Starve the producers of all profits and they will collapse.

Speaking generally, we've had several consecutive years of all-time record corporate profits.

And if you look at corporate profits over the past 30 years, you will see an inexorable upward trend, in both total profits, and return on investment.

There are very few producers in big business that are being "starved". More specifically, I seriously doubt Thom Yorke is one of them. I don't know exactly how long Yorke expects "Creep" to support his children and grandchildren, but you know, at some point, stuff really needs to start becoming public domain again.

We have a model now where peoples' grandchildren are collecting royalties for some hit single grandpa had 40 years ago. Or more likely, some corporation that had nothing to do with anything creative is collecting royalty checks for some song written 40 years ago by a guy who died 25 years ago. I don't think that's why we have intellectual property.

If I could change the law, I would have all word (patents included) expire after 15 years) and if the license is assigned to a third party, after 5 years. As it is, we are tying up creative work virtually forever, and that's definitely not why people came up with intellectual property in the first place.

Looking at acquaintance and domestic homicides, for example, not only do police records show

That leaves out suicides, which is by far the most common use of handguns by non-criminals.

No person involved with the Confederates was charged or convicted of treason.

But not because they hadn't committed treason.

The lack of prosecutions had more to do with an accommodation made by the United States to assist in reconstruction than anything else.

The problem is that the internet has shifted more power to the consumers and away from the producers

Problem? In our economic system, fewer and fewer transactions exist where the balance of power favors the consumer. The world has been on a "supply-side" fantasy for thirty years, and it has not gone well for most people.

But artists have complete control over the pricing and over which distribution channels they choose to use. Once the last nails are in the coffin of the entertainment/industrial complex, you'll see that happen, and it will be better for all artists except the ones without talent at the top of the food chain.

Thom Yorke has benefited greatly from the mainstream music industry. Now that he's on the downward slope of his career, he decides that he doesn't like how things are done any more. That's fine. I buy a lot of music that I've first heard on Spotify. If Thom doesn't want to be part of that any more, it's his choice.

Again, the reasoning behind the 2nd amendment here in the US.

You do understand that the same Constitution that gives you "2nd amendment rights" makes the overthrow of the government, treason, a capital crime, right? In fact, that part was ratified before the 2nd amendment.

Sounds like you pick and choose just the parts of the Constitution that sound good to you.

Little Brother and Homeland both by Cory Doctorow

Interesting choices. You realize that both of those books demonstrate just how futile any "2nd amendment" solution would be in trying to effect any change in government, right? None of the activities of the characters in that book that had the least bit of positive effect involved firearms or the 2nd amendment. You really think the founders put the 2nd amendment in place to authorize your overthrow of the government? Ever read the ratification debates?

fear is a good motivator

You believe the most powerful military in the history of the world is afraid of your little Bushmaster? Especially considering how you're statistically more likely to shoot yourself or a family member than anyone else with that gun, I doubt it. How'd that 2nd amendment work out for Randy Weaver?

are there really people into stalking slashdot accounts?

Our current climate of the past ten years has been all about pushing the concept of pre-crime. It seems that politicians, media, and scare-mongerers are driving us toward the inevitability of a future where every student is forced - by law - to undergo psychological evaluation during the school year (and adults, perhaps forced to undergo regular psychological evaluation as part of the government mandated "free" health care coverage). Waver much off the accepted "norm" and welcome to pharmaceutical based alteration sentences reinforced by an alternate sentence of incarceration if you refuse. Not because of crimes you have committed, but by crimes everything from your genes to your attitude toward authority or critical-thinking or being too social or not social enough suggest you could theoretically, possibly, maybe, be suspected of potentially in some greater-than-zero probability be able to commit.

This is why you constantly see news coverage during tragic events like shootings veer quickly toward "how could we have caught this with mental evaluation" and "why wasn't he taking more meds?". After all, we are too weak as a society to accept that it might be better to accept a dozen or two dead people from a horrible crime than to violate billions of citizens (over the years).

we've been getting these once-in-a-lifetime storms every ten years or so nowadays

Malice intends to cause harm. This is just not giving a shit if your actions and carelessness causes harm.

Why is very simple, people don't trust them.

The feeling is mutual.

I remember not long ago, when they helped China prosecute a journalist that supposedly leaked state secrets to a website and helped "out" chinese dissidents and helped the chinese implement and facilitate internet censorship.

You completely missed the point that was made.

When you persecute people and infringe upon them, it is necessary for their own good and their own existence to push back. Do you think gay people like spending so much of their life fighting for gay rights and equal treatment under the Constitution and the safety of not being beat to death on the street for simply being gay? Or do you think they would rather just have the equality and the safety of every other human being and carry on with the rest of their life?

Those "uppity gays" and "uppity negroes" and "militant atheists" that religious people usually say "should just shut the fuck up if they don't believe, because then it doesn't concern them" are "uppity" and "militant" precisely because they have to be active in fighting against the way they are treated, dismissed, and impacted by those who are intolerant.

Of course, not everyone can afford the time or personal/professional risk of being militant. Thankfully, there are those that make it their life-long cause to do that for the rest of them.

It is also hypocritical to call people "militant" who are just standing up for their rights and pushing back against your imposition upon society. I would say the "militant" ones are those who are using law and mob-rule to impose their religion upon politics, government, education, law, and all of society. Making comments about people being "animals" based on the tone of their skin or suggesting we should murder them so they "can meet their maker and find out how wrong they are about religion". THAT is militant.

It's a rather perverse and sick tactic to push and bully someone pretty much forever and then, when they stand up for themselves, shout "he's being intolerant of me!" (or, in some cases, trying to discredit lack of belief by claiming it is as much a religion as belief -- when it is the non-existence of belief and nothing more).

I imagine there were a lot of dudes, like yourself, back in the 1960s talking about how "all them negroes are actin' like nutjobs with all that marchin' and militant sitting in the front of the bus and drinking from white fountains and shit". (I am not trying to implicate you as a racist or anything, but am just drawing parallels between the attitude and terms exhibited by those in multiple situations to dismiss, diminish, and denigrate other segments of society who are actively demanding fair treatment).

Because writing a terse couple sentences with vulgarities targeted at you in a mailing list that you voluntarily subscribe to for a project you voluntarily participate in is exactly the same as someone stalking you in meatspace, on your property, incessantly harassing you?

I just always assumed fertilizer was discovered by a CEO.

Yep. I used to sit about five feet from a guy who was in management (but not my management) who for some inexplicable reason disliked me. Not only did he dislike me, but he talked shit about me to other managers and employees behind my back. He was very nice to my face, though. I would never have known any of this if it weren't for a colleague and another manager who clued me into what this guy was saying. And, fortunate for me, these people always countered his comments, told him he was wrong, and otherwise stood up for me in his non-sense rally to bash me to people.

I would have rather he had just been an asshole to me and lay it out, so we knew where we stood.