Illegal Business Controls The World
Illegal Business Audio Beef Today. KRS-One and Moises Naim explore Illegal Business.
'Fresh Air Interview - 01/10/2005’ (96KHz Mono MP3, 17 Minutes, 16mb)
by Moises Naim (editor of Foreign Policy Magazine and author of the new book Illicit) and Terry Gross from NPR’s Fresh Air, January 10th, 2005
'Illegal Business'
by KRS-One from his 1988 album By All Means Necessary
As at least some of you know, I listen to Fresh Air on my drive home from work. I particularly enjoy the diversity of their selection of interview subjects and topic, and today was no exception. Terry's guest today was Moises Naim, who has written a book called 'Illicit' about the extralegal trade which accounts for a large percentage of all trade in much of the developing world.
Even in the developed world, as KRS-One puts it :Illegal business controls America
Ganja business controls America
As usual, Terry asks some good questions and some very NPR-naive ones. Moises comes off as very informed, though he seems to take the party line on media piracy. Regular readers of The Beef will know that, while I agree with and respect so-called intellectual property rights, I believe that they need to be balanced with the needs of the public. Mr. Naim seems to be more of a stickler for the corporate perspective on IP, but this is consistent with his background and the 'crime' theme of the book.
From the reviews, it seems that Naim believes that criminal trade is trade first and crime second. This matches my experience of various grey markets: they are markets first and grey second. In particular, I've always viewed copyright infringement as being about culture first and trade a very distant second. This Audio/Video blog is a testament to my belief that art is culture, and that our first obligation is to enrich each other with it. I consider for-profit bootleggers as criminal as I gather Moises Naim does, but I find it essential to differentiate between piracy for art and piracy for money.
Unfortunately, our law makers disagree, so I have a simple suggestion for all of you. If you value the commons, the joy and wisdom and illumination that art and music brings.. educate yourself about Fair Use and be an informed consumer. Don't support people who don't support you. That is all.
(Floating shouts out to c., for talking to me as I wrote this. Also, teh extra mega special shout out goes to the Friend of Beef who mailed me this t-shirt bundle of joy. It is TEH own.)
Comments
Talking of the black market, I can arrange to get you some fine Israeli-made hardware if you know what I mean & I think you do
Posted by: jeff | November 14, 2005 11:16 AM
When did "black market" get substituted with "gray market" in the popular press? I've only noticed this recently.
Posted by: cinnacism | November 15, 2005 11:54 AM
Ok, I think I started to post a comment but didn't quite get what Fair Use meant in relation to copyrights. The link clarified it quite a bit and it does make sense.
I'm no fan of "the commons" in most respects, but when it limits our creativity and capabilities to produce goods or services, artistic or not, then it has gone too far.
Then again, it would be fun to see someone tell the police "not without my consent" when being read their Miranda rights and they come to the part about "anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law"
Posted by: colson | November 17, 2005 09:47 PM
do ya listen to Forum w/Michael Krazny? They had an excellent piece on 'sanity', w/Adam Phillips (uk psychologist), 11/17 or thereabouts. Check it.
Posted by: jake | November 20, 2005 05:00 PM