Illegal downloading is not theft - its something new

[Merryjest]

WARNING This is an hypotethical situation!
You probably won't get if you lack imagination (a sad thing for a gamer ), or just disagree Because :

-I'm in a isolated and ignored country ;
-there's a civil war and I might die tommorow, there's a game I want to play before that happens;
-the internet is heavily filtered (so no steam, but I can access some torrents using routers)
-anyway, if I somehow order it , chances it reach me are extremely slim or nonexistant.

Am I to die in misery because I can't get it legally?

What makes you so special that you deserve to break the rules merely because of your position? You are applying sentimentalism, and I'm sorry, it doesn't work. People die every day- fact of life- and most of them don't get what they want. I would actually call you an idiot, in this hypothetical situation, because you are wasting time playing on your computer instead of spending every waking hour of the day and night trying to devise an escape plan.

 

[Merryjest]

If i win the lottery and the state/someone takes all the money, is it theft?

Yep, actually. In the US, income taxation is not constitutionally supported- the government only has the constitutional right to tax for the services it provides (roads, education, fire, police, etc), giving you an income is not one of them (unless you work for them, I guess).

 

[Mathew952]

I agree. The real kicker is, they know all of those things. But it's hard to get people angry about "Copyright violations" than it is about theft. Analogies for Copyright violation:
What if your friend, borrowed your CD, copied it, and gave it back.
What if someone took a magazing from you, copied an article from it, and gave it back.
What if you came up with a joke and someone told it without permision.

You can't get people angry about that, to get laws passed. If you say theft,then it takes on all new connotations.

 

[Grampy_bone]

Downloading videogames is a victimless crime, like punching someone in the dark.

 

[Nimbus]

Downloading videogames is a victimless crime, like punching someone in the dark.

Wait, what?

 

[Alex_P]

MY system is evil? You are basically stating that the product and ideas of my own mind are NOT MINE. Your system calls for the slavery of man to other men, for the notion that his ideas aren't worth anything to him and he has no right to profit from them once he has concretized them. It is repulsive and repugnant, and it's clear that you have never thought how much *you* depend on the ideas of others, and on the fact that they decided to market those ideas.

Yes, the system in your head is evil, because -- to borrow your own overwrought language -- it makes all men slaves to the past. There is a reason copyrights and patents expire, and there are reason why copyright and patent laws include reasonable protections for public rights as well as the creators'.

US copyright and patent laws are all about striking a balance between public benefit and individual gain: copyrights and patents subsidize new intellectual achievements. The reason we want to encourage those achievements is that they produce non-rivalrous goods -- things that can be used to benefit anyone without diminishing their availability or value. This isn't stupid wishful thinking. This is the way American laws were designed to work: competing principles in balance.

-- Alex

 

[Alex_P]

If i win the lottery and the state/someone takes all the money, is it theft?

Yep, actually. In the US, income taxation is not constitutionally supported- the government only has the constitutional right to tax for the services it provides (roads, education, fire, police, etc), giving you an income is not one of them (unless you work for them, I guess).

You realize amendments are actually part of the Constitution, right? [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sixteenth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution]

-- Alex

 

[elpresidente]

People who wage forum wars against free downloaders are simply pissed off becuse they spend 70 bucks for a game and it turns out it is crap. They want everyone to share their misery.

Also, the mainstream media get paid to blurt out all kinds of overstretched lies against the downloaders - how they are ruining the business and whatnot. Why is Blizard still in business going sronger than ever? Because pirates or not - they don't make shit games, that's why.

 

[Alex_P]

Also, the mainstream media get paid to blurt out all kinds of overstretched lies against the downloaders - how they are ruining the business and whatnot.

I'm pretty sure they aren't.

-- Alex

 

[Merryjest]

If i win the lottery and the state/someone takes all the money, is it theft?

Yep, actually. In the US, income taxation is not constitutionally supported- the government only has the constitutional right to tax for the services it provides (roads, education, fire, police, etc), giving you an income is not one of them (unless you work for them, I guess).

You realize amendments are actually part of the Constitution, right? [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sixteenth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution]

-- Alex

You mean like the anti gay marriage amendment they were trying to pass?
Must all be good, then.

 

[Merryjest]

(...)

Sounds to me like you are someone who loves to benefit from the ideas of others- just as long as the others don't know how valuable those ideas are. It never ceases to amuse me the lengths to which collectivists thrive on the sanction of the victim.

 

[Alex_P]

You mean like the anti gay marriage amendment they were trying to pass?
So, according to you, just because it's written down on a legal document it means it is right.

I guess this is where critical thinking goes to die.

When something is written down in the motherfuckin' Constitution, it is -- say it with me now, chief -- "constitutionally supported."

-- Alex

 

[Alex_P]

(...)

Sounds to me like you are someone who loves to benefit from the ideas of others- just as long as the others don't know how valuable those ideas are. It never ceases to amuse me the lengths to which collectivists thrive on the sanction of the victim.

Sounds to me like the only book you've ever read is Atlas Shrugged.

-- Alex

 

[Merryjest]

I guess this is where critical thinking goes to die.

When something is written down in the motherfuckin' Constitution, it is -- say it with me know, chief -- "constitutionally supported."

-- Alex[/quote]

(...)

Sounds to me like you are someone who loves to benefit from the ideas of others- just as long as the others don't know how valuable those ideas are. It never ceases to amuse me the lengths to which collectivists thrive on the sanction of the victim.

Sounds to me like the only book you've ever read is Atlas Shrugged.

-- Alex

You should do yourself a favor and read the Nichomachean ethics.

 

[sequio]

If i win the lottery and the state/someone takes all the money, is it theft?

Yep, actually. In the US, income taxation is not constitutionally supported- the government only has the constitutional right to tax for the services it provides (roads, education, fire, police, etc), giving you an income is not one of them (unless you work for them, I guess).

It was a rhetorical question. Just trying to point out taking what is due is theft.

 

[Northover32]

"You wouldn't steal a BMW would you?"

Damn right i would! if it took about 4 seconds, and i could steal like 20 at a time without being caught! No one can denie that if they wern't gonna get caught they would definately steal a brand new car!

 

[Merryjest]

"You wouldn't steal a BMW would you?"

Damn right i would! if it took about 4 seconds, and i could steal like 20 at a time without being caught! No one can denie that if they wern't gonna get caught they would definately steal a brand new car!

Actually, yes they would deny it. The answer to that question is what separates quality from trash.

 

[Alex_P]

You should do yourself a favor and read the Nichomachean ethics.

Instead of name-dropping Aristotle you could go read up on the history of the US copyright and patent law systems.

Instead you call me a "collectivist" because I actually know something about why America's system of copyright and patent law was, ostensibly, created.

(How do you reconcile this obsession with artificial monopolies and your obligatory Objectivist devotion to free markets, anyway?)

-- Alex

 

[soulsabr]

And statistically speaking, it will rain if you open your umbrella. You use bad logic to justify what is clearly an act of theft. Because the definition is not ultimately specific and because there is no physical object taken, it is still theft. Lets try another way of looking at the illegal copying of digital property. If you didn't buy an object, x, then x would not be in your possession. Also, what about if somebody came to your house, babysat for you, and you didn't pay them? There was no loss of property, right? The same is with digital property. They didn't lose the possible opportunity to sell you their digital property, you took that from them by obtaining said property by an illicit method. Stealing is stealing, period. You can try to justify it, but it will never be OK.

 

[Alex_P]

You can try to justify it, but it will never be OK.

There are many acts that don't constitute theft and yet are still not okay.

Murder, for instance.

You could make some argument about how murder is "theft of life," but I find it easier to say that that murder is distinct from theft but wrong anyway. You know, on its own merits.

-- Alex