So I just read Bill Gates’ 1976 Open Letter To Hobbyists, in which he whines about not making more money from his software. You know, instead of being proud of making software that people wanted to use. And then the bastard went on and made proprietary licences for software the industry standard, holding back innovation and freedom for decades. What a douche canoe.
ai is the rich stealing from us, piracy is usually us taking it from the rich.
AI is theft in the same way that all private property theft. It isnt the piracy of media, it’s the alienation of labor from its product, and withholding it for profit.
Private property is not theft, it is exploitation. Marx already refuted this anarchist childish way of thinking
The exploitation of private property is derived from the exclusion of labor from its product - maybe you have a different understanding of what ‘theft’ means, but it’s the principled exclusion of what labor produces from the labor producing it that is the basis of marx’s claim of ‘exploitation’
All private property is theft? Lmao go back to your cave tankie
Some people on the Left regretfully tried to redefine Private Property and split off some private property into “personal property” but since that’s not how the language works it’s caused endless miscommunication. By private property is theft he means Private Mean’s of Production with the caveat that people essentially own their owns but homes can’t be bought/sold/inherited.
“Property is theft.”
Lmao sorry for not being able to take this seriously
???
Clearly one of those horrible anarchotankapalists.
tbf that’s also the tankie view about it.
Even libertarians, who are on the exact opposite side economically, agree IP is garbage made and manipulated to enrich the few.
It’s a bit of a split among libertarians. Some very notable figures like Ayn Rand were strong believers in IP. In fact, Ayn Rand’s dogmas very much align with what is falsely represented as left-wing thought in the context of AI.
It’s really irritating for me how much conservative capitalist ideals are passed off as left-wing. Like, attitudes on corporations channel Adam Smith. I think of myself as pragmatic and find that Smith or even Hayek had some good points (not Rand, though). But it’s absolutely grating how uneducated that all is. Worst of all, it makes me realize that for all the anti-capitalist rhetoric, the favored policies are all about making everything worse.
Anarchists believe that “all property is theft”? Lol
There is some disagreement between people who, for example, favor Proudhon versus those who favor Kropotkin over the ownership of personal tools that are involved in individual trade-craft. As with any ideology there are varying schools of thought but the common ideological baseline is that anything that requires capital investment should be collectively controlled and operated for the common good. A person’s personal possessions including their home and tools required for self sufficiency are not considered “property” or a “means of production” by almost anyone.
A good real world example is the FOSS community, most of us would be quite vexed to say the least if someone started changing stuff on our personal computers but we also actively share our code, experience, and knowledge with the world for free. Same goes for the open hardware folks, permacomputing community, and the open research community.
Yet none of that can be interpreted as “all property is theft” unless you redefine what “property” itself means which is a terrible strategy for advertising Anarchy.
You know how the scientific definition of theory has a fundamentally different meaning as the colloquial meaning of theory? The anarchist definition of property is synonymous with capital while the colloquial idea of property is more synonymous with the anarchist definition of possessions.
I am physically able enough and have the ability do almost all the necessary maintenance on my house, car, and other possessions myself. Of course everyone needs expert help from time to time, for example I can solder copper pipe but I don’t want to risk a gas leak so I call a HVAC tech if I need a new furnace valve. However other than external inputs like water, power, gas, and internet service which intrinsically require collective effort, a single person (who is physically able enough) can efficiently maintain a modern house by themselves.
A single person has no way of doing anything but very basic maintenance on something as technologically complex as a modern factory. Even if they were a master mechanic, electrician, calibration engineer, and every other diverse skill set involved in just maintaining a factory it would be impossible for them to run it as anything but an inefficient workshop without some sort of external labor. Things that intrinsically require collective effort to function should be collectively operated for the benefit of the community.
The same is true for a large property like a mansion (which should not really exist beyond serving a purpose as a historical artifact), an industrial farm, a power generation facility, or a water treatment plant. If it requires collective effort to run and maintain to function it is capital, thus falls under “property” and should be collectivized.
The fact that someone can own and profit off something while unable to maintain it or use it without collective effort solely for their own benefit and enrichment is theft. Without their workers they would have a decrepit building full of the rusting hulks of machinery yet there are factory workers in the US who have to sleep in their cars or work multiple jobs while the C-Suit takes home millions.
private property, distinct from personal property.
Is it? This dichotomy seems incredibly artificial and unsustainable.
Does it really? I don’t find it to be a challenging distinction at all
yes.
And piracy is actual enjoyment of art made by hardworking devs who unfortunately work for multi billion dollar companies T-T
That’s true in the same way that Trump’s tariffs are paid by other countries. Which is to say: Not at all.
Bill Gates was no billionaire at the time. His background was probably shared by almost all computer hobbyists at the time.
Hardly. Bill Gates came from a wealthy family, attended a private school, and through it had thousands of hours of computer programming time several years before even the Altair 8800 came out. He had a personal connection to IBM through his mother, which is how Microsoft got the DOS deal. His circumstances were unique, and his success the result of a hefty dose of luck.
What kind of person owned a computer as a hobby in 1976?
a rich person
Yeah, one would think so. And those were the hobbyists that Gates was addressing in that open letter.