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Originally Posted by HappyMartin
So if I download a movie illegally that is not theft as I have not deprived anyone of anything since the maker of the movie still has the movie. If I then make DVD copies of the movie and give them away that then cannot be theft either since the maker of the movie still has the movie. If I sell the movies at the traffic lights that is also then not theft. By this odd argument the person who made the movie still has it and the money I made from the movie they never had anyway so I did not take it from them. Personally I think this is an exceedingly weak and self serving argument.
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None of that is legally theft. You'll be charged with criminal copyright infringement for selling them, which has stronger penalties than civil copyright infringement, but it's still not theft. You have illegally violated the maker of the movie's exclusive distribution rights, but you have not stolen anything from anybody.
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I think all these attempts to prove that copyright violation is not theft and we all have a right to this stuff is just a mad misunderstanding of human rights.
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I don't think anybody in here is saying that copyright violations should not be illegal or that we have a right to download stuff. They're just saying that calling it "theft" is incorrect and very misleading. It just adds to the existing confusion that exists in many peoples minds about what copyright infringement actually is. Yes it is illegal, but it has nothing to do with breaking the laws against "theft" or "stealing". We're talking about an entirely different set of laws here. In most cases (except for your example above about selling copies), civil laws. There is a huge difference between breaking criminal laws and breaking civil ones.