[pp.int.general] Correct word usage for PP.

[NingúnOtro]

El vie, 08-04-2011 a las 10:57 +0200, Pat Maechler aka Valio escribió:
> I guess this definition has been taken from Richard Stallman's proposal
> http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/words-to-avoid.html
> 
> But I agree with Maike: IMO goods are well defined - at least in the
> economic academic discourse.
> The term does not imply anything on tangibility nor on scarcity nor
> whether these have to be sold.
> Public goods include public parks, but also air or the sea.
> I'd rather critize the term "digital" instead here...
> 
> Anyone who claims that "goods" have to be tangible lacks crucial
> economic knowledge...

Maybe you are looking at things from a way too formal point of view,
Pat. The standard economic academic discourse may define terms as
precisely as it wishes, that conscience of precision is not shared by
the vast amount of the general public we have to deal with in the
political battle. Are we going to use terminology that is
counter-intuitive to our general public only because it is academically
supposed to be more precise? Please also take into account on which
payroll most academics end up, and consider whether they rather yes or
not have any incentive to produce terminology that suits us best.

The general public identifies "goods" with tangible objects, only
academia and bubble economics ;) (and the more intellectually gifted,
which are scarce) care about virtuality. That is precisely why it has
such a hard time accepting that anything that is a mere particular order
in a row of 1s and 0s, and that can be duplicated by anyone at will
issuing a simple copy command (now)... is property you may not access
without paying. Property is something you can defend against
appropriation by somebody else. If you can not, then if you call it
property you are a laughing stock (which is the way most interpret the
efforts of the "intellectual property" lobby, proving me right). 

Even the copyright cartel knew from the start that this would be hard to
understand by the public at large, that is why in the intellectual
property statutes they developed at the beginning they focus more on the
establishment of monopoly positions accessible more to those who have
the economic ability to invest in the production infrastructure
(printing presses, first for paper, later for vinyl discs, even more
later for audio and video tapes, finally for reflecting plastic
discs, ... ). Unfortunately, the latter technology has evolved to a
point when everybody can have a physical copying installation at home,
and even so far that no fixed physical meduim is needed to fix the
content on.

As all their laws handle the control of physical media... they screwed
themselves, and all they can do is try to impose on us the continued use
of physical media, with whatever stupid law that forbids us to use our
newly gained liberty to manipulate the real content now the physical
layer they built all their control upon is no longer needed.

I think there are two things we should really care about:

1) The logical consistency of what we say.

We should stay logically coherent in what we say, and attack logical
incoherence in what outhers say. While we should internally try as much
as possible to correct the logical errors of those less intellectually
hardened among our ranks, it is not in our interest to do this in any
way that could traumatically alienate our following from us. We try to
close these gaps as discreetly as possible before the adversary finds
them and exploits them to their advantage.

2) The ethical consistency of what we do.

Pragmatically dropping ethical consistency to obtain tactical advantages
may give us temporal benefits, but it always backfires sooner or later.

There is one distinct advantage in being humanistically honest... it
shows in every detail, just as the lack thereof shows even more, and
honest people need not be convinced with words when they can judge you
by your acts in every, no matter how small, ACT.

That is where they are able to judge by themselves, autonomously, with
freedom.

Give that up for a perceived temporary advantage... and you have given
away victory without even noticing.

Sometimes, many people come at the right conclusions for all the wrong
reasons. While the results are practically consistent and compatible
with the right logic and respect the assumed ethic... we should be glad
we can use our sparse resources on urgent matters where change can
contribute better to the growth of our forces.

So, yes...

"Anyone who claims that "goods" have to be tangible lacks crucial
economic knowledge..."

... but fighting (and shaming those who lack the right ones) these
beliefs and diverting resources to remedy the lack of economic knowledge
is not a tactic very useful to our goals (though they might tangentially
benefit).

> pat
> ____________________________________________________
> Pirate Parties International - General Talk
> pp.international.general at lists.pirateweb.net
> http://lists.pirateweb.net/mailman/listinfo/pp.international.general
> 

NingúnOtro.
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