NateNate60

Computers will never consistently beat humans and humans will never consistently beat computers as snakes and ladders.

Or rock-paper-scissors, for that matter.

After hearing you explain it, I think you have me convinced that taxing only the land value is a fairer system and would encourage active development. My only concern is this:

• the land value of a plot of land in East Portland on which a single-family house sits may be worth $50,000
• a five-storey block of flats in, say, Downtown or even nearby like the Pearl District, Llyod, or whatever might have a land value of, for example, $100,000 (all numbers made up for illustrative purposes)
• the land on which the US Bank building may, for example, be worth $300,000
• the land on which Zenger Farms, a 10 ha. urban farm, sits may be worth $500,000 or more, because it's so big

Suppose the tax is 10% of the assessed land value. This means the owners of the East Portland house, the five-storey block of flats, the US Bank building, and Zenger Farms, would be assessed $5,000, $10,000, $30,000, and $50,000 respectively in tax. Now, I think I needn't point out that this doesn't seem fair. All of the plots of land are being used for "adequate" purposes, and yet it seems some of them are punished for that land use decision that in all isn't that bad. The urban farm is not exactly wasting land; it's providing valuable fresh produce to the city.

What I think would be better is a tiered system by categorising the traditional property tax bracket by land use:

• 0.1% for agricultural
• 0.5% or lower for medium or high-density buildings, such as skyscrapers, duplexes/triplexs/n-plexes, and mixed use zoning
• 1% for low-density commercial or single-family housing
• 5% for car parking
• 10% for vacant buildings
• 30% for empty lots

The numbers are arbitrary and illustrative only, but I think this allows for a more nuanced approach that allows for a finer-grained policy to be applied to discourage unwanted development

I cannot comment on how vigorously the law is enforced in other countries because I am not familiar with the legal environment. In the United States, downloading pirated content will eventually get legal notices sent to your internet service provider, who will threaten to (and legally is required to) disconnect you for repeated piracy. Using copyrighted pictures off the Internet will result in legal threats sent to you as well demanding settlements of hundreds of US dollars per picture, and they will follow through with a lawsuit if you don't pay. Although I have no specific examples of what Microsoft has done, Autodesk and Adobe have sued people who used pirated copies of their software for millions of dollars. People who operate websites offering pirated content have been prosecuted and sent to prison.

Maybe you as an individual can get away with it in your country, but don't assume it is the case all over the world.

It's not that shallow. You are trying to use an anecdote, and not even a concrete anecdote, to argue a matter of statistics. The anecdote isn't even illustrative of any point. It is utterly disconnected from any statistical argument. It is not logically sound and you should know that. We're talking about how many people pirate things, not whether any given person pirates something. What you have argued in your comment is, "there exists a set of circumstances where a person could reasonably be driven to commit piracy". That is neither persuasive to your thesis nor particularly enlightening.

I really wish rhetoric was taught as a standard subject in grade school. It must not be where you're from.

You really need to learn to read properly. What I'm saying is that being poor on its own does not incline people to commit crime. You read it as "People commit piracy if and only if they are poor", which is the only statement under which your reply and its implications would be logically sound.

Is being poor correlated with piracy? Yes. But I argue the much bigger factors are the lack of availability of legitimate methods of acquiring software in India as well as the difficulty of acquiring such legitimate copies, even when they are available. There are also cultural differences that make piracy more acceptable in India than in other places, such as Europe or North America.

Think of it like this: a hypothetical 13-year-old child in the United States who wants a video game and sees it on Steam for 60 USD may consider piracy, but is much more likely to save up for it and buy it legitimately when they get a Steam gift card for their birthday or ask their parents for it for Christmas. Their parents can easily go to Walmart or Amazon and buy a copy. Meanwhile, a child in India who sees the same game for sale for the equivalent of 5,000 INR will know that is firstly a ludicrous amount to save for, and secondly, may not be available in their region, and thirdly, lacks the ability to simply ask for it for their birthday or something. Gift cards don't seem to be too common in India. A person living in India is also less likely to have access to banking infrastructure that allows for easy electronic payment. Even things bought on Amazon have "cash upon delivery" available as a payment method. That is how undeveloped India's payment infrastructure is. Meanwhile in the USA, every teenager has their own bank account and debit card. As a result, the Indian teenager is more likely to pirate. But it is not solely because they are poorer.

Well, your thought is wrong. Copyright infringement is an offence in India. It's also an offence in the United States, where I live. It is also an offence in Indonesia (seeing you're using an Indonesian instance), punishable by three years imprisonment and a 500 million rupiah fine. But maybe it's not enforced well there so you didn't know about it

It's of questionable legality. It's not illegal as in "piracy", but the seller, or whoever obtained that key from Microsoft, is violating their agreement with Microsoft by reselling the keys.

That's not relevant. We're talking about why Indian people are using Linux in greater numbers so only Indian law really matters in the context of this discussion.

Yes, you are breaking a law. Copyright infringement in this manner is an offence under the Copyright Act 1957 punishable with up to three years imprisonment and a fine.

...but not legal. Being poor doesn't necessarily mean you're inclined to break the law. Besides, Linux is useful if you perhaps want to later get a job in the tech field.

This is what "property tax" is, isn't it? You pay a specified percentage of your property's assessed value in tax.

Lack of SSH would be a deal breaker for me.