eclectica
2003-09-12, 16:17
"You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time."
-Abraham Lincoln
"The great masses of the people will more easily fall victims to a big lie than to a small one."
-Adolf Hitler
Hitler referred to a "big lie" as one which is so obviously false, as supposed to a "small lie" in which it is not as obvious. He believed that due to the innocence of the masses, if a lie were too egregious, then they wouldn't dispute it and would believe it more easily than a small lie.
I use the term "big lie" in a different sense. It is not an egregious lie as Hitler meant it, but a repetitive lie. To me a Big Lie is a lie which is repeated many times until the will to resist it is dimished it by those who are exposed to it. People grow fond of lies in the same way that one can grow fond of low-quality music that is repetitively played on the radio station. A lie does not become more true when it is repeatedly told, but people tend to believe it more. Bush's lie that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction started to become believed by a good number of Americans who kept hearing that lie repeated over and over.
Those who are intellectually weak will be more susceptible to a Big Lie.
In p2p there are many supporters of the RIAA or the forces of greed who keep repeating three big lies:
1. "Downloading music is the equivalent of stealing."
Instead of thinking that downloading and sharing is stealing, let us appreciate it for what it really is. The miracle of the digital revolution is that one file can be copied and can become millions. So downloading an mp3 is not like walking into a record store and stealing the CD, because there is no loss with the copying of the mp3. The original is still there on the person's hard drive.
2. "The artists are hurt by file sharing."
Most of the money in CD sales goes to the record companies. The musicians often have to sell a certain amount before they receive royalties. The musicians make most of their money from concerts and not from CD sales. Their CDs work as a promotional tool, and p2p file sharing is promoting their product for free. Many artists are discovered by way of p2p networks.
3. "p2p downloading has reduced CD sales."
The idea that CD sales would increase if filesharing were decreased, is wrong. People if deprived of such a thing, would find other things to do with their time such as watch TV. Actually many people are exposed to new music by way of filesharing networks. CD sales are affected by a number of things, such as the economy, and competing forms of entertainment such as DVDs. Let us also not forget the consumer impact of things such as the RIAA lawsuits, the selling of copy-protected "CD"s which don't play on computers, and the fact that the music industry tends to produce a lot of crap that they think is "talent".
-Abraham Lincoln
"The great masses of the people will more easily fall victims to a big lie than to a small one."
-Adolf Hitler
Hitler referred to a "big lie" as one which is so obviously false, as supposed to a "small lie" in which it is not as obvious. He believed that due to the innocence of the masses, if a lie were too egregious, then they wouldn't dispute it and would believe it more easily than a small lie.
I use the term "big lie" in a different sense. It is not an egregious lie as Hitler meant it, but a repetitive lie. To me a Big Lie is a lie which is repeated many times until the will to resist it is dimished it by those who are exposed to it. People grow fond of lies in the same way that one can grow fond of low-quality music that is repetitively played on the radio station. A lie does not become more true when it is repeatedly told, but people tend to believe it more. Bush's lie that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction started to become believed by a good number of Americans who kept hearing that lie repeated over and over.
Those who are intellectually weak will be more susceptible to a Big Lie.
In p2p there are many supporters of the RIAA or the forces of greed who keep repeating three big lies:
1. "Downloading music is the equivalent of stealing."
Instead of thinking that downloading and sharing is stealing, let us appreciate it for what it really is. The miracle of the digital revolution is that one file can be copied and can become millions. So downloading an mp3 is not like walking into a record store and stealing the CD, because there is no loss with the copying of the mp3. The original is still there on the person's hard drive.
2. "The artists are hurt by file sharing."
Most of the money in CD sales goes to the record companies. The musicians often have to sell a certain amount before they receive royalties. The musicians make most of their money from concerts and not from CD sales. Their CDs work as a promotional tool, and p2p file sharing is promoting their product for free. Many artists are discovered by way of p2p networks.
3. "p2p downloading has reduced CD sales."
The idea that CD sales would increase if filesharing were decreased, is wrong. People if deprived of such a thing, would find other things to do with their time such as watch TV. Actually many people are exposed to new music by way of filesharing networks. CD sales are affected by a number of things, such as the economy, and competing forms of entertainment such as DVDs. Let us also not forget the consumer impact of things such as the RIAA lawsuits, the selling of copy-protected "CD"s which don't play on computers, and the fact that the music industry tends to produce a lot of crap that they think is "talent".