Freedom's just a word - in the USA

I download a lot of material from storage sites on the internet - it is legal and  I use it in my teaching programme in China.  That source may be lost after the long arm of US law enforcement agencies reached into New Zealand during the week.

 NZ residents on piracy charges denied bail

http://www.stuff.co.nz/technology/digital-living/6288082/NZ-residents-on-piracy-charges-denied-bail

An update this morning:

http://www.stuff.co.nz/technology/6293542/Megaupload-attempting-to-get-back-online

 The USA continually harasses China on a wide range of issues, but this is yet another example of its hypocrisy - it is up there with its statements on the death penalty.

Freedom of expression and information ? ? ? 

  

This relates to the recent SOPA/PIPA ordeal as well, at least that has been kicked out, for the time being. If industries are dying because they can't keep up with the pace of change then let them be.

The hypocrisy of government in the US is quite staggering. I've come accross one or two articles recently that have led me to reconsider my thoughts about the US.

Here, one of Obama's mates has taken to reducing the freedom of Chicago citizens, thankfully some of them are putting up a fight:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2012/jan/19/outlawing-dissent-rahm-emanuel-new-regime

Was reading an article the other week about the presence of Police in schools and how students as young as 6 yrs old have now got criminal records for being noisy or disruptive, for just being kids. Think this was in the state of Texas if I recall correctly. EDIT just found it:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jan/09/texas-police-schools?INTCMP=SRCH

The (self-appointed) title of Leader of the Free World doesn't seem appropriate. I believe that the faith of many Americans in this is genuine, it's asserted and reaffirmed everyday by TV, news and especially Hollywood. But it seems horribly misplaced, especially when considering that the nature of international politics means that the most powerful nations are the most hypocrtical.

We have people on here from there.
We all kid a lot, but scathing criticisms of each others' countries is not something we really need on The Saloon, is it?

American government raids a Hong Kong business, and arrests the (Non-American) owners in New Zealand? I don't see any smaller country trying to pull that one off. At the most, it seems countries request the extradition of criminals from the countries government they are currently residing in.

They don't really seem to have an answer for the 21st century at all. The whole 'anti-piracy' thing is really really fucking ridiculous. The ability to copy music and movies hasn't hurt the entertainment industries at all, people buy more music than they did in the 90s.

At the moment we are seeing major changes away from the way things were organised in the 20th century and these revolutions do have the potential to be entirely peaceful

We have people on here from there.
We all kid a lot, but scathing criticisms of each others' countries is not something we really need on The Saloon, is it?

I'm criticising the government, not the country or the people and was hoping people can spot the difference there, after all America is a massive place full of people with all sorts of ideas, not all of them in agreement with each other-just like anywhere else in the world.  I didn't say anything as an attack on America or it's people, actually I'm sure many Americans would agree with me, as I would if you said the same thing about government in the UK. I'm not a "YOUR COUNTRY'S SHIT AND MINES DA BEST" kinda guy. And I'm always willing to hear people's opinions about this, if they mention something I haven't though of then all the better.

 

Nato, thanks for drawing my attention to the article about Police in Schools, particularly in Texas. I would not have believed such a situation could exist. This just confirms my worst fears about how the world is going.

Well, don't mind me, I'm just blowing smoke, I guess.
Let me know where you're from and I'll see what I can dig up.

if the price of movies and software was more realistic then i would happily pay for it, but its exhorbitant. I think that some of the recent initiatives by the major players such as google seem to be on the ball regarding pricing policies and such. never before has it been possible for a guy in his bedroom who has some programming abilities to create a program, pay a few bucks and be able to sell it to potentially millions of users. For a couple of dollars most would happily pay for it. creating some substantial wealth for the develpoers and google make their cut for providing a distribution service that would have been unobtainable to the little guy. The same goes for music distribution, i know a lot of musicians who are doing ok with selling and creating their work this way.

The USA continually harasses China on a wide range of issues, but this is yet another example of its hypocrisy - it is up there with its statements on the death penalty.

Freedom of expression and information ? ? ? 

This isn't a censorship/FOI/FOE issue. You are free to obtain the data or information, such as teaching materials, through other methods and media.

They need a new business model. When people are downloading music and movies and software for free, what are they still paying for? Media companies could perhaps be paying their artists as content providers and asking the consumer to pay x per month for internet access and letting everything you find be free.

'course, they'd have to make the internet properly functional as a content delivery system, which it isn't at the moment. At the moment people can hunt up what they like and have some sense of ownership because they put in the effort to find, or crack, or steal it. And downloading, even with good internet deals, takes time. It feels like you worked for your theft so it's yours.

Then again, it's all moot until some version of server/client or maybe cloud tech is, if ever, an adequate replacement for saving your own copy to your own hard disk. Streaming is, and perhaps always will be (?), a pain in the posterior. City-wide wifi?


Can't remember the last time I paid for content. Years ago. But I pay for my phone every few months and for my internet once a year, like clockwork.

I'm sure this has been mentioned here before, but Google solved the problem of getting legitimate, downloadable music to China, and the big 4 music publishers get their pieces of gold.

http://www.google.cn/music

Four or 5 years ago, Google persuaded the major music publishers to allow free downloads in China since no one in China was going to pay their freight charges for music since they could get it free through Baidu's deep linking and pirated DVDs. They set it up and the majors get a slice of the ad revenue it generates plus stats on what's popular. You can only download songs if you are within China (so turn OFF your V...P...N when you visit the site).

Google doesn't promote the site, but if you're in China, you can download songs for free, and guilt-free (if IP rights matter to you), go to http://www.google.cn/music/ and download songs 'til you drop. Or your connection drops. It's in Chinese, but takes English input. And when you find the song you want, push the Big Green Button that appears. It means download to your computer.

This whole thing is an example of how US companies could adapt to the sales and marketing of their product internationally, rather than trying to wield a Big Hammer and insisting on spreading US IP law throughout the world.

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This isn't a censorship/FOI/FOE issue. You are free to obtain the data or information, such as teaching materials, through other methods and media.
[/quote]

I do not find that advice very helpful!

If, after a long search, I find the material I want can be downloaded from a link given to a storage site then I would like to think I will be able to get it.

You are suggesting that if the storage site has been blocked, or taken down by a government agency, then all I have to do is download from another site. I think that there is a gap in the logic there, in that if the material has been stored in only one location then it is not available anywhere else.

Accessing resources in Ch is never easy - it has just been made harder by the self-appointed standard bearer of the 'free' world.         

I would imagine for the most part the biggest group complaining are the leeches around the different media groups, Lawyers, executives, producers and others that benefit from the artists work. Cut out the middleman and they dont get their piece of the pie. The american government is protecting their intersets and acting as corporate security cause if they dont they will not get money to run for office.
As well the actors that make an extremely crazy amount of money also complain, remember lars from metallica that sounded like a whiny little girl cause he wasnt getting more. It is ridiculous and just aint right.
They try distracting us from the real problem by claiming piracy is the real problem when the truth is it is greed/lack of production that is the real problem.
hopefully the american politicians stop taking bribes but it is highly doubtful. What makes me laugh is how western politicians claim China is full of corruption when they themselves are just as bad.

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This isn't a censorship/FOI/FOE issue. You are free to obtain the data or information, such as teaching materials, through other methods and media.

I do not find that advice very helpful!

If, after a long search, I find the material I want can be downloaded from a link given to a storage site then I would like to think I will be able to get it.

You are suggesting that if the storage site has been blocked, or taken down by a government agency, then all I have to do is download from another site. I think that there is a gap in the logic there, in that if the material has been stored in only one location then it is not available anywhere else.

Accessing resources in Ch is never easy - it has just been made harder by the self-appointed standard bearer of the 'free' world.

I was thinking more in terms of actually buying books. As you say, it's not possible to get hold of the full range of high quality materials that you can elsewhere in the world. China is to blame for this, nobody else. If they don't care about their education then they'll produce the society they deserve.

Every time I head back to the free world I source the latest useful offerings from the relevant publishers. If you can't do that, get your family/friends to send you a pack of stuff from back home.