What is your view on illegal music downloading?

[quote name='Sporadic']:roll:

it's not stealing fuck you[/QUOTE]

Just semantics of what you want to call it. But black and white, it's a crime, it's wrong and you're a criminal.

Admit that, say you don't give a shit and quit making excuses you fucking loser. You say you don't give a shit, but you keep going on and on and on with excuses as to why your illegal behavior isn't wrong. If you truly don't give a shit, then own up to it being wrong, quit making excuses and quit publicizing your acts on forums.

If artists want to gain fans through MP3s they can easily make them freely available themselves. If they haven't then they (or their label) doesn't want to go that route and only wants their material available for purchase, so all the future money spent, new fans made etc. is a BS rationalization.
 
[quote name='willardhaven']If you take a photograph of a piece of art and send it to your friends are you stealing?[/QUOTE]

A photograph of art isn't remotely the same. A stolen MP3 is the same as the MP3 you could buy--or even better quality if it was ripped at a higher bit rate. With music you're acquiring the actual digital product that you could (and should) legally purchase.
 
You can purchase photographs of the art from the museum gallery. MP3s are of lower quality than what the RIAA claims to have lost (a CD sale).
 
[quote name='Sporadic']Here's an example. I'm a massive fan of Nine Inch Nails. When I heard that Saul Williams was opening for him on a few select dates back in 2005, I decided to download his first two CDs so I could see what he was like. I loved them and heard his live show was even more impressive. So when in 2006, I heard that he was opening for Nine Inch Nails again, this time in Pensacola, I drove 8+ hours with a friend to go see the show. Not only did I turn a friend of mine on to him that would have never heard of him otherwise, I also bought a copy of his poetry book. When word of his third album came out, I started threads about it at multiple forums (including this one). When it was released, I bought two digital copies from his website because I enjoyed the method of distribution so much.

Yeah, I may have taken his first two CDs but look at what snowballed from it. He lost two CD sales but he gained a massive fan that not only spread the word to other people (that opens the door for more sales for him) but bought his future products.[/quote]

250+ GB is a lot of Saul Williams, though. How many poetry books do you own?

I know you feel like a great benevolent soul, but I would like to know your average expenditure for items you illegally purchase. If you're going to leverage and justify two cds in the form of a poetry book and one cd, then do it on the whole. Average out everything you've spent in the past year against everything you've stolen in the past year.
 
[quote name='Sporadic']So, it's better for Saul Williams and Kashiwa Daisuke if I never did the intial act of downloading Saul's first two album and World's End Girlfriend's work?[/QUOTE]

This is a flavor of Machiavellian logic - "the ends justify the means." You're retroactively saying something is good because of what ultimately happens in the future.

Turn it around and it doesn't make the problem go away - what about all the people you download and don't listen to or don't like, and subsequently give no money to in the future? At least if you bought the CD on the chance you'd like a band based on one song you heard elsewhere, there's a sale made.

[quote name='willardhaven']If you take a photograph of a piece of art and send it to your friends are you stealing?[/QUOTE]

Getting an MP3 is almost the exact same data. Taking a photo is taking a photo - it's a facsimile of a representation of an object instead of the object itself.

This is why prints of the Mona Lisa are worth ten bucks at a college campus poster sale versus the real thing.

You aren't stealing, but you're not handing out near-identical copies. There's a difference.

The tagteam dmyke has pretty much steamrolled this thread with stuff I agree with, even if that makes me cold and bitter inside.
 
As far as I'm concerned, it should be legal. There's no difference between taping a song off the radio or borrowing a friend's tape or CD and copying it to a blank tape, as I did when I was a kid, and downloading it from some website nowadays. The fines are ridiculous. No I don't think people d/l it to sample a song. They can usually sample it from Amazon.
 
[quote name='Strell']This is a flavor of Machiavellian logic - "the ends justify the means." You're retroactively saying something is good because of what ultimately happens in the future.

Turn it around and it doesn't make the problem go away - what about all the people you download and don't listen to or don't like, and subsequently give no money to in the future? At least if you bought the CD on the chance you'd like a band based on one song you heard elsewhere, there's a sale made.

Getting an MP3 is almost the exact same data. Taking a photo is taking a photo - it's a facsimile of a representation of an object instead of the object itself.

This is why prints of the Mona Lisa are worth ten bucks at a college campus poster sale versus the real thing.

You aren't stealing, but you're not handing out near-identical copies. There's a difference.

The tagteam dmyke has pretty much steamrolled this thread with stuff I agree with, even if that makes me cold and bitter inside.[/quote]

So if I make a really shitty file, it's all good?
 
[quote name='willardhaven']So if I make a really shitty file, it's all good?[/QUOTE]

You're changing your argument. S'all good?
 
[quote name='willardhaven']You can purchase photographs of the art from the museum gallery. MP3s are of lower quality than what the RIAA claims to have lost (a CD sale).[/QUOTE]

Better to compare it as a lost legal, MP3 sale than a CD sale. And that's the same quality. Your point worked 10-15 years ago when Napster etc. emerged and there were no MP3 stores, much less the huge selection of legally available for purchase MP3s we have today. Now the RIAA doesn't just tout lost CD sales, but lost digital music sales.

Many of the people pirating stuff probably don't bother buying CDs much anymore anyway.

And besides, quality aside a reproduction of a painting is nothing like owning the real thing regardless of size/quality. Music is music more or less--especially when comparing pirated MP3s to MP3s from iTunes etc.

So the analogy is completely bunk.
 
[quote name='mitch079']As far as I'm concerned, it should be legal. There's no difference between taping a song off the radio or borrowing a friend's tape or CD and copying it to a blank tape, as I did when I was a kid, and downloading it from some website nowadays. The fines are ridiculous. No I don't think people d/l it to sample a song. They can usually sample it from Amazon.[/QUOTE]

No different because they're all illegal--well not sure about taping off the radio. But borrowing and making copies of albums is illegal as well.
 
[quote name='Strell']You're changing your argument. S'all good?[/quote]

I'm asking you a question that has to do with my argument. Explain what you think I'm changing my argument from/to.

My argument (if you read my posts) is that this is a legal gray area that the courts are interpreting based on lobbyists, not the actual law. I sometimes run red lights just after they turn, which is illegal, but I still consider myself an upstanding citizen. I am sure Dmaul has broken some laws throughout the course of his life, so I'm not sure why he is personally attacking everyone who questions him.
 
[quote name='Strell']This is a flavor of Machiavellian logic - "the ends justify the means." You're retroactively saying something is good because of what ultimately happens in the future.

Turn it around and it doesn't make the problem go away - what about all the people you download and don't listen to or don't like, and subsequently give no money to in the future? At least if you bought the CD on the chance you'd like a band based on one song you heard elsewhere, there's a sale made.[/QUOTE]

It doesn't work like that for me. I usually don't hear a song before I check out a band. I read a blog or a music forum or read it's related to an act I really enjoy, see the name and than check them out if it sounds interesting. It's much easier to do that when you don't have $10+ riding on each check.

If it's decent or I can find myself maybe listening to it in the future, I put it in my music folder (currently at 304 different musicians). Maybe in the future it could really tickles my fancy (it has happened) and I'll (skip to the part where I really like something). If it's shit, it goes into the Recycle Bin. No harm, no foul. If I really like it, I usually go to Amazon MP3 and repurchase it when I have the money or go to their site and do more research (look for tour dates)

Of course, it's impossible for me to reimburse everybody but I do the best I can with my favorites. If not buying the CD, seeing them on tour, buying merchandise, spreading word of mouth.

I do buy more and have expanded my horizons further than I would have if I would have had money riding on every hunch. Would I have ever checked out World's End Girlfriend if I had to spend $25 to import one of their CDs from Japan? Nope. Would I have been pissed after wasting $15+ on Autolux's debut CD after hearing such good things about them? Yes, enough I would have cut back my spending for awhile on new bands.

And dmaul this isn't excuses created just for you, these are the reasons I do what I do. I don't give two shits if you disagree with them or write them off. I'm still going to do it. No matter what I post, you are still going to be a douchebag.
 
[quote name='willardhaven']I am sure Dmaul has broken some laws throughout the course of his life, so I'm not sure why he is personally attacking everyone who questions him.[/QUOTE]

Yes I've ran redlights and violated various other laws etc. The difference is I don't make any excuses or justifications for it. It's wrong, and I was wrong to do them.

That's what irritates me, the nonsense excuses and justifications rather than just owning up that it's wrong and that they have no personal qualms about violating that particular law.

I speed all the time. I don't make excuses about speed limits being too slow, or being in a hurry etc. I just admit it's wrong and that I don't care about driving 5-10 miles over the limit and sometimes faster and will pay the ticket if I get caught.
 
[quote name='Sporadic']It doesn't work like that for me. I usually don't hear a song before I check out a band. I read a blog or a music forum or read it's related to an act I really enjoy, see the name and than check them out if it sounds interesting. It's much easier to do that when you don't have $10+ riding on each check.
[/quote]

There are very few bands that you can't easily check out for free. Streaming songs on their webpage or their myspace page etc.. Samples on sites like Amazon. If they don't have stuff up like that, then it's their loss for not being proactive in giving fans a legal way to check out their music. Not to mention various free internet radio sites which are a great way to find new music legally etc. etc.

And dmaul this isn't excuses created just for you, these are the reasons I do what I do. I don't give two shits if you disagree with them or write them off. I'm still going to do it. No matter what I post, you are still going to be a douchebag.
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That's fine, and regardless of excuses you're still breaking the law and a criminal. No reason to give reasons on why you break the law. No one give's a shit and it doesn't make what you do any less wrong. If you don't care about breaking the law, fine do it, don't make excuses and STFU about it. No one but fellow law breakers trying to rationalize their action's gives a shit about your reasons.
 
[quote name='willardhaven']Fair enough, but if people believed the traffic laws were being misinterpreted, would you be so irritated?[/QUOTE]

That's kind of a strawman. Traffic laws are pretty cut and dry, as are illegal downloading laws. The song is either freely available from the artist/label, or it's not. The speed limit is clearly marked on signs. Stop sign and red light laws are cut and dry etc. etc.
 
[quote name='dmaul1114']There are very few bands that you can't easily check out for free. Streaming songs on their webpage or their myspace page etc.. Samples on sites like Amazon. If they don't have stuff up like that, then it's their loss for not being proactive in giving fans a legal way to check out their music. Not to mention various free internet radio sites which are a great way to find new music legally etc. etc.[/QUOTE]

Awesome, I can check out the two good songs they have handpicked out of their entire output and find out that the rest of their album is steaming shit!

No thank you, I'd rather break the law and listen to the whole thing before I put money down on it.

[quote name='dmaul1114']
That's fine, and regardless of excuses you're still breaking the law and a criminal. No reason to give reasons on why you break the law. No one give's a shit and it doesn't make what you do any less wrong. If you don't care about breaking the law, fine do it, don't make excuses and STFU about it. No one but fellow law breakers trying to rationalize their action's gives a shit about your reasons.[/QUOTE]

Did I ever say I wasn't breaking the law or that downloading shouldn't be illegal? No, not once.

You are just completely batshit insane and refuse to read or comprehend anything I post because you have an image of what a pirate is already mapped out in your head.
 
[quote name='dmaul1114']That's kind of a strawman. Traffic laws are pretty cut and dry, as are illegal downloading laws. The song is either freely available from the artist/label, or it's not. The speed limit is clearly marked on signs. Stop sign and red light laws are cut and dry etc. etc.[/quote]


The point is that the laws are not that cut and dry. On a side note, how do you feel about "pirating" music that is discontinued and not for sale as a download?
 
[quote name='Sporadic']
Did I ever say I wasn't breaking the law or that downloading shouldn't be illegal? No, not once.
[/QUOTE]

Fair enough. I just have no patience for excuses. Ever. In any circumstance. You do something wrong, fine. Shut up about it. No one gives a shit about your reasons for downloading songs illegally, driving too fast, running red lights, driving drunk etc. etc.

A wrong action is a wrong action. Maybe it's a bit less wrong if you pirate some songs and then buy that exact album down the road. But the initial act is still wrong, and endless reasons and justifications get old. Fast.

Again, just say it's wrong, and that you don't care and move on.
 
[quote name='willardhaven']The point is that the laws are not that cut and dry. On a side note, how do you feel about "pirating" music that is discontinued and not for sale as a download?[/QUOTE]

They are cut and dry. Its either available for free with the artist/labels blessing. Or it's not.

Doesn't matter if it's not available. Unless it's in the public domain it's wrong to get a copy of it. Yeah on a moral scale it's less wrong since you have no legal option to buy it. But it's still illegal.

And with that I'm heading out of the office since it's been a shitty day and I've gotten nothing done for the last hour that pointlessly wasting time on the internet. So peace out. Until tomorrow anyway! :D
 
[quote name='dmaul1114']Fair enough. I just have no patience for excuses. Ever. In any circumstance. You do something wrong, fine. Shut up about it. No one gives a shit about your reasons for downloading songs illegally, driving too fast, running red lights, driving drunk etc. etc. [/QUOTE]

Um, that's kind of the point of this thread.

If I didn't expand on the why aspect of my view on illegal music downloading, various people would think that I just some jerk that wants everything for free with no regard for what happens to the artist. That isn't the case and it runs much deeper than that.
 
[quote name='dmaul1114']Fair enough. I just have no patience for excuses. Ever. In any circumstance. You do something wrong, fine. Shut up about it. No one gives a shit about your reasons for downloading songs illegally, driving too fast, running red lights, driving drunk etc. etc.

A wrong action is a wrong action. Maybe it's a bit less wrong if you pirate some songs and then buy that exact album down the road. But the initial act is still wrong, and endless reasons and justifications get old. Fast.

Again, just say it's wrong, and that you don't care and move on.[/quote]

Copyright infringement ~ driving too fast, running red lights, driving drunk, "etc"?

Come on man, that's a pretty weak strawman arguement, the crimes aren't remotely similar.

Fact is, without P2P we wouldn't have multi-label support for a site like ITunes, tunes for sale in a non-proprietary format, or the option to buy music without DRM restrictions. I'd like to think that in an ideal world we could have eventually organized an effective boycott of RIAA-backed record labels and legally brought about these positive developments but I have my doubts. The luddites and lawyers would have been happy to keep selling us rootkit CDs or crippled DRM music that effectively amounted to a rental if they hadn't been forced to relearn the age-old adage that the customer is always right.

Sorry that doesn't fall into your newfound black-and-white moral perspective but record executives and the the politicians they pay off to protect an antiquated business model aren't always 100% in the right. Likewise everyday consumers who buck a raw deal aren't always cardboard cutout evil pirates who download for the thrill of it.
 
[quote name='camoor']Copyright infringement ~ driving too fast, running red lights, driving drunk, "etc"?
[/QUOTE]

Never said the acts were equally wrong. Just that making excuses for wrong acts is annoying as balls any any circumstance.

And antiquated business model? Sorry if people generate a product people want, they should be paid for it unless they chose to give it away for free.

So it's hardly antiquated. Bands who want to put their songs out for for free can do so, and others can only put them out for people who pay for them.
 
[quote name='willardhaven']I'm asking you a question that has to do with my argument. Explain what you think I'm changing my argument from/to.[/quote]

Because you've gone from saying something point blank - copyrighting a song - into an entirely different argument that somehow the quality of your product ought to be considered when determining legality. That's a sliding scale you've attached to your original argument, which substantially weakens your position.

At that point, we're really entering into more of an intent scenario, which the law provides discourse on. That's why we have manslaughter, and various degrees of murder, small claims court, misdemeanors, etc. I imagine a lawyer would run circles around the argument because then all they'd have to do is show that you had intent toward copyright infringement, and since the files would be sitting on your computer, it wouldn't be very difficult for them to say so.

In other words, it hardly matters what bit quality and so forth the file is. Hell, there are videos on Youtube that have music in the background from something, and the RIAA goes after them. You think your files are any different?

Further, making an inferior file doesn't change much. I imagine all you'd have to say to dismiss that is that "the person in question isn't very tech savvy, which is why there's a lot of hiss in this file." Doesn't really matter - being technologically incompetent isn't a strong defense.

Meanwhile, a picture still isn't anywhere near the closeness even a badly ripped MP3 is to the original. You're making it sound like just because I can get a visual representation of something, that it's 100% the same as seeing it.

My argument (if you read my posts) is that this is a legal gray area that the courts are interpreting based on lobbyists, not the actual law.
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You'll have to talk to lawyers on this point. At the end of the day, there's music out there you shouldn't be able to grab for free, especially if it's always meant to be sold. You're phrasing it from some non-sequiter angle now, where you say it wasn't an issue until the lobbyists stepped in. Not really - if you were selling bootlegs of cassettes or VHS or whatever back in the day, a cop could come in and shut you down.

This notion that downloading MP3s only became illegal once the RIAA stepped in is pretty hilarious - I'm really surprised some people think that's the deal. There's been "do not copy" warnings on materials forever, all the way back to books and whatnot. It's not some newly created instance - the idea has been around longer than the 'net.

[quote name='Sporadic'] but I do the best I can with my favorites. If not buying the CD, seeing them on tour, buying merchandise, spreading word of mouth.[/quote]

Once again, Machiavellian. Poor justification. Let's move on.

I do buy more and have expanded my horizons further than I would have if I would have had money riding on every hunch.
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And I'd own more things if I didn't buy other things too. Like I could have a rare collection of stamps instead of food.

[quote name='MisterModest']In some states, it's illegal to let a donkey sleep in your bathtub.

Honestly, some laws are meant to be broken.[/QUOTE]

This is creating an adversarial relationship between you as a citizen versus the laws put in place by the authorities you live with. It's part of the package of this country. If you have an issue with those laws, you ought to try and get them repealled.

[quote name='camoor']
Fact is, without P2P we wouldn't have multi-label support for a site like ITunes, tunes for sale in a non-proprietary format, or the option to buy music without DRM restrictions. [/quote]

Camoor's famous hypothetical situations. I'm surprised you haven't pulled out the INFORMATION IS MEANT TO BE FREE chestnut. It's about as plausible as the conjecture you've got running here.
 
[quote name='Strell']Once again, Machiavellian. Poor justification. Let's move on.[/QUOTE]

I'm glad you knocked my three paragraph post down to less than a sentence and dismissed it.

Poor response. Let's move on.
 
[quote name='mykevermin']You make these arguments without really saying that this is limited to electronically transferable content. It's fine to take the labor of someone else without remunerating them and use/distribute it how you'd like. Because, after all, you've not taken anything tangible from them that they cannot then resell to someone else.

If we all thought that way, Microsoft would only be in the business of manufacturing consoles they've taken a financial shellacking on, the music and film industry would die immediately, and (as we're seeing anyway), the book and newspaper industries would die off as well.

You're pointing to the absurd and unfortunate use of copyrights to argue that all copyrights are bad. Are some? Sure. But it's disingenuous to think they all are, and that we have free reign over anything anyone produces. It reduces economic transactions to value nothing more than the raw materials that go into the products themselves - so if there are no raw materials, then there's no rational excuse to make it an economic transaction.

You make the "copyrights kill innovation" argument, in spite of the existence of copyright protections providing a financial incentive for people to produce such materials in the first place. And you flippantly disregard the financial incentive, acting as if the profit motive does not drive creative expression on some level.

You're smarter than that.[/QUOTE]

The market is changing. Is it right to download without paying? Arguably not, but that's the way things are going. You have an entire generation of people who are used to getting music for free. The fact of the matter is that musicians and record labels need to come up with better business models, and I believe those business models involve the sale of scarce goods (merchandise, performaces, etc) that one makes desirable by building a brand and community and name with the distribution of infinite goods (like digital music). I also think such business models are actually better for both the consumers and producers in the long run.

The film and music industries aren't in any danger, by the way. You can point to the lowered number of CD sales, but the number of digital sales are increasing every year. The market, again, is changing. Even iTunes has dropped all DRM on music purchased through it. The film industry is just fine as well. Movie ticket sales are higher than they've been in years. And both of these are with the highest levels of piracy ever.

Not to mention that it's futile to even try to stop piracy. It's an arms race, and pirates will remain ahead. In Switzerland, the new IPRED law came into effect just recently; the purpose of the law was to make it easier for industry reps to get information about people who download files. The response? Within a week, The Pirate Bay had a VPN service up that's hugely popular. A website is running in which one can put their IP address into to see if there are any court records containing their IP address so that they can see if a case is being built against them, and so that they can take the necessary action to protect themselves. Rather than to continue to alienate their consumers, these industries need to adapt and to take advantage of the situation, which they most definitely can. Just look at Radiohead, Trent Reznor, Saul Williams, and many others.

On the topic of Microsoft, I definitely see Windows becoming obsolete sooner rather than later in the face of open source open source, free operating systems. Microsoft got big before the internet, but the internet is changing things, and MS is going to have to innovate to remain a player.

As for books and news papers: I don't know about books, but newspapers are failing because they've failed to adapt. They've lost their relevance as social currency (where people get shit to talk about). They've been replaced by the internet. One can get the news online for free, and they can find information much, much more easily. They still have this insane idea that people will want to pay for the news, so there's a lot of talk about putting news behind paywalls or having Google News remove their listings, but they're utterly wrong. There are some newspapers around that know what they're doing, but they're far and few in between. It's just another case of old industries failing to adapt in response to new technology.


I never meant that all copyright is bad. My apologies if I was unclear. I just think that copyright today fails to do what it was meant to do, which is to protect both the creators and the public domain. Some copyright is definitely necessary, but honestly, 90 years for music? That's god damn ridiculous. Shorter copyright term limits would not only put more material in the public domain, but would offer more incentive to creators to create. Copyright limits longer than most people's life spans just lock things in and make people lazy and allow them to live purely off royalties. They don't necessarily kill innovation, but they certainly stifle it in their current form.

I think the majority of patents, however, are absurd.

And come on, Myke. I disagree with you on a lot of things, but you're a smart guy, and I respect that, but then you drop stupid ass, condescending lines like that last one in a civil discussion.

You're better than that.
 
[quote name='Liquid 2']The market is changing. Is it right to download without paying? Arguably not, but that's the way things are going. You have an entire generation of people who are used to getting music for free. The fact of the matter is that musicians and record labels need to come up with better business models, and I believe those business models involve the sale of scarce goods (merchandise, performaces, etc)[/quote]

Elaborate more on this. It's kinda of a self-serving argument, isn't it? Though at least you're honest: there are means to pay for albums, books, and game digitally and in stores. The knowledge and effort required to navigate TPB shows a person who is demonstrably unwilling to pay for something.

There's some irony to the ethics of it. Put money in the hands of artists = fuck a bunch of that. Let 'em starve. I'll sit on my throne of condescension, insist that I'd buy a "Brokencyde" scarf and sunglasses kit if they came to town in concert, and then lament that it's THEIR fault if they don't play Des Moines, and that's why they didn't make any money for me.

At the root of the matter, and sporadic says as much in his posts, this kind of behavior is sopping with this idea of limitless, boundless, morally ambiguous (immoral via the means, moral via the action of satisfying your need for acculturation), desire for instant gratification. The idea that not only should you be a consumer of culture, you are indeed entitled to the products no matter your financial situation.

That's a defeatist attitude. "We can't win." Look, I'm not for further prosecution, but if the market isn't going to change (like the war on drugs isn't going to end), and in this case we're talking about an addiction to compulsive consumerism so deep, so thick that you must download illegally, then I totally believe you deserve a massive fine. $2-5K at most. Pony up. You're the one who couldn't kick your habit for "Lil Wayne" albums.

I never meant that all copyright is bad. My apologies if I was unclear. I just think that copyright today fails to do what it was meant to do, which is to protect both the creators and the public domain. Some copyright is definitely necessary, but honestly, 90 years for music? That's god damn ridiculous. Shorter copyright term limits would not only put more material in the public domain, but would offer more incentive to creators to create. Copyright limits longer than most people's life spans just lock things in and make people lazy and allow them to live purely off royalties. They don't necessarily kill innovation, but they certainly stifle it in their current form.
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There's an interesting set of ethics that pirates have. I often hear the "I'll see them when they come to town in concert" excuse, but that's so half-hearted and untrue. I know that, as individuals, people really do think that way, but get fuckin' real. If 100,000 people in 10,000 cities say this on a daily basis (a severe underestimate), then you have a large population of people who are never going to make good on their promise to put the penny back in the "give a penny, take a penny" cup.

So fucking over artists and going to great lengths to discover new means of acquisition that involve a good bit of time to learn how to operate are ok. Where I work now, running torrent programs will get you IP blocked from the network (even if OMG we're doing so to ethically share a WoW update!). But people still download. They know how. fucking over musicians you adore is ok. Getting pissed at the people who are pissed because you are a thief is ok. Having your indirect costs go up (tuition) in order to pay for the software that monitors and blocks your downloading habits as well as programs of legal music distribution (can't recall the name, but college gives big studios a buncha money for a service the students have access to) is shit, however, and something you should protest over.

Doesn't matter if downloading killed of legitimate businesses due to selfishness and compulsive behavior, or who you fuck over along the way. The worst thing you can do, ethically as a pirate, is to have an unbalanced u/d ratio. Hilarious.
 
[quote name='Strell']Because you've gone from saying something point blank - copyrighting a song - into an entirely different argument that somehow the quality of your product ought to be considered when determining legality. That's a sliding scale you've attached to your original argument, which substantially weakens your position.

At that point, we're really entering into more of an intent scenario, which the law provides discourse on. That's why we have manslaughter, and various degrees of murder, small claims court, misdemeanors, etc. I imagine a lawyer would run circles around the argument because then all they'd have to do is show that you had intent toward copyright infringement, and since the files would be sitting on your computer, it wouldn't be very difficult for them to say so.
[/quote]
Getting an MP3 is almost the exact same data. Taking a photo is taking a photo - it's a facsimile of a representation of an object instead of the object itself.
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You're the one who brought quality into the mix. An MP3 is not a CD, it's a representation of one.

This is why prints of the Mona Lisa are worth ten bucks at a college campus poster sale versus the real thing.
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So if Leonardo Inc. came to the campus and started selling the same pictures, and someone else was producing their own for free, it then becomes illegal? This is what "legal" MP3s are, a repackaging of what people were already making on their own.

In other words, it hardly matters what bit quality and so forth the file is. Hell, there are videos on Youtube that have music in the background from something, and the RIAA goes after them. You think your files are any different?

Further, making an inferior file doesn't change much. I imagine all you'd have to say to dismiss that is that "the person in question isn't very tech savvy, which is why there's a lot of hiss in this file." Doesn't really matter - being technologically incompetent isn't a strong defense.

Meanwhile, a picture still isn't anywhere near the closeness even a badly ripped MP3 is to the original. You're making it sound like just because I can get a visual representation of something, that it's 100% the same as seeing it.
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You are doing the same thing with MP3s/CDs aren't you?

You'll have to talk to lawyers on this point. At the end of the day, there's music out there you shouldn't be able to grab for free, especially if it's always meant to be sold. You're phrasing it from some non-sequiter angle now, where you say it wasn't an issue until the lobbyists stepped in. Not really - if you were selling bootlegs of cassettes or VHS or whatever back in the day, a cop could come in and shut you down.
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Key point there is selling, if you were making copies for your friends nobody would interfere.

This notion that downloading MP3s only became illegal once the RIAA stepped in is pretty hilarious - I'm really surprised some people think that's the deal. There's been "do not copy" warnings on materials forever, all the way back to books and whatnot. It's not some newly created instance - the idea has been around longer than the 'net.
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Some people interpret file sharing as Fair Use, and others do not.
 
[quote name='dmaul1114']Never said the acts were equally wrong. Just that making excuses for wrong acts is annoying as balls any any circumstance.

And antiquated business model? Sorry if people generate a product people want, they should be paid for it unless they chose to give it away for free.

So it's hardly antiquated. Bands who want to put their songs out for for free can do so, and others can only put them out for people who pay for them.[/quote]

When the people can't get the goods they need or want a black market opens up. Big-label music was controlled by a convicted price-fixing payola-happy cartel, and as soon as technology allowed a black market alternative this black market really blossomed to give music fans what they had been asking for all along.

Record labels had a chance to get out in front, to embrace technology and give the people music in the DRM-less song-by-song compatible format that the average consumer wanted at a reasonable price. Instead they chose to stick with the buggy whip and the results were as predictable today as they were in Henry Ford's day.

Copyright was invented to foster art and innovation, not to beat customers over the head for refusing desired content in a crippled format.

[quote name='Strell']Camoor's famous hypothetical situations. I'm surprised you haven't pulled out the INFORMATION IS MEANT TO BE FREE chestnut. It's about as plausible as the conjecture you've got running here.[/quote]

So you think P2P didn't introduce competition and force a comfortable cartel to reinvent itself for the digital era? In fact you think P2P had no impact on the recording industry? Just looking at their lawyer bills should convince you otherwise.

Oh and my posts are internet famous?!? Rock on!
 
[quote name='mykevermin']Elaborate more on this. It's kinda of a self-serving argument, isn't it? Though at least you're honest: there are means to pay for albums, books, and game digitally and in stores. The knowledge and effort required to navigate TPB shows a person who is demonstrably unwilling to pay for something.

There's some irony to the ethics of it. Put money in the hands of artists = fuck a bunch of that. Let 'em starve. I'll sit on my throne of condescension, insist that I'd buy a "Brokencyde" scarf and sunglasses kit if they came to town in concert, and then lament that it's THEIR fault if they don't play Des Moines, and that's why they didn't make any money for me.

At the root of the matter, and sporadic says as much in his posts, this kind of behavior is sopping with this idea of limitless, boundless, morally ambiguous (immoral via the means, moral via the action of satisfying your need for acculturation), desire for instant gratification. The idea that not only should you be a consumer of culture, you are indeed entitled to the products no matter your financial situation.

That's a defeatist attitude. "We can't win." Look, I'm not for further prosecution, but if the market isn't going to change (like the war on drugs isn't going to end), and in this case we're talking about an addiction to compulsive consumerism so deep, so thick that you must download illegally, then I totally believe you deserve a massive fine. $2-5K at most. Pony up. You're the one who couldn't kick your habit for "Lil Wayne" albums.[/quote]Elaborate? Okay. Let's take the analogy of newspapers. They're slightly different situations in that newspapers are dying out because they can't compete with how up to date the internet is, but one can look at another reason for their demise: they cost money. People nowadays don't attach value to the news. They really don't at all. Ask any one if they'd be willing to pay.
They've gotten used to getting the news for free, whether from their local stations broadcasting over the air for free, or from the internet, over even free papers. The news has NO value any more. Absolutely none. If you run into a website with content behind a paywall, are you going to pay for it, or are you going to go elsewhere? But just because people won't pay for the news, it doesn't mean one can't make money from the news. News websites have advertising. That's where the majority of their revenue comes from. So, news companies build a brand, a base, by giving away content for free--the news--and make money in other ways--advertising.
The same thing is happening with music now. People don't want to pay for music. At all. Again, we can argue over whether it's right or not that people download music, but I think that, in the long run, such an arguement is meaningless in that the attitude of downloading is becoming so much more ingrained into our culture that the same thing that happened with the news will happen with music. People simply won't want to pay for it without getting more than just songs. Fortunately for artists, they have plenty of other revenue streams available to them ranging from merchandise to performances to endorsing products (if they're big enough) to even just their fan base (an artist recently, for example, asked her fans to "prefund" an album for her. They threw her some cash, she booked recording time in one of the most well known and highly reputed recording places in California and got a famous producer on board too. She used the community that she built around her music. The fans that donated got copies of the album).

The mentality that you have is that there are no other ways for artists to make money. It's the same kind of thinking that has newspaper folks demanding that the news be locked down behind pay walls so that they can make money. It's the same mentality that had content providers demand that Hulu block Boxxee (sp?) users when Boxxee does nothing more than make it easy to stream Hulu to one's TV. Technology is changing the market, and the kneejerk reactions of these industry organizations are nothing more than a refusal to adapt to the changing environment.


[quote name='mykevermin']There's an interesting set of ethics that pirates have. I often hear the "I'll see them when they come to town in concert" excuse, but that's so half-hearted and untrue. I know that, as individuals, people really do think that way, but get fuckin' real. If 100,000 people in 10,000 cities say this on a daily basis (a severe underestimate), then you have a large population of people who are never going to make good on their promise to put the penny back in the "give a penny, take a penny" cup.

So fucking over artists and going to great lengths to discover new means of acquisition that involve a good bit of time to learn how to operate are ok. Where I work now, running torrent programs will get you IP blocked from the network (even if OMG we're doing so to ethically share a WoW update!). But people still download. They know how. fucking over musicians you adore is ok. Getting pissed at the people who are pissed because you are a thief is ok. Having your indirect costs go up (tuition) in order to pay for the software that monitors and blocks your downloading habits as well as programs of legal music distribution (can't recall the name, but college gives big studios a buncha money for a service the students have access to) is shit, however, and something you should protest over.

Doesn't matter if downloading killed of legitimate businesses due to selfishness and compulsive behavior, or who you fuck over along the way. The worst thing you can do, ethically as a pirate, is to have an unbalanced u/d ratio. Hilarious.[/QUOTE]

I don't think you read what you responded to with this.
 
If can buy the music in this country, I'll buy it.
BUT! if the newest anime opening isn't available on itunes or the zune marketplace I find it elsewhere.

Why don't they include Japanese Rock/Pop music?
 
I would be in favor of internet companies tracking people who download movies, music, and games illegally online and the government issuing an automatic $1,000 fine for every infraction.

I've never seen the likes of it, grown men and grown women feel that because it's the internet they have the right to just blatantly steal shit.

How about this... if you feel so strongly you have the right to take shit without paying for it, then just walk into your local Wal-Mart and load up a shopping cart with all manner of movies, games, and CDs and just walk out the front door with it. You're not really a thief, you're just a typical file-share user. It's your god given right to steal.

Ok, so god was actually against stealing... BUT MY POINT IS STILL VALID DAMNIT!
 
[quote name='Survivor Charlie']I would be in favor of internet companies tracking people who download movies, music, and games illegally online and the government issuing an automatic $1,000 fine for every infraction.

I've never seen the likes of it, grown men and grown women feel that because it's the internet they have the right to just blatantly steal shit.

How about this... if you feel so strongly you have the right to take shit without paying for it, then just walk into your local Wal-Mart and load up a shopping cart with all manner of movies, games, and CDs and just walk out the front door with it. You're not really a thief, you're just a typical file-share user. It's your god given right to steal.

Ok, so god was actually against stealing... BUT MY POINT IS STILL VALID DAMNIT![/QUOTE]
How many times do people on the internet have to go through this?

The difference between downloading music and stealing it from Wal-Mart is that after you download, the person you downloaded from still has the song. When you steal a CD from Wal-Mart, they have one less CD.
 
[quote name='rickonker']

The difference between downloading music and stealing it from Wal-Mart is that after you download, the person you downloaded from still has the song. When you steal a CD from Wal-Mart, they have one less CD.[/QUOTE]

And the songwriter has one less dollar made because someone stole a song instead of purchased it. When you take something that costs money and don't pay for it, it's stealing, period. If you're going to steal, have some balls and take it straight from the store you miserable chickenshit pussies.
 
[quote name='Survivor Charlie']And the songwriter has one less dollar made because someone stole a song instead of purchased it. When you take something that costs money and don't pay for it, it's stealing, period. If you're going to steal, have some balls and take it straight from the store you miserable chickenshit pussies.[/quote]

Your title really suits you...
 
Now that DRM has been removed from iTunes I am more likely to buy a digital song than use other means of acquiring the music. Can't say I am pleased with the pricing structure the music industry is forcing on the e-retailers but I'll let my purchasing power speak for itself.
 
Paying for MP3s is fucking retarded.

I wouldn't own 90% of the music I own if it wasn't for illegal downloading. I download stuff illegally, then buy the actual CD if I like it. I have a decent sound system, so the CD is the only way to get something that sounds good. Shit, I just dropped $26.97 on the Audio Fidelity remaster of Pet Sounds.
 
piracy is stealing on one level, violation of creator's rights on another. it's wrong. indisputably. but i do it anyway.
 
Back when Napster first came out I had a bunch of songs I already owned on it and some I did not. I had a ridiculously crappy comp and knew nothing of storing files, so Napster was basically my iTunes of the day. My friends would come over periodically and download new songs from bands I had never heard of without me asking. Most of them I loved and promptly went out and bought the CDs for my car because that was the only way I could listen to them anywhere but my comp. Was it illegal? Sure, but I discovered a lot of new music that I never would've heard if I didn't hear it there. In fact, I'd say 6 of my 10 favorite bands of all time I first heard on Napster. 2 I had known of beforehand and 2 came after Napster got in trouble.

Downloading songs for free is something I never really saw a problem with personally. Who hasn't borrowed a CD from friend to listen to? Before everyone could easily copy CDs you would just borrow it till you were done with it. Hell, back when everyone still used cassettes you could make copies and no one gave a crap.

If I told Metallica I downloaded their songs for free back then they would've sued me, but if I told them I have their CD which I purchased from a garage sale for a buck they couldn't do a damn thing. In an unrelated story I did sell Load and Reload for 2 bucks a pop at a garage sale a couple years ago.
 
I used to download lots of shit but Amazon pretty much provides exactly what I want to make it so I have no desire to download anymore. Amazon's cheaper than most places, has a nice 256kbps, no DRM, MP3 format, and will let you redownload stuff if you e-mail saying a download screwed up. Basically, Amazon kicks the living shit out of iTunes.

If I resort to downloading illegally, it's usually something so obscure or just plain unavailable in the mass market. Stuff nobody cares about, not even enough to make easily available to consumers.
 
[quote name='Survivor Charlie']And the songwriter has one less dollar made because someone stole a song instead of purchased it. When you take something that costs money and don't pay for it, it's stealing, period. If you're going to steal, have some balls and take it straight from the store you miserable chickenshit pussies.[/QUOTE]

A dollar that the songwriter never had in the first place. Wal-Mart actually possessed the CD. By the way, do you really think a songwriter gets the whole dollar when you buy a song? :lol:
 
[quote name='Survivor Charlie']And the songwriter has one less dollar made because someone stole a song instead of purchased it. When you take something that costs money and don't pay for it, it's stealing, period. If you're going to steal, have some balls and take it straight from the store you miserable chickenshit pussies.[/QUOTE]
That kind of logic is stupid as fuck.

"Hey, you bought some Sweet Leaf Tea at the store? Well, that's $3 less made for Arizona Tea, you miserable stealing chickenshit pussy!"
 
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