MESSAGE
| DATE | 2008-10-07 |
| FROM | Ruben Safir
|
| SUBJECT | Subject: [NYLXS - HANGOUT] Cost of Copyright Violation as reported is a lie?
|
Commerce Dept Cites Bogus Stats, Chamber Of Commerce Uses Them To Ask
Bush To Accept Copyright Czar
from the bogus-stats-are-fun dept
We've seen it time and time again, where totally bogus stats about the
"costs" of "piracy" are floated (usually by lobbyists) and then suddenly
accepted as fact. It's even worse when it's government officials citing
the stats as fact. Yet, we've got that happening again. In urging
President Bush to sign into law the ProIP bill, which would give him a
copyright czar (something the Justice Department had said it it doesn't
want), the US Chamber of Commerce is claiming that 750,000 American jobs
have been lost to piracy. Yet, it doesn't cite where that number comes
from.
Wired's David Kravets tries to track down the source but finds no one
can quite figure it out. Instead, they each point to different gov't
organizations which have all quoted the number -- often citing each
other, but no one pointing out where it actually came from. Chances are,
of course, that the stat comes from a variety of reports, like the
easily debunked piracy impact report from the BSA, put together by IDG.
That lists out a number for job losses in the software industry that's
simply untrue, and is based on only the negative impact of "piracy"
impacting jobs, leaving out any positive impact (i.e., if a company used
only pirated software, it could hire more people). That's not to defend
piracy, but to note that the job loss claim is completely made up -- and
now repeated by a variety of different government officials based on...
nothing.
--
http://www.mrbrklyn.com - Interesting Stuff
http://www.nylxs.com - Leadership Development in Free Software
So many immigrant groups have swept through our town that Brooklyn, like Atlantis, reaches mythological proportions in the mind of the world - RI Safir 1998
http://fairuse.nylxs.com DRM is THEFT - We are the STAKEHOLDERS - RI Safir 2002
"Yeah - I write Free Software...so SUE ME"
"The tremendous problem we face is that we are becoming sharecroppers to our own cultural heritage -- we need the ability to participate in our own society."
"> I'm an engineer. I choose the best tool for the job, politics be damned.<
You must be a stupid engineer then, because politcs and technology have been attached at the hip since the 1st dynasty in Ancient Egypt. I guess you missed that one."
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