Not at all -- my position is consistent with the court decisions on this matter, which is more than I can say for yours.
If you put something on my property without my permission and leave it there, and as I have suggested I ask you to remove it, by simple act of negligence it passes into my possession.
Ah, now you add further conditions to your original overly simplistic statement. So you *have* done some work on it as I suggested. Good for you.
Unfortunately, it still fails to meet the giggle test.
Are you suggesting that the satellite companies are "leaving" the signals for, say, last Tuesday's shows lying around on your lawn like litter?
No -- they are transient signals, which you wouldn't even know were present unless you went out of your way to build or buy a suitable receiver and acquired the means to break the encryption on the signal that was specifically placed there to *prevent* you from accessing copyrighted information which you haven't paid for.
Your quaint ideas about treating constitutionally copyrighted material as if it were a baseball left on your lawn are ridiculous, not to mention an empty selfish rationalization for breaking the law.
If you left it there, it's mine, Sparky.
You keep telling yourself that as the courts rule against you, maybe it'll bring you some type of comfort as you pay your fines.
Precisely. My house. Do what I want. I did not ask for the signals to be given to me, and I have made no contract with the provider as to the limitations placed upon the signals.
Your quaint ideas about treating constitutionally copyrighted material as if it were a baseball left on your lawn are ridiculous, not to mention an empty selfish rationalization for breaking the law.
I'm empty? I'm selfish? You slay me. I'm also right.
By your logic we shouldn't even be having this argument, because the article we're referring to is copyrighted and we shouldn't be reading or discussing it. Wait, you forgot about fair use provisions of copyright. It seems to me you may be getting your ideas of law from the 9th Circuit.
You keep telling yourself that as the courts rule against you, maybe it'll bring you some type of comfort as you pay your fines.
Um, nope. We have cable at my house and we pay for it. Too many trees for Dish.
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Your quaint ideas about treating constitutionally copyrighted material as if it were a baseball left on your lawn are ridiculous, not to mention an empty selfish rationalization for breaking the law.
Much as I hate to talk down to the crowd, in your case I'll make an exception
My dear friend...
You labor under the illusion that simply because something is the law of men that it is good law, and thus must be followed, as if such a thing is somehow divined from Congress above and handed us for genuflection.
Poppycock.
You would actually stand by the piece of toilet paper known as the DMCA to shake your fist at interlopers who steal that which does not exist? It's well accepted that the framers favored shorter (or no) as opposed to longer protections of copyright and patent (ie. Thomas Jefferson). The framers' ideas of 'intellectual property' were unclouded by the largess of the Disney company. Would that today's leaders had such foresight.
My dear friend, if the sun shines on my lawn, it's my sunshine. If you shine a light in my yard and I deign to make shadow puppets on my garage wall, it's my light and my shadow puppets; my right to them ends at the edge of my property.
By the same token, if you shine a light in my bedroom window at night or if you play loud music and I can't sleep, I can use the law to make you stop. That's the concept of property rights: sovereignity.
However, if you put signals into the ether and I collect them and make whatever I will of them on my property, they're mine- and as long as I do not pass your signals off to others at profit to myself, I've done nothing wrong. I have no contract with you. Your intentions for your signals are irrelevant, insomuch as they are on my property. As I said in an earlier post, a simple letter to DirectTV each month asking that they stop sending signals to your house ought to suffice to quiet yappings such as yours. Not that I think it's even necessary, but we can see that with the logical gymnastics that you're willing to perform in pursuit of this notion, one can't be too careful.
The funny thing is, I make my living in the arena of 'intellectual property', producing things you've probably actually seen. And I have a very dim view of those who cloak themselves, as you do, in arguments about things which are barely property at all. I recommend you take a look at "The Noblest Triumph: Property and Prosperity Through the Ages" by Tom Bethell. It's an illuminating look (part of it anyway) at the fallacy of real property vs. so-called 'intellectual property'.
Regrettably, whole class of litigation has risen up around the notion of 'intellectual property' that's frankly Barbara Streisand. Did you see where NCR is trying to patent the internet?. Heaven help us.
You've got the snide thing down pretty well, Ichneumon, but you need to adjust the rabbit ears on your logic.