Entry 102: Viruses, Piracy, and Meritocracy Bullshit

Another major virus attacked my computer this week. It was similar to the one I got before, where a fake security warning pops up and tells you every program you try to run and every site you try to visit is a threat. At first it's easy to ignore, but it quickly becomes more and more invasive, and pretty soon you can't do anything, as every three seconds a prompt for a "security scan" pops up, and all open programs freeze until you close the prompt. I think the idea is that people will believe the scan is real, follow the steps to remove the fake malicious programs, and eventually give their credit card number to buy nonexistent clean up tools.

It's especially annoying because I pay for real antiviral software (I've tried both McAfee and Norton), but it does nothing to stop it. It can't even detect it when I run a scan. All the solutions I find online require me to pay for additional malware removal software that I know nothing about, which I'm hesitant to do for obvious reasons. I trust that the software is legitimate, but without a guarantee that it will work, I'm not throwing more money at the problem.

[This is what was constantly popping up on my screen.]

S's solution is to buy a new computer, but S's solution to everything is to buy something. She just likes shopping. Instead, I restored my computer to factory settings (again) which wipes out everything you have on it, but solves the problem. I had enough forethought to not put a bunch of stuff on my computer since the last time it crashed, but still, it's very annoying.

I'm trying to figure out why my computer is so susceptible to these viruses. Perhaps the problem is that I will occasionally stream football games from shady peer-to-peer sites. That's the only thing I can think of, as otherwise I stick to pretty legitimate places. I generally don't delve into the back alleys of the Internet. I should probably stop streaming games, which will be easy since the football season is almost over, anyway.

The subject of streaming football games is particularly apropos given the recent foofaraw over the proposed anti-piracy bills SOPA and PIPA. Online piracy is something I've given quite a bit of thought to over the years, and I come down somewhere between the lines of illegitimately obtaining copyrighted material should be stopped at all cost and everything should be freely available to everybody. I probably lean a bit toward the latter sentiment, because my experience is that piracy is often the result of a broken or outdated business model, and once people recognize that they can't stop it through traditional measures, it spurs innovation.

[No, it's PIPA, not Pippa. I don't really see what all the fuss was about over her. I mean, she's a nice looking girl, but you'll see dozens of women like this walking around DC everyday of the week.]

In the early 2000s everybody stole music using Napster or Limewire not necessarily because they wanted to be a thief, but because they didn't like paying $18 for an album with one good song on it (or worse, $7 for the single with five different dance versions). Now, everybody uses iTunes and buys individual songs legally. It's a somewhat similarly story with movies and Netflix. Sure, there are always going to be actual online pirates, who just want to steal stuff, but I think the vast majority of people want to buy things above the table. They just want a system that isn't tilted so heavily away from the consumer.

[Wikipedia protested the anti-piracy bills by shutting down for a day.]

And this is the litmus test I apply when I stream something online. Is there an easy, fair way I can get this legitimately? If the answer is yes, then I will do that, if the answer is no, then I might watch a questionable stream of something. In the case of football games, the NFL and cable companies have shown little regard toward their fans in providing easy and affordable access to their games (they mainly just fight among themselves), so I have little compunction about streaming the occasional Seahawks game (although, apparently computer viruses are my payment).

Plus, I'm not even sure if it's illegal to watch an unauthorized stream. I don't think it is. Downloading something copyrighted without permission, sure, that's got to be illegal, but just watching something that somebody else is providing. I don't know. To use an analogy that anti-piracy people use frequently, I'm not going into a movie store and pocketing a DVD from the shelf. I'm going over to somebody's house to watch a DVD they pocketed from the shelf. Is that wrong? Maybe. Is it illegal? Probably not.

[Remember when Metallica vehemently took on Napster? Kind of a double-edged sword, that one, since in a way they were going after their own fans. Independent of all that, this song objectively rocks.]

At the heart of piracy, in my opinion, is an utter lack of innovation. People that used to make shit tons of money off a system when technology was limited are now only making tons of money (1 shit ton = 100 tons, if you were wondering) and instead of figuring out new ways to monetize their products they're trying to regress to the old system. It's unlikely to work, because technology is only getting better and more widespread, and because there's a group of nouveau riche who are making shit tons of money off the current system (ahem, Google) who will oppose any changes to the new guard. (Will we see the day when somebody invents some new controversial search engine and Google is the one lobbying congress to limit it?)

In my view, this speaks to a larger problem with big business in the US today. To quote The Wire's Frank Sobotka, "We used to make shit in this country -- build shit -- now we just put our hand in the next guy's pocket". There's a real lack of innovation at the top. Yankee ingenuity seems long gone. That's what makes the Republican trope about a meritocracy, so laughable. The current GOP's idea of a meritocracy is that the rich get richer no matter how incompetent they are, no matter how much damage they inflict on society.



The fact of the matter is that our country's economic system is currently incredibly biased towards those who already have money, and who need it the least. This is why the American Dream is now the Canadian Dream , why your parents wealth has a larger influence on your wealth in the US than in other comparable nations, why the disparity between the super rich and everybody else in the US is growing with no tangible benefits to society overall, why Mitt Romney pays way less than you in taxes and thinks $350,000 a year is "not very much" (since I'm pointing this out, I must just be jealous, right Mitt?), and why many businesses (and their bought politicians) yell and complain and litigate every time the possibility of the most basic and reasonable regulations are entertained (i.e., not destroying the economy, again, and not polluting our air).

This is a point I feel doesn't get mentioned enough. If the rich are really the best and the brightest among us, the pillars of society, the job creators, the innovators, the John Galts, then why do they scream like little bitches whenever they don't get exactly what they want? We're the country who put a man on the moon over 40 years ago, and you're telling me that, today, our best and brightest can't figure out a way to generate energy without decimating our environment? They can't profit from investments without completely turning us into a country of debtors and rentiers? They can't grow their businesses without lucrative tax benefits? If this is the case, our best and brightest ain't so best or bright.

[If you had to come up with a personification of "The Man" could you do better than Mitt Romney? White, male, middle-aged, good-looking, born to wealth, super corporate, politically amoral -- I don't think it gets more The Man-like than ol' Mitt.]

What's becoming apparent is that the Republican idea of a meritocracy -- of the rich being innovators who earn their money by working hard, and providing otherwise non-existent jobs and benefits to everybody else -- is, in large part, unadulterated bullshit. That is, unless you consider new ways to litigate and lobby as being innovative benefits to society.

OK, that's enough of that. It's time for me to alight* from my high horse and get on with my day.

Until next time...

*I just played the word "alight" as the winning move in a game of "Words with Friends", so I wanted to use it in a sentence.