I think the author made an interesting analogy about bits and Colour. Colour is an intangible property that only exists in the minds of people who care about it, such as lawyers. In the computer science world, Colour simply cannot exist. If two files are exactly the same, there is no way to trace the Colour of where it came from or if it is legal.
What I got from the article is that the main reasons Colour, or rather the lack of it, is important is because it matters to the law. Lawyers care about where bits come from and whether they were gained legally. Computers and computer scientists realize that this information can't actually exist, and it can't really be tracked because metadata attached to files can be changed. I think maybe it would be better for lawyers to focus only on the actual illegal transfer of files, rather than the files themselves. When two files contain the same bits, it's just not possible to determine if it came from a legal source.
Also, I haven't finished reading it yet, but Skala posted a follow-up article here if anyone is interested.
I looked at the follow up and thought, wow thats as long as the first one! I think that it clarifies some things from the first post. In my opinion the first post was not as offensive as some people who had responded seemed to think. I like that the author puts their argument in some mathematical terms. thank you for finding the follow up.
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