Wasn't btjunkie used primarily to violate copyright?
If so, it seems you are mistaken about the outrage regarding SOPA. The outrage was not defending our right to free movies. When Megaupload got taken down I started seeing all these posts that seem to be under the impression that the Internet had rallied around the right to get everything digital for free/cheap against the creators' wishes, which is not the case.
So a knife is an arms. But it does not mean It's unlawful. If you are after copyright violators, go for them. Declaring knives outlaw is not the solution.
In this analogy, somebody tried and failed to make knives illegal. Meanwhile, the government has gotten more serious about going after those who willingly supply knives primarily to those who will use them illegally. And one such supplier has ceased business volutnarily
No it's not an exact analogy. For instance, knives can be made from any substance, and by anybody. This site, btjunkie is not a supplier of knives. It's a place where someone can find who builds and sells knives.
The point is, nobody has made file sharing in general illegal. But the government is going after sites that primarily enable illegal file sharing. And some sites that do this are shutting down voluntarily.
Injustice is making people close sites and get out of business even if they are not doing anything illegal. For another analogy, this is like a pawn show deciding to close because some unrelated guys makes drug dealing inside. In this situation does governments go after pawn shops? or only after dealers? Better yet why not make drugs legal and receive taxes for this deals?
> Injustice is making people close sites and get out of business even if they are not doing anything illegal.
Is there any evidence that anyone made btjunkie shut down? It sounds voluntary. Presumably they know they are doing something illegal and have chosen to shut down.
> For another analogy, this is like a pawn show deciding to close because some unrelated guys makes drug dealing inside. In this situation does governments go after pawn shops? or only after dealers?
If it can be shown that the pawn show was designed primarily to facilitate illegal conduct inside, then it's not really "some unrelated guys".
> Better yet why not make drugs legal and receive taxes for this deals?
Why not make murder-for-hire legal and tax it? Let's not make analogies just so that we can appeal to whether some other activity should or should not be legal in the analogy. And I don't even know what your point about taxes would since btjunkie likely paid taxes on their ad revenue and donations.
We can just discuss whether copyright should exist rather than resorting to silly analogies. I am not even close to happy with the current situation with copyright. My personal view is that copying for personal consumption should not be illegal. But copying or enabling copying for profit is much more nefarious to me.
I gather you think copyright should be entirely abolished and it should be legal to profit from distributing content created by someone else against their wishes. I'll respect that opinion. But it has nothing to do with SOPA, and nothing to do with people engaged in entirely legal activities being pursued.
If you believe the current laws are unjust, then please be clear that this is your stance rather than pretending that they aren't being broken. And please don't pretend that Wiki pedia and thousands of other sites blacked out for a day in support of illegal file sharing.
No I do not mean copyright should be abolished. No It's fundamental security guard for producers. But as you mention current situation with copyright handling is a mess.
File sharing must be a right and this desire should be fulfilled via content producers. Making people ache for buying content and going after people making it easier is not a way to make consumers happy.
Nobody wants to watch 15 minutes of undesired videos and adds. Instead they go pirate. Nobody wants to buy physical media anymore. Nobody likes DRM content which disables them even using two different players for their enjoyment. Even yet, Hollywood and Music producers are making more and more money.
This is where the producers are making the wrong. They believe they have the every sole right to put their consumers to agony. And if someone tries to lower this pain, it's in no way can be rightful. They just try to punish them for their efforts. As we have seen with Hulu.com, Groveshark.com or last.fm. The producers are greedy. If these sites pay royalties or not, they are not happy and they do want more. They want them to make their way of restriction for their customers. In the first place these sites are here for not using that restrictions.
So everytime the consumers lose. Government and producers could sit on a table with piratebay or btjunkie and think how could the situation be solved by working together. Everybody could win.
For the SOPA side of the story,
I'm living in Turkey. And I do know what could SOPA do to Internet. Because we have 5651 and BTK and living in agony. Turkish government department for information security mails websites to do self-censorship. They do hijack dns without court orders and without reasoning. SOPA is not about filesharing. It's about Governments and Producers right for censorship.
And by the way these two subjects are really not related.
I agree with the majority of this post. It would benefit everyone involved if those who produce content would get up to speed with technology.
However!
> This is where the producers are making the wrong. They believe they have the every sole right to put their consumers to agony.
They are not putting us through agony by producing content and then fumbling the delivery. They have no obligation to us to produce the content we want in the way we want to consume it: At worst they are not affecting us at all. We can simply not consume the content. If you consume content in a way that agonizes you, that is your own decision.
> And by the way these two subjects are really not related.
Presumably you mean SOPA and btjunkie are not related?
This discussion thread is stemming from the claim that they are related. I assumed that was where you were coming from.
I'm sorry about saying these subjects are not related. I was wrong.
But consumers are why these producers are in business. They must fulfil their needs and desires to stay in business. But you are right about not consuming. But this would be possible if there are alternatives. But there is a war on alternatives because they can not be legal, or they are pushed to their limits where they can not compete with the mainstream players.
By the way, by saying producers, most of the time I mean, distributors or production companies. Not actors or musicians.
By the way, by saying producers, most of the time I mean, distributors or production companies. Not actors or musicians.
A lot of the times, and for a lot of popular content, the production company IS the producer/artist and not the actor or director. I.e the whole "vision" of the thing is not artistic in any way, just a scheme by some marketing guys in a production company to make some dough. Like almost all blockbuster movies, lots of top-10 billboard artists, teen idols, etc. Those aren't much "created" as they are "produced", usually by committee.
So If I started a website that only catered to the distribution of illegal credit card numbers (but not the actual stealing of those numbers) and your number was on the site, would you fight for my right to keep the site up?
I'm merely pasting numbers on a website, which isn't illegal.
If so, it seems you are mistaken about the outrage regarding SOPA. The outrage was not defending our right to free movies. When Megaupload got taken down I started seeing all these posts that seem to be under the impression that the Internet had rallied around the right to get everything digital for free/cheap against the creators' wishes, which is not the case.