[chii]

> But that's an issue to complain to the people who write the laws, not the content providers who take advantage of them.

that works when the law makers are ethical and neutral. When the "content providers" get in bed with law makers to create laws favourable to themselves, then what?

I want to participate in culture by creating a derivative work based on the disney micky mouse figure. But i m disallowed, because of the said laws, unless i paid disney some amount of money. Do you think disney deserves this money?

[talmand]

According to the law, yes. They absolutely deserve that money because that's what the law says. You can't choose to ignore a law because it's inconvenient for you. If you choose to ignore a law for your own benefit then that allows others to do the same for your potential detriment. That's extremely bad short-term thinking.

Your complaint is with the law, it has nothing to do with the content providers. You say but the content providers influence the law with money. In that case your complaint is with the system that writes the law. Your ire is misdirected and likely will cause nothing to change.

Of course, there's civil disobedience to consider. It would be an interesting way to combat the laws at hand but I'm not sure how to go about that in terms of media consumption. I suppose if enough people did it at the same time.

But you fall into the common problems with these type of discussion; you act as if your choices are limited. For instance, with piracy it's usually "they don't make it easy and/or cheap enough for me to buy so therefore I must steal it" which is a self-limiting range of options. It totally ignores several options such as simply not consuming the content in question and move on to something else. You present only one option in your desire to create, a derivative work based off of another's content. That's not your only option in this case.

Finally, this idea that this stuff is a part of our culture and we're locked out of it. I would say if we're locked out of it so tightly that we can't enjoy it then I wouldn't call it part of our culture. But this culture defense is new to me in these terms, it's an interesting idea. It will ultimately fail in the end but an interesting defense nonetheless.

[sp332]

According to the law, yes.

That's begging the question. We could change the law, but first we have to ask if we should, and in what way. That's why chii asked: Do you think disney deserves this money? Only after we answer that, will we know what the law should be.

[talmand]

Change the law? Absolutely. That is actually what I've been trying to advocate all through several discussions, that the outrage is misplaced. Don't like the law? Demand a change in the laws instead and stop wasting time on the companies that follow the law.

It's like that silly issue where everyone gets mad every year at international companies following various country's tax laws to reduce their tax obligations as much as possible but never actually demand a change in the laws themselves. They rail against the company as if that will change anything.

But to answer the question again, yes indeed, Disney deserves that money because that's what the law states. I don't understand how I can make that more clear. The fact that they get any money at all from their original creation is directly tied into such laws. Without those laws they have to hope for the best on the goodwill of people to compensate them for their work. As for deserve? They created it didn't they? Do they deserve anything at all? If they do, for how long until it could be considered public domain? Should anything be considered public domain after a time at all? That's what the law is for, to answer those questions. If you want to change the law, the current law applies until you change it. You can't start at zero and build up, you have to start with what's already established. Therefore, Disney deserves that money because of the law as it stands today.

[smaudet]

Except the law is not ethical - if it were ethical we would never need to change it.

The term 'deserve' implies something ethical. Your statement here is so much horseshit - nothing is 'deserved' because of the law, it is only legal because of the law. It is their legal money, but it is not necessarily their deserved money.

Just because someone slips in a by-clause that lets them legally rob a bank every fortnight, doesn't make that money their deserved money, or the robbing of the bank ethical.