===Challenge===
We can from this point either degenerate to bickering -or seek consensus on what's ethical or not.
===Response===
The ethics part of this is a two way street. And this is, as I see it, where most of the problem comes from. All we ever hear about is the college kids that are using P2P to rip off the "artist's" intellectual property.
<snip>Much clear and reasonable logic</snip>
Ethical responsibility of consumers to content creators. Ethical responsibility of content creators to the general public.
You can't have one without the other, else you create an unsustainable system.
===New Challenge===
Well spoken. Yet content creators who strongly defend their right to maximize profit believe that they are doing so because of ethics. They justify their position by saying that it is their ethical responsibility to persecute all who "steal" from them.
It is wise to draw attention to ethics, and to put the responsibility upon the giver and the receiver. Both of these you have done.
Yet how do we manage the folks who believe that they are ethically responsible when they are not? They cannot be persuaded by an appeal to ethics because they already believe they are abiding by a noble ethic.
-Jared
p.s. Hint 1: For an ethical system to be superior to another ethical system, it must apply _less_ force in implementation. Brute force is the lowest form of ethics. What is the highest?
Hint 2: I think Linus Torvalds has a pretty good idea of it, but a lot of people who "follow" him do not. And as near as I can tell, he's okay with that. ;-)
Jared wrote:
Yet how do we manage the folks who believe that they are ethically responsible when they are not?
Simple. We don't. In my opinion, we would be over-stepping our ethical boundaries to try and force these ethics on others. Telling someone it's wrong to beat their wife is one thing, telling them it's wrong to collect excessive royalties is completely different. *You* do what is right, and hope that in time others will "see the light."
They cannot be persuaded by an appeal to ethics because they already believe they are abiding by a noble ethic.
Most of these profit-seeking folks don't believe they are "abiding by a noble ethic." In fact, many of them are very aware of the fact that their ethics suck. They simply don't care.
I don't say this just because I "think" this is how it is. I know it. I socialize with a wide variety of people, several of which fall into the artist/author-with-sucky-ethics group. I recall one fellow who developed a simple application that he was selling for upwards of $1K per copy. The product had some fairly obvious flaws that could have been easily corrected, and when I suggested the fixes the guy replied with something to this effect: why fix it when my customers are dumb enough to buy it how it is? This is an example of an author not having any respect or ethical responsibility to his customer, and it's wrong.
Hint 1: For an ethical system to be superior to another ethical system, it must apply _less_ force in implementation. Brute force is the lowest form of ethics. What is the highest?
Read up on Ghandi.
Hint 2: I think Linus Torvalds has a pretty good idea of it, but a lot of people who "follow" him do not. And as near as I can tell, he's okay with that. ;-)
Linus has some good personal ethics. Linus is also very forward about his refusal to force his ethics on others. This is why he doesn't like the GPL 3 for *his* projects. Linus doesn't care if you use the GPL3, and he will likely end up as an end-user of many GPL3 programs. Since the GPL3 exceeds what he feels is acceptable bounds, he isn't using it.
~Bradley
This has brought up some interesting viewpoints. Some of them seeming to be more sane than others. What makes this all come back on topic for Linux?
The consensus and meritocracy tests have become embedded as how Linux "works" Applying those tests works. Ignoring them ?
Yet how do we manage the folks who believe that they are ethically responsible when they are not?
Simple. We don't. In my opinion, we would be over-stepping our ethical boundaries to try and force these ethics on others. Telling someone it's wrong to beat their wife is one thing, telling them it's wrong to collect excessive royalties is completely different. *You* do what is right, and hope that in time others will "see the light."
Excellent answer. I entirely agree.
They cannot be persuaded by an appeal to ethics because they already believe they are abiding by a noble ethic.
Most of these profit-seeking folks don't believe they are "abiding by a noble ethic." In fact, many of them are very aware of the fact that their ethics suck. They simply don't care.
Look closely: they are not fully aware that their ethics suck. Their noble ethic is: "Competition" and they DO believe they are abiding by a noble one. They care, but little: they see other noble ethics as unrealistic in the "real world" of competition.
They just haven't realized that competition makes money, but not loyal customers. They wonder why they have to work so hard for their money, and they "simply don't care" because they are so weary from working so hard. When enough weariness sets in, the more noble ethics become attractive.
I don't say this just because I "think" this is how it is. I know it. I socialize with a wide variety of people, several of which fall into the artist/author-with-sucky-ethics group. I recall one fellow who developed a simple application that he was selling for upwards of $1K per copy. The product had some fairly obvious flaws that could have been easily corrected, and when I suggested the fixes the guy replied with something to this effect: why fix it when my customers are dumb enough to buy it how it is? This is an example of an author not having any respect or ethical responsibility to his customer, and it's wrong.
Yup. And all we can do about it is wait for him to wake up, because no amount of persuasion will convince him. But time will.
Hint 1: For an ethical system to be superior to another ethical system, it must apply _less_ force in implementation. Brute force is the lowest form of ethics. What is the highest?
Read up on Ghandi.
Or Socrates, who perfected the art of the rhetorical question on the subject of ethics.
Hint 2: I think Linus Torvalds has a pretty good idea of it, but a lot of people who "follow" him do not. And as near as I can tell, he's okay with that. ;-)
Linus has some good personal ethics. Linus is also very forward about his refusal to force his ethics on others. This is why he doesn't like the GPL 3 for *his* projects. Linus doesn't care if you use the GPL3, and he will likely end up as an end-user of many GPL3 programs. Since the GPL3 exceeds what he feels is acceptable bounds, he isn't using it.
Good example. It will be interesting to see how Stallman and Torvalds followers work this one out over the centuries consequent to their groundbreaking work in this new era.
-Jared
-- "In the information era, wars are fought over the Quality of information, not the Quantity of land, as with all previous wars. The wars will not be bloody, but the information will become more and more pure, as power accumulates around Quality of information same as it accumulates around Quantity of land." (Zend and the Art of River Maintenance, 2007)
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Bradley Hook -
Jared -
Oren Beck