Do you consider it to be unethical...

[SteveEisenberg]

Has anyone brought up examples like the Great Gatsby? It's under copyright in the US, but out of copyright in Australia, and also, I believe, Canada.

In my system of morals, it can't be unethical to copy the book on one side of the street (Derby Line Vermont) and ethical to copy the book on the other side of the street (Stanstead Quebec).

I suppose that the most ethical thing for Australian downloaders would be to send a bit of money to the estate of F. Scott Fitzgerald. Of course, even if such an estate can be identified, no Canadian or Australian is going to do that. I conclude from this that none of us are perfectly ethical.

The unethicalness of copying an out of print book is minimal. But would it be better to get the copyright holder's address and mail them a dollar or two? Sure.

So does legality have nothing to do ethics? Well, if there is a chance of my getting arrested, and then unable to support my family, the action becomes unethical for that reason (unless there is compensating moral benefit, as in the underground railroad).

What about the possibility that there is an ethical aspect to supporting your country's laws, independent of whether the law is good, or enforced? I'm really on the fence there, but leaning towards no.

[GA Russell]

Originally Posted by SteveEisenberg

What about the possibility that there is an ethical aspect to supporting your country's laws, independent of whether the law is good, or enforced? I'm really on the fence there, but leaning towards no.

That has a lot of appeal to me because of the way my parents raised me, but the Nuremburg trials made it clear that that is not the policy of the US.

[Harmon]

Originally Posted by carld

Really? Then it's not illegal to download copyright movies or music if it's only for your own use?

In my view, it's not "illegal" if you do it exactly right. But you have to be very very careful.

The copyright laws forbid selling and distributing copyrighted material. Therefore, you do not want to get involved, even marginally, with selling or distributing.

So if you download using a service that charges you, you will be entering into a commercial transaction which would make it "illegal" if the service is violating copyright. That is, the service would clearly be violating the copyright laws, and you might be implicated as a buyer. Or maybe not. Basically, don't buy and download anything from anyone who you aren't sure has the right to sell it.

Likewise, if you download something for free using a torrent, which involves your computer participating in distributing bits & pieces of the movie, you are asking for trouble. This is because you would also be involved in uploading. Uploading is distributing, and I believe that some courts have decided that this is enough to nail kids who get involved with torrenting, even if money isn't involved.

But if all you do is copy your buddy's cd or dvd for your own personal listening or viewing pleasure, I don't think it's illegal. Or if someone posts a music file on his homepage, I don't think it's illegal for you to download it. Your buddy might have a contractual problem with the copyright holder, and the homepage guy might, too, but I don't think you do.

And if you download a movie, and have a bunch of friends over to watch it, it's theoretically possible that some court would decide you are distributing the movie.

Of course, the fact that it is not illegal does not mean that it is ethical or moral. You'll have to work that one out on your own!

Note: all this has nothing to do with whether, for example, your ISP or college might forbid you to use their services for copying files, even if the copying does not technically violate the copyright laws.

[Harmon]

Originally Posted by SteveEisenberg

What about the possibility that there is an ethical aspect to supporting your country's laws, independent of whether the law is good, or enforced? I'm really on the fence there, but leaning towards no.

I look at it this way: morality involves your duty to God, ethics involve your duty to your fellow man, and legality involves your duty to society.

These things overlap, but they are not coterminous. There can, indeed, be a moral or ethical duty to disobey the law.

You are not required by morality to tell the Nazis that you are hiding Jews in the basement. You have a duty to God not to help murderers. You are not required by ethics to help a slaveholder capture his escaped slave. You have a duty to your fellow man not to help someone enslave him. Yet the laws in force in each instance would have required otherwise.

Basically, your ethical duty to obey the law revolves around the simple fact that unless the law is generally obeyed, it cannot perform its necessary function in creating and sustaining justice in society. And creating and sustaining justice strikes me as a moral duty to God, or, if you are an atheist, an ethical duty to other people. So as a practical matter, the wisest course is to obey all laws that don't clearly violate your ethical or moral duties.

Note that I use the word "duty," not "principle." Some law might violate your moral or ethical principles, but unless in obeying it you find yourself violating an ethical or moral duty, I don't think you have the right to disobey it. Someone might think that the income tax, even in a democratic country, is unethical, because it deprives people of the fruits of their labor against their will. But I don't think that means that you should not obey the income tax law, because as far as I can tell, there is no moral or ethical duty not to pay income taxes. It does mean, however, that you don't have to help the state enforce the income tax laws, because given your principles, you have a duty not to make your fellow man pay income taxes. So if you are on the jury, don't vote to convict!

My personal belief is that copyright law should always be obeyed, not because I think that it is ethical in its current state, but because I can't see that I have any duty to disobey it. I do not, however, share what seems to be the general belief that any copying of copyrighted material is forbidden by the law. That's what the publishers would like you to believe, but the law is not quite so all-encompassing.

For example, I am confident that if you lend me a book that you have bought, and I sneak off with it & photocopy it to read later, while giving the book back to you, I personally have not violated the copyright law. It is possible (but not in my view, likely) that if you gave it to me knowing I was going to copy it, you might have violated the law- but I still haven't.

This thread, of course, is about whether I have an ethical duty that extends beyond the requirements of copyright law, to the point where it should be considered unethical to copy that book you lent me, even though it is not, in my view, illegal.

Or maybe the thread is about whether there is an ethical duty to actually violate the copyright law, which in my view would require you to copy and sell some copyrighted work without permission of the copyright owner. Somehow, I don't see that such an ethical duty exists.

But I'm pretty clear on the proposition that I have no ethical duty to obey a law that doesn't exist.

[Fbone]

"What is copyright infringement?
As a general matter, copyright infringement occurs when a copyrighted work is reproduced, distributed, performed, publicly displayed, or made into a derivative work without the permission of the copyright owner."
http://www.copyright.gov/help/faq/fa...l#infringement

According to a 1993 8th Circuit Court case the judges decided that infringement "requires an actual dissemination." In one of the few illegal download cases that went to court the judge wrote, "Unless a copy of the work changes hands in one of the designated ways, a "distribution" under Sec. 106(3) has not taken place. Merely making an unauthorized copy of a copyrighted work available to the public does not violate a copyright holder's exclusive right of distribution."
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-99...in;contentBody
http://news.cnet.com/8301-10784_3-99...?tag=mncol;txt
Where it was decided (in two other cases) that the individuals willfully downloaded and distributed so monetary damages apply. Cases are under appeal. Copyright infringement most likely has occurred.

But what is an "unauthorized copy" the judge mentions? The US Copyright Office has "reproduced" in it's definition of copyright infringement.
Is an "unauthorized copy" illegal? Does it violate the copyright holder's right to reproduce their work?
If using Kazaa or Limewire, who does the copying? The (originator, giver, sender) or the (recipient, taker, receiver)? One could say the file originator was passive and the other party was the aggressor by making a copy.

[GA Russell]

Fbone, the case you cite refers to music file sharing. Clearly the record companies have been active.

My original question dealt with books which are out of print in all legitimate forms.

Perhaps I should ask a new question:

When a book is out of print, may the public ethically presume that the copyright holder no longer cares?

A book may be out of print for a short while when it changes publishers. But if a book is out of print for a certain period, say one year, I think that the public may assume that the work has been abandoned, and proceed accordingly.

[Fbone]

Originally Posted by GA Russell

Fbone, the case you cite refers to music file sharing. Clearly the record companies have been active.

My original question dealt with books which are out of print in all legitimate forms.

Perhaps I should ask a new question:

When a book is out of print, may the public ethically presume that the copyright holder no longer cares?

A book may be out of print for a short while when it changes publishers. But if a book is out of print for a certain period, say one year, I think that the public may assume that the work has been abandoned, and proceed accordingly.

Yes, I know what you original asked. And I gave my response by asking another question many pages ago.

I really like your new question and hope you receive many excellent replies.

[TGS]

Originally Posted by kennyc

Yes....but....there's way more to this whole issue than Legal Definitions.

This thread was started by asking the question "is it UNETHICAL..."
that has little to do with official legal definitions.

But don't you agree it is good to get one of the issues that inevitably raises it's head in this kind of discussion settled? As far as the legal framework in the US is concerned copyright infringement is not theft. There may of course be rhetorical reasons for continuing to call copyright infringement theft - but I think that just serves to confuse the issue. Having clarified the legal definition we can then, if we wish, go on to discuss the ethical issues involved in copyright infringement - without being encumbered by the argument about whether it is theft or not.

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by Harmon

Actually yes. Me. I'm a lawyer.

It's not the legal definition of "theft" that is in issue here. It's the legal definition of "property." What everyone calls "intellectual property" is NOT actually property. As a legal matter, it cannot be stolen (unless, of course, there is some other law specifically establishing some form of intellectual property as "property" for purposes of the statutes against theft. I believe that there are some concerning trade secrets. But in the case of copyright, there are none that I am aware of.)

That's a nice piece of sophistry. I particularly admire the deployment of the imprimatur of inarguable authority based on your credentials to put an end to the opposition. But, assuming arguendo that you are indeed a lawyer, then, surely, counselor, you have failed to mention Downing? The--and I mean THE--precedent case on the topic of "property?" In which the court held that Property is a broad concept that includes “every intangible benefit and prerogative susceptible of possession or disposition.” Downing v. Mun. Court , 88 Cal. App. 2d 345, 350 (1948). The one case cited constantly on the very topic of the definition of property, since 1948?

"Intellectual PROPERTY" is property. That's why it's named "property," and not "Intellectual Ephemera." You're attempting to make your case by an inverted argument; that because there is a separate set of Federal Statutes that specifically address the criminal activity termed "infringement," (above and beyond those laws that cover "theft") that this means that what occurs when this type of personal property is "misappropriated" or "converted" ISN'T theft. As if this is the end-all and be-all; as if some Roddenberry-esque utopian idea exists that our form of government is so streamlined and so efficient that additional, unnecessary laws never come into existence, and that no legislator ever existed who introduced a completely unnecessary set of Statutes to be passed, regardless of the fact that the thef--excuse, me, the "infringement"--of this form of personal property would have been adequately covered under the existing laws governing theft.

You FURTHER fail to mention that States regulate their own laws regarding everyday, ordinary THEFT, and that the federal government was REQUIRED to specifically address the crime of copyright infringement, not as some lesser, wink-wink, nudge-nudge, "everyone is doing it and we'll turn a blind eye" offense, but as something covered by and prosecuted by FEDERAL law because of its very origins. The fact that the Feds named it something different hardly constitutes a viable argument that it somehow doesn't amount to the legally-defined term of "theft." That's akin to arguing that because a horse is a Thoroughbred, that means it's ONLY a Thoroughbred, and no longer a horse. That's obvious nonsense; a thoroughbred is merely a TYPE of horse; or, in the alternative, it's a thoroughbred in addition to being a horse. I submit to you that the categorization of "copyright infringement" is nothing more than a naming convention specifying and setting apart a TYPE of theft.

Since that term--theft--seems to blow so much smoke up your nose, however, fine; I'll limit myself to simply calling it "stealing," which isn't covered under Statutes anywhere, to the best of my knowledge. Or, if you would prefer, pilfering; nicking; swiping; lifting; how about "ripping off?" There, is that much better?

That's why we have copyright laws. If your misunderstanding of the law of theft and property were correct, we would not need to have any copyright law. The very existence of copyright law demonstrates that "theft" doesn't do the trick. Otherwise, we'd simply bring prosecutions for theft.

I don't misunderstand it at all. You know quite well that we have copyright law for myriad reasons, and not because it "isn't theft." We have many overlapping laws from Federal and State Statutes. You further know that many criminals are in a toss-up, jurisdictionally, for prosecution; that hate-crimes, for example, can be prosecuted at the State level OR the Federal level, and may be called two very different things--the offense differently named--but the crime remains the same. It's misleading to state your position as a settled legal FACT. Your assertion that the existence of Federal copyright laws is dispositive proof that copyright infringement isn't theft is an argument; it's not a statement of settled legal finding, the last time I looked. I'm sure if it was, you'd have cited the precedent and/or decision, to actually "settle" the argument--but you didn't. I mean, what, 12 pages of posts and you can't be bothered to post the precedent that clearly states that IP isn't "property?" Since you seem heated about it, I'm sure you have that case immediately to hand, and I for one would like to see it. Hell, I'm sure everyone involved in this discussion would like to see it.

My advice is to keep the law out of this discussion. It won't help you that, for example, it is not a violation of copyright law (in the US) to download a book from a pirate site for free, if all you are going to do is read it yourself. Nor is it a violation to strip DRM from a Kindle ebook in order to read the ebook on your Sony.

It MAY be unethical, in your view. But that's a different matter.

I notice you also failed to reference Kremen v. Cohen, which is fascinating, in which the court held that a domain name (sex.com, in case anyone is interested) clearly intellectual property in the context of this discussion--is personal property. The court went on to say that:

[We applied] a three-part test to determine whether a property right exists:
“First, there must be an interest capable of precise definition;
second, it must be capable of exclusive possession or control;
and third, the putative owner must have established a legitimate
claim to exclusivity.” G.S. Rasmussen, 958 F.2d at 903
(footnote omitted). Domain names satisfy each criterion.

Moreover, Bancroft (Bancroft & Masters, Inc. v.Augusta National Inc., 223 F.3d 1082 (9th Cir. 2000)) found that a domain name--by any line of reasoning, "intellectual property"--was property, and that the the defendant had committed conversion of a domain name, which it characterized as “tortious conduct.” By your own logic, this patently proves that intellectual property is "property," as only property may be converted. That which is NOT property may not be "converted" under law; hence, if IP may be converted, it is property.

BTW, in Kremen, the court went on to say:

"It would be a curious jurisprudence that turned on the existence of a paper document rather than an electronic one. Torching a company’s file room would then be conversion while hacking into its mainframe and deleting its data would not. That is not the law, at least not in California." It further stated that "...And the common law does not stand idle while people give away the property of others."

I think that's pretty damned clear.

James Madison wrote in Federalist Paper No. 10 that “[t]he protection of . . . the faculties of men, from which the rights of property originate . . . is the first object of government.” (For those of you who like to opine as to what the intent of the Founders really was.)

So, curiously, the court cases relevant to this seem to contradict your assertion that IP isn't "property." The Kremen case's Appellate decision language about the distinction between paper and electronic documents being specious seems to be rather precisely on point with regard to this topic, in fact.

And lastly, I notice that in your statement that "it is not a violation of copyright law (in the US) to download a book from a pirate site for free, if all you are going to do is read it yourself," you neglect to mention the outcome of the Napster case, the RIAA suits, or the fact that the four Pirate Bay founders each got a year of prison time in addition to massive (millions) in fines. I would like to know your basis for that statement--what case or precedent are you citing? Unless the book on the pirate site is Creative Commons licensed, downloading it is a violation of copyright laws because, again, you have obtained that property without the consent of its creator and without a license to use that property from the creator.

People should not be fooled by the fact that all the fooferah--all the legal action and prosecution--has been initially over music, and then movies being pirated. That's because it was music and movies that first became widely available in a digital format. Now, however, books are being widely distributed in digital format, and if you think that Morrow and Random House and all the others are going to remain idle on this topic, you're wrong.

And I come back to what I said in my last post: it's clear to me, as no one has disputed it, that the pirates here wouldn't DREAM of walking into a bookstore and stealing a physical book. They know that that act IS theft, inarguably. They don't do it because they'll be caught and punished. So the fact that they'll pilfer its digital equivalent isn't about any cleverly sophistic and specious argument as to whether or not it's infringement, or theft, or conversion; it's about CRIME AND PUNISHMENT.

And now, I really am DONE with this thread. I said this previously; but was sucked back in...but it's too much of a time-suck and, frankly, a gigantic waste of time and text. I apologize to you all--okay, MOST of you--for the length of this post, but I thought that presenting actual court decisions, language and precedents might be useful to those trying to grapple with this topic.

Truthfully, I think the entire discussion about whether or not IP is "property" is a gigantic red herring; another act of sleight-of-hand to misdirect the watcher's eye from the fact that somebody's work is being pilfered, and that the person who made it isn't being paid for it. I don't know how much simpler it gets than that.

Later.

[HamsterRage]

Originally Posted by kennyc

Yes....but....there's way more to this whole issue than Legal Definitions.

This thread was started by asking the question "is it UNETHICAL..."
that has little to do with official legal definitions.

I think there's a tacit assertion by some, that if it's illegal then it's naturally unethical - QED.

[HamsterRage]

Originally Posted by Jadon

Surely not even the most naive of us believe anyone changes their mind on this perpetual topic? This topic, in the many threads it pops up in, exists only for people to talk past each other, since each side is fundamentally incapable of thinking the way the other does. The closest anyone has ever come to changing their mind is when an author has said "I used to obsess about piracy, but now I've learned to live with it." Which is not to say that they think it ethical, merely that it's inescapable. Worrying about the inevitable is as pointless as discussing it.

To be perfectly honest, I was lukewarm about the subject before I saw this thread. The amount of vitriol that's spewed almost exclusively from the anti-darknet side of this argument has now totally convinced me that there is no way that they can be correct.

It's coming close to convincing me that I have a moral obligation to society to strip DRM and fileshare as much as possible.

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by Hitch

Elfwreck wrote:

Oh, puhleeze. Please don't try to turn this discussion into an alleged argument about the "increased access to knowledge." The 'Net and digitization has opened up an entire world of knowledge for anyone who wants it. We're not talking about "knowledge," here; we're talking about entertainment. No one has a constitutional right to be entertained. And I hope that no one is desperate enough to come back with some nonsense about the pursuit of happiness.

Agreed: There is no moral right to entertainment. (Or at least, not to any specific bit of entertainment.)

Disagreed: Entertaining material does not enhance knowledge.

I own physical copies of all 8 of the Sime/Gen novels. (Science fiction. 80's. Midlist authors; obscure series.) They're all out of print. None of them are available as legit ebooks. If I shared digital copies with people (I haven't), it would (1) presumably entertain them and (2) increase their knowledge of:

• The particular science-fiction world in which those books take place,
• Science fiction literary tropes,
• Vampire literary tropes,
• 80's literary patterns,
• The range of literature considered publishable in the 80's,
• Those particular authors.

There's really no point in continuing the discussion, at least, not on my part. Everyone here who bootlegs or downloads ebooks, whether by copying, scanning, handwriting them out, or lifting epubs or mobis or what-have-you, is taking money from an author.

If I copy them for myself, how much money have I taken from the authors?
If I give those copies to a friend, how much money is the author out?

Serious, not-rhetorical questions here. What's the value of a "stolen" item that doesn't legally exist?

There are a very, very few of you here who are what I would call "conscientious objectors." You few "CO's" genuinely oppose copyright law, having a communistic or Marxist view of property belonging to "everyone."

I never said all property belongs to everyone. I said that IP, in accordance with the US constitution, belongs to everyone after a limited time. This includes my own writing as well as that of everyone else.

I am *sharply* aware that current copyright law means every email, every forum post, every blog entry & comment, belong to someone, and another person could, technically, sue someone else for crossposting or forwarding them.

The rest of you: the bottom line is that you steal these books because you can. If you knew that the courts would actually start prosecuting you, under Federal statutes, and you would do 3-5 years for infringement, as is allowed under those selfsame statutes, you would not do it.

There is no penalty of 3-5 years for copying less than a certain amount (by dollar value *and* number of copies) in a certain time period. Criminal charges only kick in when there the minimum dollar value is met.

What's the dollar value of a single copy of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone in PDF form? Not the value of the hardcover or paperback--if I steal a paperback, I'm not prosecuted based on the value of the hardcover. What's the value of the PDF? Of the .txt version with no italics?

Go ahead, try to reconcile THOSE two positions--that it's okay for you to "take" a digital copy, but that you wouldn't take it in print. It all comes down to YOU being prosecuted; to YOU being CAUGHT, doesn't it?

When you make an additional digital copy, you're not *taking* anything. Nobody else is lacking their copy.

"Theft" does not mean "increasing the amount freely available until sales are unlikely to occur."

[Harmon]

Originally Posted by Hitch

That's a nice piece of sophistry. I particularly admire the deployment of the imprimatur of inarguable authority based on your credentials to put an end to the opposition.

I'm afraid that I see no point in continuing a discussion with someone who calls me a sophist, and falsely accuses me of using the argument from authority.

[Harmon]

Originally Posted by HamsterRage

To be perfectly honest, I was lukewarm about the subject before I saw this thread. The amount of vitriol that's spewed almost exclusively from the anti-darknet side of this argument has now totally convinced me that there is no way that they can be correct.

It's coming close to convincing me that I have a moral obligation to society to strip DRM and fileshare as much as possible.

(But I'd advise against the filesharing.)

[BexBits]

Originally Posted by HamsterRage

To be perfectly honest, I was lukewarm about the subject before I saw this thread. The amount of vitriol that's spewed almost exclusively from the anti-darknet side of this argument has now totally convinced me that there is no way that they can be correct.

De-lurking for a moment to agree. I'm really surprised by the difference in tone between the two sides and it has influenced my opinion on the topic.

ETA: It has not, however, moved me toward stripping DRM because that does not allow me to vote with my dollar (however paltry a vote that is.)