Look, I’m the first to admit that we young people are dumb: we are sex-crazed, druggy rock ‘n roll freaks who love Family Guy and fart jokes, but at least we care about the future. For us, most of our lives lie in the future. For old people, most of their lives lie in the past. I think that might be why old people are so stuck in their ways.
If you haven’t heard, the people who run The Pirate Bay were found guilty and sentenced to a year in prison and fines of about $4 million. This is nothing more than the older generation trying to stop the future from happening. By the way, they weren’t even convicted of sharing files illegally, or even sharing information about illegal files, but simply linking to information about illegal files which “aids and abets” the downloading of illegal files. This is nothing more than censorship.
I really hate people who try to stop change. As I mentioned previously in my blog post on Star Trek and Intellectual Property, a world in which information is free is one step closer to utopia. It’s nothing to be afraid of. If history has taught us anything, it’s that you can’t stop innovation.
Now, I don’t know a single 20-something or younger person who believes filesharing to be wrong (or gay marriage, or marijuana). Hopefully, once our generation takes over things will change.
BEST COMMENT: d00d — “this post is great!
it manages to offend baby boomers who are offended when you call them old, now that they are old. they were once considered cutting edge, hip and trendy.
it offends people who have no idea how to dispassionately read a blog. “i disagree with you! i am going to sit here and shout at my cat while i type a witty/obscene response and then go to bed grinding my teeth in frustration b/c i am not able to disassociate myself from my reading.”
it offends ignorant people, because they are ignorant. “you want to legalize things that i think should be illegal? why don’t you just legalize murder and rape while you are at it, since i think those things should be illegal, too.”
it offends otherwise smart people, who attempt to hold the 300 year tradition of copyright up as though it has lasted eons, and that those who violate it should be physically imprisoned for committing information related meta-crimes in the virtual world.
and it offends me. because the reaction to this piece shows how many ignorant, self-centered and egotistical buffoons are still stubbornly part of the problem.”
EDIT: I’m fully aware that not all old people are conservative and not all young people are liberal. However, most stereotypes have some amount of truth to them. My comment about the old generation was actually specifically relating to the filesharing part: a generation which knows absolutely NOTHING about computers (and therefore NOTHING about filesharing) should not be making laws against things they know nothing about. Although the old generation probably knows more about drugs and marriage than us young people (who have only been doing drugs for a few years and aren’t yet married), don’t even try to pretend you guys understand computers or the Internet. And I repeat, anybody who is against filesharing really has to read my blog post on Star Trek and Intellectual Property. For the record, I’m 26 years old, I do have a job, and my company has just recently started open sourcing its projects.
Tags: bittorrent, filesharing, freedom, future, gay marriage, intellectual property, marijuana, The Pirate Bay
playing and music making art is the same as making collectables
prints exist so someone can have a replica. the radio plays music so you dont have to pay, downloading, filesharing, and piracy is the same.
i paint and play music. i paint WHILE im at work because my job allows it and then i sell the paintings their so i can make more paintings. people like me enjoy supporting GOOD music and GOOD art by buying the real thing when you can find it. I absolutely love being 500 hundred miles away and stumbling upon something like a CD from a band i go watch.
i couldnt care less about how much money i make off of my art or music because in all honestly its the performance of both that is where my passion lies. just seeing someone love or even like what i have to offer is like someone telling me they love or like who i am. the point of art is the passion and emotion in every aspect. you have to be selfish in your creation so that you can be as honest in its completion and only after youve poured yourself into it (knowledge of what works and what doesnt is pretty important i.e. color theory and chords etc)
bottom line, listen to your records for free, print of a picture of your painting or whatever, but go see your favorite band live and buy a real painting or a poster or whatever if you really care and have the money or time. no artist should go to school for being an artist if you really care. find the time if you have the passion and get a practical job to pay for things. that being said it is possible to live off of your passion but you gotta do it right and i dont have a clue as to what to tell you there.
i make enough money of my passion to keep my passion on fire and then everything else goes towards my car and bills, PLUS extra for tattoos and hella dank ass bud. i couldnt be happier cuz im only 19 and i get laid by amazing women of a wide variety in age and culture. one day karma will return the effort you put in to be an honest individual and if you feel like downloading music for free is honest i would have to agree with you. im just happy people like each others music to listen to it
hopefully that made enough sense, im high and at work so im not spell checking and whatnot
I hate when they try to ban filesharing, my isp has banned pirate bay because they were pushed around by a mega music company.
[...] we can legalize filesharing, marijuana, gay marriage, etc. and then get on with our lives?Source:http://www.philipbrocoum.com/?p=588 Posted by Poker Fiend at 12:48 Labels: gay marriage, marijuana, [...]
Damn it, it was the generation of my parents (or at least their younger siblings) who were supposed to legalize marijuana, normalize gay sex, open up free speech, and all that hippie shit I still believe in when THEIR parents finally died off. I knew it was going to happen, and by 2000 all that fundamentalist shit would be gone. That’s what they told us, when they were kids.
The real problem is that all too many people are 45 year old reactionaries from the day they’re fucking born. I’ve heard some of my kids friends espouse positions that would have shamed Reagan. I wait for their young supposedly liberal friends to react. Nothing.
The seeds of not-going-to-change-in-your-lifetime-either are among you, and in your peers. Change doesn’t come from “the older generation dying off”, it comes from technological and its accompanying social change, and what freedom you believe you have can still be taken away from you at any moment… and not by “those old guys”, but by people of your own generation.
PS: Don’t forget that Mark “Privacy is dead and if you could upload your soul to Facebook as well as your life I’d sell that too, suckers” Zuckerberg is your generation.
I’m absolutely amazed that someone who can write as intelligent as you can’t think though the logic of your own arguments. Yes, I read Star Trek and Intellectual Property.
Read Ann Rand. The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged. I’ll even buy you a copy if you can’t find one…
Well, I see you have a job, however i would not give you one in any organisation in which I work. Do you know why? Because you are ignorant and make stupid generalisations. Anyone who says, “a generation which knows absolutely NOTHING about computers” has to be an idiot – sorry, but thats the way it is. Some of the best network specialists, CISCO certified and MCSEs as well as some of the best programers I have ever seen are around the 60 mark.
One of my readers, Casey, posted a comment to a fantastic video I would like to share with you all. It does an excellent job outlining the folly of the music industry. So, without further ado, for your viewing pleasure, “Dinosaurs Will Die.”
I agree to everything in that post. but I’d want my grandma alive for those few years she has left. she didn’t do anything evil in her life
You sir, couldn’t be more wrong. I read this post and your start trek post as well and you are not in the right state of mind. You imagine the world as it is now, plus replicators. However, you don’t see the big picture, you don’t understand why so many in this world have chosen to produce intellectual property for us to “copy” aka steal.
I imagine you like movies or video games or even computer software, all of which are created mostly for the purpose of making money and receiving acclaim. If I’m going to spend 5 years and millions of dollars developing my property only for it to be replicated for free, indefinitely, well guess what, I’m not going to make it.
If you go tomy website,
Sorry got cutoff, if you go to my website, you’ll see I’m a developer for the android market, 2 of my applications aren’t for free, I use google’s copy protection such that it makes it more difficult for people too copy my app and redistribute it for free.
I made three app, I spent the time and effort and paid the fees to become a dev,i also spent time too gain the necessary knowledge and used my own creativity too come up with this product. I spent months on it and will spend more to make it better throughout it’s life cycle. In your world of free information,i wouldn’t have bothered making it.
Many developers would’ve made the same choice and we’d see fewer apps on the market. Yes, lots of apps are free or have free versions and that’s great, but it’s also a choice. IN your fantasy land, you have no choice but to give it away for free, and I think many like minded people would agree with mein knowing that it’s not fair.
The older you get, the more conservative you get. For different reasons I suppose. So by the time they die, we will be old enough to have change toward more conservative views, and then the younger generation will hope we die to change the world, but by the time we die, they will be older and more conservative, at which point the younger generation will…
Source for the older-more-conservative stuff: Spent by Miller
Filesharing will destroy the incentive for content creators to continue creating content. Especially quality content. I say this as someone who has spent countless hours downloading music, games and videos compulsively, however I feel like the point should still be made. Without monetary incentive our tired capitalist society will grind to a halt, and with it all the music, games and videos we love will lose their backing. This is simple fact; if you think not, try to consider breaking your back for years to churn out amazing gems such as Starcraft or The Watchmen to have parasites such as myself and yourself revel in them for free. If you think you could live with this you are clearly a better person than me. And a liar. How can you possibly think your rights are being slashed because you can’t have all the shit you could wrap your greedy hands around, for free? This is just gross human negligence, that in you have neglected to realize where your free lunch trickles down from.
OOOO Now I got philip where you coming from. Pot head, like to take up in the ass and like to steal other people’s work. Now I understand where you are coming from.
Good job man, you are really helping the world to be a better place, we should legalize killing as well… I would start with people like u that don’t deserve that air that u use.
Yes, some people will stop making music, but many many more independent hobbyists who otherwise wouldn’t have an audience are now thriving thanks to the internet. Far more has been gained than has been lost. If you don’t believe me, just think about the free software movement.
It’s also basic economics, people: unlimited supply with limited demand necessitates that the price goes to zero. There’s nothing you can do about it, regardless of your moral or ethical beliefs.
Artists can do what everybody else in the world does: get a day job. If they don’t like it, they can stop making music. Simple.
If anybody thinks that “there will be no music” in the future because of that, then you are ignorant, and you are forgetting about all the successful free industries: I guess YouTube doesn’t exist, DeviantArt doesn’t exist, Linux doesn’t exist, the radio doesn’t exist, broadcast TV doesn’t exist, Archive.org doesn’t exist, Wikipedia doesn’t exist, Shakespeare in the Park doesn’t exist, and I could go on forever.
The following statements perhaps provide the most telling window into your world of ignorance and arrogance:
“the old generation … knows absolutely NOTHING about computers”. “Although the old generation probably knows more about drugs and marriage than us young people … don’t even try to pretend you guys understand computers or the Internet.”
Here are a few facts you may find interesting:
Bill Gates will turn 55 on October 28, 2010. He is more than twice your age. He’s an old dude. So, according to your logic (and I use that term extremely loosely), he knows nothing about computers or the Internet.
Steve Jobs turned 55 in February. Old dude, so he knows nothing about computers/Internet.
Tim Berners-Lee is also 55 (old), therefore knows nothing about the Internet that he basically INVENTED, Al Gore notwithstanding (http://www.w3.org/People/Berners-Lee/).
Paul Allen is even older – 57.
In case you are too young and dumb (an admission you made in your opening sentence above) to know who these people are, there is this thing called “Google” where you can type in their names and it will bring up all kinds of really cool info. Yes, I’m an old dude and I know about Google.
Re: Paul
Yes, because every single old person is either Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, or Tim Berners-Lee.
99.99% of old people don’t understand computers, and that’s enough for me. 99.99% of young people DO understand computers. Simple.
Obviously, there are exceptions to every rule, but you can’t worry about the 0.01% that are the exceptions.
The baby boomers are a detestable generation. They did whatever they wanted, broke every convention when they were young, now they’re telling us do as we say, not as we did. Ass a generation they’ve sold out to the original values they’ve held in the 60′s. They stand for nothing, but more of the same, a generation of selfish corporate sell outs. Now they’re screaming whose gonna take care of us? now that they got old and neglected to take care of their retirement, destroyed medical and medicare. There’s no one to take care of you, cause you’ve destroyed the internal structures which use to allow the young to take care of the old. There’s just too many of you and too few of us. When you all die it will be huge burden lifted off of us.
Hahaha! “Anybody else waiting for the old generation to die so that we can legalize filesharing, marijuana, gay marriage, etc. and then get on with our lives?”
So true man…so true.
lmao this issue with the younger generation is what makes my ass want to take a dip of snuff (oh and i will wait on you while you Google what that is) Computers are a good thing but like everything in life, nothing is foolproof FOOLS PROOF trying to show us old folks that the only limitations with a computer is the operator trying to engage in siber sex and whatever other generic generated pc toys for the taking. Bottom line, having known only one young person who has Respect for Said Old Generation is cause he does not poison his young mind on video games and virtual reality and all that’s not real. Go out and grab some fresh air and sunshine and while your at it travel around the world meet new real people and learn some real values in life that makes life worth living. Many of you won’t be worth much if you don’t… unless you refuse to unplug wanting to get high and become perverted and have a gay marriage! Good Luck on Your Future!
You make quite a good point actually WRT it mostly being the older generation putting these laws into place. Maybe though younger people should just go into gvmnt?
So we understand neither computers nor the Internet? Really, I had no idea. The fact that I’m 50 and second generation in the computer industry (I had the run of the Lawrence Berkeley Lab by the time I was three; I grew up with computers) makes me unable to understand computers, does it? My father created two of the systems that became backbones of the Internet, yet I know nothing about the Internet, despite meeting my second husband on an online system (and this was not match.com) back before AOL was allowed to post on Usenet?
Do tell. I’m all ears.