Wow, how can so many people not understand the concept of copyright? It’s a valid concept and you are really missing something if you can’t understand it.
I have pirated material left, right and centre, but at least I don’t try to pretend it’s not theft. It is clear theft. It isn’t as bad as stealing something from a shop in many, many ways, but it is still theft.
No, the principle is not remotely the same. Real pirates forcibly rob people of their (extremely valuable) possessions under penalty of death. There is absolutely no comparison between this, and someone downloading a song or movie. The song/movie still exists, the original creator still owns it, nobody has been threatened, harmed or killed…what has happened is an illegal copy has been made.
If pirates were able to use duplication technology to instantaneously replicate a ship that they wanted to obtain for themselves, thousands of miles away from the actual ship, without anybody knowing or caring…then “the principle” would be “the same.”
Piracy is not theft nor is it piracy. Piracy involved peg legs, ships, parrots and 15 men on a dead man’s chest yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum. thief it taking something of a known and prepurchased value while espionage could cover the taking of secret material and ideas.
What the current offense is best case guesstimated loss of income, which is very dubious at best.
In the OP no it would not be unethical, because your audience would effectively have zero interest of financially supporting the artist but the work of that artist should be made as public as practical as to show it’s potential shortcomings.
Well, there is at least also some sort of “voyeurism” involved if you pirate a work that you “would find disagreeable”. I mean why should you pirate it at all if you find it disagreeable? To make assumptions and judge what other people like?
I meant to say something like kanicbird, i.e. that without the controversial elements, the work would be worthless to the ‘pirate’ so no potential benefit was lost.
Well, all you can learn from other people is that they found it offensive, not that you’d find it offensive, though… it might give you enough suspition to pirate it.
Well, they can delete it with just two clicks.
The principle is that taking something that doesn’t belong to you is wrong. How you took it may or may not involve other wrongs. Whether or not other wrongs are involved doesn’t matter to the OPs question.
Would you consider jay walking to be theft? If you say yes, then you’ve diluted theft to have little meaning, if you say no, then your definition is inconsistent because jay walking is taking a right of way that doesn’t rightfully belong to you.
This is what you call sophistry.
It is not meant to be a step forward in the search for truth, but is submitted
for the sole purpose of scoring a cheap point in debate.
Jaywalking is not taking away a right, it is claiming a right where none exists.
Not really, a ‘pirate’ in this case would only want to see or hear the horrible thing once, before deleting it.
It’s a distinct thing from ‘pirating’ something enjoyable, as most pirates would just stash it on their harddrive
Making a copy of something in order to enjoy it is no different from making a copy of it in order to make sure that you hate it.
What does this even mean?
**There is more than one kind of “real” pirate. another, non-maritime version has been around since Shakepeare’s time: **
(from link, emphasis added):
It remains sophistry to insist on having to qualify the phrase “permanent possession” to reflect the fact that a possessor may destroy his possession.
That is absurd. Jaywalking is a technical violation of the law which does not involve taking anything. Online piracy is no different than stealing a DVD from a store. I don’t like the copyright laws that create this situation for the convenience of the sellers, and I don’t like jaywalking laws. But I wouldn’t jaywalk and claim that I hadn’t broken any law because a policeman didn’t stop me from doing it, or because I only went halfway across the street and the came back, or because I didn’t like crossing the street. And I wouldn’t claim that stealing a DVD from a store isn’t wrong because I didn’t like the contents of the DVD.
It means you do not have a right to disobey pedestrain traffic regulations,
that is what.
I don’t think that’s actually what kanicbird said. What you seem to be saying is that if the work wasn’t controversial then the hypothetical pirate wouldn’t want it, so since it is controversial he’s justified in pirating it. However, this is so obviously irrational I can only hope I’ve misunderstood you.
So you think it’s okay to steal from people if you merely suspect that they’ve said or done something you might consider offensive. That’s a pretty vague standard, one that could be used to justify stealing anything and everything. If something is ordinarily unethical, it doesn’t suddenly become ethical if you’re motivated by spite. If anything that makes it worse.
There are two ethical things you can do if you’ve heard secondhand that a creative work is offensive. You can obtain access to this work through any of the legal means available to you, or you can live without ever reading/seeing/hearing it.
Well a DVD is a physical item. Inventory the store no longer has. Where as downloading is making a new copy. Therefore different.
What is being “stolen” is the legal monopoly on making copies, not store inventory. If infringing on a legal monopoly on production is theft. I don’t see why infringing on legal right of way isn’t theft.
I’m not is saying online piracy isn’t wrong, or is legal.
Because you’re stealing the right of way from it’s rightful owners.
The legal monopoly isn’t being stolen, it is maintained. Jaywalking does not create a new right of way or transfer one either. What’s being done is taking property that belongs to someone else.
I’m no fan of the way intellectual property is defined, or the public enforcement of property rights for owners who rely on the honor system. But that doesn’t change the situation any more than stealing a DVD from a store and shouting “DVDs belong to the people”.
If you think online piracy is wrong, how is different than what’s wrong with theft?