How to Defeat Piracy (Part 1)

    Foreword


    In this post, I risk grabbing the cons from representatives of both camps - the militant advocates of copyright and the no less militant supporters of the free distribution of copyright. ;-) However, on the contrary, I would like not to inflame the flame of flame, but, if possible, to consider the essence of the whole problem of piracy in a detached and objective way and finally give an opinion on how piracy should be combated and how it can be defeated. We are talking about all types of intellectual property, but for simplicity I will cite only movie production in the examples (although there are few of them - the article is more theoretical). With music, books, software, etc. everything is approximately the same with a number of amendments.

    In general, this post I do not pretend to be anything special, but I just want to clearly formulate and formalize my personal position on this issue so that it would be possible not to enter into discussions, but just to provide a link. :-) There is also no new information in it - all this has already been expressed in various articles, posts, comments (including my own), however, I hope that all this will be interesting to read to anyone except me.

    And just in case - we are talking exclusively about our country and the post-Soviet space (by virtue of a similar morality to us). Although all conclusions will be valid in Europe and in other countries that are not the United States. ;-) The

    post is divided into two parts, so as not to force the consciousness of those reading a large number of letters. :-)


    Thesis is zero - you cannot embrace the immense


    First of all, a simple axiom should be clarified (which, however, is not obvious to everyone): it will never be possible to completely defeat piracy with all desire. There will always be “ideological” pirates, there will always be hackers / researchers spinning in this area out of pleasure and interest, there will always be a marginal layer of consumers who will still look for a free DVDrip, even if it’s exactly the same, but for the ruble, right next to it Further. To completely overcome this is unrealistic - how unrealistic it was to do it in other areas of life - starting with counterfeit alcohol and ending with trips in public transport with a hare.

    Therefore, the task of combating piracy is not to 100% disappear and not appear in any form, but to separate it from the mass market to the maximum. Pirates and "sympathizers" should be and spin in their closed environment (which is not only inaccessible to everyone else, but simply not necessary and not interesting to them), and the mass user and consumer should buy and use legal products. And if piracy is completely exterminated, I repeat, it’s not realistic, then this task is completely solvable.

    Thesis one - psychological


    Actually, everything basic begins with it. Those who claim that “piracy is theft” and try to convince others of this do not understand at all that such a judgment (like, in general, the vast majority of the others are not exact sciences for you!) Is not absolute, but depends on the worldview and morality of a particular person and society as a whole. The laws of the state and the attitude of people towards them depend on morality - laws that do not correspond to public morality will in fact not be fulfilled (in general, the ratio of the concepts of morality and law is studied in the first year of the law faculty).

    Returning to the specifics, we can definitely call piracy not theft, but the deprivation of copyright holders of the potential income from using the copyright object. And in relation to this very “deprivation”, worldview differences are manifested. Modern cinema, audio and other industries related to intellectual property are for the most part created, owned, formed, directed and dependent on companies and people from the USA. The morale and views of the inhabitants of America are very different both from Russian or Asian, as well as from the views of continental Europe. Without going into historical and socio-psychological reasons, I’ll just say as a fact: the psychology of American society is based on the primacy of personal interest and personal success, mostly expressed in the form of material enrichment. This is not good and not bad - it just is there and on the basis of this one should evaluate the behavior of Americans, their activities, etc. - help to better understand them. In practice, this is expressed in the fact that on the one hand, any actions leading to personal success and enrichment are quite moral for most Americans - if only there is a result (this, by the way, is very well seen in popular culture - the same films), and on the other - that actions that prevent someone from realizing his “pursuit of happiness” ((c)United States Declaration of Independence ) (i.e. material gain) - are unacceptable and immoral. This is the main point of the problem: Americans really perceive depriving someone of the opportunity (not even real, but potential!) To receive a certain income - as actual theft. Such actions abhor their public worldview, social concepts of morality, and so on.

    For continental Europe, Russia and Asia, these views are completely alien and the vast majority of society does not share them. In this regard, we and Europeans are much more realistic (you can only steal something specific and this will mean the seizure of this object from the owner, rather than copying) and are organically more prone to piracy. Moreover, the culture itself (namely, intellectual property is usually referred to in it) in the European and Russian traditions is something social that belongs to the whole society, and not to someone specific, which already gives a kind of “good” for copying and replication objects of this very culture.

    In our country, it’s still “sadder”: in the Soviet period, in principle, the idea of ​​“art for the people” was propagated - people (our parents) were brought up from the outset that all objects of culture exist and are created for them, which they have already paid for , which means thinking about some kind of rights there - it makes no sense. This, incidentally, is perfectly confirmed by practice: I have not yet met a single person of the older generation who would be worried about buying unlicensed DVDs or installing pirated Windows. Most of them do not even understand the term “licensed”: what is it all about? Here is a disc, a movie on it - what problems? Attempts to explain to them the essence of rights to intellectual property are perceived ironically and skeptically. This is especially interesting in the case of people with a higher legal education: they know very well which, in principle, is being discussed, but for themselves they do not consider the use of pirated products to be something bad and wrong. What is characteristic, the majority at the same time is well aware of the need for the same licensed software in organizations and enterprises, but for personal use - never! :-) And, again, thanks to all of the above, they positively (or at least neutrally) evaluate the activities of pirates pirating the same DVDs - they say, what’s wrong with that? - they sell, well, and wonderful ... they positively (or even neutral) evaluate the activities of pirates pirating the same DVDs - they say, what’s wrong with that? - they sell, well, and wonderful ... they positively (or even neutral) evaluate the activities of pirates pirating the same DVDs - they say, what’s wrong with that? - they sell, well, and wonderful ...

    This story could have been stretched for a long time — with examples from European countries and so on — but the point is important: at the level of morality and public outlook, piracy is perfectly acceptable for the vast majority of people in continental Europe, Russia and Asia. All the "tensions" on this subject come "from across the ocean", and we are mostly affected only by the process of globalization, which (despite my extremely positive attitude to the very essence of this phenomenon) is a little less than completely imposing an alien on the world him the ideology of the United States. One should not see any nationalistic motives in this - this is an axiom known to all political scientists, sociologists, and so on. As, by the way, and all that I wrote above about moral aspects. The important thing is that people in different parts of the world are really different. And it is impossible at the click of a finger to make all of them think differently than they think now. Moreover, as the experience of Europe (which under the pressure of the United States is already damned knows how much time) shows - this is impossible even for decades. So it’s not even worth trying to change people and their psychology, try to prove to all of them that they think and feel “wrong”, start up holivars on Habré and so on. :-) We must proceed from what we have in reality and accordingly build our activities.

    We will end with psychology in this , in the next part - economics. :-)

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