[p2p-research] Fwd: [fcforum] Fw: iPad DRM is a dangerous step backward. Sign the petition!

[Ryan Lanham]

On Wed, Feb 3, 2010 at 4:38 PM, Andy Robinson <ldxar1 at gmail.com> wrote:

> You're probably right, I'm probably never going to convince you.
>
> But I do wish you'd stop pulling out all these silencing invalidatory
> tricks.  Matters vs doesn't matter, works vs doesn't work, most people vs
> small minority etc.
>
>
Well, you are certainly willing to say whatever you want.  But so am I.



> All subjective judgements on your part, but portrayed on the scale of grand
> knowledges.
>
>
I have no grand knowledge other than what people want and my own opinions.
Other than that, I try to rely on science...which I think you rather
dismissively referred to as being an "analytic type."  I am definitely one
of those.  But I've struggled through my share of Zizek and Zerzan both.
Indeed, I think I've posted links to both of them in this very list.  I
always try to read things I disagree with.  It is method I use to learn.


> *"It hasn't worked in the many dozens of times it has been tried,"*
>
> 99% of human societies.  All societies start out stateless.  Only a tiny
> minority of them develop states.  These ones have the habit of colonising
> and subjugating everyone else.
>
>
States are technologies.  Of course everyone starts out without them.  I
agree that states are competitive so far.  That doesn't surprise me since
humans are competitive...even the Yanomamo.



> *"It isn't any way people want to live (99.999% of us)"*
>
> *sighs*...  you've interviewed how many?...  I think we'd exceed 0.001%
> just with indigenous peoples who have resisted state control (the West
> Papuans for example number in the millions).
>
>
I've not interviewed a one.  And how many Papuans have you counted?



> As for the rest of the world...  I'm not sure as anyone really knows what
> the vast swathes of the global poor really want - often including the global
> poor themselves - but when they start articulating their own autonomous
> politics, it often takes anarchistic (if not strictly anarchist) forms.
> Most people don't like to be enslaved, and for there to be dominant people
> there need to be dominated.  People who are dominated - who usually
> outnumber the dominators - *tend not to like it very much*.  They have a
> habit, very annoying to their 'betters' no doubt, of *fighting back*.  Of
> course, if enough of them can be persuaded or tricked into thinking they can
> be one of the dominators instead of one of the dominated - and if reality
> seems to offer no options except to be one or the other - they might never
> get around to asking which system they'd prefer.
>
>
Sure we do.  We know they want to not be poor.  Every chance they get they
leave families, home lands and social structures to get an education to earn
money.  So much so that we literally have to wall them off from moving en
masse to opportunities.  China has the largest urbanization in history.  I
agree people don't like domination; they dislike poverty even more.


> I would also add that of this 99+% who supposedly prefer lawful state
> societies, about 98% break the law in one way or another.  Which makes me
> wonder whether they *really* prefer this kind of society, or just *
> fantasise* that they do.
>
>
Of course they do.  People aren't perfect.  But they like governance.  Just
look at failed states like Somalia or even Jamaica and you'll see people who
live in abject misery for want of a working state.  States are typically
flawed in huge ways, but they alternative is, to me, far less appealing.
I've seen lots of utopian efforts.  Haven't seen one work.



> *"I like living in a world of laws,"*
>
> Probably because you're not the one getting locked up.  You wouldn't like
> living under someone else's laws.  It's only because you're lucky enough to
> be in the in-group that you like it.  The underside of a truncheon does not
> look so nice as the top side.
>
>
Systems are imperfect and unjust. Show us how to do it without imperfection
and injustice.  My view is you focus on justice and dialogue and
productivity.  You educate people in ways that allow them to participate in
the desires and goals they esteem. Is it Nirvana?  No.  It's messy, broken,
constantly collapsing and easy to criticize.  It burns out good people
continually.  If I knew a better way...a consistently better way...I'd fight
for it.  The best I know of now is markets, democracy, good governance,
transparency, personal liberties, human rights...the whole spectrum of
modern governance.



> You are also quite probably benefiting from cheaper prices due to enslaved
> (mainly black and Hispanic) prison labour, not to mention the others forced
> into sweatshop labour through state expropriations and fear, though I doubt
> you know it well enough for it to affect your preference for 'laws'.
>
>
Undoubtedly so.  The US imprisons ridiculously too many people in my view.
But a democratic society chooses those outcomes continually.  It isn't fair
and it is racist.  Those are things that need hard work to repair.




> *"I am more that willing to subscribe to US views of rights or those of
> the Human Rights Convention."*
>
> Strange, I don't remember things like intellectual property being in the US
> Constitution or the UN Declaration on Human Rights.  The latter is
> deliberately very quiet on issues of property relations and distribution.
> The former...  well, suffice to say that if read literally it would require
> dismantling most of the current US state apparatus.  The approach of these
> kinds of rights documents is usually very similar to that which I set out
> initially - there are a small number of basic rights which are either
> absolute, or have priority as a group (they can only conceivably be trumped
> by other rights within the group); these rights are *meant* to be an *outer
> frame* within which a range of policies, specific social orders etc can
> then be pursued.
>

You need to re-read them.  The Constitution references patents.  The UN has
numerous documents, treaties and conventions on the protection of
intellectual property.  The Declaration has Article 17 which has numerous
times been discussed in terms of both physical and intellectual properties.
See also article 20...no one may be compelled to be in an association...



> But in practice, states will very often *violate the outer frame* either
> by ignoring it, 'balancing' it against secondary concerns, reading secondary
> concerns into it, or rendering the rights impotent by technical
> interpretation.  This was how I initially discussed this issue at hand...
> the DRM framework in this case, is a violation of the right to privacy (core
> right), makes using a particular technology conditional on effectively
> carrying around the state in your pocket - reversing the burden of proof
> (Fifth Amendment violation - you are required to report on yourself through
> the item signing in automatically), and creates the *technical potential*for very serious violations of core rights such as widespread political
> censorship or restrictions on freedom of expression (such as the risk that
> the government could order the removal of all copies of "Cop Killer" and the
> addition of those who purchased it to no-fly lists; or the Chinese
> government locking up and torturing everyone who has a Free Tibet song on
> their playlist).
>

DRM a violation of the right to privacy?  By who's legal interpretation?
Any court so find?  In any nation?   You are certainly entitled to your
opinion. But the rest of us are entitled to our legal frameworks.



>
> You responded that it is justified because of its positive aggregative
> teleological effects (saving the music industry) and enforcement of
> second-order non-core 'rights'/privileges/legal entitlements within a
> particular system (suppression of piracy).  (This can be avoided - for now -
> by not purchasing the product which implements this technology, but in cases
> like mobile phones, market hegemony of dangerous technical practices was
> followed rapidly by legislation to require them.  I would add that one is
> only likely to refrain from buying something for these kinds of reasons if
> one believes strongly that such technical measures are wrong).  But the
> whole rights framework requires that core rights cannot be trumped by
> aggregative teleological effects, non-core rights, or other kinds of
> entitlements.  The core rights trump the other rights.  So you're willing to
> endorse and draw symbolic capital from these kinds of rights discourses, but
> not to uphold them when they're inconvenient for the pursuit of other
> ethical positions you hold.  You aren't really prepared to operate them as a
> limit on how and whether states and corporations can exercise power in cases
> where you think their purpose is justified.  You aren't prepared to bear
> their costs, and this means you don't really endorse them at all.
>

No one needs a phone.  If you don't like the system, don't participate.  If
you can implement a better system, I'm with you.  Certainly complain, rail,
protest, do all that is reasonable and legal to change injustices.  But
don't expect support when you decide what the rules should be without due
process and the instruments of society unless you are willing to suffer the
consequences when society finds you anti-social.   You say you want a
revolution?  Well, we all want to change the world.
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