really isn't absurd. They are treated, legally, as another person like you and me, but they don't act like normal people. Perhaps you don't want to say they act like psychopaths, but I'd like to hear a better description of why they act how they do, and and explanation why their behavior would be ok for a person with the same rights.
Re:Corporations are psychopaths? (Score:1)
Re:Corporations are psychopaths? (Score:1, Insightful)
First off, you have to think of the corporation as an entity. In reality it is a collection of individual people with different values serving many different roles but generally trying to accomplish the same thing. For the purposes of this discussion, though, we think of a corporation as a single entity owned by the stockholders.
As an individual, you make many decisions every day. Most of their decisions are mundane. Some of them, though, have ethical an
Re:Corporations are psychopaths? (Score:1)
There is a certain sentiment that says that a corporation has a responsibility to produce maximum return for its shareholders. If they don't, the shareholders can sue the company and collect. That means if an employee falls down a mineshaft and the rescue effort would cost more than the settlement to the next of kin, the company is NOT ALLOWED to do the "right thing". The sharehol
Re:Corporations are psychopaths? (Score:1)
Re:Corporations are psychopaths? (Score:2, Interesting)
I have an argument or two to contribute
I don't believe that this argument takes into account corporations supporting corporations. Arguably the corporations doing the most evil are either supported by a monopoly (SBC) or supported by
Re:Corporations are psychopaths? (Score:1)
Corporations have one purpose and one purpose only. Profit. They exist only to enrich the shareholders.
Since the shareholders are safely insulated from the day to day actions of the corporation they feel no guilt when the corporation does something immoral. They don't go to jail when the corporation does something illegal. Only recently, and only in certain circumstances, have corporate officers been held legally and financially responsible for the actions of their corporation.
A corporation gives it's lea
Re:Corporations are psychopaths? (Score:1)
Actually, they aren't safely insulated from the actions of the corporation, they are just less susceptible to excessive losses on the corporation's part (read limited liability). As I stated, the price of this limited liability is that the rewards are also smaller (you get taxed on income and so does the corporation). Since excessive immorality would (
Re:Corporations are psychopaths? (Score:3, Informative)
Not so. "The court does not wish to hear argument on the question whether the provision in the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which forbids a State to deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws, applies to these corporations. We are all of the opinion that it does." [wikipedia.org]
>I'm curious, what would be the psychological evaluation of the