I buy all my music and movies online, and if I can get the product instantly rather than wait a week for it to arrive, I’ll certainly chose that option (assuming the music is not in some rediculous proprietary format which does not allow me the same freedom a CD does). Fortunately, the music genres I’m interested are generally not affiliated with the music dinosaurs of the 20th century, allowing me easy access to the music I want to buy. The same is unfortunately not true for the movie industry, so I’m still stuck with buying movies physically.
I don’t personally try to argue right or wrong, because it’s not as if morals really play a role at all. Most people don’t pirate because they are trying to be “immoral.” They do it because of economics (and be aware, economics != just money). If the situation causes people to pirate intellectual property, then it will happen, and it is merely a fact of life. Morals are also not factual in either way, so I don’t feel as if they hold up much straw at all.
I just live with the fact that some people pirate, and some people don’t. If the industry wishes to reduce piracy, then it can figure out why people are compelled to pirate, and remove that particular reasoning. iTunes (and similar online music stores) made it much easier to purchase songs spontaneously, where it wasn’t as accessible or easy as it was, and that likely reduced piracy quite a lot.
Trying to argue morals is also impossible to do right. Whether the total societal benefit is positive or negative is impossible to judge. Anecdotal evidence is useless. I say forget it, and let economics take its path. It simplifies the situation and presents solutions, rather than dabble in philosophy.
ethical motive: motivation based on ideas of right and wrong
“right” can be defined as the easiest path to a goal. We are made primarily of water and electricity, it’s in our nature to follow the path of least resistance.
As long as it is easier to download music for free on the Internet than it is to earn the money required to buy that music, the “right” thing to do is download it for free.
Once downloading music for free on the Internet becomes harder than earning the money to buy that music, the “right” thing to do will be to earn the money and buy it.
This is not to say that ethics have nothing to do with the feelings and needs of others.
Consider an artist who just sits on their *** in some different part of the world than you and cries about people stealing their music.
Now consider a boss who screams at you for 2 hours while you earn the money to buy the music.
Which one would you rather deal with ?
Remember, there are three people that matter here.
Which is also a very strong point. There’s a fee on all recordable medias in Denmark as well, so everyone here who downloads copyrighted files actually do pay for what they download. The ethical problem is, this money doesn’t go to the artists, but to the Danish RIAA-equivilant.
[ot]
Absolutely brilliant! Follow the current, you might say I might steal that some day ;)[/ot]
I think that pricing has a lot to do with this. As an example, photoshop is an expensive program, but I do believe that, even being a fantastic software and I love it, it would not be that widely used if it wasn’t because it has been copied (illegaly) so many times.
I don’t know why, but while I listen to copied music, I refuse to steal photoshop. Okay maybe because then I’d have to go get a dedicated Windows machine as well, or maybe because the open source community is pretty good at similar software, but I won’t steal programs. Weird.
I rarely if ever take from torrents (last time it was to replace a broken cassette), but I get some music from my brother in law, who I think gets it online.
So I got the newest album from Delain, and while their first album wasn’t anything I’d buy, I like every song on this one. So I’m definitely going to buy it (going to a concert of theirs in December, and I do like to buy albums at concerts rather than stores if I can). I’m listening to them now but I consider it similar to listening to a friend’s copy or to them on the radio. Since I know I’m going to buy the album I don’t worry about it and don’t feel bad.
To answer the OP if he’s still taking notes : )
I don’t consider it unethical if it’s a sound test. If I like the music, and I can purchase the album, then generally I will. I do consider it unethical to have copies of music that you happily listen to but did not pay for (and I have some music like that in my playlist, and am slowly trying to get all legal copies just for my own reasons).
I don’t consider it unethical to get digital copies of music I already own in vinyl, cassette or other analog form. I bought the CD of Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, but I got a copied version of the White Album. But I own them all on record already. It may be illegal, I don’t know and never bothered to find out, but I don’t find it unethical.
I don’t consider it unethical if the band is sending out the albums themselves. (as listed above, like Radiohead etc have done)
I don’t consider it unethical if the record company decided to make the music unavailable to me because of where I live (that’s wrong), or if the album/music is no longer available. I don’t consider it unethical if I pay for music or a movie but it doesn’t play in all my players or doesn’t play on my computer due to DRM or regional encoding. I’ll go take the online version that works. I paid for it, dammit, it had better work whether it’s in a car or on a computer.
I’m tempted by the idea of stealing music simply because DRM is evil, but I don’t. Sticking it to the man doesn’t really work, I don’t think.
The way the OP has posed the question makes it somewhat redundant. Torrents by nature are designed to distribute data - that is, you can’t download without uploading as well. So the question becomes: is it ethical to take and distribute copyright material without the rights holder’s permission? I don’t think anyone could answer yes to that. I don’t think there can be much discussion around this point either: doing something that requires permission without permission is inherently unethical, isn’t it?
EDIT — I can think of one ethical reason to circumvent copyright protection: when you have purchased the product and download a hacked version to alleviate the frustration of complying with the built in protection mechanisms. Not legal, but ethical I think.
At any rate, I say “go the torrents”.
For software I give you linux. For movies I give you this gem: Ink. For textbooks I give you the library.
I don’t think the world would be worse off if movie studios had to cut actor salaries from $50 mill to $5 mill.
[OT]
Personally I think this is the problem, and the reason torrents are so prevalent: the staple business model needs addressing.[/OT]
So the question becomes: is it ethical to take and distribute copyright material without the rights holder’s permission?
I disagree. There’s a very big difference between sharing a music piece, which has a grotesque and completely unnecessary administrative overhead with the creator of the contents receiving virtually no money, and sharing a self-published niche book where the author is out more than 10 000 dollars.
Only if ethical values vary per individual. I’m saying it is unethical to do something to someone against their will, you’re saying it’s fine if they are grotesque.
I’m saying it is unethical to do something to someone against their will, you’re saying it’s fine if they are grotesque.
Certainly - I do not believe that the free will of a person (or, in this case, a corporation) is above everything else. If we take your stace to the logical extreme, you are saying that it is unethical to prevent e.g. child molestation, if that is the will of the child molester. I strongly disagree with that.
I wouldn’t consider that stealing. I think that most of the people wouldn’t buy it, anyway… they only do small retouches to their pictures at home.
The second group belogns to those who want to learn how to use the software and they would not be able to do it if they didn’t have a full working copy of it.
And although Adobe is fighting against it, the truth is that if they are at the top of retouching software is because Photoshop is great and also because many people downloads it and learns how to use it and therefore they will always choose it because they know how it works.
The problem now becomes the definition of ethical. The child molestation example doesn’t work: the molester is doing something to someone against their will, therefore, of course it is ethical to stop them. A better example might be “intervention” or forced rehabilitation from some addiction.
However, neither of these cases touch on the actual subject at hand. An author has willingly entered into an agreement with a third party in order to maximise their profit. Or, alternatively, an author has attempted to fund the distribution of their own works.
Either way, you have no ethical right to distribute their work without their permission, and arguing that author A made less money/etc than author B holds no relevance. Best case scenario you become a vigilante.
Hash, I agree with you up to a point. I mean, it is true, you don’t have the right to distribute a work without his authorisation. But most of the authors and bands don’t complain about their music being distributed free via torrents. The Music companies do. And the few bands that did said something about it (Metallica, The Corrs) were affected negatively and seriously in the sales of records and therefore in their profits, right at the beggining, and were forced to do it by their company record (although they believed what they said. The Corrs said in an interview that you had to buy the rights if you bought the CD, but also that you had to pay again each time if you wanted to do a copy on a cassette, or any other media. I think this is really exagerated.)
This was many years ago, at the very beggining, and I haven’t heard anything of the kind in the last few years (although it may be that I haven’t paid attention :D)
Maybe if authors did have a share of the pie (they receive almost nothing for their work) it would be another thing.
Yet, all the polemic regarding torrents was and is a question of money, due to the possible lack of profits for the music industry (thanks to the RIAA and similar organizations in other countries) which has proved to be minimum and even wrong. What they lost on one side, they won it on the other.
Most of the authors and bands love the attention they get in this way, cheaper and faster than using other medium.
I wouldn’t consider that stealing. I think that most of the people wouldn’t buy it, anyway… they only do small retouches to their pictures at home.
Which is sad since there are so many programs for simple stuff like that out there, free or low-cost, that do it better (because of a simpler interface).
The fact that Adobe does such terrible price gouging is reason enough for me to never, ever support them with my money. Well, and their nasty Linux support. And that you can’t even have the privilege of buying their overpriced stuff without JS turned on (I got asked to “upgrade” my browser to AOL!). Oh and even though I chose “Dutch”, all buying information always goes to Engrish, as do any pages for downloading their Acrobat Reader (talk about confusing for older Dutch people to download!).
An image editor
A PDF document maker
Full from € 415.31
A text editor
Full from € 570.01
A back-end (server-side) programming language
Full from € 5,462.10
Though I guess this supports your original suggestion, molona, that cost is one reason people take from online. For me, it’s one reason never to touch their products except when forced. Seriously, 5 thousand euros for cold fusion… is that why Adobe’s site runs so slowly?? : )
The problem now becomes the definition of ethical. The child molestation example doesn’t work: the molester is doing something to someone against their will, therefore, of course it is ethical to stop them.
That wasn’t what you wrote. You wrote that, no matter how grotesque, it is unethical to prevent someones free will. And your example fails, because it is also against the free will of those downloading through torrents to be stopped.
However, neither of these cases touch on the actual subject at hand. An author has willingly entered into an agreement with a third party in order to maximise their profit. Or, alternatively, an author has attempted to fund the distribution of their own works.
Either way, you have no ethical right to distribute their work without their permission, and arguing that author A made less money/etc than author B holds no relevance. Best case scenario you become a vigilante.
I disagree entirely with your ethical viewpoint, then. My ethics tells me that the action which benefits the most people, both in the short and the long run, it the right one.
Yes you can. Just set the available bandwidth for uploading to zero.
Anyway the use of torrent for distributing of open source software and similar is both legal and ethical and is probably the best method by which to distribute the larger files - and that is the sort of thing that torrent was created to do.
Ah I don’t think that’s what I wrote. That would mean I couldn’t prevent axe murderers form axe murdering people. The artist enters into a contract with the record label, they are not forcibly imprisoned, so it is unethical to do something with either parties property against their will.
You are defining the benefit. If I decide it is beneficial to 1 billion people to murder a few million, that is only ethical in my mind, not to societies’ standards in general. In general, it is not ethical to do something with someone else’s property without their consent.
I thought there was a share ratio, so I wouldn’t attempt this in case I accidentally destroyed the world with a divide by zero operation (:
From what I can see by checking out a few torrent sites there are lots more people using it to copy without sharing what they copy than there are who distribute. So if setting it to zero will end the world then the world ended long ago.
I did finally paid for my copy when CS3 came out. I bought the web premium package which included Flash, Illustrator and some other software. It costed me 2350 Euros.
The software is great but they can wait for me to buy the next version! I’m not that rich
Ah I don’t think that’s what I wrote. That would mean I couldn’t prevent axe murderers form axe murdering people.
True.
The artist enters into a contract with the record label, they are not forcibly imprisoned, so it is unethical to do something with either parties property against their will.
But you are ignoring the free will of those who wish to download the music.
You are defining the benefit. If I decide it is beneficial to 1 billion people to murder a few million, that is only ethical in my mind, not to societies’ standards in general. In general, it is not ethical to do something with someone else’s property without their consent.
You stated that the contract between the artist and the record company is profit-motivated. Thus, the benefit for these two parties would be to make more money. If the actions of a third party helps these two parties make more money, for example by downloading some of their music (which has been shown to be the case), then that action would be beneficial.
I might steal that some day ;)[/ot]
That’s a good question.