Where do you draw the line on downloading stuff illegally?

[member11579]

It's funny how little some people know about economics and law, yet they are so ridiculously opinionated about "big greedy companies ripping us off." Come on!!! Get off your Robin Hood high horses, folks... Read the copyright laws and the Fair Use Doctrine, etc. Google it. This discussion should have ended a LONG time ago if you would have read up on the law and precedents, etc.

Dead horse. Beaten. Pulverized. Pulp. Roadkill.

Theft is theft. Pay or steal. End of story. I'm not posting any more on this topic (at least in THIS thread). It's a waste of time if people aren't willing to read up on things themselves and just want to bitch about prices and profit margins.

Cheers. :hatsoff: :nanner:

Just because something IS law, doesnt mean it always WAS, or always WILL BE.

Yes stealing is stealing etc etc, but there are decent reasons behind it in some of these cases. This discussion is about where people draw the line, not what the law currently states about it.

There has been plenty of times in the past that laws have been changed and abolished to adapt to a changing world.

Also, you said yourself you used to download illegally if I recall correctly. Have you paid for those crimes now that you are condemning others, or did you get away with it as well.

Dont mean to sound rude, but your black and white stance to this is not very constructive.

 

[Dinalt]

:wave2: Another point that hasn't been mentioned yet, although it's been touched upon, is how dependant society has become on films and other media.

Take for example students, who generally aren't rolling in money. I can understand why they need to use P2P (I'm not condoning it, merely using this as an example).
Society's culture in some areas has almost centred on the entertainment world - to the degree that you could feel isolated if you can't afford the latest film/album.
So I could be wrong, but I think in some cases it's downloading to be accepted, rather than deliberately breaking copyright laws.

I know when I was younger, most conversations were about the latest bands or films, and I'd imagine it's much the same today.
Those on limited incomes will probably feel ostracised if they haven't seen the latest film, or heard the latest album.

Again, I'm not excusing P2P, just providing another possible example for why people use it.

Being accepted is probably important to a lot of people, whatever social group you interract with, so in some cases I feel it's not a case of wanting a product - it's a case of needing a product to fit in.

Personally, I think it's wrong that people should feel that way, but unfortunately that's modern society for you. I don't think you outgrow this need to fit in until you're older.
Even then, some people never outgrow it.
Those that do outgrow it will either exercise tolerance, or preach about the evils of file sharing. Human nature again.

As I've said, it's not condoning P2P or illegal file sharing, just another point to consider and maybe debate.

 

[anotherguy]

Nightfly - I know you said your not going to post anymore on this thread but at least think about this....

Your main argument is that its wrong because its illegal. If in the country I live in their were no laws protecting interlectual property but in your country their were, in your view would it be acceptable for me to download stuff and you not?

What about porn? Im presuming you found freeones because you like porn and you have no moral grounds against it, same here, and its legal in both our countries, but what about the people who live in countries where porn is illegal? Do you think they should just sit back because its illegal? while your happily looking at porn. Do you think its wrong for them to look at porn?


Like someone said its not as black and white as your making out!

:hatsoff:

 

[member2686]

I have said all I intend to say here. You can call it a "grey area" all you want and try to justify the theft of copywritten material. That's your issue.

Google this topic. Read up on the issue and the laws (for your country). I cannot supply you with all the laws, cases, legal precedents/decisions, etc. It's too time consuming. You'll have to do some footwork of your own.

If you really care about the issue, spend a day reading about it. I don't have the time to put out a banquet table of info. That's why I said I am done discussing it -- some of you seem absolutely steadfast that you're going to continue STEALING no matter what, and others of you seem to have honest consciences but haven't read enough about the topic.

I'm still in the process of moving from one apartment to another, and while I still spend a great deal of time online (during breaks and at the end of the day when it's too dark to do my move), I can't sit here and beat this dead horse over and over. You're going to have to do some reading and research yourselves. I'd rather move on to other topics and work on my other projects.

And yes, 001, I said I USED to file share (I never actually shared from my PC, but I stole songs using P2P). I also have sped in my car before and committed other crimes. I don't anymore. That's better than CONTINUING to do those things, right? What's your point?

 

[Union Jax]

the thing that annoys me about all this shit is.....If u want a song...why pay £20 for the whole album when its only one song u want?

Now u can say...."buy it on a single" but what if its an oldie?....there is no chance of getting that on a single nowadays.

 

[Dinalt]

the thing that annoys me about all this shit is.....If u want a song...why pay £20 for the whole album when its only one song u want?

Now u can say...."buy it on a single" but what if its an oldie?....there is no chance of getting that on a single nowadays.

:thumbsup: I'll agree with you Union Jax, the whole thing's a down and out con by the record industry.
CD Singles cost about half the price of an album - for 1 track, and maybe 3 remixes of the same track or crap!

I don't use P2P, but most of the music I want ISN'T available - either on CD or for download via legal systems. Much of the stuff I want is old rock and heavy metal (not everyones taste), but it just isn't available on i-tunes, Napster (relaunched legal version) or anywhere else I've looked.
Maybe I'm showing my age, but the latest boy & girl bands just don't interest me, so I'm not interested in the latest stuff anyway.
My only choice is buying second hand albums (which is also technically illegal without the consent of the copyright holder). Yet another grey area, that's ignored by most countries.

For those who are adamant that P2P is immoral, wrong and indecent - please re-read the other posts in this thread.
Yes, it's illegal, but you can't isolate your opinion to that and ignore every other viewpoint put forward. At least debate the argument thoroughly, and disprove every statement made in this thread.
At the end of the day, let's debate the issue thoroughly - not just say it's illegal, wrong and that's the end of it.

I draw the line at not downloading anything from P2P, and that's my choice. I won't inflict my moral standards on anyone else, because there ARE reasons why P2P is used so much.

 

[Oops!WrongHole]

if i like what i downloaded i go buy it.

 

[fred1]

Well, in direct response to the question, I don't download any crcked software or movies. I did however use Napster for some times but I don't use anything like that these days. I think it's acceptable to download something that you already have on vinyl. It's not very different from sampling the contents of the vinyl but it is more convenient.

There's a shareware program, relesed as nagware, that I haven't paid for yet. There was no secure website at the time but now there is and I'm going to ay for it. I have paid the royalties for my copy of winzip which I think isn't very common.

I think most recently released DVD's are overpriced so I only buy them them when the price has been cut. or I may buy a 2nd hand copy, I would never try to download any movie illegally from some kind of P2P server.

I think that it would make economic sense to obtain software like Photoshop for personal use only. There's a program called Maya which is available under such a license. I think you don't get much support but then you don't pay much either. There's a special version of Visual Studio available free of charge for the hobbyist programmer. Microsoft doesn't lose any money because of this because it means that Windows will continue to sell well. With Apple, you get Xcode free of charge for the same reason. If you sell an OS, you really don't want to make it difficult for anyone to make software for that platform. The only exception to this rule are gameboxws such as xbox and playstation. The reason is of course that each piece of hardware is sold at a loss. The idea is that the games sold make up for that loss. That's why you don't find any kind of shareware or freeware games.

 

[AFA]

This thread is over 2 years old, and is walking a too thin line on an rule breaking issue, copyright content.
The line will be drawn right now.

The thread was better off dead.

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