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Who's the Pirate Here?
Who's the Pirate Here? By Sharif M. Abdullah, director of the Commonway Institute From the hundreds protesting in Prague, the thousands protesting in Davos and Jakarta, and the tens of thousands protesting in Seattle, it is clear that people are fed up with the forces of economic domination and the increasing concentration of wealth. Anger is expressed with nonviolent vigils, vitriolic slogans, and broken windows. It is an anger born from the feelings of powerlessness in the face of a planetary machine trying to pave the world. Take heart. Just as every action produces its own reaction, the extreme of global corporatism fuels its own demise. There is already an effective economic response to global corporatism and its many official arms, including the WTO. This response is technologically sophisticated, worth untold billions of dollars, is grass roots oriented, and is gaining strength. It is considered illegal, even evil, in the eyes of global corporatism and its puppet national governments. However, there is a good chance you already participate in this economic enterprise. It is the Pirate Economy. The world's pirates are actively turning the tables on those with monopoly power. They are the lightest, quickest, least bureaucratic, most democratic, and--most importantly-most market-driven sector of our economy. In a world of corporate dinosaurs, the pirates are the rats feasting on dinosaur eggs. Here's a real-life example of how the Pirate Economy works: Two years ago I was walking down the street in Hong Kong and spotted what appeared to be a Waterman pen and pencil set. If it was a "real" Waterman, the cost would be over $300. I asked the vendor (selling from a card table on the sidewalk) how much the set cost. We negotiated for $4. The vendor's price provided crucial information about my purchase. At that price, I knew: -it was not a Waterman pen and pencil set. -the vendor knew it was not a Waterman pen and pencil set. -the vendor knew that I knew it was not a Waterman pen and pencil set. -The vendor was going to eat that night. In this exchange, NO ONE WAS HURT. Waterman did not lose a sale since I was not in the market for a $300 pen and pencil set. Even at $4, both the vendor and the manufacturer made money. You may protest: "Of course someone was hurt; the Waterman Corporation had their copyright infringed--the value of their copyright is lower because some Hong Kong knockoff artists faked their signature look." Good argument. Read on. Another example, this time using my favorite target, Bill Gates. (Since I would never do anything like what I'm about to describe, let's hypothesize that I have an evil twin, named Sharif2.) Sharif2 buys one legitimate copy of Windows, then loads the one licensed copy onto the six different computers he runs. Sharif2 owes Bill Gates almost $20,000 (he's done this with other software). He has violated Microsoft's copyright. Because Sharif2 feels bad about this (after all, he is my brother), he promises to pay Bill all the money he owes, at the first sign that Bill is actually in need of more money. Bill Gates is one of the wealthiest men in the world, and Sharif2's money will only make him wealthier FASTER. Big Bill made about 4 billion dollars last month. If Sharif2 pays him, it will be $4,000,020,000 next month. Sharif2, in the meantime, used that money to further social transformation goals. MAINTAINING MONOPOLIES The issue isn't really copyrights and intellectual property. The issue is money, power, and control. Because of his vast monopoly power, Bill Gates and Company can charge almost anything they like for their product. Because of his political power, Big Bill can enforce his monopoly pricing, even though others can make and sell the exact same product (or better) for much less, and the public (like Sharif2) is demanding to buy the product for less. The market be damned-the choice isn't about markets, it's about monopolies. The global dinosaurs call their system "capitalism", but it isn't. I call this economic system "global corporatism". It destabilizes market-driven economics and grows best when consumers are blocked from making informed choices. (If you don't believe me, read David Kortens' book, "When Corporations Rule the World".) It is corporate greed that creates piracy. It is only because they charge so much, grossly out of line with the cost of production and development costs, that Bill Gates and the other corporatists become such inviting targets for pirates. It is their greed, the gap between the value of the product and what the monopolists charge for that product, that creates the market for pirates. The pirates fill the market created by the monopolists. Piracy is capitalism at work. THE MORAL IMPLICATIONS OF PIRATING You argue: "How would you feel if someone violated the copyright for your new book?" Ouch. If someone came up with the $7.95 version of my $15 book, I'd probably be flattered. I'd also try to stop them: I worked hard to write "Creating a World that Works for All". But, if the principles in this article are true, I would make a pretty poor pirating target-the cost of my book is in reasonable relationship to its production cost: it doesn't make sense for a pirate to copy it. If I charged $150 for my book, production costs remaining the same, my greed would push the price toward a pirating target. Profits have to be truly obscene, not just bloated, to make piracy work. THE IMMORALITY OF CORPORATE GREED There is another moral issue regarding corporate pricing: overcharging for an indispensable product is immoral. A small handful of pharmaceutical companies sell combinations of drugs that slow or halt the virus the causes AIDS. They charge in excess of $5000 a month for the drugs, grossly in excess of their manufacturing costs and beyond the means of even middle-class families. In this country, the drug cartel's lobbyists get governments (state and federal) to subsidize the drugs instead of charging less. For the country of Uganda alone, to supply the AIDS drugs for their current HIV+ citizens would cost $25 billion annually at the drug cartel's prices (20 times Uganda's annual gross domestic product). The tens of millions of AIDS victims are condemned to suffer and die a lingering death, all to maintain the drug cartel's obscene prices. It is immoral to profiteer in the face of a pandemic like AIDS. However, the media does not call the drug cartel immoral profiteers-they are reasonable businessmen trying to make a reasonable profit from their resonable efforts. (The drug cartel spends millions on public relations to appear reasonable.) Assume that in Africa, "Pirate Pharmaceuticals", a reasonably equipped laboratory, can manufacture the same drugs for about $5 per month. Assume they decide to sell the drugs for $20 per month, within the reach of many HIV+ Africans. Given the millions of HIV+ people in Africa, it is in the long-term interest of most African governments to ignore the operations of "Pirate Pharmaceuticals". Of course, it will be in the corporate interests of the United States and its western allies to ENFORCE the drug cartel's patents and copyrights, at the threat of withholding foreign aid (and perhaps even using military force). A WTO FOR JOLLY ROGER? CREATING STANDARDS FOR PIRATING For pirating, it's the Wild, Wild West. Anything goes. Not every person copying Big Bill's software, Nikes' swoosh or Waterman's pens is conscientiously trying to create a fair and just economic system. Some are pioneers; many are parasites. Some standards are emerging for pirates, allowing us to separate the food from the feces: 1. There is a big difference between piracy and counterfeiting. A pirate informs the buyer (through the price of the goods) that the product is not made by the original producer. A counterfeiter is basically lying to the customer, saying that the copied product is in fact made by the original producer. This lie is embedded in the price. I can tell, simply from the price charged, that my Hong Kong pen was not made by Waterman. If I know this, I am making an open, honest (if illegal) consumer choice. A pirate is ripping off the corporate overpricer; the counterfeiter is ripping off the customer. A counterfeiter is also lying about their identity. A $4 Waterman pen says-loudly-I AM NOT A WATERMAN PEN. A person who copies Photographer X's artwork says-untruthfully-I AM PHOTOGRAPHER X. Stealing a human being's identity is digitally possible, but should rank near the top of our criminal acts of the 21st Century. 2. Quality is an issue. If I buy a shirt with bad seams, software with bugs or viruses, or medicine that is tainted, I have little redress. For most pirated items, the risk is built into the price. 3. Morality is also an issue. From drug smugglers to gunrunners, the pirate economy tends to be associated with ANYTHING not officially sanctioned by global corporatism. Just as with the standard economy, be aware of what you're supporting. I want to know that my light bulb purchase does not support nuclear weapons manufacturers, and I also want to know that my choice of a pen and pencil set did not support and arms smuggler. 4. Another issue is wealth distribution. Just because someone is a pirate doesn't mean they have any more social conscience than slime mold. Ultimately, the question is: was anyone hurt by the pirate's action? If so, the pirate has chosen a bad target, or doesn't give a damn about who he or she hurts-the morals of global corporatism. CONCLUSION Perhaps the best way to respond to the overbearing WTO (and similar regulatory bodies that benefit global corporatism) is to disregard its mandates, along with the rest of the regulations that are put in place by corporate-friendly governments to protect their interests. The pirate's willingness to operate outside of the rules established by powerful monopolies is what ultimately destroys those monopolies. This may be the ultimate subversion: destroying the WTO by ignoring it.
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