Re: Expanded Oracle DBA Site

From: Paul Drake <drak0nian_at_yahoo.com>
Date: 22 Apr 2003 23:56:50 -0700
Message-ID: <1ac7c7b3.0304222256.312972be_at_posting.google.com>


joel-garry_at_home.com (Joel Garry) wrote in message news:<91884734.0304221547.39f053ec_at_posting.google.com>...
> Links are notoriously unstable (just look at my link page :-O ).
> There is value to redundant electronic copies in a distributed system,
> and in fact, that is a major feature of the web.
>
> And of course, as we've all seen by now, it isn't Mr. Rogers'
> copyright. Any copyright holder must vigorously defend their rights
> or lose them, so we all lose out in the name of potential excess
> profit. The legal system is simply too far behind current technology,
> and is going the wrong way.
>
> jg

wtf is "potential excess profit".
please explain.
you've got to be kidding. excess profit. yeah - and a certain part of my anatomy is *excessively* long. at least "that's what she said". right.

you may be entirely on with every other sentance in the entire post - but - you lose me there.
there is no such thing as excess profit. if some poor sod was willing to pay an amount in a transaction - that is what it was worth to that individual. subjectively, there may seem to be something excessive - but objectively, the transaction occurred.

this will quickly descend further into drivel, but profit is a short-term phenomena, which after a sufficient number of participants have entered a market - competition will have driven the margins (and profit) towards zero - to where investors will have received better returns by having a passbook stampted at a savings and loan - and invested elsewhere.

and that kind of economic theory depends upon the supposition that people are well informed and are making rational decisions - and usenet is no place for that.

in the long run - barring a monopoly that something like the DMCA can enfore - profit tends toward zero.

$18 (USD) per CD (plus tax) does not result in excess profit. it results in profit - but it also results in people saying "fsck the recording industry - I won't buy any more CDs". As fewer purchases are made as a rational response to a usurpary rate, the monopolist loses both revenue and profit - but no "excess" profit is made or lost.

Paul Received on Wed Apr 23 2003 - 08:56:50 CEST

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