[Cdn-DMCA] CAAST calls for review of piracy penalties

[Kal Lin]

On Tue, 11 Jun 2002, Russell McOrmond wrote:

[snip]

>   I am in support of having the fines be higher.  It would encourage
> businesses and citizens to fully look at the costs of proprietary
> software, and adequately evaluate the alternatives.  This is the basis of
> the http://www.stay-legal.org/ campaign.


Last night CBC radio 1 at 9:05pm, the IDEAS show was about
crime and punishment.  I didn't listen to it but heard second
hand some of the arguments.  Two ways to reduce crime are:

1) tackling the social problems like poverty;

2) harsher punishments.

Studies have found if you are only interested in reducing
crime then 2) is more cost effective.  Jails are expensive
but not as expensive as social programs.  Politicians also
like 2) because the average person can see the correlation
between harsher punishments and personal safety.  The benefits
of 1) are much harder to quantify.  Most people find it
difficult to see how having more members of society as
productive law abiding citizens benefits them.

What does this have to do with harsher piracy penalties?
It's like 2).  The goal is to make using proprietary software
to produce more proprietary software cost effective.  Whereas
free (as in libre) software benefits society in many ways which
are harder to quantify.

Long winded,
--Kal



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