[free-sklyarov] Protest strategy & goals

[Seth Finkelstein]

>> On Sat, Jul 21, 2001 at 07:37:08PM -0700, Bob La Quey wrote:
>> Wrong. Adobe and the big corporations whose greed got the DMCA passed by 99-0
>> are the root cause of the problem. The DMCA is an important symptom but please
>> let us not confuse cause and effect here. Adobe must suffer a massive PR hit

> Declan McCullagh wrote:
> Could not another competing "problem" be the fact that congresscritters
> are such knaves that not one voted against the DMCA?
> 
> Oh, no. I suppose it would be too much to hold them to such a high standard.
> 
> -Declan

	Myself, I think the fundamental question is
"What Is Property?". Having large corporations being able to
redefine property to their own advantage strikes me as the
basic problem (as has been articulated elsewhere). Complaining
that Congress has a moral responsibility to define property
in some conjectured Libertarian-type fashion, and then endlessly
repeating some variant of government-bad when they do not - well, 
it seems to me that's unproductive in the extreme. Maybe it 
fills column space. But in terms of analysis, in terms of having
any utility whatsoever besides preaching (maybe not even to the
choir), I just don't see it.

	Here's the key difference; When someone looks at the motives
of the corporations, they understand *WHY* the law was passed,
and that can lead to some possible insight as to how to change it.
In contrast, when someone merely proclaims their scripture as
to what the government SHOULD do, it's the net equivalent of
bible-banging. Both the courts and Congress are noticeably
unreceptive to it, and it leads to nothing besides more
bible-banging as they will remain unreceptive to it.

-- 
Seth Finkelstein  Consulting Programmer  sethf at sethf.com  http://sethf.com
http://www10.nytimes.com/2001/07/19/technology/circuits/19HACK.html