The argument is "Piracy doesn't harm creators - take this example of the Avengers." I'm calling this Avengers example a strawman.

Perhaps my post should have been in response to the 20-30 posts above making that argument instead of a standalone reply.

I'll need to see citations for your claims of ridiculous measures at theaters, laws, draconian enforcement, etc. It's not that I don't believe you, it's that I think they are very, very rare since my anecdotal experience (myself going to movie theaters) has never encountered any of them.

This is a complete strawman argument. A camcorder copy taken in a theater has much, much lower quality than the actual movie in a theater. The video quality is poor and the audio is terrible. I wouldn't want to watch a camcorder version of just about any film, ever. I saw one once, and it was garbage. You'd have to pay me to watch one, in fact, since it's a waste of my time otherwise.

Pirated copies can hurt sales when their quality is identical to the version for sale, yet their price is $0. For example: 1) pirated digital music file vs. the for-sale digital music file, or 2) a digital rip of a DVD vs. the for-sale DVD. The pirated quality of both of those items is identical to the for-sale items, yet they cost $0.

Pirates obtain the game for $0, which makes recouping the cost of developing the game impossible with a single sale to a consumer. So game producers say okay, instead we'll recoup the cost of making the game with what amount to microtransactions (via monthly payments via the Internet connection) over the course of any person's gameplay. I don't see what the problem is. The free market works both ways folks; if pirates figure out how to not pay game developers for the game that they should be paying for, game developers find a different way to get paid.

This bill reduces oversight, regulation, and investor protection measures when companies want to raise investment capital. Please read the following:

http://baselinescenario.com/2012/03/20/cfa-institute-against-the-jobs-bill/
http://baselinescenario.com/2012/03/21/jobs-disaster-looms/
http://baselinescenario.com/2012/03/22/last-ditch-attempt-to-save-a-little-bit-of-investor-protection-in-the-united-states/

One of the biggest cause of the recent financial crisis was too little regulation of the financial industry. I do *not* want to do it again in 5 years.

My post was addressing the (IMHO incorrect) inference that "devs pay for bandwidth" implies "there is no capacity problem." I stand by my original argument.

If you want to have a different argument about exactly what bandwidth and capacity is, and how an ISP should be amortizing their network investment, we can do that, but that in no way erodes my original argument.

You seem to have missed the following, which was in my original post:

You missed the part of my post where I said: "You can also argue that bandwidth is not a true "physical" resource that takes cost to produce; once a certain capacity is in place, you shouldn't charge for usage."

What are you talking about? AT&T is proposing to *not* charge on the download side, i.e. not count the bandwidth towards the download cap of the end user. Instead, they would charge for it on the upload side, to the service provider who is delivering the content. Sure, the service provider may pass that charge right along to you, but that's *still* only one charge for the bandwidth by my math.

This is a total strawman argument. Take a data plan that can handle streaming video (I don't know if there actually are any today, as this is the problem AT&T is trying to address here, but hypothetically speaking), and the ads or other junk that comes alongside it would be a tiny, tiny fraction of the overall bandwidth used.

While I tend to believe that this is AT&T being corporate money-grabbing assholes, I have to disagree on the inference you made, that "we will allow the apps on our network if devs pay for bandwidth" implies "there is no capacity problem".

Charging for something is a way for regulating demand for a scarce supply of something. It's literally Econ 101, supply and demand. AT&T has to charge someone for the capacity used, such that the rates charged for it will regulate it. If there's a capacity problem, the rates go up. When the rates go up, demand goes down, and the capacity eventually reaches equilibrium based on price. It's how any producer sets the price of something in limited supply and high demand.

If demand is high enough for a sustained amount of time, then it's in AT&T's best interest to expand the production capacity (i.e. increase bandwidth available on their network), thus raising the supply. The marginal price goes down, but they are selling more total bandwidth, so their total revenue goes up. If they don't expand in a timely manner, a competitor comes in with better service for the same price, and all AT&T's customers leave and join the competitor.

In any case, you need to attach a price to the thing in limited supply so that it self-regulates. If no one pays for it, that's when there's a capacity problem.

If you want to argue about AT&T selling unlimited data plans that aren't really unlimited, that's one thing. You can also argue that bandwidth is not a true "physical" resource that takes cost to produce; once a certain capacity is in place, you shouldn't charge for usage. You can also argue that spectrum itself is scarce and the government grants a monopoly to these few companies, so competition is limited or nonexistent, and so they should be regulated. These are all fair arguments. But the general inference of "devs pay for bandwidth" => "no capacity problem" is fallacious.

You're right about that, but you imply that there is no causal link between the pedophilia in Catholic priests and celibacy, and I'll argue that there is a causal link.

I'd argue that the causation is in the selection bias that the celibacy requirement creates. By saying that priests must be celibate, the Catholic church eliminates a huge chunk of good, non-pedophile men who might consider the priesthood if they could have sex.

The pedophiles are going to try to become priests no matter what - the celibacy requirement doesn't deter them. The celibacy requirement does deter non-pedophiles. And so with many fewer non-pedophile applicants, that skews the percentages towards pedophiles.