No. The substance of it is irrelevant to my argument. You’re still arguing ideas which content that is created is not. It may be intangible but it is not simply an idea. It is a manifestation of an idea and is, therefore, wholly different.
Not to put too fine a point on it - ideas are like assholes; everyone has them and most of them stink but the idea of an asshole doesn’t actually make you wretch the way the stench of an actual asshole might.
You’re still arguing ideas which content that is created is not. It may be intangible but it is not simply an idea. It is a manifestation of an idea and is, therefore, wholly different.
Not quite; what makes ideas incompatible with exclusive possession is the same thing that makes digital content incompatible with exclusive possession - their intangibility. A person can labor for years on an idea, and retain exclusive ownership over that idea having not realized it to others; "but the moment it is divulged, it forces itself into the possession of every one, and the receiver cannot dispossess himself of it."
The same applies to digitally represented media.
You've made a statement about the labor involved in producing an idea or digital media, and I'm making a statement about the nature of intangible goods. Embodied labor isn't the same as some objective moral or ethical imperative, nor is embodied labor the same as value.
If you want to watch something enough to pirate it, it has value.
Everything else you said is a dishonest argument that you would not accept for your own time, work, and effort. The mere fact that an idea is materialized into something more than an idea invalidates the crux of your argument. An idea is just that. An idea materialized into reality, even an intangible reality, is still more than the idea itself.
If you want to watch something enough to pirate it, it has value.
I haven't claimed it doesn't have value. I've only challenged your implication that 'value' and 'market extractive value' are -or ought to be- in balance. If you can acknowledge that not everything that has 'value' has a commensurate 'market value', then you should be able to see that a piece of digital media can have 'value' but doesn't necessarily have a commensurate 'market value'.
Demand is only representative of market value where supply can be said to be reasonably restricted, and if supply needs to be artificially restricted in order to justify it's market value then the circumventing of that restriction can't really be said to be 'stealing' in the moral or ethical sense of the word.
It can if you're ingesting the product. If you're ingesting the end product then value and market extractive value are the same. Either you think it's worth the price that the creator is asking or you don't. If you don't, then that doesn't mean you're entitled to view it for free just because you think they're asking too much. It means you don't get to watch it and they don't get to be paid for it.
Everything else you said is irrelevant. The supply is the creator, not the product that the creator made. If they can't make a living creating those products, then those products go away. Whether you want to claim that's artificial or not is completely moot.
You're talking about supply and demand for intangible products. That means that you're either being intentionally obtuse about the fact that intangibles aren't affected by supply and therefore can't be bound to it or you're being dishonest about the argument from the start. No one is talking about slavery. No one mentioned it. You're mischaracterizing what I said so that you can dismiss it because it invalidates the argument you've attempted to make.
And now you've confirmed that you're being dishonest because I've said far more than "that's just the way it is". I've provided the logic behind the argument and the evidence for why it is stealing and even prefaced the argument with the clarification that I am not against piracy and that I believe that there are situations in which case it may be justified and even beneficial. You ignoring that is why I know you're being dishonest and why this third point is justified.
I'm not saying that because I don't like your reasoning. I'm saying it because what you've said has no bearing on the point I'm making nor is it in any way an argument against what I'm saying. You're arguing something else entirely which means it's irrelevant to the point I'm making and therefore unnecessary to address or even validate.
No one is talking about slavery. No one mentioned it.
Maybe you're just confusing terminology, but traditionally 'supply' is referring to 'supply of a commodity', as in 'supply and demand' economics. I took -'The supply is the creator, not the product that the creator made'- to mean the creator is the commodity you're paying for and not the product, but maybe i've misunderstood your point.
That means that you’re either being intentionally obtuse about the fact that intangibles aren’t affected by supply and therefore can’t be bound to it or you’re being dishonest about the argument from the start.
Actually I think I was being generous, you seemed to be talking about economic properties of price and value since you were implying that a digital product's 'price' was determined by your willingness to pay for it (i.e. demand). That's how our market works now, and I was pointing out that the nature of digital media is that the supply is theoretically unlimited so market price would be zero without an artificial restriction in supply (i.e. withholding access in order to justify a price). Maybe you really don't know what you're talking about here, but honestly it's hard to tell anymore. Regardless, I'm pretty sure you're arguing that creators should own and control access to their work so that they can extract their price from it? If that's the case, then I'm saying that ownership and artificial restriction to the access to that work is literally what makes that possible. You've alluded to as much when you say that piracy is stealing; by circumventing that restricted access you're denying the price the creator is demanding? It is directly relevant to the point you're trying to make.
I’m saying it because what you’ve said has no bearing on the point I’m making nor is it in any way an argument against what I’m saying. You’re arguing something else entirely which means it’s irrelevant to the point I’m making and therefore unnecessary to address or even validate.
Maybe you should put your argument in precise terms, so it's impossible for me to misunderstand then?
Yes, you have. Creators/artists/producers exchange their time and talent for something - whether that's money or something else that they gain as a result. Their time and talent are the scarce "supply" that would normally be "supplied" in your argument. It's not slavery to exchange your time/effort/labor/creations in exchange for money or another commodity. That's literally how jobs work.
I think you're just overextending my point to give yourself something to argue against. All I am saying is that creators deserve to be paid for their work (if that's what they're asking in exchange for that work) and that, if people are pirating that work, then it means they find some value in it. Nothing more, nothing less.
I have put my argument in precise terms but you're just ignoring it and arguing something else entirely.
Ok... now we know you are being disingenuous and not arguing in good faith. You (unless you are not reading these) just admitted to being overly verbose, pompous and that it makes you look bad. Also that you are making ad-hominem arguments while trying to claim other arguments/points are wrong because they are ad-hominem.
I must bow in this display of wordsmithing, as you have done all this in just 2 words.
you are making ad-hominem arguments while trying to claim other arguments/points are wrong because they are ad-hominem.
I also did not do that. I was not saying that anyone's point was wrong when I insulted them. I insulted them because they were not actually addressing the argument. The insults were intended in what I wrote to them precisely because they weren't making an argument against what I was saying. They were being dismissive and I was returning that dismissiveness in kind.