Well, this is part of the problem.
Sometimes "the author's labor" amounts to reordering questions at the back to mark it as new revision and charge 150+ usd for a book that should have been $20 brand new, and is only purchased because it's a required title in a required class to get a piece of paper required for employment.
In that case... Fuck yes. Screw the author's "labor". Arguably, screw the whole damn system.
---
Copyright rarely helps small authors who actually need it.
It usually gets employed by conglomerates that own distribution and are already screwing authors as hard as they think they can get away with.
It's genuinely a pretty terrible system in its current form.
The problem there isn't copyright. It's whoever is demanding students use the latest version.
> Copyright rarely helps small authors who actually need it.
>
> It usually gets employed by conglomerates that own distribution and are already screwing authors as hard as they think they can get away with.
Do you think these small authors have the resources to try to enforce copyright?
The textbook thing was a non issue when I was in college. Previous year books were sold on to the next year, and lecturers gave us page numbers for at least two editions.
I think all of the books for my year were about $150, not just one.
Now I'd assume everyone is using digital books so it might be different.
Let's take the emotion out of this, because it is clouding your judgement. There are a number of distinctions that must be made.
1. The actual labor of an author. Writing a book requires a nontrivial amount of labor. This cannot be ignored. You cannot categorically say that you have a right to the labor of an author and the publisher.
2. The dishonest business practices of publishers (and some authors). I agree that university textbooks often follow this model, but that is largely a flaw with the American university education system which has long abandoned education as its primary aim. The money-making schemes around education are downright criminal, and it is disgusting that universities abet and enable them.
3. The distribution of books where this is a problem. Most published books do not go through successive bogus editions that only reorder the exercises in the back. W.r.t. university texts, I've had professors who use old books published decades ago (e.g., Dover, which are cheap) and these tend to better than the glossy tomes many professors seem to prefer for some reason. There is absolutely no reason for a 30th edition book on basic number theory or the foundations of Newtonian physics.
Professors are first and foremost pedagogues, hence why I think the research university is a grave injustice toward students, where pedagogy takes a back seat. Each professor should effectively be writing his own "textbook". This doesn't have to be a published tome. Orally-delivered or via lecture notes, doesn't matter.
> Let's take the emotion out of this, because it is clouding your judgement.
Why make this point?
Address my actual content - I believe we can do better than modern copyright (personally - I think "no copyright" is likely a better and more ethical solution than the modern incarnation, but that's a real discussion, and there are FAR too many leeches (excuse me - vested interests) for this reasoning to gain traction in western countries).
I think modern copyright is at the root of an absolutely incredible amount of rent-seeking behavior, and I think we both agree on that point.
You state: "The money-making schemes around education are downright criminal, and it is disgusting that universities abet and enable them."
But copyright enables these exact money-making schemes, and it does so on a level far beyond the damage done by universities alone. We see this across huge swathes of the economy.
Again, my opinion is that current copyright laws have become a tool that facilitates stagnation, enriches middlemen rather than funds authors or creatives of any type, and are largely harmful to society.
That's NOT a condemnation of copyright as a concept, I believe there are implementations that can be much more fruitful. But what the US promotes is, well, a steaming pile of horse-*&^% that reeks so bad we'd be better off washing it away entirely.
So to your points:
> 1. The actual labor of an author. Writing a book requires a nontrivial amount of labor. This cannot be ignored. You cannot categorically say that you have a right to the labor of an author and the publisher.
I entirely agree, work should be compensated. I don't believe that work entitles you to a revenue stream for eternity, or functional eternity (ex: life of author plus 70 FUCKING YEARS). We don't pay the skilled workers who build houses for every month someone stays in them. They do work in exchange for a set payment. They don't get payment forever in exchange for one-time work.
> 2. The dishonest business practices of publishers (and some authors). I agree that university textbooks often follow this model, but that is largely a flaw with the American university education system which has long abandoned education as its primary aim. The money-making schemes around education are downright criminal, and it is disgusting that universities abet and enable them.
We both agree, no argument here.
> 3. The distribution of books where this is a problem. Most published books do not go through successive bogus editions that only reorder the exercises in the back. W.r.t. university texts, I've had professors who use old books published decades ago (e.g., Dover, which are cheap) and these tend to better than the glossy tomes many professors seem to prefer for some reason. There is absolutely no reason for a 30th edition book on basic number theory or the foundations of Newtonian physics.
Yes, people can and do act ethically at times, all on their own. Those people are great, but we're not referring to them, we're referring to the systemic problems of copyright that enable the opposite behavior. The world could be so much better if more people acted in this manner, but human nature implies we're not dealing with that world.
More to the point: the reason you find so many people advocating for pirating textbooks specifically, is because textbooks have often been used by authors/institutions/publishers to fleece students:
> Some textbook companies have countered [the second hand market] by encouraging teachers to assign homework that must be done on the publisher's website. Students with a new textbook can use the pass code in the book to register on the site; otherwise they must pay the publisher to access the website and complete assigned homework.
> Harvard economics chair James K. Stock has stated that new editions are often not about significant improvements to the content. "New editions are to a considerable extent simply another tool used by publishers and textbook authors to maintain their revenue stream, that is, to keep up prices."
Students can tell when they're being scammed, and are more than happy to go to war with scammers such as these.
I would personally love and do support ethical publishers /companies and authors themselves but I refuse to engage with the exploiting kind, since there is effectively little difference between them and pirates.
Good. The internet is meant to uplift human society, not enable petty theft. If only they could have gone after each thief to take back the money they stole.
There's a difference between "I am the creator of this content [that I actually didn't create]" and "I am enjoying this content that I did not create." One could argue that it matters, in the latter case, whether you are enjoying the content in a manner with the creator's intention of how you enjoyed it, but, to state one among many possible responses, it is far from clear when I consume media through approved channels that that accurately represents how the creator would prefer I enjoy it.
The whole time I'm doing it, I'm trying to think of better ways. I'm thinking of libraries, utilities or even frameworks I could create to reduce the tedium.
This is actually one of the things I dislike the most about LLM coding: they have no problem with tedium and will happily generate tens of thousands of lines where a much better approach could exist.
I think it's an innovation killer. Would any of the ORMs or frameworks we have today exist if we'd had LLMs this whole time?
I doubt if we're talking about the same sort of things at all. I'm talking about stuff like generic web crud. Too custom to be generated deterministically but recent models crush it and make fewer errors than I do. But that is not even all they can do. But yes, once you get into a large complicated code base its not always worth it, but even there one benefit is it to develop more test cases - and more complicated ones - than I would realistically bother with.
What is it like purchasing consumer goods from the EU under the new 10% section 122 rates? Previously I could have expected 25% tariffs + UPS/govt fees equivalent to another 40%. But hearing the horrors of shippers (UPS, FedEx, DHL) charging import fees equivalent to 1000% with no recourse to refuse the shipment and recoup costs, I never pulled the trigger. Has anything changed with the section 122 rates, especially considering the $800 de minimus exception won't be reinstated?
It's still possible for two commits to conflict only semantically, one obsoleting the other. Merging both would lead to dead code so perhaps stricter (line-base or ast-based) conflicts would be preferable.
You're right, that's a real risk, weave runs post-merge validation for exactly this, it checks entity dependencies after merge, so if one side obsoletes what the other side depends on, it warns you even when the textual merge is clean
Yeah, I buy a very high percentage of my clothes on eBay (and also Poshmark, but it ends up mostly being eBay).
What I don't buy used:
- Socks
- Underwear
- Gloves
- Knits in general, as they're too likely to be messed up, though with the odd exception for pieces unusual enough that I figure it's likely they were treated OK, provided the price is low enough I can take a gamble. I think all such exceptions have been 100% linen or ~50/50 silk/linen blend sweaters (these are warm-weather sweaters, basically)
- Jeans. If they get creases and fades I want them to be from me. Plus I have my size dialed in on Levi's STF 501s and I can already get those for like $40 on sale, so... what's the point?
- Modern sportswear in general. I don't have much of this, but what I get, I buy new (though from e.g. Sierra Trading Post, if I can manage it)
Pretty much everything else comes from eBay or poshmark (exception: I don't think quite half my shoes are used, but a lot are).
Belts, ties, trousers, shirts, jackets, coats. Ebay or poshmark.
Shirts: I've got my sizing figured out really precisely with four or five brands. I can shop these really well by size tag. Like, I know with one Japanese brand I can get the "slim" fit of their very-largest Japanese size (these are neck + sleeve measurement shirt sizes) and it'll fit me great for a modern-fit button up shirt, except the sleeves will be a little too short (in the longest sleeve they offer! And I'm not even that big! LOL). I can get the "New York" "slim" from the same place, which they offer with a size one larger than that, and it'll be absolutely perfect, damn near as good as if I'd had a shirt custom made. I know stuff like that about a few brands. They're all nicer brands, so the sizing is quite consistent. All I have to do when I want a shirt is set a few eBay saved searches, and wait for one I want to come up (if there's not one on there already). Sometimes I've even snagged batches of shirts from someone with my size, resulting in stupid-low prices (like, $10/shirt) for things that look like-new.
Jackets: mostly blazers and sport coats. I know my body measurements, and I know the measurements of jackets that fit me well (arm length from shoulder and from pit; waist at middle or top button, depending on 3 or 2 button; length down the back; chest measured across pits; shoulder, front and back measurement, seam to seam). I have a sense of how to size up for winter garments that have thicker fabric and under which I'll probably want to wear thicker clothes. I know the range of standard jacket measurements (e.g. "40R" for a 40" chest, regular length) I'm likely to find what I need in. The vast majority of sellers provide enough relevant measurements that I can achieve an almost-perfect hit rate on these, and the nicer the piece the more likely they are to provide them. I'd say the average I've spent is $100-$120, and some of the ones I've got would have been . I've leaned on these measurements to also get things like a cotton canvas chore jacket, and a leather jacket. Brand knowledge is all but useless for sizing here, jackets vary far too much and many have been tailored. Closest it gets to being useful is that I know a couple outdoors/sporting brands that either make or used to make sport coats, and that theirs run way large (they probably expect that you'll need to move in them, and that you'll wear heavy clothes under them) so not to automatically skip over them because the nominal size would be too small in ~every other brand.
Trousers: Waist measurement is a must of course, nominal trouser sizes are basically gibberish even in good brands, and many trousers have been altered in the waist. Leg length a must (too long is fine, many nicer ones ship intentionally very-long anyway so you can alter them to your need, but too-short is a problem), measured crotch to end of leg so you're not including the rise. Ideally also leg width at the ankle, and rise (crotch to top of waist), though those can be sort-of eyeballed. Many listings will let you know if there's fabric to let the waist out or leg down, and roughly how much. Like with shirts, I have a good
Suits: for a 2-piece, it's just jacket + trouser, there's nothing new here. For vests (if it's a 3-piece, or if buying an odd vest) the main thing to care about is pit-to-pit chest, which I find to be a little more forgiving (I can go very-slightly smaller) than a jacket provided the vest material is on the thinner end, and maybe the length neck-to-hem, especially if you've got a notably long or short torso.
Coats: Like a jacket, but size up an inch or so, maybe more (for some styles that are meant to be worn very loose, a lot more, potentially). These may go over jackets or other thick or layered clothes (e.g. heavy sweaters), and generally you want them to have a looser fit anyway. If you buy them like a jacket you'll find you can only comfortably wear them over a shirt, which makes for a pretty limited coat. Or, if you have measurements of existing coats you like, just base your decisions on those (basically same measurements as a jacket)
-----
It looks like a lot, all laid out like that, but if you already have clothes that fit well in each category, it's really just a half-hour with a surface to lay them flat on, and a measuring tape. Pro tips: measure several examples of each as there's probably a small range of each measurement that works well, pay attention to material thickness and how they fit over different thicknesses of clothes for e.g. jackets to get a sense of what to look for for different seasons, and check with fit guides online to make sure these clothes really do fit correctly (they may feel OK, but look off in ways that may be hard to pin down if you don't know what to look for), and measuring clothes that don't fit quite right can also be useful to figure out what's plainly too much, or too little, in a given dimension. Also, consider as you try on for fit stuff like "do I prefer these trousers to those because of, say, the rise? OK, so I need to make a note of which rise measurement, specifically, I prefer..."
Boom, you've got what you need, and will only rarely need to re-do any of that (waist and chest, especially, may shift a little, and we all get shorter eventually, but otherwise you're good). Measure yourself, too (true waist, hip, chest, maybe neck... I also have hand [around, at the knuckles] and head for gloves and hats, LOL) and you're solidly ready to buy clothes with reasonable confidence online, used or new. If you do get something that fits wrong, measure whatever part's not fitting right to help refine your criteria.
Measurements of your own body are mostly helpful for buying new. Lots of retailers will provide size charts based on body measurements, not garment measurements. For used stuff, it's gonna be 100% garment measurements, which will always be at least a little larger than the corresponding body measurements (so it's simplest to just measure stuff you have that fits well, for this)
Show me a sewing machine that can cut, sew, hem, iron, and qacheck a stretch-fabric garment, and I’ll show you a trillion dollar domestic manufacturing opportunity! Until then, look up the object called “sewing pattern”; it’s just a clothes blueprint that assumes you only have a 2D printer (scissors or a pizza cutter) and need a physical guide for the 2D fabric cutter (which will be you), an instruction sheet for sewing (also you), and the assumption that you understand that you should have ironed the fabric beforehand (throw it out and start over). Sewing is an extremely old human craft and may perhaps be the most difficult challenge faced by industrial robotics. Threading a loom for woven fabrics is equally as difficult and is still done by hand, too. Note that most clothing doesn’t fit in a normal desktop cutter because fabrics are typically 40” wide so you end up having to escort the entire process using tool-assisted human labor. They have, at least, figured out how to make robotic top-sewing machines for quilts, so as long as your stitches are in 2D and the fabric is already sewn together, you can have it sew the linear mile of stitches to finish the quilt (but only after weeks to month of piecework and assembly).
reply