Paul Graham: Define "property"
“Is it possible to pay a photographer with photos of money?”
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As a child, I read a book of short stories about the famous 18th century judge Tadasuke Oooka. One of the cases that he considered was initiated by the owner of the grocery store. A poor student who could only afford rice, was eating this rice, enjoying the aroma of freshly prepared food coming from the store. The owner wanted the student to pay for the pleasant smell. A student steals his scent!
')
I often recall this story when I hear that the American Recording Industry Association and the American Film Association accuse people of stealing music and movies.
For us to consider the smell for property is absurd. But I can imagine scenarios under which one could charge for odor. Imagine that we live on a lunar base, where we have to buy liters of air. It can be assumed that air suppliers will be able to add odors for an additional fee.
It seems ridiculous to attribute smells to property because it does not work. Although it will work on the lunar base.
What is considered property depends on what we are willing to accept as property. And this perception not only can change - it has already changed. People always (in cases of a definite meaning of the words “people” and “always”) belonged to small things that were carried by people as property. However, hunters never attributed land to property, as we are doing now. [1]
The reason why many people think that property can be described by one unchanging definition is that this definition changes very slowly. [2] But we live in the midst of such a change.
Recording and film studios distributed their product as well as delivering air to the lunar station through pipes. But with the advent of the Internet, it was equivalent to moving to a planet with a suitable atmosphere. Information today spread like a smell. And because of the union of the desire to wishful thinking for real and short-term greed, the studios ended up as the very owner of a grocery store who accuses us of stealing smells.
(I used “short-term greed”, because the main problem of recording and film studios is that the people leading them are more interested in receiving short-term bonuses more than capital. If they were guided by the latter, they would look for ways to benefit from technological change, and do not fight it. However, building a new one takes too much time. Their bonuses depend on the income of the current year, and the best way to increase them is to extract more money from the material they have already done.)
Then what does all this mean? People should not charge for content? This question has no definite answer. People need to take money for content when it comes to charge.
But by "it turns out," I mean more than just "when they can win a match." I put there a situation where people can charge for content without forcing it into society. In the end, companies selling smells on the lunar base can continue their activities on the ground, but on the condition that they lobby for a law that will oblige us to breathe here through pipes, despite the fact that we no longer need it.
Crazy legal measures that were taken by recording and film studios, have just such a taste. Newspapers and magazines also tighten the screws, but their number is at least gracefully reduced. The Recording Industry Association of America and the American Film Association can make us breathe through the tubes if they want.
Ultimately, it all comes down to common sense. When you insult legislation by trying to use mass lawsuits against randomly chosen people for the sake of exemplary punishment, or by lobbying for laws that can explode the Internet, which is proof of a broken definition of property.
Here it is useful to have a real democracy and several sovereign states. If there was only one despotic government in the world, companies would be able to buy a law that would establish the definition of property they need. Fortunately, there are still countries that are not “colonies” of the United States, and politicians in America are still afraid of the large number of active voters. [3]
People who govern the United States may not like the situation when voters or other countries refuse to obey their will, however, it is in our common interest to prevent the existence of one method of attack that would work on those who are trying to change the law for their own reasons. Private property is an incredibly useful idea, perhaps one of our best inventions. Therefore, each of its new definition brought us an increase in wealth. It is logical to assume that the same will happen with the latest definition. It will be a disaster if we all have to continue working with the outdated version just because a few strong people were too lazy to upgrade.
[1] If you want to learn more about hunters, I strongly recommend the books "The Harmless People" and "The Old Way: A Story of the First People" by Elizabeth Marshal Thomas.
[2] The change in the definition of ownership in most cases is due to technological progress, and since progress accelerates, this affects the speed of change in the concept of "property". What does it mean for society is becoming more important the ability to properly respond to these changes, because they will appear at an increasing rate.
[3] As far as I know, the term “copyright colony” (Copyright colonies) was introduced by Miles Peterson.
[4] The state of technology is not just a function of the concept of "property." Each of them limits the other. But then you can not mess with the concept of "property" without affecting (and possibly without harming) the state of technology. The history of the USSR is a vivid example.
Translation: Liza Lamova
Publishing support - Edison company, which specializes in asphalt plants automation and the development of payment systems and terminals .
- comment
As a child, I read a book of short stories about the famous 18th century judge Tadasuke Oooka. One of the cases that he considered was initiated by the owner of the grocery store. A poor student who could only afford rice, was eating this rice, enjoying the aroma of freshly prepared food coming from the store. The owner wanted the student to pay for the pleasant smell. A student steals his scent!
')
I often recall this story when I hear that the American Recording Industry Association and the American Film Association accuse people of stealing music and movies.
For us to consider the smell for property is absurd. But I can imagine scenarios under which one could charge for odor. Imagine that we live on a lunar base, where we have to buy liters of air. It can be assumed that air suppliers will be able to add odors for an additional fee.
It seems ridiculous to attribute smells to property because it does not work. Although it will work on the lunar base.
What is considered property depends on what we are willing to accept as property. And this perception not only can change - it has already changed. People always (in cases of a definite meaning of the words “people” and “always”) belonged to small things that were carried by people as property. However, hunters never attributed land to property, as we are doing now. [1]
The reason why many people think that property can be described by one unchanging definition is that this definition changes very slowly. [2] But we live in the midst of such a change.
Recording and film studios distributed their product as well as delivering air to the lunar station through pipes. But with the advent of the Internet, it was equivalent to moving to a planet with a suitable atmosphere. Information today spread like a smell. And because of the union of the desire to wishful thinking for real and short-term greed, the studios ended up as the very owner of a grocery store who accuses us of stealing smells.
(I used “short-term greed”, because the main problem of recording and film studios is that the people leading them are more interested in receiving short-term bonuses more than capital. If they were guided by the latter, they would look for ways to benefit from technological change, and do not fight it. However, building a new one takes too much time. Their bonuses depend on the income of the current year, and the best way to increase them is to extract more money from the material they have already done.)
Then what does all this mean? People should not charge for content? This question has no definite answer. People need to take money for content when it comes to charge.
But by "it turns out," I mean more than just "when they can win a match." I put there a situation where people can charge for content without forcing it into society. In the end, companies selling smells on the lunar base can continue their activities on the ground, but on the condition that they lobby for a law that will oblige us to breathe here through pipes, despite the fact that we no longer need it.
Crazy legal measures that were taken by recording and film studios, have just such a taste. Newspapers and magazines also tighten the screws, but their number is at least gracefully reduced. The Recording Industry Association of America and the American Film Association can make us breathe through the tubes if they want.
Ultimately, it all comes down to common sense. When you insult legislation by trying to use mass lawsuits against randomly chosen people for the sake of exemplary punishment, or by lobbying for laws that can explode the Internet, which is proof of a broken definition of property.
Here it is useful to have a real democracy and several sovereign states. If there was only one despotic government in the world, companies would be able to buy a law that would establish the definition of property they need. Fortunately, there are still countries that are not “colonies” of the United States, and politicians in America are still afraid of the large number of active voters. [3]
People who govern the United States may not like the situation when voters or other countries refuse to obey their will, however, it is in our common interest to prevent the existence of one method of attack that would work on those who are trying to change the law for their own reasons. Private property is an incredibly useful idea, perhaps one of our best inventions. Therefore, each of its new definition brought us an increase in wealth. It is logical to assume that the same will happen with the latest definition. It will be a disaster if we all have to continue working with the outdated version just because a few strong people were too lazy to upgrade.
Notes
[1] If you want to learn more about hunters, I strongly recommend the books "The Harmless People" and "The Old Way: A Story of the First People" by Elizabeth Marshal Thomas.
[2] The change in the definition of ownership in most cases is due to technological progress, and since progress accelerates, this affects the speed of change in the concept of "property". What does it mean for society is becoming more important the ability to properly respond to these changes, because they will appear at an increasing rate.
[3] As far as I know, the term “copyright colony” (Copyright colonies) was introduced by Miles Peterson.
[4] The state of technology is not just a function of the concept of "property." Each of them limits the other. But then you can not mess with the concept of "property" without affecting (and possibly without harming) the state of technology. The history of the USSR is a vivid example.
Translation: Liza Lamova
Publishing support - Edison company, which specializes in asphalt plants automation and the development of payment systems and terminals .
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/314652/
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