Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Master_Shake
How do you attribute the quotes to someone like you've done? I don't know how to do that.
|
Replace the {} with the square brakets:
{quote="Mr T"}You da fool{/quote}
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Mr T
You da fool
|
=)
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Master_Shake
He has it only because he's allowed to have it. He didn't build the factory, and the idea, once passed to other people, is no longer his alone. But the government sends cops out to protect his plant, and makes it illegal to use the idea. That's not capitalism, that's government enforcement of that guy's wealth.
|
Ignoring the 'intellectual property laws are wrong' arguement:
He paid people to build the factory, or bought it off someone else. Are you claiming that property rights of any kind are slavery?
Maybe he found a magic rock on the land his great great great great^100 grandmother was born on, before mankind was civilized, and that magic rock is the means by which you can be more productive. You seem to think you own the land you are born on, maybe you'll take that as a just bit of property rights.
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Master_Shake
No, yes, yes. But I think you misunderstand me, I'm going to take the job because I don't have any other choice. But I'm not going to cheer for the guy, and if I had the opportunity to do something different I'm sure I would.
|
The exploitation was a
bad thing? Justify that. Go right ahead. You are better off because you where 'exploited'.
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Master_Shake
The value of your labour is what it is worth on the open market. When there is no open market then your labour is undervalued or overvalued depending on where you are on the system's protection list. Bill Gates, who doesn't write code anymore and probably just hangs out occasionally making some decisions doesn't put nearly as much value into the new windows OS as some other people. Yet he's paid a ridiculous amount of money because the system is set up to protect him (copyrights).
|
So, you value labour, and labour only.
There is an alternative to Windows -- many of them even. Linux, *.BSD, Solaris. All of them are free. They are even set up in a way that someone can't use copywrite to 'steal' any work you contribute to it. People are free to use those operating systems, and the government won't shoot you for doing so.
At the same time, the lack of copyright and a lesser profit motive means that those operating systems don't have all the bells and whistles that Windows has. But they exist.
The protection of creative works for a limited time is in the best interests of society as a whole. I would hold the current duration of copyright is too long.
You seem to ignore the value of capital. Bill Gates earned a fuckload of money way back when. He took this money and
risked it on his own company. At that point, anyone could have risked their money on Microsoft, but Bill risked a metric fuckton. Capitalism rewards you when you make bets like that properly.
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Master_Shake
Concentration of capital among the most productive is a side effect of market capitalism. Concentration of capital among a class of people that put protections in place to a) ensure they no longer have to be productive, and b) will continue to receive revenue is not market capitalism.
|
Capitalism simply concentrates wealth. If you have a bunch of people equally productive, and you add in some random chance, capitalism will concentrate wealth in a few of them. It is a side effect of a capitalist market.
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Master_Shake
How competent do they have to be?
|
Conspiracies are hard to keep quiet. Especially large ones involving the hiring practices of every company in the industrialized world.
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Master_Shake
There are occasional changes, of course, once in a while some poor people do get rich, and some rich people are tossed to the wolves as a sacrifice. But you look at Microsoft and IBM as two distinct operations. When Microsoft became the dominant computer company, it was absorbed by the industry. Where do you think the people who work for it came from? IBM (or some other similar company). It doesn't matter what name it goes by, whatever company is on top nearly always consists of the same people. Why do you think CEO's are shifted around from one company to another?
|
Yes, actually. They are (and where) distinct, with very different corperate cultures.
The people who work for Microsoft came from CS schools around the country.
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Master_Shake
Probably not instantly, but if you do manage to improve to such a level you are absorbed into the system, yes.
|
Your position is that "the man keeps everyone down. Anyone who isn't down becomes part of the man. Thus, my statements are irrefuteable." Do I misunderstand you?
Unfalsifiable claims are weak, pointless and boring.
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Master_Shake
An economic system in which the means of production and distribution are privately or corporately owned and development is proportionate to the accumulation and reinvestment of profits gained in a free market. -Dictionary.com, first entry The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
I didn't redefine the term. Private ownership means that the means of production and distribution are not owned by the government. They are owned by the government here in America.
|
Strange that. I could have sworn I owned my car. Hell, I could have sworn my landlord (who doesn't charge me enough rent, heh) owned his building. But, I guess, if you are taxed 1%, that makes you own 0%. =p
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Master_Shake
I have no idea. Sometimes I'd like to find out. And either way, I'd like to be able to make the choice to find out.
|
There are 6 million square miles of arable land under cultivation. There are 6 billion people.
Your share is a packet of land 36 meters on a side. Bring along no tools of technology. I'm sure you could manage to buy this much land somewhere in Africa.
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Master_Shake
Why write my own? There's a perfectly good OS that's already on my computer. I physically own it, I only have to pay him because he says so.
|
It was written because you would pay him. If you didn't pay him, it wouldn't have been written. There are
consequences to destroying all intellectual property rights.
You believe the world would be better without them. Now, put up.
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Master_Shake
I think that's nonsense. People are always going to want to do things better or cheaper. Without copyrights they'll choose to do it because they want or need to, not because they need to think up something more expensive to convince us to buy.
|
I said
insufficient economic incentive. I didn't say
nobody would do it. Fewer people than there should be, in order to maximize everyone's well being, would be doing it.
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Master_Shake
I don't know where you live, but in PA you face up to 30 days for possession of a small amount of marijuana and a $500.00 fine. Granted, most people get some form of probation the first time out, but you still face that possible penalty. And $500 isn't a small fine to me. Maybe you're rich but that's a more than a week's wages to me.
|
My location is on the left. 128$ fine, if they bother prosecuting, last I checked.
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Master_Shake
It's not ridiculous. When the roads are built as a form of corruption in the first place, then it's all corrupt.
|
Look, it was stated that 'the government would 100$ of my money and build roads which would cost 1$ to build if it wasn't for the corruption.', or words to that extent.
I am aware you are redefining "corruption = government", but I don't have to agree with your arbitrary word redefinitions.
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Master_Shake
You still haven't shown how the government is different from the mafia (other than being bigger and better organized). Do you admit they are the same thing?
|
Both the Mafia and the Government are made out of protons. Thus they are the same.
Both the Mafia and your Grandmother are made out of protons. Thus they are the same.
You have claimed the exitance of huge conspiracies, going from the entertainment to the defence to the buearocracy to the elected officials to the corperate board room, covering every part of society, designed to keep you down, and thus enslave you.
I disagree with that, and consider it paranoia. Your attribution of motivation has been without ground.
Ice and water are the same thing. Ice and water are very different things. I claim you are looking at superficial, unimportant points, and basing your world view on them.
If you removed the government (just made it go poof), would people be better off? While we are at it, lets remove all governments. I hold the answer is no.
If you removed the Mafia (just made it go poof), would people be better off? While we are at it, lets remove all crime organizations. I hold the answer is yes.
One is a leach. The other an enabler. One is close to the best of all attempted worlds. The other is close to the worst.