# Time for a renewed fracas on Illegal Downloading (Re: Thomas Verdict) **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [October 5, 2007, 10:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-renewed-fracas-on-illegal-downloading-re-thomas-verdict/421695 "2007-10-05T22:21:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2007, 1:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-renewed-fracas-on-illegal-downloading-re-thomas-verdict/421695/81 "2007-10-08T01:06:45Z")
[QUOTE=Mr2001] Unless you’re arguing that what she did somehow caused _more_ damage, you’re making **The Librarian** ’s point. [/QUOTE] The **Librarian** said > [@Librarian](#): > > To answer the question about the fairness of the fine, I’d like to pose another question: > > How much damages would she have had to pay if she physically stole and distributed (for free!) 24 cd-singles from a Music-store of your choosing? > > That jury was on crack. What possible relevance would the penalties for stealing CDs from a “Music-store” have on the case in question? ---
**Author:** ![Blalron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/35a633/32.png) [@Blalron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blalron)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2007, 1:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-renewed-fracas-on-illegal-downloading-re-thomas-verdict/421695/82 "2007-10-08T01:17:07Z")
[QUOTE=samclem] Cite for the RIAA writes the laws on copyright? [/QUOTE] Since I can’t prove they physically wrote it, I withdraw my claim that they did. ---
**Author:** ![Blalron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/35a633/32.png) [@Blalron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blalron)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2007, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-renewed-fracas-on-illegal-downloading-re-thomas-verdict/421695/83 "2007-10-08T01:18:47Z")
[QUOTE=samclem] The **Librarian** said What possible relevance would the penalties for stealing CDs from a “Music-store” have on the case in question? [/QUOTE] “Theft” is commonly used to describe the activity of illegal filesharing. Ok, even if we grant that it is theft, why is it punished much more severely than theft of a tangible item? ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2007, 1:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-renewed-fracas-on-illegal-downloading-re-thomas-verdict/421695/84 "2007-10-08T01:31:09Z")
[QUOTE=Mr2001] Devaluing someone’s property is not the same as stealing it. Suppose you make chainsaws at a cost of $50 and sell them for $100. I come up with a new way to make equally reliable chainsaws for $10, and I sell them for $30. Now I’ve devalued your entire inventory, because no one wants to buy yours when mine are so much cheaper. But I haven’t stolen anything; you still have a warehouse full of chainsaws. The loss of value is in the minds of your would-be customers, not in your property. [/QUOTE] Suggesting that this is parallel is stupid. Claiming the work of someone else as your own to sell and creating a competitively priced product are two entirely separate things. > [@](#): > > Ah, but there already was a way to profit, and a motive to create things for other people. It’s the same one that people had, and still have, in every other industry: the prospect of getting paid for their labor. If I’m the only guy in town who can write songs, and there are people around who like music and have money, then I don’t need copyright to make a profit. Their money will find its way into my hands simply because I have what they want. No, without the commodifiability of publication and distribution rights, there’s no worth in paying an artist any substantial amount for his work. If I pay him $1000 for his new song and within three hours of the release all of my competitors are already publishing their own copies, then I’m getting screwed in the ass. I had to pay $1000 where they just had to buy a single copy of the book. If he tries to publish it himself, he’ll have to purchase and maintain a server, set up a web store, and maintain this–which will require either hiring someone else or learning network security. And still within hours any competitor web bookstore will have his book up for download and there’s no reason for them to pay him a dime. And more importantly, there is no guarantee that _any_ author will be able to make a living. Prices in a free market fluctuate based on two things: How much is needed to attract and support skilled workers and their labor and how much people are willing to spend on it. If something is very expensive to produce, then it will have a high price, but alternately if it has low demand it will have a low price. Those two values conflict with each other and so decide the ultimate cost and the size of the worker pool within the industry (or simply kill it off if it just isn’t viable.) But so to support how ever many several thousand authors there are in the world, and based on the demand for their work, they **need** an average of $4 per copy or however much to be able to continue working. If they get paid less then the number of authors will lower to a point where it isn’t able to meet demand. Charge more and there won’t be enough demand to meet it to support all the authors. If the author has no way to negotiate a price with his customers, then he has every chance of getting screwed. And his power to negotiate a price is **dependent** on his being able to maintain publishing and distribution rights. If people can just grab a copy regardless of anything he does, then he has no power to negotiate. There is no value to becoming an author, and so there would be no authors–or at least none except people who did it as a hobby which would be less than enough to meet demand and certainly of much lower quality than is reasonable for a professional industry. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2007, 1:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-renewed-fracas-on-illegal-downloading-re-thomas-verdict/421695/85 "2007-10-08T01:35:38Z")
[QUOTE=Blalron] “Theft” is commonly used to describe the activity of illegal filesharing. Ok, even if we grant that it is theft, why is it punished much more severely than theft of a tangible item? [/QUOTE] With an intangible item, how many units do you own? ---
**Author:** ![Blalron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/35a633/32.png) [@Blalron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blalron)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2007, 1:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-renewed-fracas-on-illegal-downloading-re-thomas-verdict/421695/86 "2007-10-08T01:59:46Z")
[QUOTE=Sage Rat] With an intangible item, how many units do you own? [/QUOTE] I suppose each unique song on your hard drive would be counted as a unit. If I had a thousand copies of the same song on a hard drive in my personal possession, it would only count as one. If I had a thousand different songs on my harddrive, than that’s a thousand bucks worth of music “stolen.” I’ve heard snide comments about how my proposal is unfair, with a frowny icon accompanying it, but I haven’t seen any actual reasoning about what’s so unfair about ratcheting down the penalties for copyright infringement. Is the status quo really that great? ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2007, 2:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-renewed-fracas-on-illegal-downloading-re-thomas-verdict/421695/87 "2007-10-08T02:08:55Z")
[QUOTE=Blalron] I suppose each unique song on your hard drive would be counted as a unit. [/QUOTE] Alright, well if you have an unlimited distribution right for each one of those songs, how much is that possibly worth? Rock stars probably make millions off of each CD. So if you’ve stolen the distribution rights for every song on the CD, aren’t you liable for millions of dollars? ---
**Author:** ![Blalron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/35a633/32.png) [@Blalron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blalron)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2007, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-renewed-fracas-on-illegal-downloading-re-thomas-verdict/421695/88 "2007-10-08T02:19:49Z")
[QUOTE=Sage Rat] Alright, well if you have an unlimited distribution right for each one of those songs, how much is that possibly worth? Rock stars probably make millions off of each CD. So if you’ve stolen the distribution rights for every song on the CD, aren’t you liable for millions of dollars? [/QUOTE] Depends on many people you’ve distributed it to. ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2007, 2:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-renewed-fracas-on-illegal-downloading-re-thomas-verdict/421695/89 "2007-10-08T02:46:06Z")
[QUOTE=samclem] Cite for the RIAA writes the laws on copyright? [/QUOTE] OK. > [@RIAA.com](#): > > [the RIAA works to protect intellectual property rights worldwide and the First Amendment rights of artists; conducts consumer, industry and technical research; and monitors and reviews state and federal laws, regulations and policies.](http://www.riaa.com/newsitem.php?news_year_filter=1999&resultpage=&id=6446F9E7-95A3-F900-5648-43B6CCEFC6EB) ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2007, 2:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-renewed-fracas-on-illegal-downloading-re-thomas-verdict/421695/90 "2007-10-08T02:50:30Z")
[QUOTE=Blalron] Depends on many people you’ve distributed it to. [/QUOTE] Why can’t it be dependent on what you stole? If I steal a loaf of bread but am caught before I can sell it, should that mean that I shouldn’t be punished at all? ---
**Author:** ![Blalron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/35a633/32.png) [@Blalron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blalron)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2007, 2:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-renewed-fracas-on-illegal-downloading-re-thomas-verdict/421695/91 "2007-10-08T02:54:09Z")
[QUOTE=Sage Rat] Why can’t it be dependent on what you stole? [/QUOTE] Not sure where you’re going with this. If my hard drive contains a thousand identical copies of “Oops, I did it again” by Britney Spears, do you contend I’ve stolen a thousand separate times? ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2007, 2:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-renewed-fracas-on-illegal-downloading-re-thomas-verdict/421695/92 "2007-10-08T02:56:24Z")
[QUOTE=Blalron] Not sure where you’re going with this. If my hard drive contains a thousand identical copies of “Oops, I did it again” by Britney Spears, do you contend I’ve stolen a thousand separate times? [/QUOTE] Again, what you’ve stolen is an intangible item called “distribution rights.” What is the value of the distribution rights for “Oops, I did it again”? ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2007, 3:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-renewed-fracas-on-illegal-downloading-re-thomas-verdict/421695/93 "2007-10-08T03:02:35Z")
[Not to mention writing the new Iraqi copyright law.](http://www.theregister.co.uk/2003/04/29/riaas_rosen_writing_iraq_copyright) See also the [Intellectual Property Protection Act of 2007.](http://www.consumerist.com/consumer/riaa/should-attempted-copyright-infringement-be-a-criminal-offense-260635.php) Google also pointed me to [this beauty.](http://www.boycott-riaa.com/article/27921) Apparently, the US Copyright Office attempted, in apparent contravention of common sense & two different fundamental copyright laws, to “copyright” its database of copyright registrations. > [@](#): > > If someone, like a library of college, wants to acquire a copy of the Copyright Office’s database of copyright registrations, they will discover the following: “The Cataloging and Distribution Service of the Library of Congress sells a current subscription for $31,500 and makes the retrospective database available for $55,125 for a total cost of entry of $86,625. The Library of Congress Terms of Use assert copyright on this data.” Huh? A. The US gov’t can’t legally copyright anything. Now, the copyright is technically held by the Library of Congress, which is an arm of Congress, not the executive; but I suspect that Congress is still considered bound by that. B. US gov’t agencies have an obligation to make information like records of held copyrights & trademarks available. I understand that it’s expensive to release all that information, but they need a better way to justify the fees charged, because C. Even a private institution can’t copyright a mere list of information. So, I’m guessing the Copyright Office isn’t writing the laws themselves. That might require knowing what copyright is & is not. I’m sorry, is that a cheap shot? ---
**Author:** ![Blalron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/35a633/32.png) [@Blalron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blalron)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2007, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-renewed-fracas-on-illegal-downloading-re-thomas-verdict/421695/94 "2007-10-08T03:04:52Z")
[QUOTE=Sage Rat] Why can’t it be dependent on what you stole? If I steal a loaf of bread but am caught before I can sell it, should that mean that I shouldn’t be punished at all? [/QUOTE] If I’ve stolen a loaf of bread, then I’ve deprived you of the economic value of one loaf of bread. Plus the extra hassle of having to bring in the law to get the value of your loaf of bread back which ought to count for something. However, I shouldn’t be obligated to sell my car or my house to pay you back for a single loaf of bread I stole. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2007, 3:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-renewed-fracas-on-illegal-downloading-re-thomas-verdict/421695/95 "2007-10-08T03:10:53Z")
[QUOTE=Blalron] I’ve deprived you of the economic value of one loaf of bread. Plus the extra hassle of having to bring in the law [/quote] Indeed. Even though you didn’t have a chance to sell the bread, you are still liable for it’s economic value. > [@](#): > > However, I shouldn’t be obligated to sell my car or my house to pay you back for a single loaf of bread I stole. No of course not. I’m not arguing for anything more than the economical value of what you stole plus the extra hastle of bringing in the law. So again, what is the economic value of the _distribution rights_ for “Oops, I did it again”? ---
**Author:** ![Blalron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/35a633/32.png) [@Blalron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blalron)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2007, 3:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-renewed-fracas-on-illegal-downloading-re-thomas-verdict/421695/96 "2007-10-08T03:14:11Z")
[QUOTE=Sage Rat] Again, what you’ve stolen is an intangible item called “distribution rights.” What is the value of the distribution rights for “Oops, I did it again”? [/QUOTE] It depends on how many people I distributed the song to. If I personally possess one unique instance of the song than I’m guilty of stealing one song. If I copy it to my roommate than I’m guilty of stealing the distribution rights twice. If I distribute a thousand copies, than I’m guilty of a thousand counts of copyright infringement. The punishment should be proportionate to the offense. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2007, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-renewed-fracas-on-illegal-downloading-re-thomas-verdict/421695/97 "2007-10-08T03:18:02Z")
[QUOTE=Blalron] It depends on how many people I distributed the song to. The punishment should be proportionate to the offense. [/QUOTE] Why does it matter how many people I distributed the song to when it doesn’t matter that I wasn’t able to sell the loaf of bread? I could have distributed to a thousand people, I just got caught before I had a chance to. I could have distributed to ten or it could have been a million. My one unit of distribution rights is enough to supply the entire population of world with. And my intent was most certainly to take the right for everything I could get from it. ---
**Author:** ![Blalron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/35a633/32.png) [@Blalron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blalron)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2007, 3:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-renewed-fracas-on-illegal-downloading-re-thomas-verdict/421695/98 "2007-10-08T03:21:28Z")
[QUOTE=Sage Rat] Why does it matter how many people I distributed the song to when it doesn’t matter that I wasn’t able to sell the loaf of bread? [/quote] Why are we assuming that the loaf of bread was going to be sold? You’re extrapolating something that could theoretically happen, but which hasn’t happened. The mere fact that a song exists on my hard drive, does not, in and of itself, deprive the artist of anything. We are allowed to legally assume that it does but there really ought to be limits to how much we can assume. I can assume anything, but that doesn’t make the assumption reasonable. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2007, 3:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-renewed-fracas-on-illegal-downloading-re-thomas-verdict/421695/99 "2007-10-08T03:26:23Z")
[QUOTE=Blalron] Why are we assuming that the loaf of bread was going to be sold? You’re extrapolating something that could theoretically happen, but which hasn’t happened. [/QUOTE] To rephrase then, why am I being charged with the economic value of a loaf of bread if I steal bread, but I’m not being charged with the economic value of the distribution rights of a song? ---
**Author:** ![Blalron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/35a633/32.png) [@Blalron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blalron)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2007, 3:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-renewed-fracas-on-illegal-downloading-re-thomas-verdict/421695/100 "2007-10-08T03:29:30Z")
[QUOTE=Sage Rat] To rephrase then, why am I being charged with the economic value of a loaf of bread if I steal bread, but I’m not being charged with the economic value of the distribution rights of a song? [/QUOTE] If, as you say, the economic value of distribution rights are theoretically infinite (one copy can easily turn into a billion copies), why not charge an offender infinity dollars for each illegal song? Ok, there’s only six billion human beings. So six billion per song? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-renewed-fracas-on-illegal-downloading-re-thomas-verdict/421695.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-for-a-renewed-fracas-on-illegal-downloading-re-thomas-verdict/421695.md?page=6)