| |
| META TOPICPARENT | name="SecondPaper" |
|---|
We Are All Prometheus Now | | | In an attempt to make the information artificially scarce, sellers have tried increasingly sophisticated mechanisms to control it. But, these have been foiled again and again. Universal computers can run the algorithms that defeat the restrictions, because they have to be leaky for the information to be distributed and read by paying customers. Information sellers respond by developing restrictions that are increasingly fundamental to the operation of the computer. For example, software can be silently installed in computers that secretly reports on unauthorized access when a computer goes online, or even shuts computer's operating system and ability to function entirely. This is especially common in computers that are marketed in ways that avoid calling them "computers," like smartphones, tablets, game consoles, and embedded devices.
Anything thought builds, though, thought can undo. Thoughts, implemented as algorithms running on computers, can be used to break all the most sophisticated locks placed on information. The knowledge of how to circumvent can be restricted by banning certain algorithms, censoring the websites that publicize them, and watching those who seek them. Algorithms, imagined by knowledge applied creatively, can go around all these measures. So, the only solution is to ban the thoughts behind the algorithm -- to punish the people who think about them and try to learn about them. | |
<
< | This is why copyright law in the digital age is inconsistent with our conception of free society based on freedom of thought. Enforcement means outlawing circumvention. It means limiting thought, and punishing it when it goes out of bounds. Still, enforcing these laws can't prevent anything. The police can only go after violators after the fact, after the locks have been broken, and the information products -- thoughts -- go free, breaking that carefully constructed market built on false scarcity. | | |
| | |
| |
<
< | Soon, many of us will ask governments to stop evil people from building 3-D printing weapons and synthesizing infectious agents. But, any technological countermeasures will fail, no matter how sophisticated they are, and no matter how heavily backed by laws and their enforcement. The only recourse will be to more severely punish those whom are caught -- only after the locks are already broken. There is a better alternative. We can finally set aside the false choice between freedom and safety. We can stop avoiding hard problems by punishing thinking, and instead share our thoughts and work to build solutions. | >
> | The concept of intellectual property has always been about the control and restriction of thought. IP means the use of the weapons of the state to enforce artificial boundaries around thoughts, so that information can be made scarce to give it a price. The ability to freely distribute and display with networked computers reveals that this loss of freedom is based on a false bargain based on promoting creativity at the cost of our freedom to think about owned thoughts. Computers that can be plugged into 3-D printers and build weapons, challenge the false bargain of sacrificing our freedom for personal safety and security. Any technical countermeasure, enforced by government, will have to control thought about algorithms. It will necessarily fail, except in its ability to punish those who aren't skillful enough to avoid capture, and to make it harder for dissidents to use these algorithms to circumvent restrictions on other things governments want to control, like the ability to organize protest. The solution isn't to control and punish thought, but rather to free thought, and to allow for creative solutions. | | | | |
<
< | -- BahradSokhansanj - 17 Jan 2012 | >
> | -- BahradSokhansanj - 24 Jan 2012 | | | | | | Thank you very much for your thoughtful comments, Devin. I'm going to have to think about this... I'm not sure what it would be to argue for freedom from first principles might look like? I'm trying to start from the initial point that we associate the core of freedom as being the freedom of thought, and that's what's being challenged by all of this -- so if you want the restrictions, then you have to accept the loss of that core freedom (and then what freedoms are really left?) and then, that this would be futile anyway, so it's not really like you're trading freedom for anything but illusory security -- and in fact, real solutions for the security problems can only come from human creativity, which requires freedom to think about these unthinkable algorithms.
-- BahradSokhansanj - 21 Jan 2012 | |
>
> | I've changed the article, but now it's rougher and represents a couple of conflicting ideas. Maybe this really needs to be split in two essays, or I should just focus on the freedom/security false balance (for example, take the time to explain how thinking about algorithms led to secure commerce, for example, better than the solution that government tried to provide through control).
-- BahradSokhansanj - 24 Jan 2012 | | |
\ No newline at end of file |
|