EthicalPiracy

Piracy as civil disobedience of copyright law.

The arguments about the overreach of copyright law in the US are many. But it seems to me that just because copyright is overreaching, it doesn’t meant that piracy is always acceptable. Here are my guidelines for when it may be ethical to pirate. Note, it isn’t legal to pirate, that is in the definition of the word. Like all civil disobedience it is not a defense in court, it is not a shield against criticism, and you should engage in ethical piracy if you choose to with your eyes open and aware of the consequences. Note also that this isn't really a discussion of Fair Use and transformative works. I am narrowly discussing the copying and distribution of media verbatim. Not making remixes, anime music videos or building fake trailers from assorted clips. By no means do I advocate that you engage in any illegal activity, ethical or not, and the following ideas are not an admission of piracy on my part.

Out of Print 

 It seems ethical to me to pirate copies of media that are out of print and unlikely to come back into print. This also covers items that are not licensed for a region and are unlikely to be. The rationalization is that if you cannot pay for media to the creators or rights holders, no harm is done by obtaining a copy elsewhere. Note: This doesn’t mean “Well I can’t buy the summer blockbuster because it’s not on BluRay yet, it’s ethical to pirate it!” A copy will be available in a reasonable amount of time. Cool your jets and pre-order. Also, to be most ethical one should buy a copy when it is available for sale. For example, if you pirated SimCity 2000 because it wasn’t for sale, but now it’s on GOG.com you should purchase it. Spend the money and get a legitimate copy. This creates market forces to make out-of-print games, movies etc available again.

Piracy for the sake of archiving media. 

 As the arts become more and more digital, it becomes harder to preserve copies of art for future generations. Video games especially become difficult as hardware to run the game becomes non-existent and the keys to unlock the anti-piracy protections disappear. Worse still are computer games that require a remote server login to operate and multiplayer online games that require servers to connect players. Piracy and the cracking of digital locks to enable these works of art to be studied and enjoyed by future generations is not just ethical, but noble. There is no harm in taking obsolete software and making it accessible. I feel that the primary purpose of creating art is communication, not profit. What artists want to do is make something to share with others. The profit motive is a social construct, not one inherent to art. Artists should profit from their art if they choose. But if art can no longer be experienced in a way that rewards the artist or rights holder, but is still held captive by Byzantine laws of ownership then it is ethical to distribute that art. Distributing out-of-print or inaccessible art freely should not be a crime as they are spreading the art to new audiences. If the profit margin was acceptable, the rights holder or artist would put the work back into print. Demand creates market space, but our understanding of demand is hard. Especially if the demanding group is marginalized and under-represented in the market. Piracy has shown rights holders that there is money left on the table for unobtainable art. Firefly, Family Guy and other TV and movies profited from piracy as it clearly showed the rights holders of this abandoned art that there was money to be made.

If you already own it. 

If you have purchased a media item, say a VHS cassette of Gremlins and you want to watch it on your computer. Transferring your owned media to a new format should not be a crime. This wouldn’t cover changing type of media. If you’ve bought Fight Club the book, pirating the movie would not be ethical. Ownership of a copy of the Ang Lee Hulk movie wouldn’t make it ethical to pirate the later Edward Norton movie. But scanning or downloading a digital copy of a book that you own the paper version of shouldn’t be a crime. Copyright is there to protect the artistic expression of ideas. If you have already paid for the expression in question, obtaining another copy without incurring costs onto the publisher, retailers or artists does not diminish the artistic expression. To put it another way, don't steal physical media. However, if you can buy another copy, you probably should.

If the article would have been in the public domain by the copyright laws at the time of publication.

This one requires a little research. If the media was published 52 years ago and copyright was 50 years at the time of publication, the author and rights holders had no reasonable expectation that Disney et al, would have lobbied for copyright to be extended to such a length of time. They made that art with the expectation that it would be protected by law for the period specified by the law at that time. The artists and rights holders would have assumed that they would no longer be making money from their art after the period expired. For example, the Wizard of Oz 1939 film was made when the copyright term was 28 years. Thus it should be in the public domain.

Piracy as a tool to escape censorship. 

 If a work is censored or banned in a location, it is ethical in my opinion to pirate it to learn from it and to distribute it to others who need to know about it. The ban might not even be explicit. Media with representations of LGBT+ people is hard to come by in the Bible Belt of the US. No laws say you can’t make or sell art about LGBT+ people and experiences, but you won’t find it in the library, local bookstore, Walmart or other outlet. In situations like that piracy is ethical to me. Luckily the internet is making this barrier easier to overcome. You can read books discreetly on your phone, and watch movies on demand. Much like the out of print example, when you can buy them, you should. But it seems to me that no harm is done by downloading and distributing forbidden books, movies and other media in an oppressive environment.

The Parable of Venkman and Peck

The parable of Venkman and Peck

 or

"How did we get here?" A story of the gun control issue since 2004.

Remember back to 2004 and the years following it. The Assault Weapon Ban sunsets, high capacity magazines are legally available again, Shall-Issue Concealed Carry permits are available in a growing number of states and the Heller and McDonald decisions seem to cement gun rights into law. Crime was down, things were good. Even staunch Democrats kept gun control on the back burner.

Then there was a spate mass shootings and people started thinking again about strict gun control laws. Here is where our parable starts. Gun control advocates are like Walter Peck in Ghostbusters. Concerned with the danger they are seeing, they come to the gun community/the NRA. They ask to investigate and want to understand what is happening. The NRA acts like Peter Venkman, being sly, and eventually standing on their rights to send Peck away.

A few years pass and more mass shootings happen. Now Peck comes back with the police, civilian support and a court order. Now Venkman is cooperative, trying to defuse the situation before his life and livelihood get taken away. But Peck is having none of it, wrecks the business and puts Venkman (and his friends/co-workers) in jail.

That's where we're at now. Gun culture had it's chance to talk it out and negotiate some common sense rules that might make things better. We, as gun owners, had a chance to work with the liberals and help guide the law. But instead we behaved like jackasses and said bullshit like "The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun." We failed to address any of their concerns in a meaningful way. Now they are having none of it and are coming for as much as they can take. I'm just hoping that this doesn't end as it did in the movie with an even larger disaster causes by those wishing to reduce harm.

BraveBrowser

So I hear about the Brave Browser as an alternative for private browsing. I'm always looking for more private browsing options, especially ones that are simple enough to recommend to more people at #EncryptEverything and on the street. And the marketing sounds good, if you pair it with DuckDuckGo. However, the word "Blockchain" sticks out to me on their site, so I keep investigating.

Brave Browser is funded by and designed around a crypto-currency called "Basic Attention Token". And you can spend these tokens on sites you visit based on how long you are on the site or you can block them or give them more if you like. And they have a one-way function that can convert other crypto-currencies (and "fiat currency" which is a red flag term for me) to BAT. There is a hole in their site where they mention that they are building an advertiser system as well that isn't ready yet. So investigating further I see the BAT site talks about "Paying" into the Brave user's wallet by experiencing ads.

Here's my problem. They build a browser that is ostensibly for privacy. And they bake in a way to pay sites without seeing advertising using traceable crypto-currency that can identify you with a profile linked to your wallet. A unidirectional wallet that you can't draw out of and can get "Paid" in by seeing advertisements. Sites will be able to track which wallets are engaging with them and how much and advertisers can do that same. If I understand the blockchain, how wallets interact with sites and ads will be public knowledge as well. So you can directly track a user's browsing habits and the ads they see. All it takes is one site matching logins to wallets and all of that "Privacy" that the browser offers comes tumbling down. And I don't see anything in their documentation that will keep sites from correlating wallets with other identifiers. If you build a browser for "Privacy" and bake in a system that can track users, you are not building a private browser.

My conclusion is that this is not a privacy forward browser. This is a company trying to cash in on the crypto-currency boom and redefining how sites get paid by viewers. Changing the advertising paradigm is a valid and logical goal, one that I'd support. Crypto-currency is a problem in several ways, many of which Charlie Stross laid out years ago. Maybe Brave could be used as a private browser with the right combination of settings, but for now I'll keep using Firefox and DuckDuckGo.

Universal Encumbrance Rules

Universal Encumbrance Rules

I've found normal encumbrance systems to be either ignored or so vague as to not help the story or the character. I wanted to create a system that helps a player develop a better feel for how their character is hauling gear, and a tool for GMs to interact with characters and their circumstances. These ideas are rooted in the ways that people carry stuff in the real world, but are not strict in their realism. 

My solution is a point system that accounts for how you are carrying your stuff. This allows for details that help solidify the character in the player's mind. It better reflects reality, where you can usually carry and move with a certain amount of stuff and if you add more things get bad, but you don't improve with you are carrying nothing. These points are the amount of gear that can be carried before penalties are assessed to Combat, Climbing, and Stealth Skills. All gear has an encumbrance point rating.

Maximum Encumbrance: 
Max. encumbrance is the total amount that can be carried by the character. It is calculated as as a combination of Strength and Endurance(...) This is the total marching weight that can be carried all day (resting 15min every 2-3hrs). I considered a system of Light, Medium or Heavy encumbrance and found it lacking. It seems to be that there is more nuance then that. You might not be carrying a lot of weight, but having a bunch of bags slung over your shoulders is going to make moving, fighting and doing active stuff difficult.

Encumbrance Locations: 

Maximum “free” points by location, However total encumbrance applies.  If you only have 4 Encumbrance pts then a full Cops belt (6pts) is going to penalize you.  Even though it doesn't exceed the 6 pt belt maximum. Only one LBE item may be worn in a location (1 helmet, 1 thigh holster, etc) with the following exceptions:

• Chest; Bandoleers can be combined with any chest LBE; Shoulder/Chest Holsters may be combined with Suspenders. 
• Back; A Buttpack may be worn with a knapsack but NOT a framepack. 
• Belt; Two (2) belts may be worn without additional penalty, a third belt means that Belt 1’s items are no longer accessible: 

Belt Locations: 
The six points of belt carry reflect the 6 major spaces that things can be carried on a belt. Front Left, Front Right, Left Hip, Right Hip, Back Left, Back Right. This rule is completely optional, but again it can help you visualize things better.

Chest Locations: 
Load Bearing Equipment, Vests and Body Armor determine chest locations. Generally the number of points is equal to the number of spaces. A Shoulder Holster has 2 points of carrying capacity, Left and Right.  Load Bearing Vests have up to 9 points arranged however you’d like. Remember that the encumbrance of armor counts against this location as well as the gear hung off the armor.

Back Location: 
While 6pts may be directly attached without additional penalty (by armor or a vest for example), Backpacks and knapsacks are special cases. A framed backpack can carry its rating in encumbrance, but only encumbers 1pt for every 5pts loaded. Knapsacks (a backpack without a frame) encumber 1pt for every 3 loaded. Encumbrance past the 6pt area max encumbers at +1 for every 20 lbs/pts (double what every other location is). The downside is that everything stored in backpacks is unavailable until the pack is removed and dug through. It generally takes 1d4 rounds to find what you want in a knapsack, 1d6 in a backpack, and 1d10 in a Large Backpack. The above rules on total encumbrance and exceeding location encumbrance apply.

Location chart:
This is a list of the locations and their maximum encumbrance capacity for humans. Not all of these slots should be filled. For larger then normal humanoids like Orcs, belts might have 8 "Slots" for stuff as opposed to 6. For Halfling or Goblin sized humanoids a belt might only carry 4 points and limbs max out at one point per limb. Giants and giant robots shouldn't use this chart as anything more then inspiration on how to carry stuff. Generally the theory is these creatures will have their encumbrance modified by their total strength and endurance enough that the variations in location maximums is less of an issue. Obviously discussion and common sense should be used to iron out any questions. (*See the Penalties section)

• Head: 1pt
• Chest:  Special*
• Back: Special*
• Belt: 6pts 
• Thigh: 3pts each 
• Calf: 1pt each 
• Forearm: 1pt each 
• Upperarm: 1pt each 
• Slung: 5pts* 
• Inhand: STRx2

Elbow pads are worn on the Upper arm, Knee pads are worn on the on the Calf. All penalties are cumulative.

Encumbrance Penalties and Notes: 

All Encumbrance penalties are cumulative.  Exceeding total encumbrance points results in a -1 to hit and a 10% penalty to active skills per 5 points exceeded. Some more specific encumbrance penalties are below.

• More than 1 Slung Item= -1/-10% difficulty per extra item. EXCEPTION: 1 Bandoleer may be (Slung) and 1 may be (Chest) w/o special penalty. 
• Clothing and LBE/Gear only encumbers when carried not when worn This applies the encumbrance of the +clothes/gear itself, NOT any attached/carried items. 
• All armor encumbers when worn and when carried. 
• Unless concealable, LBE is the always top layer. 
• Carrying a person/animal/item over your shoulders (fireman’s carry) is considered Back location and encumbers 1pt for every 5lbs. HOWEVER, at least one hand is occupied with the load. 
• Swimming: ALL Encumbrance points are counted toward the negative Swimming Modifier.
• Gymnastics: ALL Encumbrance points are counted for modifiers.
• GMs should certainly keep encumbrance in mind when characters are off balance, trying to squeeze through small spaces 

Encumbrance Notation:
Item A, 1; A standard item with unaltered encumberance
Item C, 1c; A concealable item, standard encumbrance
Item P, 1p; A pocket item, .1 lbs encumbrance, number is for pocket encumbrance (see below)

Pocket Encumbrance: 
Clothes have pockets, and keeping things in them takes no appreciable tool on your character. While carrying a gun or knife or ammo in your pocket can be encumbering, Pocket items have virtually no encumbrance, but they do take up space, filling the capacity of the pocket equal to their encumbrance. ex. Car keys, .5p, Wallet 1p. All Pocket items are Concealable. A pocket item can be attached to LBE/Gear, taking up slots but not weight. A pocket and LBE can have the same location, BUT the LBE will block the swift retrieval of the pocket item (2 actions to retrieve/draw). Belts do not block pockets.