Spam and Telemarketing

Over the last few decades I've heard quite a bit of complaining about telemarketers. Over the last decade it's been about spam. There's an easy solution. If telephone numbers and email addresses were viewed as private property, an owner could post a "no trespassing" or "no soliciting" sign, and telemarketers and spammers could be held criminally liable for trespassing when they send their unwanted messages, with restitution owed the owner. Also, I'm surprised that phone companies and ISP's haven't taken to using passwords for everyday phone calls and emails. Maybe things are already this way and I haven't noticed. Or maybe phone numbers and email addresses really aren't private property after all. Anybody out there know?

RIAA's Lazy Man Payoff

Today in America it seems that the lazier the slob, the greater the payoff in so many ways. The RIAA case against music downloader/sharer Jammie Thomas is one such example. Thomas was sued for $222,000 for sharing 24 songs in "violation" of copyright laws protecting music as intellectual property. The basic premise is that this is theft.

Let me use an analogy to show how absurd this is. Suppose I have a new car, with a car alarm, and I park it in my garage at night, with a house alarm. Somebody breaks in to my house, disarms both the house alarm and the car alarm, and makes off with my car silently while I sleep. Would this be a crime of theft? Of course. Would you feel sorry for me? Of course, because I took every reasonable precaution to make sure my car wouldn't be stolen. Now suppose I left the new car in a dark alley in the worst neighborhood in town with the windows rolled down and the keys in the ignition, and somebody took it. Would it be theft? Still, yes. Would you feel sorry for me? Of course not, because my lack of responsibility for my own property invited the theft. You would tell me that it was the most stupid thing I've ever done. Now let's say that in the first case I demand a replacement car from the thief, plus a bit extra for the problems it caused, as a matter of justice. This is reasonable. Then in the second case I demanded several million dollars. This is absurd.

But the second case is the way the music, movie and software industries work in the eyes of the law. Brilliant marketing has placed music and software in every place, easily accessible with common electronic devices, with easy buying access for almost anybody - third parties completely unknown to the "owner" of the product. This has led to unbelievable profits. But this has also led to copying of music at an unprecedented rate. Decades ago, it would have been cost prohibitive to copy music because it would have taken top of the line equipment. Today, such copying is as cheap as anything there is, and it is much easier to do than get in a car and turn the key.

Along with the ownership of private property comes the responsibilty to protect that property. The recording, movie and software industries have done nothing to protect their own property, yet demand the most unjust punishment. I heard a quote from Thomas' attorney on the radio saying that 24 songs at about 99c per song should demand damages at about $24. He's not far from the truth. The bible demands restitution for theft according to what is stolen. Anywhere from 20% above cost to five times cost for an ox. Even if you view her actions as theft (and there is doubt even of this within intellectual property theory debates), Thomas' damages should be about $30.

Mass electronic piracy is the heavy price being paid by the recording insustry for decades of the irresponsible marketing of their own "private property." They refuse to take responsibility, yet demand that others be responsible for their own property at exponentially higher expense. Quit whining, RIAA, and take it like a man.

What To Do When Dope-Smoking Liberal Pinko Commie Leftist Radical Berkeley Wackos Are More Biblical Than You and You're a Conservative (Part 2)

Read part 1 here.

I spent five years of my life in Berkeley, California. Yes, the place famous for riots and demonstrations in the 60's, hippies, tie-dyed t-shirts and Grateful Dead concerts. I went to school for three years at the University of California, Berkeley, then lived in Berkeley after school for another two. During that time, the city council passed a city ordinance declaring that the Berkeley Police Department wouldn't arrest anybody who was found in possession of marijuana in an amount small enough to be considered for "personal use."

As a conservative kid from the suburbs (engineering major), my friends and I were incredulous at such a proposition. This also made national headlines. Marijuana was, after all, against the law, and the city of Berkeley was saying that it would ignore state law, which was against the moral law of obeying state law. I was raised within a culture that put state law above everything else (including God's law). Politicians, even though they were idiots, somehow were gods when legislating, and disobeying state law in any sense was tantamount to hating God or something.

But now, looking back on those wild times, I've come to a completely different conclusion regarding marijuana, Berkeley and conservative suburban culture. In the Bible, God tells the whole human race through Adam,

"Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the surface of all the earth, and every tree which has fruit yielding seed; it shall be food for you; and to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the sky and to every thing that moves on the earth which has life, I have given every green plant for food" and it was so. Genesis 1:29-30

Well, not only does marijuana fit this list, but so does opium and cocoa leaves. God plainly gave these things to man to use, so who is man to disagree? Even though I was a conservative "law abiding citizen", dope-smoking liberal pinko commie leftist radical Berkeley wackos, whether they knew it or not, held to a more biblical position than I did. So, now, I have no choice but to believe the bible. I've found so many of these things that I can no longer call myself a conservative.