| ▲ | __MatrixMan__ 2 hours ago |
| Since we're doing minor nitpicks... Data can't be owned in the first place. We can debate the merits of copyright but it's not a property right. I'm all for finding better ways to support authors. It's a shame that the best we have for them is "intellectual property" which has always been a bit of a farce. |
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| ▲ | JumpCrisscross an hour ago | parent | next [-] |
| > Data can't be owned in the first place Of course it can. Ownership is a social construct. It’s more accurate to say data resists being controlled. But honestly, so do e.g. air and mineral rights and the “ownership” of catalytic converters in cars parked on the street. |
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| ▲ | randallsquared 22 minutes ago | parent | next [-] | | We've built a lot of layers of social machinery on top of it, but looking at the behavior of animals, ownership predates humanity, let alone social convention. Coming at it from that direction, something can be private property only if it is defensible in principle. Physical objects meet this bar, but concepts and types do not. | | |
| ▲ | JumpCrisscross 21 minutes ago | parent [-] | | > something can be private property only if it is defensible in principle. Physical objects meet this bar, but concepts and types do not Why not? I sing song. You sing song. I beat you with stick because that’s my song. You stop singing song. | | |
| ▲ | __MatrixMan__ 10 minutes ago | parent [-] | | Well it really comes down to how good you are with that stick. You "can" stop me from singing your song... But can you? You don't even know where I am. | | |
| ▲ | JumpCrisscross 6 minutes ago | parent [-] | | > You "can" stop me from singing your song... But can you? Yes. I kill you. Stealing was usually punishable by death in ancient cultures. > You don't even know where I am This isn’t a thing in early human societies. Like, yes, you could theoretically get away. Lots of thieves of physical property actually get away. That doesn’t make said property indefensible in principle. |
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| ▲ | __MatrixMan__ an hour ago | parent | prev [-] | | Yes, but it is a social contract governing things that can't be easily copied. We desperately need better social contracts which help us deal with data-about-me and data-i-created, but neither of those align very well with property. | | |
| ▲ | WarmWash an hour ago | parent | next [-] | | I own paper money that is pretty easy to copy and worth far more than the paper it's on... | | | |
| ▲ | JumpCrisscross 44 minutes ago | parent | prev [-] | | > but it is a social contract governing things that can't be easily copied I think it’s fair to argue this makes data something that should not be able to be owned. But saying it can’t be owned is plain wrong. | | |
| ▲ | __MatrixMan__ 25 minutes ago | parent [-] | | You're right. We can implement social contracts however we please. But regarding the particular implementation as codified in US law (and I think elsewhere also), property rights do not extend to data. | | |
| ▲ | JumpCrisscross 22 minutes ago | parent [-] | | > regarding the particular implementation as codified in US law (and I think elsewhere also), property rights do not extend to data Maybe not in general, though I’m curious for a source. Practically speaking, what separates data and information is a necessarily subjective exercise. And information absolutely can be property. | | |
| ▲ | __MatrixMan__ 4 minutes ago | parent [-] | | What kind of source would satisfy you? There are laws about what happens to me if I break into your house and steal your property. I can therefore find you case precedent indicating that a TV is property because people have been charged with violating those laws when they steal a TV. But I can't present to you the absence of such a thing. We have trademark, copyright, and patent law, but as far as I'm aware there's no crosstalk with things that talk about property, things like armed robbery. | | |
| ▲ | JumpCrisscross 3 minutes ago | parent [-] | | > What kind of source would satisfy you Any lawyer making this argument. > I can't present to you the absence of such a thing I’m asking why you’re saying data theft isn’t codified under U.S. law. (It isn’t comprehensively, at least at the federal level. But it’s surprising to claim it doesn’t exist at all.) |
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| ▲ | Aurornis 12 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| > Data can't be owned in the first place. We can debate the merits of copyright but it's not a property right. This is factually incorrect. I don’t know if you’re unaware of the law or introducing your own beliefs about what it should be, but this is not how the law works. |
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| ▲ | zugi an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Stallman tried to introduce the term "intellectual monopoly", which fits better, since they really are monopolies granted by the government for limited periods of time, intended to promote progress in science and the useful arts. "Property" was chosen specifically as a bait and switch. It tries to get people to take a concept that has been understood for thousands of years for physical objects, and apply it to this novel century-or-two long experiment for encouraging the production of easily-copyable things. |
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| ▲ | simonh 39 minutes ago | parent | next [-] | | All, or at least most property rights are monopoly rights anyway. I have a monopoly right over my house, and my car, my bank balance. That's just what ownership means. | | |
| ▲ | ekianjo 17 minutes ago | parent [-] | | Those rights are very flimsy actually. The government can seize your house, your car, and your money anytime. Hardly a monopoly when a third party can break it at will. |
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| ▲ | JumpCrisscross an hour ago | parent | prev [-] | | > since they really are monopolies granted by the government This is property. | | |
| ▲ | __MatrixMan__ 34 minutes ago | parent [-] | | There are multiple usages of the word. One of them refers to tangible things, was first codified more than 5000 years ago, and is almost entirely uncontroversial. The other was popular in 1700's France re: their system of privileges, and the people found it so onerous that they embarked on a campaign of executing nobility until it seemed like the concept was good and dead. We can use the word however we like, it's just a word, but if we conduct ourselves as if they're the same sort of thing, which France was doing at that time, we're in for the same sort of pain. So what I'm saying is that its a bad idea for us to let data be property. | | |
| ▲ | JumpCrisscross 26 minutes ago | parent [-] | | > One of them refers to tangible things, was first codified more than 5000 years ago, and is almost entirely uncontroversial Which definition are you referring to? Debts, wholly intangible legal fictions, have been treated as property for thousands of years. | | |
| ▲ | __MatrixMan__ 15 minutes ago | parent [-] | | I was thinking of the code of Hammurabi as the settled one, and membership in a trade guild--which you had to buy from the government--as the controversial one. I wouldn't classify debt as an uncontroversial kind of property. In medieval Europe, Christians were prohibited from owning debt by their religions (Jews weren't, so they ended up being the lenders, which is probably why the stereotypes exist today). I'd argue that the fungibility/resale of debt is a bad idea because it takes on weird properties when too much of it accumulates in one place. | | |
| ▲ | JumpCrisscross 12 minutes ago | parent [-] | | > was thinking of the code of Hammurabi Do we have evidence around what the Code considered property? It seems to be vague [1]. (“Stealing” is applied to minor sons and slaves, for instance.) > wouldn't classify debt as an uncontroversial kind of property I wouldn’t either. I’m saying it’s old. And I wouldn’t say the concept of privately-owned land is “an uncontroversial kind of property” either, entire races had to be wiped out to consolidate that view. [1] https://avalon.law.yale.edu/ancient/hamframe.asp |
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| ▲ | simonh an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Property can and does refer to rights over both tangible and intangible assets. It simply refers to ownership. Trademarks, brand identity and trade secrets are property. Some kinds of license can be property, and bought or sold. Shares in companies, or bonds are property. You may not like it, but that's a separate question. What's usually happening here is that property is being misinterpreted as meaning something like object, but it just refers to a right of ownership which can be of objects. |
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| ▲ | bcrosby95 an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| It seems like you're completely ignoring the privacy angle. If no one can own data how can privacy be a thing? |
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| ▲ | stevehawk 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-] |
| * can't (?) |
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