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  #81  
Old 07-29-2009, 10:39 AM
jOHN rODRIGUEZ
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Re: The beginning of the end for P2Ps/Torrent Sites?
Quote:
Originally Posted by potatobroth View Post
...I can't believe this thread is multiple pages of people defending stealing intellectual property. Its stealing. You've taken something that has a cost/value associated with it and taken it without paying that cost. That is the very definition of theft.

....
Music's just the type of the iceberg dear boy.
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  #82  
Old 07-29-2009, 11:13 AM
potatobroth
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Re: The beginning of the end for P2Ps/Torrent Sites?
Quote:
Originally Posted by jOHN rODRIGUEZ View Post
Music's just the type of the iceberg dear boy.
Yep. I see stolen photos and even illustrations all the time. The internet has made that super easy.
  #83  
Old 07-29-2009, 11:24 AM
jOHN rODRIGUEZ
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Re: The beginning of the end for P2Ps/Torrent Sites?
Try thinking a little bit bigger.

I see 401K's 404'd.
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  #84  
Old 07-29-2009, 11:48 AM
King of Snake
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Re: The beginning of the end for P2Ps/Torrent Sites?
that definition of theft is at least partly based on the assumption that there's a scarcity of the good in question. If you steal someone's car, that person loses his car. If you download an album, the artist doesn't lose that music, nor does the retailer lose a physical product (cd/lp).
The artist and retailer might have lost a sale if the downloader would have bought the physical product if the free download was not available. This is not certain though.
Just saying that with the current state of technology there is a definite grey area in the whole downloading=stealing debate IMO.
I can't claim to be completely on one side or the other myself. I've definitely downloaded music and software for free that otherwise I might have bought, but I do also buy a lot of music and software that I might not have bought if I hadn't downloaded it "illegally" first (I put that in quotes cause over here downloading music is actually still legal, but uploading isn't).
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  #85  
Old 07-29-2009, 01:20 PM
jOHN rODRIGUEZ
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Re: The beginning of the end for P2Ps/Torrent Sites?
See?
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  #86  
Old 07-29-2009, 02:38 PM
stimpee
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Re: The beginning of the end for P2Ps/Torrent Sites?
pototobroth: are you telling me you've never downloaded any music you've not paid for? (assuming it wasnt given away).

I'm not trying to justify _my_ downloads. I've downloaded lots, but it has led me to buy lots of music that I wouldnt have otherwise which I think is the general argument here. Theres no way that if the only way I could listen to music was to buy it or listen to 30 second clips that I would have bought so much music. Thats just the state of play right now. Its not theft, but its definitely copyright infringement. There is no justification, just a listening path which leads to investment.
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  #87  
Old 07-29-2009, 03:17 PM
Sean
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Re: The beginning of the end for P2Ps/Torrent Sites?
Quote:
Originally Posted by 34958hq439-qjw9v5jq298v5j View Post
Well I'm sorry for being 'stunningly naive" but I'm sick of people saying that downloading = shoplifting.
Have you considered that maybe people keep saying it because it's true? If you illegally download and keep a product that's only been made available by it's copyright owners for purchase, then you have stolen it.

Quote:
Originally Posted by 34958hq439-qjw9v5jq298v5j View Post
I know that some people will think that every download = one lost sale, but that's simply not true. A kid who has 10,000 albums and downloads 10,000 more that he never intends to listen to is not then causing the music industry $150,000 worth of damage.
I absolutely agree, and have said as much earlier in this thread.

Quote:
Originally Posted by 34958hq439-qjw9v5jq298v5j View Post
The actual figure would probably be about $0.
On this, I disagree. It's fair to assume that a certain portion of the illegally downloaded files in most people's collections are indeed representative of lost sales.

Quote:
Originally Posted by 34958hq439-qjw9v5jq298v5j View Post
I meant in terms of the artist, not the consumer. When I download an album that I didn't intend to purchase, how much money is the artist losing? Could they actually be making money from that? Hard to say isn't it?
Let's focus on the actual problem I have here, which is that there are tons of people out there who download albums for free simply because they can do it rather than having to pay. I listen to music in my office a lot, and I've had many people pop in to say "that sounds really cool - can you burn me a copy?" And when I tell them that I have kind of a rule about not doing that, they look at me confused, like they have no idea why someone wouldn't just make free copies of an album for all their friends. So my impression is that a huge percentage of people do this with far less consideration of the consequences than most people in these forums seem to have.

That being said, your questions above aren't really that hard to answer. One, there are many ways to be exposed to hearing music we would have otherwise never purchased, but none of them justify theft. Back when I used to frequent more record stores, I was constantly hearing them play something I had never heard of, and would find and buy it right there and then. That's how I came across some of my favorite groups as a matter of fact, like One Dove, Voices of Kwahn, and many others. But there's a crucial difference now with illegal downloads, which is that instead of hearing it being played in a store and then buying their own copy, people download something they've never heard of, like it, and then simply never pay for it. You mentioned earlier that you downloaded some Primal Scream albums which led you to attend one of their concerts. I assume that means you enjoyed the albums, yes? So then did you ever buy official copies of them?

Quote:
Originally Posted by 34958hq439-qjw9v5jq298v5j View Post
Understood. But the fact of the matter is that Kid A NEVER would have hit #1 if not for illegal, immoral, and selfish theft. That makes this not such a black and white issue.
Not sure how you can assert this as fact.

Quote:
Originally Posted by 34958hq439-qjw9v5jq298v5j View Post
Naaah, I'm actually pretty good about buying albums from bands I actually do like and supporting the artists that I'm a big fan of. If you want to argue that it's illegal or unethical, that's one thing. But that's not the logic I'm trying to use here. I'm just arguing that it's not as black and white as *actual* theft.
What does that mean, "*actual* theft"? The act of stealing is taking "another person's property without permission or legal right and without intending to return it". Illegally downloading music is taking another person's intellectual property without permission or legal right, and many people do it without any intent to pay for it. What's not "*actual* theft" about that? And seriously, the fact that a digital file is non-physical and therefore as a format has no inherent value, does not in any way discount the fact that there is inherent value to the music itself, and that said music is legally owned by it's creator or whoever happens to possess the copyrights. So saying you've taken nothing of any value is false.

Quote:
Originally Posted by 34958hq439-qjw9v5jq298v5j View Post
Consider these scenarios:

1. A guy who has never heard of your band is burned a copy of the CD by a friend, and then buys a ticket to a show.
2. Someone sneaks into a non-sold out concert, likes the music, and buys a T-shirt
3. Someone downloads a copy of a certain software, but likes it enough to buy the next version when it comes out.

Now, according to what you're saying, all three of these people are immoral, selfish, and acting outside the law.
In these instances, yes. They are behaving in immoral, selfish, and illegal ways.

Quote:
Originally Posted by 34958hq439-qjw9v5jq298v5j View Post
However in all three cases, the artist/band/software company has made money from this behavior at NO COST.
I disagree. In your first point, once again, you're only weighing the cost of the physical medium itself. You're ignoring the fact that the creation, distribution, and marketing of the music indeed constitutes a "cost" for the artist who's being ripped off, not just the medium it's released on.

In your second point, your hypothetical person has denied the artist return on their investment in booking the venue, paying the band members, lighting set-ups, roadies, transportation, live performance equipment, etc, etc. Buying a t-shirt helps defray the cost of designing and manufacturing merchandise, but not the concert.

Your third point about illegally downloading software was already addressed as well. When you buy software, you're helping pay for all the costs that have gone into developing and marketing that software. When you subsequently purchase upgrades, you're helping pay for all the additional research and development that's gone into improving the program.

So ultimately, in all three scenarios, you're bizarrely trying to justify stealing one thing by paying for another. That just doesn't hold up to any kind of scrutiny. You're not the one who decides what you should pay for and what you should take for free - the people who own and provide the goods and services in question are. What in the world would make you feel like you're entitled to steal something from someone as long as you pay them for something else later on down the road?

Quote:
Originally Posted by 34958hq439-qjw9v5jq298v5j View Post
I'm not saying downloading music is ethically sound. I know it would be bad if EVERYONE did it and nobody bought CDs. But that's just not what's happening now and probably not what's going to happen in the future
But it's happening enough that it's hurting artists - smaller independent artists in particular. And the attitudes towards illegal downloading seem to be getting more and more flippant, which doesn't bode well for future artists.

Quote:
Originally Posted by 34958hq439-qjw9v5jq298v5j View Post
You can be upset that your friends are no longer able to make music because they only sold 1,000 copies of a disc due to everyone downloading. But how do you know that the disc wouldn't have sold only 500 if nobody downloaded it?
I can't be certain exactly how much it cost them, but I do know that one of the singles in question actually charted in the UK, so it's popularity certainly wasn't reflected in it's sales (or lack thereof).
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Last edited by Sean; 07-29-2009 at 06:36 PM.
  #88  
Old 07-29-2009, 03:25 PM
potatobroth
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Re: The beginning of the end for P2Ps/Torrent Sites?
Quote:
Originally Posted by stimpee View Post
pototobroth: are you telling me you've never downloaded any music you've not paid for? (assuming it wasnt given away).

I'm not trying to justify _my_ downloads. I've downloaded lots, but it has led me to buy lots of music that I wouldnt have otherwise which I think is the general argument here. Theres no way that if the only way I could listen to music was to buy it or listen to 30 second clips that I would have bought so much music. Thats just the state of play right now. Its not theft, but its definitely copyright infringement. There is no justification, just a listening path which leads to investment.
Of course I have. I just can't side with the fact that some don't think its stealing or even condone it.

I'll be honest though, aside from live gigs I haven't illegally downloaded in a LONG time. I iTunes everything now. Same goes for software; I buy all of it now. I'm not saying this to be preachy or whatever, I just never understood the argument in favor of downloading music for free.

Heck, I have a good friend, who is a BIG Underworld fan, who didn't even purchase OWB. How fucked up is that? He got hold of a copy a few weeks before release, burned that to a disc to tide him over til the proper launch, but never actually went out to get the album. Now, that friend has put tons of money in UWs pockets thru live gigs, merch, you name it. But still to this day I still find it strange that he never purchased the actual CD of the band he loves -- no, it wasnt me.
  #89  
Old 07-29-2009, 03:35 PM
Sean
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Re: The beginning of the end for P2Ps/Torrent Sites?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Jan View Post
To all who made the mistake: Theft/stealing and copyright infringement are different concepts. Please try your best not to confuse the two.
There are indeed differences, but both "copyright infringement" and "stealing" apply equally to the issue of illegal downloading. Please try your best to understand that as you read on.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Jan View Post
Also it's maybe hard to accept for some musicians but they don't "own" anything. We (the public) merely granted them a temporary exclusive right (should be around 10 years, but due to lobbyism etc. 50+ years now) to market their creations. We do that because we want to hear more music in the future.
I absolutely beg to differ. When I create and copyright a piece of art, be it music, paintings, photographs, or whatever else, I do legally own it. And if I create a remix for hire, I sign a contract that states in no uncertain terms that the original artist legally owns said remix when it's done. It doesn't matter that we're discussing intellectual property versus physical property, ownership is very clearly outlined in any legal agreement regarding artwork.

The philosophical argument can be made about ownership of less tangible forms of artwork, but ultimately, people need to respect the fact that an artist creating a piece of art and selling it is no different than any manufacturer out there making any other product that they sell.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Jan View Post
Fact: If you don't want people to hear your music, don't release it. Once an idea is out there, how do you want to stop it?
Who said they didn't want their music to be heard? I think virtually all musicians want their music heard - they just don't want to be ripped off. Like I said before, I've made plenty of my own music available for free through my sig below, but some tracks I've done are only available for purchase. I want those to be heard too, but since they're only available for sale rather than free download, I do expect that people pay for them. And how do I want to stop people from illegally obtaining my work? That would be through copyright laws.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Jan View Post
Another fact: There is no shortage of good music; so apparently the situation is not as bad as some people describe it. If you are a musician and nobody buys your album, maybe it isn't the fault of "The Pirate Bay", but maybe it's because the music is bad?
Oh dear lord.
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  #90  
Old 07-29-2009, 04:41 PM
Jan
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Re: The beginning of the end for P2Ps/Torrent Sites?
I see a lot of small independent labels releasing new exciting music.
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