What are your views on illegal copying?

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by Sparrow

It's also theft when money is taken from me to give to authors and publishers for books I don't want to read.
(That's how the UK public library system works.)

What goes around comes around.

\


Well, yeah, but that's kinda stretching it I think. If you feel you are not getting your money's worth from the tax money spent on libraries, then you can work to reduce their funding, etc.

Just recently here in my suburb they closed several branch libraries because the people were not willing to spend more on libraries. I personally think it's a travesty and bad thing for our people/government/society. Much along the lines of paying only a pittance to teachers and expecting to have an educated public....

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by troymc

And it's also then "theft" when works which were originally scheduled to enter the public domain get "grandfathered" simply to line the pockets of megacorp publishers & greedy families. This is even closer to the definition of "theft" since the public domain does lose something which had been promised to it.

Here's a perfect example:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/19/bo...pagewanted=all

It's an amazing double-standard -- individuals are expected to act honestly/legally/morally while they're being fleeced by amoral corporations & immoral copyright owners who seemingly have no shame.


Troy

I agree completely with that!

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by mgmueller

If I can't get it legally, but want to read it, I try to get it elsewhere.
Perfect example: Lord of the Rings. Had them as scanned PDFs, bought them as soon as they've been available. Harry Potter still isn't available...

Scanned PDFs? Shudder. The text versions have bounced around usenet since the year 2000, and probably earlier. (And they weren't spelled "Tha Hobbit.")

I've often wondered why publishers don't scour newsgroups & the torrent sites for bootleg ebooks, and then edit those by comparing with the print edition, instead of starting with scans and lousy OCR.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by Elfwreck

...
I've often wondered why publishers don't scour newsgroups & the torrent sites for bootleg ebooks, and then edit those by comparing with the print edition, instead of starting with scans and lousy OCR.

Yeah, sorta like getting the work done for free, eh?

[MrBlueSky]

Originally Posted by kennyc

Yeah, sorta like getting the work done for free, eh?

As in... Information Wants To Be Free, yes!


btw, that was my vote.

[Ben Thornton]

Originally Posted by Kevin2960

Exactly which is why I Still say Theft is Theft, letting it slide, glossing over it, dressing it up differently are the REASON our society is as it now is, And there may not be a way back to older values and better times!

Plato apparently said "What is happening to our young people? They disrespect their elders, they disobey their parents. They ignore the law. They riot in the streets inflamed with wild notions. Their morals are decaying. What is to become of them?". It still sounds very modern nearly 2500 years later!

I agree with Barnardo's as discussed in this BBC article, that demonising children in particular - and nostalgia for bygone days when there was more moral fibre in general - can be a dangerous and a damaging thing.

Perhaps my idea of asking whether people crying "thief" would like to be called "child molesters" has more merit than I had imagined. By legislating against a younger generation perceived as having lower morals, the older generation in power does indeed harm their children.

My hope is that those who lack a nuanced view of the situation (i.e. those at both extremes) are in the minority, as this poll suggests (athough it's a small sample that doesn't represent the populace at large).

[rwizard]

Originally Posted by dsvick

If you do not get the right to make a copy through legal means then copying it is wrong. Case closed, no discussion, it is cut and dried - if it is not legal to do something and you do it then it is wrong.

Hmm, by this logic the US should still be under British rule since I am positive that declaring our independence was illegal at the time. Yes this is an extreme example and no I don't think it is right to get a copy of something you have not paid for off the internet; but, something being illegal does not necessarily make it "wrong" in the moral sense. There have also been plenty of ridiculous laws in some states in the past (I think some states still have some ridiculous laws on the books) but not following a ridiculous law is not by definition morally wrong. I believe that this pole is on a question of morale judgement not legality. Of course, if your belief is that any thing that is legal is morally right and anything that is illegal is morally wrong, then that is a good argument. Just keep in mind that you are also arguing that slavery was at one time morally right (even if it is not now since it is now illegal), it was morally wrong to revolt against England, and it was morally right to prevent women from voting (just as examples).

Just something to think about .


Sorry, I had some strong feelings regarding a post toward the beginning of this thread and replied before reading the rest or noticing how many more posts there were.

[Kevin2960]

Originally Posted by Ben Thornton

Plato apparently said "What is happening to our young people? They disrespect their elders, they disobey their parents. They ignore the law. They riot in the streets inflamed with wild notions. Their morals are decaying. What is to become of them?". It still sounds very modern nearly 2500 years later!

I agree with Barnardo's as discussed in this BBC article, that demonising children in particular - and nostalgia for bygone days when there was more moral fibre in general - can be a dangerous and a damaging thing.

Perhaps my idea of asking whether people crying "thief" would like to be called "child molesters" has more merit than I had imagined. By legislating against a younger generation perceived as having lower morals, the older generation in power does indeed harm their children.


My hope is that those who lack a nuanced view of the situation (i.e. those at both extremes) are in the minority, as this poll suggests (athough it's a small sample that doesn't represent the populace at large).

Ben you are so out of order, although not directly saying it, you imply that those who disagree with you, and or believe that some of the practices of some people on this site amount to Theft, are nothing more than child molesters,

I've had enough, i refuse to take part on this thread anymore, you obviously started it following our previous discusions to stir up arguements,

I had thought you had the capacity to be a decent person, boy did i get that wrong !!!

[Jack Tingle]

What part of "illegal" is giving people problems?

You can work towards changing a law. You can militate for publishers to change the way they do business. You can even start your own business and run it your way. Breaking the law is still wrong. You may do like Thoreau and Ghandi, and break it, go to jail, pay the penalty and use that as a bully pulpit, but it's still wrong, even in a good cause.

Now, where the law is currently unclear is what is "illegal". If you get an ebook and put it into a torrent for all the world to read, that's clearly illegal. It's less clearly illegal if you sell an ebook you paid for to someone and erase all of your copies. It's very unclear whether you're allowed to format shift a book you paid for.

Don't you love simple answers?

Regards,
Jack Tingle

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by Ben Thornton

...

My hope is that those who lack a nuanced view of the situation (i.e. those at both extremes) are in the minority, as this poll suggests (athough it's a small sample that doesn't represent the populace at large).

You mean besides the fact that the "poll" was flawed from the beginning, biased by the group polled and "analyzed" without a proper sample size?

[Ben Thornton]

Originally Posted by Kevin2960

Ben you are so out of order, although not directly saying it, you imply that those who disagree with you, and or believe that some of the practices of some people on this site amount to Theft, are nothing more than child molesters,

Not at all. My point in a previous post was that calling people thieves was not pleasant, and that people could make up all sorts of arguments to use emotive labels - and I picked an especially emotive one on purpose, of course. The point here is that it is, in fact, harmful to the younger generation to label them all as thieves and attempt to legislate against them - as Baranados are keen to point out in the context of labelling children as hooligans etc.

I've had enough, i refuse to take part on this thread anymore, you obviously started it following our previous discusions to stir up arguements,

My starting this thread was nothing to do with you - it was to find out what people thought (that's what a poll is for), to get beyond the piracy is good/bad debate to a more nuanced discussion (some hope there, it seems).

You seem quick to take offence, but while you (and others) have been happy to call people thieves, talk about stealing, some saying that most people are thieves nowadays etc. - I have not made such sweeping statements. I find this labelling to be out of order. In contrast, I said:

This emotive language is not appropriate. If I consider my posts as my children, and anyone who disagrees with me as molesting my posts, should I refer to their actions as child molesting? Might that upset them? It would be inappropriate because what people mean by child molesting is different to what they are doing.

To spell this out in words of one syllable, it meant: "Stop calling people thieves - how would you like being called names?". In my more recent post, having found the article on the BBC which I felt was appropriate given the ranting agains the younger generation on this thread, I said:

Perhaps my idea of asking whether people crying "thief" would like to be called "child molesters" has more merit than I had imagined. By legislating against a younger generation perceived as having lower morals, the older generation in power does indeed harm their children.

My point being that it is harming children to have this kind of attitude towards them.

I had thought you had the capacity to be a decent person, boy did i get that wrong !!!

I suggest that you review your language and mine. I have refrained from responding in kind to people who sling around emotive terms and moral certainties - and now insults. Look to the beam in your own eye.

[Ben Thornton]

Originally Posted by kennyc

You mean besides the fact that the "poll" was flawed from the beginning, biased by the group polled and "analyzed" without a proper sample size?

Yes, besides those facts - (I said "athough it's a small sample that doesn't represent the populace at large", didn't I?) - I live in hope that both extremes are in the minority, as I said.

Of course, I don't get everything I hope for ...

[kennyc]

Like I always say, "When there's nothing else, in our darkest hour, when there is nothing left there still is hope."

[tompe]

Originally Posted by Ben Thornton

You seem quick to take offence, but while you (and others) have been happy to call people thieves, talk about stealing, some saying that most people are thieves nowadays etc. - I have not made such sweeping statements. I find this labelling to be out of order. In contrast, I said:To spell this out in words of one syllable, it meant: "Stop calling people thieves - how would you like being called names?".

Exactly. That point was very clearly put and I do not understand how people could miss it. Or how people can miss that if they use what others consider to be the wrong term they cannot complain when the same strategy is used against them.

[Ben Thornton]

Some of the attitudes on this thread reminded me of this video. And it seems appropriate given the topic to also link to this one!