Downloading Music and Software?

[Quath]

Since users of music don't sign any agreements saying that they won't copy the content and give it freely to friends, they are thus not legally liable if the just give it freely.

Copyright laws are the agreement. So one does not need to be spelled out verbatum for a sales transation.

End user agreements are largely bogus legalese nonetheless, mostly an attempt by companies to reduce the likelyhood of lawsuits, "Windows is not for use on lifesupport equipment" and just plain silliness, "Use of Java may result in disease, serious injury or death."

I agree with you here. A lot of end user agreements have not been tested by law. For all I know, I have signed myfirt born offspring to Windows when I click on the "Accept" button.

Your analogies to a kid in a candy store and Bob the shoplifter are false. The Record companies can't say that they would have made more money if filesharing didn't exist, the evidence just isn't there.

My analogy was that even if the music industry lost no money, it was still stealing. Just as taking candy from a store that lost no money is stealing.

Quath

 

[cubedbee]

It sounds like you don't believe in theft of an idea or intellectual property.

Sorry, I lost track of this thread. No, I don't particularly believe in IP.

1. A coworker came up with a great marketing idea. You read his notes and present it first to your boss. In that case I would say you stole his idea.

You would say that, but it's just a figure of speech. Ideas aren't objects that can be owned. In this situation, what I did wrong was deceiving and/or lying to my boss in order to falsely take glory for myself.

2. Microsoft comes up with a new OS. Someone copies it and gives it away on the internet for free. Microsoft loses millions of dollars from this. I would say this copying is equivalent to stealing millions of dollars and passing it out to people around the world. But it was still stealing.

If Microsoft loses millions of dollars, it's their own fault for bad financial problems--it is not a theft. No more than the guy selling cheap knockoff purses on the corner is stealing from the original manufacturers. Some people are willing to save money by buying copies of the originals. Other people will pay more money and only settle for the original, generally because the original is of higher quality. If Microsoft develops a long string of binary data, and foolishly makes it so that copies of this data have near same quality as the original, then they should expect that many people will not pay for the original. They aren't truly "losing millions" though, because it's unlikely that most of the people who are using the copies would have bought the original if copies did not exist.

3. You find your daughter's diary. You photocopy it and sell it to a publisher. You daughter still has her diary, so nothing material was lost to her. But her secrets were stolen.

Once again, this is a matter of dishonestly taking credit, and money, for something that isn't yours, not stealing. Secrets can be revealed, not stolen.

So patent and copyright laws are designed to deal with theft on the intellectual side instead of the physical side. The morality is that taking something from someone (idea or property) without permission is theft.

Patent laws and copyright laws both prohibit others from profiting off the patent/copyright holders ideas for a fixed period of time. They do not prohibit others from copying either the physical object, or the copyrighted material, if the use is not ofr profit.

 

[Quath]

Sorry, I lost track of this thread. No, I don't particularly believe in IP.

Without IP, who would want to pay for research if someone could just copy it with no cost to themself? It would really hurt R&D efforts.

Patent laws and copyright laws both prohibit others from profiting off the patent/copyright holders ideas for a fixed period of time. They do not prohibit others from copying either the physical object, or the copyrighted material, if the use is not ofr profit.

There is "fair use" copying such as taking snippets for reporting, parody and education. That is the only free copying allowed.

Judges have ruled that copying music on the internet is a violation of copyright laws, even though here is no money in it. That is why they have been going after the file sharing companies that work for free.

Quath

 

[bobo81]

This is a great post.

Ive been wondering where to download christian music? Any particular software?