Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.
Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you get in touch with technology? With
Speaker 1: tech Stuff from how stuff works dot com. Hello, everyone,
Speaker 1: welcome to tech stuff. My name is Chris Poulette and
Speaker 1: I am an editor here at how stuff works dot Com.
Speaker 1: Sitting across from me as always a senior writer, Jonathan Strickland.
Speaker 1: The code is more what you'd call guidelines and actual rules,
Speaker 1: Parley Poley. Um. That actually leads us directly into a
Speaker 1: little Facebook feedback. That's a thing, well it could have.
Speaker 1: It's not listener mail our Facebook. So I heard it
Speaker 1: that way everymore. Yeah, I just made it up. So
Speaker 1: Facebook feedback lots of fs and that. Uh. This listener
Speaker 1: mail comes to us from home. Ecebook feedback comes to
Speaker 1: us from someone whose name I can't pronounce because my
Speaker 1: pronunciation for names and Indian languages is terrible. But I'm
Speaker 1: going to give it a shot and he can write
Speaker 1: to me on Facebook and tell me how wrong I
Speaker 1: got it. On Tricks says Hey, I've got an awesome
Speaker 1: podcast idea, the ethics of pirating media. You have already bought. Well,
Speaker 1: if I'm not that clear, here's an example, you buy
Speaker 1: a music CD and you travel somewhere. You had the
Speaker 1: music from the CD on your computer, but you accidentally
Speaker 1: deleted it. Is it right to download the music from
Speaker 1: an illegal source? Maybe torrents? Downloading without purchasing is illegal anyway,
Speaker 1: but people argue that this is ethically right. I'm one
Speaker 1: of them too. You could read this as a listener
Speaker 1: mail and you can mention my name too. I tried. UM.
Speaker 1: So we're gonna talk about piracy ethics. You know, when
Speaker 1: is it is it ever all right to download something
Speaker 1: uh for free? You know, whether you've purchased it or
Speaker 1: haven't purchased it, and sort of the issues that surround
Speaker 1: this and make it more complicated than you might first imagine.
Speaker 1: So let's get started, shall we. Yes, Now it does
Speaker 1: become more complicated as you start uh crossing international boundaries.
Speaker 1: This is uh. If it was a piece of music
Speaker 1: recorded and save Britain, UH and you were in Germany
Speaker 1: when you had your files deleted and you wanted to
Speaker 1: download them, uh, it makes things even more complicated. Unfortunately,
Speaker 1: well fortunately and unfortunately for the pirates. I suppose, UM,
Speaker 1: there are treaties in between these different countries, including those
Speaker 1: but around the World Intellectual Property Organization or Weepoh wow, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I I focused mainly on the United States because that's,
Speaker 1: for one thing, is the easiest for me to get
Speaker 1: information on in a language that I can read. Yes,
Speaker 1: that is our sphere of operation, of course, so it's
Speaker 1: a little easier for us. But you know, on tricks,
Speaker 1: we do know from his frequent feedback on Facebook. Hey,
Speaker 1: that's lots of alliteration there. Um does live in India,
Speaker 1: so you know, he might have a different perspective than
Speaker 1: the media. Right. But in the United States, copyright law
Speaker 1: as it stands is already fairly complicated. Yes, okay, So
Speaker 1: in general, a work created on or after January one,
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy eight has a copyright that will last through
Speaker 1: the duration of the author's life plus seventy years. Yes,
Speaker 1: before January one, ninety eight is more complicated. Um. And
Speaker 1: also you could, uh, from the ones from before then,
Speaker 1: corporations and authors had the opportunity to extend copyright further
Speaker 1: if they wanted to, which could not bring it up
Speaker 1: to the same amount of time as if it were
Speaker 1: created after nine. But it's it's complex. So, uh, what
Speaker 1: copyright allows you to do? Is it it allows you
Speaker 1: to dictate how how your your content can be purchased
Speaker 1: and distributed. Uh. So let's say that I create an idea,
Speaker 1: I've got it under copyright. What I choose to do
Speaker 1: with that content, that content belongs to me, and I
Speaker 1: can license it out to people as I see fit. Uh,
Speaker 1: that's really a lot of the arguments I see kind
Speaker 1: of ignore this whole licensing issue, which is to me
Speaker 1: right at the very heart of the problem. But UM,
Speaker 1: go ahead, you're better to say something. Yeah, well, I
Speaker 1: was just going to say, at least in the United States. UM,
Speaker 1: let's say you're an author and you're writing a book. Well,
Speaker 1: as soon as you finish it and you you've you've
Speaker 1: you know, say, printed it out, it's in a fixed
Speaker 1: form and you're done with it. Copyright already is protecting
Speaker 1: that work in the United States. As soon as they
Speaker 1: exists in a fixed form, it is under copyright. You
Speaker 1: are the copyright holder. Um. You do not have to
Speaker 1: file paperwork for it, although for some protection it does
Speaker 1: help you to do that. Um, but you've already got
Speaker 1: it. It It starts right then and there. Now, say you
Speaker 1: want to have your work published. You'd like to see
Speaker 1: your name in print. You want to go on tour
Speaker 1: and do book signings. This is the dream that you've
Speaker 1: always been wanting to pursue. Well, you're going to need
Speaker 1: a publisher to help you with that. You could self
Speaker 1: publish it, but you're still you know, unless you happen
Speaker 1: to own a printing press, it's gonna be hard to distribute. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you're you're you're going to want some kind of publishing
Speaker 1: help with it. So let's say, uh, let's let's say
Speaker 1: you're really interested in having somebody like Random House publish
Speaker 1: your work, and so you submit it and they're they're
Speaker 1: gaga over the whole thing. They love it, they love
Speaker 1: the idea. They want to print it. But you're going
Speaker 1: to have to license the copyright to them in order
Speaker 1: to do that, and you're going to sign a long
Speaker 1: agreement that allows them to be the publisher to do that,
Speaker 1: and so you're basically giving them access to or copyright
Speaker 1: if you will. So at that point, um, making unauthorized
Speaker 1: copies affects the company too, and not just you as
Speaker 1: the author, right, And then we have to kind of
Speaker 1: address something that's there's a lot of confusion around this
Speaker 1: as well. The concept of fair use. Fair use definitely
Speaker 1: has its place, but unfortunately or fortunately, depending on which
Speaker 1: side of the argument you happen to be on at
Speaker 1: any given time, it's not firmly defined. In general, fair
Speaker 1: use allows a couple for a couple of different um
Speaker 1: exceptions to the whole copyright issue. One is, if you
Speaker 1: are using material for educational purposes and you are commenting
Speaker 1: on it, or you are um, you know, using it
Speaker 1: to illustrate a point, you are allowed to use a
Speaker 1: certain amount of information without it being considered a violation
Speaker 1: of copyright. However, that certain amount is up for discussion.
Speaker 1: There's no there's no clear definition. There's no like two
Speaker 1: paragraphs is the limit and over to paragraphs is copyright
Speaker 1: violation or is the utmost limit you can go to.
Speaker 1: There's nothing set in stone. It ends up being a
Speaker 1: case by case basis. Right, if you're going to use
Speaker 1: a portion of someone else's work in your own and
Speaker 1: the person who's copyright uh is in question, uh, you know,
Speaker 1: feels that is being infringed upon, they take you to court.
Speaker 1: It is ultimately going to be up to the judge
Speaker 1: to decide, you know, how much is being used and
Speaker 1: for what purpose? If it it relies on a couple
Speaker 1: of things. It needs to be transformative. So if you've,
Speaker 1: for example, weird al Yankovic takes songs that are already
Speaker 1: um popular and will remake them into a parody. Often
Speaker 1: puts it in a different key, and rewrites new lyrics
Speaker 1: to it, and makes subtle changes to the song to
Speaker 1: make it his own. But it's essentially a song that
Speaker 1: is recognized old people. Parody is protected. Parody is protected,
Speaker 1: but it is what he has done is transformed the
Speaker 1: original work and and put it under a parody. So
Speaker 1: he's okay with that. Now, if you took an entire
Speaker 1: poet's poem and used it in your work and claimed
Speaker 1: it was your own, then you're probably gonna get in trouble,
Speaker 1: right Or if you if you end up writing a
Speaker 1: an essay, let's say that makes the exact same point
Speaker 1: as the essay that you are using to illustrate your point,
Speaker 1: there might be an argument there that that's just plagiarism
Speaker 1: and copyright violation, that you're not you're not using this
Speaker 1: in a new way of or or really using it
Speaker 1: to educate or illustrate. You're just borrowing someone else's stuff,
Speaker 1: and uh, and using it as part of your own material. Um,
Speaker 1: but you can also make copies of things that you
Speaker 1: purchase intellectual property. Essentially, you can make copies of I
Speaker 1: P for archival purposes. Yes, Now that means that, let's
Speaker 1: say that you bought this really came about, especially back
Speaker 1: with during the whole vinyl album and cassette era, and
Speaker 1: say that you would buy a vinyl album. Kids, if
Speaker 1: you don't know what that is, actually probably do because
Speaker 1: they're kind of coming back with the whole DJ stuff.
Speaker 1: But that in our our tech stuff audience is probably
Speaker 1: into that anyway. Yeah, but but you might want to
Speaker 1: make a copy of that because this is physical medium,
Speaker 1: and media can sustain damage and wear and tear over time,
Speaker 1: and you still want to be able to listen to
Speaker 1: that content after that media has died out or perhaps
Speaker 1: perhaps even it gets to a point where the equipment
Speaker 1: you have that can play that media no longer works, right,
Speaker 1: So you want to be able to create an archival copy. Now,
Speaker 1: this is a copy for your own personal use. It's
Speaker 1: something that you're keeping so that you can again maintain uh,
Speaker 1: the ability to access that material that the license that
Speaker 1: you have essentially purchased to that material for a while
Speaker 1: that in the United States that became really pretty much
Speaker 1: impossible to do with legally, right because companies were putting
Speaker 1: DRM on top of UH of their physical media like
Speaker 1: let's say c d s or DVDs, and in order
Speaker 1: to be able to create a copy, you had to
Speaker 1: break the d r M, right, But breaking the DRM
Speaker 1: was illegal, So even though it wasn't illegal to make
Speaker 1: the copy, it was illegal to break the protection that
Speaker 1: prevents you from making a copy. So in effect, it
Speaker 1: became illegal for you to make a copy because there's
Speaker 1: no legal way to get around it. Yeah, now it's
Speaker 1: not going to come as any big shock to any
Speaker 1: of our listeners that the world of computer technology has
Speaker 1: completely changed, uh the need for copyright protection in the
Speaker 1: eyes of people who own copyright. Now, I mean, you
Speaker 1: had a six page book, you know, in eighty two.
Speaker 1: The only way anybody was going to make a copy
Speaker 1: of that was my hand and that right then and
Speaker 1: there is going to be a deterrent to most people
Speaker 1: to make another copy of the book now. I mean,
Speaker 1: obviously the the printer is going to have the printing
Speaker 1: press and be able to make more copies of it,
Speaker 1: and you could do that Um, but it's not like
Speaker 1: everybody on the street is going to be able to
Speaker 1: do that. Now that everyone has a computer and it's
Speaker 1: easy to make copies of let's say, for for the
Speaker 1: purposes of this particular part of the conversation, unprotected anything
Speaker 1: that's unprotected like electronic books, digital music files, digital video files.
Speaker 1: I mean, if there were no protection at all, Uh,
Speaker 1: it would be easy to you know, rip new copies
Speaker 1: of that and give them to everybody you knew, distribute
Speaker 1: them on the internet freely and amount of seconds. In fact,
Speaker 1: that happens all the time. Sure, sure, So DRM is
Speaker 1: in is digital rights management is an attempt on the
Speaker 1: part of the copyright owners and the publishers of that
Speaker 1: content who have a stake in it too, now that
Speaker 1: they have a license to to produce and distribute the content. Um,
Speaker 1: it is an attempt for them to protect it and
Speaker 1: to get people to actually fork over the money for it. Um.
Speaker 1: The thing is they have also pushed government in general
Speaker 1: and multiple countries to help them do that by lobbying
Speaker 1: intensely for very thorough and someone to just say, you know,
Speaker 1: draconian measures that help them protect their d r M
Speaker 1: and leave it in place. Which is what the which
Speaker 1: is what's often used in conjunction with the Digital Millennium
Speaker 1: Copyright Act here in the United States. Yeah, d m
Speaker 1: c A. You've probably heard that term before, especially if
Speaker 1: you live in the United States. That's that's what I
Speaker 1: was talking about with the d m c A, where
Speaker 1: it made it a criminal act to try and either
Speaker 1: bypass DRM on a DRM product or to create software
Speaker 1: or some other tool that would allow you to bypass DRM.
Speaker 1: So if you created a tool that would break d
Speaker 1: r M and UH, and even if you had never
Speaker 1: done it yourself, like if you never created a file,
Speaker 1: just creating that tool was illegal under d m c A. Yes. Now,
Speaker 1: of course, the entertainment industry in the United States is
Speaker 1: very very big and very very powerful. UM. The d
Speaker 1: m c A was signed into UH into law on
Speaker 1: enter by President Bill Clinton UM, and it did bring
Speaker 1: the United States into compliance with two different w I
Speaker 1: p O treatise UM, which UH basically is the w
Speaker 1: y p O Copyright Treaty and then w I p
Speaker 1: O Performances and Phonograms Treaty. Now, everybody who's all the
Speaker 1: countries that are are on board with these treaties UM
Speaker 1: have an obligation to protect copyright from on things from
Speaker 1: other countries just as much as they would anything that
Speaker 1: was copyrighted in their own country. So um, if somebody
Speaker 1: in Russia wanted to uh copy and distribute Madonna's latest album, um,
Speaker 1: and Russia has signed onto the w I p O treaty,
Speaker 1: they are at the government is legally obligated to protect
Speaker 1: it as though it was somebody a Russian artist who
Speaker 1: had also recorded and released an album in its own country.
Speaker 1: Right now, let's get even more complicated with this whole
Speaker 1: digital media. So okay, so we've already established the idea
Speaker 1: that creating digital copies from physical media can be uh well,
Speaker 1: depending on the exceptions. Also because d m c A
Speaker 1: does have some exceptions that that tend to get in
Speaker 1: introduced every three years or so. But um, but creating
Speaker 1: digital copies of physical media can be difficult and in
Speaker 1: some cases illegal because you have to violate the DRM.
Speaker 1: Another reason why this is a complicated issue is that
Speaker 1: it's hard to wrap your mind around stealing a digital
Speaker 1: five because really what you're doing is you're creating another
Speaker 1: instance of that file. Yeah, you're not taking anything from someone.
Speaker 1: For example, if I own an album that Chris wants,
Speaker 1: so we're gonna call it, um let's see the Ramones
Speaker 1: Greatest hits. Let's say I've got the Ramones Grace Hits
Speaker 1: on vinyl and Chris is thinking, you know, I'd really
Speaker 1: like to listen to Blitz Creek Pop. And Jonathan's not looking.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna take that album and he takes the album
Speaker 1: out of my house. Well, I no longer can listen
Speaker 1: to the Ramones Grace Hits because my copy has been
Speaker 1: a student. But let's say that I have the album
Speaker 1: in digital file format on my computer and Chris says,
Speaker 1: you know, I want to listen to Blitz Creek Pop.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna copy that file off Jonathan's computer and put
Speaker 1: it on my computer. Well, I can still listen to
Speaker 1: my copy of Blitz Creek Bop. As far as I
Speaker 1: can tell from my perspective, nothing bad has happened because
Speaker 1: everything I have is still where it should be. Ut,
Speaker 1: that's a case of theft. It's just not a case
Speaker 1: of theft that is analogous necessarily just stealing physical goods.
Speaker 1: And this, I think is where are a lot of
Speaker 1: the arguments center around this concept, the idea that if
Speaker 1: you're not if you're not really bereft of something, if
Speaker 1: if the object is not has not left your possession,
Speaker 1: how can you call it stealing? Well, this is where
Speaker 1: we get to the concept that when you purchase i P,
Speaker 1: you're not really purchasing the i P. You're you're licensing it, right,
Speaker 1: Like if I buy a book from Chris, Like Chris
Speaker 1: has written a book and he's published the book, and
Speaker 1: I buy it from him, I know I don't own
Speaker 1: Chris's work, that that ownership does not transfer to me,
Speaker 1: that that intellectual property doesn't transfer to me, just my
Speaker 1: access to it. That's a license to access that i P.
Speaker 1: And if you think of it in terms of licenses,
Speaker 1: then these questions start to get a little easier to understand. Now,
Speaker 1: the question we were specifically asked was about getting an
Speaker 1: the legal copy of something that you already own legally
Speaker 1: and where does that fall ethically? And I guess that
Speaker 1: really depends upon whom you ask. Yeah, yeah, I mean
Speaker 1: speaking speaking as a recording artist myself. Um, you know,
Speaker 1: long time listeners will recall that I am I've been
Speaker 1: in several bands and have done recordings with with a
Speaker 1: few as well. Um, I sort of sympathized with the
Speaker 1: big name artists who have uh basically hollered about the
Speaker 1: about people stealing their music because you know, for them
Speaker 1: that's how they make their living. Um, so basically people
Speaker 1: are taking away a potential source of revenue. Now it
Speaker 1: doesn't you know, you could argue, you could make the argument, Hey,
Speaker 1: I know these guys are on name of major label here,
Speaker 1: they're only getting a buck for every CD and I'm
Speaker 1: basically on stealing a dollar from their coffers of money
Speaker 1: that they're making touring. It's no big deal. But to them,
Speaker 1: you know, if suddenly thousands of people are doing that,
Speaker 1: then there's a possibility that they might have to go
Speaker 1: get a day job. And I mean seriously, but there's
Speaker 1: also there's a getting to make that. To make it
Speaker 1: more complicated, of course, this in this particular situation, we're
Speaker 1: talking about someone who has purchased that that product legally,
Speaker 1: has converted it into digital media, which again is legal, yes,
Speaker 1: but then loses the digital copy and does not immediately
Speaker 1: have access to the physical copy. Is it wrong to
Speaker 1: download those files again for free? I would say that
Speaker 1: here's the problem that I have with this. The problem
Speaker 1: is that by downloading those files for free, you are
Speaker 1: participating in piracy. From from your perspective as the consumer,
Speaker 1: it's not a huge deal, right, You're getting access to
Speaker 1: files that you originally had access to in the first place.
Speaker 1: So for you, it just seems like it's it's like
Speaker 1: nothing's really changed. But what you're doing is you're actually
Speaker 1: trafficking with someone who is distributing these files for free,
Speaker 1: and that means that they have violated copyright. They don't
Speaker 1: have the right to distribute that content. They are doing
Speaker 1: something that's wrong, and you are a part of that.
Speaker 1: So I would say that ethically, on your end, it
Speaker 1: doesn't seem like a big deal, but in a bigger
Speaker 1: picture perspective, it's the wrong thing to do. I think
Speaker 1: legally it's more black and white. Well legally it's black
Speaker 1: and white, but ethically and legally are two totally different concepts. Well, no,
Speaker 1: that's That's what I wanted to stress, is that there
Speaker 1: there is a clear division there. You know, legally, yes,
Speaker 1: there's really no question according to these these laws that
Speaker 1: have been set up in in so many countries and
Speaker 1: the treaties that they have made to protect them, Yes,
Speaker 1: that is technically theft. Um or at least technically piracy.
Speaker 1: But ethnically, you know, from the user standpoint, it's a
Speaker 1: lot murk here. From the artist's standpoint or the author standpoint,
Speaker 1: it's like, hey, you know, you bought a copy of
Speaker 1: my book. I can't help it if you left it
Speaker 1: on the train. You know, that doesn't give you an
Speaker 1: excuse to go to the the library, you know, photocopy the
Speaker 1: entire thing and make yourself another copy for free. That's
Speaker 1: not that's not my fault, right. But from the user's point,
Speaker 1: you know, I've already paid my twelve right, that's a
Speaker 1: that's a very good point. I'm glad you paid that
Speaker 1: way because the example I used when Chris and I
Speaker 1: were just kind of chatting about this casually before the
Speaker 1: podcast was I said, well what if what if you
Speaker 1: um uh see how did I words? Le'll say, you
Speaker 1: you buy a book, okay, and then the book gets
Speaker 1: damaged beyond repair, or you lose it or whatever. At
Speaker 1: some point you no longer have access to that book,
Speaker 1: but you purchased it. That does not give you the
Speaker 1: right to go out and steal another copy of that book.
Speaker 1: But then you have the argument of hey, you're talking
Speaker 1: about physical media, here, by stealing a physical object, you
Speaker 1: have didn't eyed the the publisher or bookseller or whomever,
Speaker 1: the right to sell that. Whereas when you're talking about
Speaker 1: digital again, you're making a copy, you're not stealing a
Speaker 1: physical object. But it's again, if you go back to
Speaker 1: the license argument, as you did, because you were talking
Speaker 1: about going to the library and copying a book, that's
Speaker 1: still not legal. And is it ethical or not? Well,
Speaker 1: it depends on upon whom you ask again, Like like
Speaker 1: I said, they are like Randy Cohen, who writes for
Speaker 1: the New York Times magazine. Randy Cohen writes about ethical issues,
Speaker 1: and he was specifically asked about a case where someone
Speaker 1: had bought a hardback copy of a novel and she
Speaker 1: wanted to be able to read an electronic copy of
Speaker 1: that novel, but there was no e book available for purchase.
Speaker 1: So what she was wondering was is it wrong to
Speaker 1: download a pirated electronic copy of that book having already
Speaker 1: purchased the book through legal means, and there's no there's
Speaker 1: no legal recourse to get an electronic copy. Mr Cohen
Speaker 1: said that he thought ethically that was all right. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that blew my mind too. I I'm not so quick
Speaker 1: to jump on that. Um. Here, here's the thing. If
Speaker 1: you went and you purchased a book, and you brought
Speaker 1: it home and scanned every single page and created a
Speaker 1: digital copy yourself, I have no problem with that because
Speaker 1: I think of that as fair use. You're doing that
Speaker 1: for archival purposes, or you're doing it you're your your
Speaker 1: space shifting the work correct like you're you're shifting it
Speaker 1: from a physical medium to a digital medium. UM, I
Speaker 1: have no issue with any of that. What I have
Speaker 1: a problem with is the fact that by going to
Speaker 1: a source where they are distributing this, you have taken
Speaker 1: part of an illegal practice, and that means you're supporting
Speaker 1: an illegal practice. Now, now from your perspective, you're doing
Speaker 1: it very ethically because you've already purchased that content. It's
Speaker 1: not like you are getting around purchasing the content again
Speaker 1: because again there's no legal recourse for you to get
Speaker 1: that e book ethically for you, I guess I don't
Speaker 1: have an issue with it. But again, big picture, you're
Speaker 1: supporting a larger piracy effort that violates the distribution portion
Speaker 1: of copyright. So while while I would say that, I
Speaker 1: would feel as on my own end that I would have.
Speaker 1: You know, I don't have a big problem with doing this.
Speaker 1: If I thought about my actions beyond just the fact
Speaker 1: that this is benefiting me to this is supporting an
Speaker 1: entire illegal industry, then that's where the problems start coming
Speaker 1: in for me Ethically. It's it's it's a a tough question. Um,
Speaker 1: I can tell you. Let me be perfectly honest here.
Speaker 1: I'll just to lay it out on the table. There
Speaker 1: was a particular television series that came out in the UK. Yes, Um,
Speaker 1: several years ago. He's trying not to smile because we
Speaker 1: just talked about this in a completely unrelated light the
Speaker 1: other day. So it's really funny. So this particular television
Speaker 1: series came out in the UK, and there was no
Speaker 1: legal way to get access to a US version of
Speaker 1: this UK television show. The only thing I could have
Speaker 1: done is I could have purchased the UK version of
Speaker 1: the show and then bought a UK or region free
Speaker 1: DVD player so that I could watch the show. But
Speaker 1: other than that, there was no way for me to
Speaker 1: do it. The only thing that I could do if
Speaker 1: I wanted to watch the show was to download it illegally. Subsequently,
Speaker 1: the show became available in the United States and immediately
Speaker 1: went out and purchased a copy. Because I did download
Speaker 1: it illegally, I left that part out. I illegally downloaded
Speaker 1: a television show that was not legally available in the
Speaker 1: United States. Uh. And I didn't feel badly about it
Speaker 1: because I was like, I would pay for this if
Speaker 1: there were a way for me to pay for it,
Speaker 1: and I will pay for it if there ever is
Speaker 1: a way, and I did. Doesn't justify my action. Still
Speaker 1: that I don't think my actions are really justifiable, because ultimately,
Speaker 1: the way I acted was that I said, I want
Speaker 1: access to this content, and I'm going to get it.
Speaker 1: But there is nothing in the universe that guarantees you
Speaker 1: access to any content. You do not have the right
Speaker 1: to access content just because it exists. This is where
Speaker 1: Jonathan goes on a rant, because I mean, I am
Speaker 1: I have fallen guilt guilty of this in the example
Speaker 1: I used as a perfect example. By the way, in
Speaker 1: case you're wondering, the show was spaced so it was
Speaker 1: a different show. Yeah, but I do remember, dude, you
Speaker 1: don't need to tell them I've done it more than once. No,
Speaker 1: that's not the one you were talking about I think
Speaker 1: I was taked about Battle Royal, wasn't I? Yeah, okay,
Speaker 1: Battle Royal, which I subsequently ended up deleting eventually. But
Speaker 1: that was another example early on. Uh No, Space was
Speaker 1: what I was thinking of this the UK show I
Speaker 1: was thinking. You meant a different show that we were
Speaker 1: talking about was someone had uploaded to YouTube. You mean
Speaker 1: the American pilot for the I T crowd And you
Speaker 1: want me to just keep on naming things and dig
Speaker 1: a hole even deeper. But you didn't download anything illegally,
Speaker 1: know that one I just watched somebody uploaded Italy. So
Speaker 1: at any rate, Getting back to the Space discussion, as
Speaker 1: soon as it became available legally, I went out and
Speaker 1: purchased a copy, and I ended up deleting my um my,
Speaker 1: the copies I had digitally because it didn't need them anymore,
Speaker 1: like the DVD copy was superior to the digital format
Speaker 1: that I had. Um But yes, you don't. You are
Speaker 1: not entitled to content just because it exists. Let's say
Speaker 1: that a cool game comes out and it's more expensive
Speaker 1: than you are able to justify in your budget. You
Speaker 1: have no right to that content. It's not like you know,
Speaker 1: just because it's more expensive than you think it's worth,
Speaker 1: that you should go out and steal it. That's wrong.
Speaker 1: That's that is, that is the very definition of wrong.
Speaker 1: The way you do this, the way you go about
Speaker 1: this is that if you think content is too expensive
Speaker 1: for what it is worth, you do not buy the content,
Speaker 1: and if enough people do not buy the content, the
Speaker 1: content provider will have to change the way things are
Speaker 1: or the content provider goes out of business. You do
Speaker 1: not say, hey, that game is sixty dollars, but I
Speaker 1: think it's only worth ten dollars, so I'm gonna steal
Speaker 1: it for free. That does not work. That is the
Speaker 1: wrong way to do it. That is stealing. I I
Speaker 1: feel compelled to point out that that I feel that yes,
Speaker 1: it is simply put, information does want to be free,
Speaker 1: and that was That's part of the whole thing about
Speaker 1: copyright protection is that, um, there is some provision for
Speaker 1: fair use, and there's also the expiration of copyright law.
Speaker 1: That's been the big um. The big thing about copyright
Speaker 1: law extensions that have come up, especially with the Sonny
Speaker 1: Bone Know extension a few years ago, was the Mickey
Speaker 1: Mouse Protection extension. Is what some people derisively referred to
Speaker 1: that as well. Yes, because of course Disney UH is
Speaker 1: very serious about protecting characters such as Mickey Mouse. Makes
Speaker 1: perfect sense from a business perspective, from a creative perspective,
Speaker 1: for the people who would like to build upon things
Speaker 1: that have already come before, which is, by the way,
Speaker 1: the history of human development. UM, it's antithetical, it's it's
Speaker 1: it's harmful to keep extending copyright. But for the people
Speaker 1: and the corporations, who, as we know in the United
Speaker 1: States are treated as people, UH, it makes perfect business
Speaker 1: sense to keep extending it as long as as possible
Speaker 1: in order to ensure that you've got that that exclusivity.
Speaker 1: And I assumed that probably in the next fifty two
Speaker 1: seventy five years there's going to be another attempt to
Speaker 1: lobby for from Disney or someone else who had UH
Speaker 1: characters that are still very viable in the marketplace that
Speaker 1: have been around for a very long time. They're they're
Speaker 1: going to keep lobbying government to to UH extend that.
Speaker 1: But the thing is, it's it's designed to expire specifically
Speaker 1: for the purposes of building upon that and and UH
Speaker 1: and making changes to you can you could say things
Speaker 1: about pride and prejudice and zombies um, which is completely
Speaker 1: legal because um, you know, the person the work itself
Speaker 1: is in the public domain at this point. And I
Speaker 1: should point out that the w I p O treaties
Speaker 1: have a provision for that things that are in the
Speaker 1: public domain or in the public domain, no matter where
Speaker 1: they are. So if it's something that, say in Britain
Speaker 1: isn't in the public domain, but or is in the
Speaker 1: public domain, but it wouldn't be in the United States,
Speaker 1: you know, in the country it's published and it's in
Speaker 1: public domain, then it then it counts. So it's um.
Speaker 1: So that's sort of a thorny thing. And and you know,
Speaker 1: don't get the idea that we're uh completely on the
Speaker 1: side of of all protecting information. But the thing is,
Speaker 1: if it's still under copyright, uh, you know, it's still
Speaker 1: protected and you have to abide by the law. You're
Speaker 1: supposed to abide by the law. And that's you know,
Speaker 1: where the line is to go on to go on record.
Speaker 1: As far as my opinion goes with the whole copyright thing,
Speaker 1: I think copyright law is really messed up. And I
Speaker 1: think that a lot of the motivations that come from
Speaker 1: the pirates quote are at least semi legitimate. Um that
Speaker 1: that a lot of the problems come out of the
Speaker 1: fact that that the UH copyright practices and particularly DRM
Speaker 1: practices are so over the top and ridiculous that it
Speaker 1: promotes an a a environment of piracy. So for example,
Speaker 1: if you video games are a great example, right, like
Speaker 1: you get video games that have really heavy DRM on it.
Speaker 1: Sometimes that makes it difficult to play the game. Legitimately, yes,
Speaker 1: I think that's a big part of why Spoor ended
Speaker 1: up tanking and badly as it did, was because the
Speaker 1: initial complaints about the the fair play Wait now that's
Speaker 1: Apple's sorry, I can't remember the name of it. Anyway,
Speaker 1: the the DRM they had included it Electronic Arts UM
Speaker 1: was so you know, it actually hampered playing the game.
Speaker 1: I had trouble playing it on my Mac because of
Speaker 1: the DRM, And as soon as they removed that sent
Speaker 1: me the download and it updated, it was fine to
Speaker 1: play after that. But you know, by that point, the
Speaker 1: reviews that come out, um, you know, it's still I
Speaker 1: look the other day, it's still something like two stars
Speaker 1: on Amazon, and most of the negative comments are over
Speaker 1: the DRM, which has been removed years ago. Chris I
Speaker 1: got a question for you. Okay, all right. Let's say
Speaker 1: that you have purchased a game such as Spore. Okay, okay, uh,
Speaker 1: and the DRM has made the game virtually unplayable. Right,
Speaker 1: but you have the option of illegally downloading a version
Speaker 1: of that game that has the DRM broken, which would
Speaker 1: make the game perfectly playable on your system. Right, So
Speaker 1: you've already bought the game. I paid for it, You
Speaker 1: paid for it. Uh. Would you download the illegal copy? No?
Speaker 1: I would not. All right? Now, do you think it's
Speaker 1: ethically wrong for someone to get the illegal copy knowing
Speaker 1: that they like, let's say, they don't even bother to
Speaker 1: take the Spore version out of their box. They're not
Speaker 1: going to give it away. The boxes just sitting there
Speaker 1: in the closet, So they're they're going to keep a
Speaker 1: copy if the if the Feds show up in No,
Speaker 1: I see, I bought a copy of this thing. It's
Speaker 1: in my closet, exactly. You still find do you still
Speaker 1: find that ethically troubling? Yeah? I do find it ethically troubling.
Speaker 1: So this is one of those gray areas that's hard
Speaker 1: for me to It's hard for me. I tend to
Speaker 1: feel sympathy for the pirates because on the one hand,
Speaker 1: I think, hey, I've purchased something. They've promised me a
Speaker 1: particular experience, and I am I am not a I
Speaker 1: followed all the rules, I've done everything they've asked of me,
Speaker 1: and the experience is not what they said because they've
Speaker 1: put so much protection on this that I can't run it.
Speaker 1: Another good example is let's say you get a game
Speaker 1: like the ones Ubisoft put out where the only way
Speaker 1: you could play it is if you could connect to
Speaker 1: their servers, and that was how they put on DRM.
Speaker 1: If you're not familiar with the story, what Ubisoft did
Speaker 1: was for a couple of the games they put out,
Speaker 1: you would have to have a persistent Internet connection to
Speaker 1: the Ubisoft servers to confirm that you had a legitimate
Speaker 1: copy of the game. And if you lost Internet connection
Speaker 1: during any point of playing this game, and these were
Speaker 1: single person games that were not multiplayer games, you don't
Speaker 1: You aren't using the network for anything like that, You're
Speaker 1: just using it to verify the copy of the game.
Speaker 1: But if you lost the Internet connection, you would no
Speaker 1: longer be able to play the game until your Internet
Speaker 1: connection was restored. For a single player game, now again,
Speaker 1: pirates were breaking the codes on this and then offering
Speaker 1: up the game for free, essentially saying that if you
Speaker 1: purchase this game and you want to play it, then
Speaker 1: you should go ahead and get this version of the
Speaker 1: game because you don't have to worry about your Internet connection. Um.
Speaker 1: I can kind of see their argument because the DRM
Speaker 1: has gone so far as to make the product unusable.
Speaker 1: But at the same time, you are supporting this this
Speaker 1: pirate piracy environment, so it's really an honor system thing
Speaker 1: in a way. You're saying, hey, you know, I want
Speaker 1: to support this company, I want this this I've paid
Speaker 1: for this this content, I just want to have access
Speaker 1: to it now. It's a complicated issue, you know. That's
Speaker 1: that one's not very easy. The same thing with like
Speaker 1: a lot of the music services that came out, where
Speaker 1: the DRM was tied to servers and then the servers
Speaker 1: were going offline, and the music service services were saying, hey,
Speaker 1: you know all those songs you bought from us, Yeah,
Speaker 1: you might want to burn those two CD like now,
Speaker 1: because we're gonna turn the servers off in a month
Speaker 1: and you won't be able to play those files anymore. Yes, yes,
Speaker 1: more than one name, big name did that. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: in these cases, like you could argue, well, you've only
Speaker 1: purchased a license to listen to that music from so
Speaker 1: and so, But when you purchased the license, it was
Speaker 1: understood to be in perpetuity, right, there was no time
Speaker 1: limit on that, Like you can listen to this song
Speaker 1: until January seventeen, two thousand and eight. That that wasn't
Speaker 1: in the agreement. Yeah. Now see the thing the thing
Speaker 1: about that this is if you've bought a copy of
Speaker 1: it and you find it's unplayable speaking of games, still um,
Speaker 1: and you've gone out and downloaded a pirate copy the
Speaker 1: company still even though you've purchased a copy legally. The
Speaker 1: thing that bothers me to other than the ethics standpoint,
Speaker 1: is the company doesn't know what's going on. They have
Speaker 1: the company has no idea what that that you have
Speaker 1: encountered this trouble with the d r M, that you're
Speaker 1: upset about it, that you're downloading an illegal copy of it,
Speaker 1: and you know, I think it's important to one of
Speaker 1: the things is I'm not saying that piracy is good.
Speaker 1: I ethically still have a trouble pirating and copy of
Speaker 1: that game, but you know it would be. It would
Speaker 1: have been good to have known that up for and
Speaker 1: not spend your money with them, because then more people
Speaker 1: spend money on it intending you know. Now, say you
Speaker 1: know that it's going on, your friends said, oh, this
Speaker 1: is a great game, but it's unplayable with this DRM.
Speaker 1: If you go out and buy a copy of this
Speaker 1: and then pirate the game, you paid for it and
Speaker 1: you're still playing it, and then you're still supporting the
Speaker 1: company applying that DRM the game. What you're saying is
Speaker 1: that you are not letting the market correct itself because
Speaker 1: you are participating in this kind of charade. Everything is cool,
Speaker 1: you know, I can totally see that. Yeah, yeah, it
Speaker 1: is a weird thing. Um. Like I said before, if
Speaker 1: you want content and they have a certain asking price
Speaker 1: for it and you can't or won't meet that asking price,
Speaker 1: then you go without that content. If you want content
Speaker 1: and you're willing to pay what they're asking for it,
Speaker 1: there's usually no problem till you encounter this DRM issue. Um.
Speaker 1: And if you encounter the DRM issue, then that's where
Speaker 1: things got gray for me. And it was a little
Speaker 1: it was still a little darker for you than it
Speaker 1: was for me. Um, But I mean here's another. One
Speaker 1: other example, or one other point I want to throw
Speaker 1: out is that part of the justification for piracy comes
Speaker 1: from some disingenuous statements that various content providers and organizations
Speaker 1: have made regarding how much money they lose as a
Speaker 1: result of piracy. So they're not helping themselves, right that
Speaker 1: You've got the pirates on one side and these organizations
Speaker 1: on the other, and you have organizations saying, hey, we're
Speaker 1: losing you know, X billion dollar amount per year due
Speaker 1: to piracy. Well, the Government Accountability Office filed a report
Speaker 1: in t that's the United States Government Accountabilities Yes, the
Speaker 1: US Government Accountability Office. The report was Intellectual Property Observations
Speaker 1: on Efforts to quantify the economic effects of counterfeit and
Speaker 1: pirated Goods. This one beyond just did total media. This
Speaker 1: was all sorts of counterfeit goods. Right. Well, in this case,
Speaker 1: they said that it was impractical, too impossible to figure
Speaker 1: out how much money was lost because you can't quantify
Speaker 1: factors like, uh, how much, Uh you know, how how
Speaker 1: many of the people who stole something would have purchased it? Otherwise, Yeah,
Speaker 1: there's really no way to know unless you do a
Speaker 1: survey with them and we get down to piracy. People
Speaker 1: aren't again, right, honest. Yeah, So if you can't if
Speaker 1: you if there's no way of knowing how many people
Speaker 1: would have bought it if they hadn't stolen it, it's
Speaker 1: hard to say what the actual economic impact is. Now
Speaker 1: we know that there is an economic impact if nothing else.
Speaker 1: There's an economic impact in the sense that studios and
Speaker 1: companies are pouring money into finding ways to prevent piracy.
Speaker 1: So there's an economic impact, right. It's not direct. It's
Speaker 1: not saying that, oh, we lost twelve bucks because you
Speaker 1: downloaded that album illegally. It's saying, hey, we lost x
Speaker 1: amount of money because that's how much we had to
Speaker 1: pour into trying to prevent people from downloading stuff illegally.
Speaker 1: So it's a complicated issue. Um. Ultimately, I would say
Speaker 1: don't pirate stuff, like don't if it don't illegally download things.
Speaker 1: You know, it's you again, if you if you bought
Speaker 1: something in one medium and you converted to digital and
Speaker 1: then you lose the digital copy, you still have the
Speaker 1: physical medium even though it's not at hand. You wait
Speaker 1: until you get your hands on that physical medium again,
Speaker 1: because that then you're following the rules of fair use.
Speaker 1: But just going out and getting something because you bought
Speaker 1: it once before. Is that's a slippery slope, And really
Speaker 1: it doesn't. It doesn't take much longer before you get
Speaker 1: to the point where you're saying, hey, you know, I
Speaker 1: bought books one through ten of the series and book
Speaker 1: eleven is out, and um, you know it's it's already
Speaker 1: out of print, and I would have bought it, so
Speaker 1: I'm just going to download it. That's you know again,
Speaker 1: that's it's leading you down a pathway that is more
Speaker 1: difficult to justify. Yeah, and I don't just as a
Speaker 1: note that I thought of as sidebar, um, there's another
Speaker 1: reason why you might not want to be running around
Speaker 1: downloading a lot of torrents if you don't have to. Well,
Speaker 1: of course, torrenting is not in and of itself illegal.
Speaker 1: It is the method of sharing files. But if you
Speaker 1: are downloading illegal files, especially if you don't know who
Speaker 1: you're downloading them from, there's a possibility there's a security issue.
Speaker 1: There's a possibility that you're going to download something very
Speaker 1: nasty because uh, people who like to start bought nets
Speaker 1: like to put malware on servers like that and disguise
Speaker 1: it as other files. Yeah, An unnamed friend of mine
Speaker 1: recently posted something on Facebook where this unnamed friend said,
Speaker 1: I've found a virus on my computer. It's something called
Speaker 1: a root kit? How bad is that? And did not
Speaker 1: like my answer of that is very very bad. That's
Speaker 1: about as bad as it gets. Really, yeah, kind yeah,
Speaker 1: giving you back to our access to your computer, that's that's.
Speaker 1: I can't think of something that's worse than that. Well,
Speaker 1: I mean it's it's obviously the laws are different no
Speaker 1: matter where you go. I mean, they're they're all going
Speaker 1: to be similar in some ways in different than others.
Speaker 1: So I mean it's it's up to your local laws
Speaker 1: depending on on some of these questions about whether or
Speaker 1: not it's it's ethical legal to do that. And you know,
Speaker 1: ethically this is an issue with which we're all going
Speaker 1: to have to come to grips. But um, you know,
Speaker 1: in general, I think Jonathan's right. If it's if there's
Speaker 1: a question of whether or not it could be illegal,
Speaker 1: then you you shouldn't do it. Yeah, uh yeah. And
Speaker 1: that might mean that, you know, you campaign to have
Speaker 1: laws changed, and that I'm fully in support of that.
Speaker 1: I think I think that's the way to go. It's
Speaker 1: It's much better than going all Batman and saying I'm
Speaker 1: above the law, because that that's a losing game. It
Speaker 1: is this for everyone ultimately, because if you get caught,
Speaker 1: then you have to face these incredibly ridiculous finds that
Speaker 1: that organizations like the r I Double A and the
Speaker 1: MP Double A demand be placed on people who violate
Speaker 1: the copyright laws. But you also hurt everybody else in
Speaker 1: the sense that these companies continue to try and find
Speaker 1: ways to prevent piracy that ultimately hurt honest consumers the most. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but it sounds it sounds like entricks is you know,
Speaker 1: a legal consumer. He's already purchased the music in the
Speaker 1: first place, so he wants to do the right thing. Um,
Speaker 1: and I think most people do that. The producers want
Speaker 1: to produce stuff that people will buy, the people want
Speaker 1: to fork over their money for it. It's just that
Speaker 1: there has to be a level of trust between them
Speaker 1: for the for the transaction to work out. Okay, and
Speaker 1: then d r M and copyright law, you know, just
Speaker 1: complicates that matter of trust. Agreed, Yes, yes, neither side
Speaker 1: is wholly without blame. So with that being said, please
Speaker 1: don't steal this. Actually this podcast is freely available, so
Speaker 1: go ahead and distribute it all you like and tell
Speaker 1: all your friends to listen to it. And if you
Speaker 1: have any comments or questions you can listen. Know on
Speaker 1: Facebook and Twitter are handled. There is tech Stuff hs W,
Speaker 1: or you can email us. Our email address is tech
Speaker 1: stuff at how stuff works dot com and Chris and
Speaker 1: I will talk to you again about something else I'm
Speaker 1: sure that will be ethically disturbing really soon. If you're
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