I think that what I thought was a matter relevant to this discussion–artistic use of copyrighted material–has become a fullgrown hijack and is confusing the issue. Sorry bout that.
Despite your best efforts to differentiate the two, violating a copyright is “stealing” in the classic sense. The fact that the “property” involved isn’t some “tangible” thing you can touch is of no importance. After all, there are plenty of “property” rights that are intangable that you would be quite happy to enforce, I am certain.
Theft is theft. Use of something that doesn’t belong to you without the permission of the owner is a form of theft. And, yes, a thing that is illegal is immoral on a societal basis; your personal morality is of little concern, or otherwise societal norms would be of no value at all. To argue that something is “moral” because some particular individual perceives it to be moral is to make anything “moral.”
What if it’s illegal because a special interest group bought themselves a law?
You seem to be missing a big point. It takes a HUGE amount of work to create that music in the first place. It isn’t the media, its the content. Making the content is a huge undertaking. Years of practice and in many cases a year or more recording the content. The fact that the content can be copied does not mean that it is moral to do so.
MEDIA!=CONTENT.
When a band sells a CD, they are not selling just the physical CD, they are selling the songs on the CD. The CD is just the delievery method.
Oh, and you are wrong. You can take what does not physically belong to another person. Cite. Cite 2. None of those people physically owned what was taken from them.
And last, the idea of abandoning copyrights (or any other property rights) just because there are thieves in the world is just stupid.
Slee
msmith537 and mks57, it sounds like both of you are arguing that there should be no IP ownership, is this correct?
If so, why allow real property to be owned but not IP?
I would argue that in both cases our economy is helped by providing people incentive to work knowing that they can expect to gain some reward. Maybe you feel that ownership laws should not be related to our ability to make a living, if so, please explain what the underlying theory for laws on ownership should be based on.
The question isn’t “how can artists make money given that lots of people will use their work and not pay for it?”
The question is “is it right for people to use an artists work without paying for it?”
When works go public domain, what would you call that in the “classic sense”? The government defines exactly how much right you have to the work, both in the length of time and what constitutes fair use. This is not generally the case with other property. The government does not normally have the right to say that my property will become the world’s property after a period of time, nor can they say others can use my property without my permission as long as they only use it for a short time.
When you call it theft, all you’re doing is opening up the argument about whether or not it is theft. Copyright infringement is just as illegal as theft, I don’t see why it’s necessary to argue that it’s something else as well.
Laws usually reflect society’s morals. However, once you claim that laws define our morality, you give up a bit of your humanity. There have been more than enough odious laws in world history to prove that laws are not always moral.
Stealing in the “classic” sense means picking something up and walking away with it.
No, I am arguing about a very specific aspect of IP ownership and the nature of the ownership.
For example, I cannot simply take the lyrics to someone elses song and pass it off as something I created. I cannot make a copy of an artists work and release it to the public whenever I choose (like what happened with Dave Mathews Band’s Lilly White Sessions). I can’t start burning bootleg copies of CDs and selling them on the street because the artist did not decide to go into business with me.
But once the music is out there, the artist has little control over it. He can prevent someone else making money off of his work, but he can’t control when and how people listen to it or what they do with it in their own homes.
Think about it this way, if an artist decides that he doesn’t like a song he releases, does he have the right to recall all copies that have been sold? Are we ethically obligated to turn in our CDs?
The question IS about money otherwise no one would care. We want to compensate artists for their work in order to provide incentives for them to keep providing us with their work.
Define morality and I will tell you if filesharing is or isnt immoral
[disappears up own philosophers arse]
Morality is the compromise humans make with one another so that our competing desires to live happily don’t interfere with one another’s, and the overall price of the compromise is balanced out among all.
I hold that people who download songs have obfuscated the issue by constantly claiming that the RIAA and others are against all forms of file-sharing when the RIAA’s position has always been against the downloading of copyrighted sound recordings, a position that mentions nothing about non-copyrighted materials, or hell, even other copyrighted materials that aren’t covered by the RIAA. Like books, for example.
Just because it’s difficult to prevent does not make it right, does it?
I don’t think this is relevant. When I purchased the CD there is an agreement we entered into, I give money for the right to unlimited personal use of the music. Nowhere in that agreement did I say I would return the CD if the artist demanded it.
The question in the OP is just a simple right/wrong question.
Yes there is a larger issue and that is how to solve the problem that currently exists, and that is an interesting question to debate, and maybe you’ve already answered the right/wrong and are on to the next logical question, but the impression I get is that you haven’t actually taken a clear position on the OP’s question yet.
Explain to me how it’s wrong.
My position is that it is at worst morally neutral. It’s no more immoral than making a tape mix.
Because the artist invested time, energy and money to produce a product with the understanding (based on our laws) that the right to listen to it could be traded for money.
In summary:
- It’s against the law.
- It deprives the artist the right to determine how best to make use of their product.
Why do you think it’s wrong to make unauthorized use of real property?
I’m curious about your position on each of the follwing examples of things that are easy to copy and are basically just information:
A book?
A movie?
Software?
Logo?
Trademark?
Company Name?
Patented design of a product?
What about transaction data within my companies ERP system? Customer lists, product pricing, costs, strategic plans, salary information, etc.?
Is there a difference between any of this and music?
Cheesesteak is absolutely right. A classic example is slavery. It may have been legal, but surely has never been moral.
Cheesesteak is absolutely right. A classic example is slavery. It may have been legal, but it surely has never been moral.
I think patents and copyrights serve a useful purpose. In general, I reject the concept of intellectual property, as it is used by those who would like it to be equivalent to more established property rights. Patents and copyright should be viewed as temporary grants of rights by the government, to advance the interests of society. Joe Blow, or Disney, getting rich is not one of those interests, just a side-effect or a means to an end. Copyrights and patents can only be justified if they provide benefits to society that outweigh their costs.
I would like to see copyright terms reduced to the minimum needed to provide a reasonable chance for the author to make a profit on his work. Let’s say 20 years after publication. I also support a liberal interpretation of fair use. People should be able to make use of short excerpts from copyrighted works without obtaining permission or having to pay for it. Copyrights should not be used as a tool of censorship. If you refuse to publish your work, or offer it to the public, the copyright should be voided. Abandoned copyrights should also be voided. I’d like to see a requirement for copyright registration, to avoid the present situation where everything, no matter how trivial, is “born copyrighted”.
Patents definitely are viewed by everyone as temporary monopolies.
They can. It’s done every day.
Many jurisdictions have a law that specifically bars actions (usually copyright and trademark actions) that are aimed at preventing the defendant from speaking. These are known as anti-slapp suits (“slapp” = “strategic lawsuit against public participation”).
So, people should be able to steal and publish your personal diaries, works in progress, and other personal secrets without your permission?
Define “abandoned” in a copyright context.
That would violate the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works.
This is patently untrue. The Copyright Act of 1976 protects only works that show a minimum level of creativity and originality (that are fixed in a perceivable medium). The following things are examples of things that are not protectable: compilations of facts or common information, words, short phrases (names, titles, slogans), and blank forms.