Quote:
Originally Posted by gsquared
Here in South Africa the law is clear - I would have thought that copyright law is much the same elsewhere. Clearly, from this thread, I am wrong.
Theft is the act of stealing, thus taking something from a person without that person’s permission, leaving the person without the specific work. With copyright infringement the copyright owner can still use the work and commercially benefit from it, but someone else is also using the work for which use the copyright owner is not compensated and not duly recognized. If I remove a book from the library and keep it, it is theft. If I take it, copy it and return it, it is not theft in our law, but copyright infringement.
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Which is illegal, so it is a crime. What ever you care to call it, theft or piracy, the fact remains it is illegal in much of the world.