Auto-SummaryThe post discusses the evolution of economic ideals in the context of the internet's rise. It suggests that the internet has mirrored the historical shift from capitalist rejection of Marxist idealism to the realization of information as a material asset. The author argues that while the internet enables free copying of information, it does not necessarily imply justice or fairness. The post critiques the notion of intellectual property and its commercialization, suggesting that the internet has not fundamentally changed the underlying debate about usage rights and ownership. The author concludes by stating that the internet has not fundamentally altered the moralistic sentiment of capitalism but has rather made it more evident.
fireworks_god said:
daytripper23 said: The internet is an historic rebound in the spectres of economic idealism:
Once it was the capitalist who rejected the contrived idealism of marx, in favor of the "natural" seizure of assets/property. With the realization of the internet though, this ethical situation is mirrored. Of this one time "ideal" metaphysic, one could positively say that the ideal has been materially realized as information. To that there is no more material burden than the bitrate of the stream!
Or one could say in the negative on the other hand, that the notion of asset/property central to capitalist ideology, being positively dependent upon material reality, is reduced to absurdum. That is to say, it has now become the absurd burden of the capitalist to posit or construct his idealism in face of the "disappearance" of material conditioning. The "bitter truth of material human nature", or "the best we can practically realize" (if not quite just), has become a moralistic plea in the new found need to posit this material condition. That materiality is not of nature though, as the natural medium has inverted this condition. Material conditioning is now the contrived idealism of the market demand. Thus the capitalist now expects us to imagine these burdens of material, or even go so far to program limitations into the natural medium. In other words, it now has the burden of a constructed, rather than "natural" ethic.
But when people say "information is free" they are not talking about any subtle opposing or underlying sense of justice, as say, the Capitalist was in "fair exchange" to the Marxist. They are not speaking of justice, but of what is simply and evidently free - materially, or spatially. So while the pirates may demonstrate a "natural seizure" that perfectly reflects the incentive once held dearly in the rhetoric of the capitalists, it isn't followed with the relative deprivation of property for others that became the chauvinistic sentiment, a violent sense of "honor", and finally the "justice" that the capitalists cling to. It is simply the copying of information that is out there, an extension of the mind and memory.
So the capitalist's sentimentality is now seen for what it really is, and always was. A positive sentiment for materialism. We may now observe the culmination of capitalistic fetish: the utter imagination that information is somehow actually owned. That idealism was always present in their ethic, but now we have come to a practical realization of it, by turning that same ideal on its head, through the advent of technology. Now we see that same ideal through the same material lens, as an empty and impotent vessel of moralistic sentiment. Yes, the capitalist is no longer the grim, but practical and realistic naturalist, but the chiding moralist who can now only cry "Repent sinners!"
The genealogy of ideals/morals, as rhetorically constructed:
Marxist sentiment
to
Capitalist (sentiment)
to...?
Nice masturbatory session.
Portraying the advent of the Internet as a historic, momentous occasion in which there is occurring a grand reversal of positions between two polar stances on economic ideals, such as property, is just a bit out of touch with reality, IMHO. There's always been a distinction between physical property and intellectual property, and, regarding intellectual property, its always been a question of usage rights. Questions such as "can this other company use this catch-phrase slogan?", or, "I invented the schematics for this object, should other people be allowed legally to replicate its design for commercial purposes?" have been around long before the Internet ever materialized.
What has changed, other than the fact that the configuration of computers and the Internet provides a form through which it is much easier for information to be propagated? You refer to how it is only "the copying of information that is out there", but this is patently disingenuous, most obviously in cases of proprietary software, because the information isn't simply being copied, but it is being modified to make its contents accessible despite the terms of usage that had been set by the creator.
It'll remain to be seen how society and its conceptions of usage rights as it pertains to information will change as a result of the influence of the Internet. The simple fact that, until now, there's been a proliferation of the current legal stance on usage rights being ignored doesn't equate into some grandiose upheaval in the order of ideology. Its the same old preexisting debate, in which material possession isn't even a factor, since its always been recognized that it is a matter of intangible assets.

The only reasons one could argue against Free Information is either if one is not smart enough to use a system that allows one to make a living from the sharing of information without forcing each user to pay for it, or one is simply unable to see through the propaganda that is present nearly everywhere.
-------------------- The Great Mycelium (TGMM) is more than you and me, we are all part of One.
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