This is a long and, in some cases, technical piece that makes a number of important (albeit, in some cases, false) points. In it, Cory Doctorow of Boing Boing and Hal Stern of Sun discuss a number of topics around system design, privacy, pirating, etc.

A couple of interesting points:

First, Doctorow says, "...I often wonder whether trusted computing architectures that allow remote parties to enforce policy on your hardware are a good idea." It's true that it's "our hardware," but that's as far as such an idea goes. If we want that hardware to perform particular tasks, and can't write our own software for it, then we necessarily have to procure that software from someone else. Naturally, we do so (or should) according to terms that are agreeable to both of us, within the context of our varying positions.

If I have a need for a piece of software to perform a particular function, and someone else has done a good job of writing it, then in this instance the software writer has the ability to enforce a policy to which I might not otherwise agree. That is, I either agree to the policy, or I forego my ability to utilize the software. Whether enforcing this policy or not is good economic sense is for the software developer to decide--and it is he who suffers the consequences of poor decisions.

There's nothing inherently "bad" in this, no imbalance in the voluntary relationship between us--it merely reflects the difference in our abilities again in this particular context. In other contexts, the roles might be reversed, and I might have something that the developer (or someone else) really needs. Ultimately, this is just the essence of the free market, and it's eminently fair because it rewards those who are productive and effective and it punishes those who aren't.

Second, at the very end of the piece, Stern says:

"Which is the one that you're going to try to regulate? After you watch a DVD you bought off of some guy's blanket on a New York City street - and you realize that you're watching a copy of the movie made by someone with a handheld camcorder, with a guy behind him asking for more popcorn and coughing - in some cases, if you liked it, you might go out and buy the real one. That's market-expanding, even if the original content was pirated. There's a reason that bands such as the Grateful Dead and Phish encouraged bootlegs: because they reach more listeners."

Similarly, this is a meaningless point, because of course any creator of intellectual property has the right to give that property away or to ignore its theft (although, perhaps as with trademarks, if one ignores copyright infringement for long enough, one might give up the right to prosecute it at some point, but that's for a different discussion). In some cases, it might even make good economic sense. However, in a free society, it's up to the owner of intellectual property to decide the terms under which he trades his property. Anything else makes him into a slave.

Today, many people attack the major labels for taking most of the profits and leaving little for the artists, and make the claim that by doing so they abdicate their right to control the property or which they've duly negotiated. This is rubbish: any artist who signs with a major label does so voluntarily and for reasons, good or bad. As has been mentioned elsewhere in this blog, denying the validity of our own agreements is the quickest way to destroying our ability to control our own existence. If we don't like the way our agreements turn out, then we need to change their terms, not evade our responsibility for them.