Poll: Piracy is legal

[Entitled]

Well, it is, assuming that you live in one of the countries [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/114537-File-sharing-Remains-Legal-In-Switzerland] such as Switzerland or The Netherlands that either already legalized it, or at least decriminalized it.

For the rest of you, the question is this: If piracy (that is, individual, non-commercial sharing of otherwise copyrighted data) would be legal in your country, would that change your feelings in any way about whether or not the people using it are thiefs/assholes/self-entitled freeloaders respectively?

(Vote "other" if you feel that it was always a morally ambigious or acceptable or neutral act to begin with).

I'm asking this because in te usual "morality of piracy" threads, we tend to hit a wall when we get to the point of wheter it is the letter of the law that makes something right or wrong, or it's something that's inherently there. So this time, let's focus on just that.

 

[General Twinkletoes]

I don't see how the legality of piracy ever really mattered to anyone, who apart from a few providers was actually was at risk of being caught and punished?

It's always been a morality thing. Whether it's legal or not, my opinion stays the same.

 

[SckizoBoy]

I've got myself a letter of marque from my government, so it's not technically piracy, it's privateering... ¬_¬

 

[BrassButtons]

That wouldn't really change my opinion at all. I'm part of an artistic community (chainmail) so I've seen how upset people can become when their work is stolen. It often doesn't matter if the thief is making money from the material or not--what matters is that someone put a lot of time and effort into creating something, only to find another person acting like they own it. That other person is a jackass, no question.

I mean, take a look at my avatar. Do you know what went into making that image? MONTHS of work. I didn't just find something cool and snap a photo of it--I found an (open source) image of a Jolly Roger, adapted it to a pattern, played around with some of the details, spent no small amount of money on rings, and then proceeded to make the damn thing one link at a time--and then had to UNMAKE it in several places to fix mistakes (the weave is so tight that I couldn't just remove one ring out of the middle--if a link needed to go then every row under it had to be undone as well. I nearly cried when I realized I had a mistake 8 or 9 rows up). That's the biggest chainmail project I've ever completed. If someone were to steal that photo I would be insulted. It's not just about the image, but about what the image represents.

 

[Keoul]

Morality is subjective
So it varies from person to person, there really isn't a right answer for this. Also just a word of caution

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[bastardofmelbourne]

I don't see how the legality of piracy ever really mattered to anyone, who apart from a few providers was actually was at risk of being caught and punished?

It's always been a morality thing. Whether it's legal or not, my opinion stays the same.

I almost don't know what to say - it's fundamentally a legal question. Asking whether piracy is "okay" is basically asking "is it legal?" Copyright infringement is a legal concept with a legal definition. Morality never really comes into it.

It's not like, say, lying, which can sometimes be illegal (such as with fraud) but which is fundamentally a moral question. Copyright infringement only exists because the law has created intellectual property rights to be infringed. It has zero basis in moral principles. Even "giving the creator their due" isn't a foundation principle for copyright law - if it was, the rights would be inalienable like they are in Germany, meaning the creator can never sell them away.

Basically, it's a bad thing because the law says so, not because people actually think it's a bad thing. I don't think I've ever met anyone face-to-face who sincerely thought pirates were bad people.

 

[5ilver]

Each individual decides what is morally okay for him and what isn't.

If it was legal, I think most people would also consider it morally okay- same as what's happening with weed currently.

 

[Tom_green_day]

Downloading films/games/music for your own use when normally you would need to pay is robbery, and robbery is illegal. I think they should crack down on this even harder than on actual robbery, as this is easier.

 

[Hagi]

I don't see how the legality of piracy ever really mattered to anyone, who apart from a few providers was actually was at risk of being caught and punished?

It's always been a morality thing. Whether it's legal or not, my opinion stays the same.

I almost don't know what to say - it's fundamentally a legal question. Asking whether piracy is "okay" is basically asking "is it legal?" Copyright infringement is a legal concept with a legal definition. Morality never really comes into it.

It's not like, say, lying, which can sometimes be illegal (such as with fraud) but which is fundamentally a moral question. Copyright infringement only exists because the law has created intellectual property rights to be infringed. It has zero basis in moral principles. Even "giving the creator their due" isn't a foundation principle for copyright law - if it was, the rights would be inalienable like they are in Germany, meaning the creator can never sell them away.

Basically, it's a bad thing because the law says so, not because people actually think it's a bad thing. I don't think I've ever met anyone face-to-face who sincerely thought pirates were bad people.

I'd say there's some morality in play with more moderated copyright laws.

The idea that it's unfair for person A to come up with something and person B to then steal it and reap the profits is a moral one. And that's what copyright laws were originally based on, I think.

Seems that nowadays, specially in the states, it's less about right and wrong and more about companies and profit though, so you've got a point there.

 

[Chimpzy_v1legacy]

I'd like to point out that piracy is not strictly legal in the Netherlands.

What the law says is that you are allowed a copy for personal use of any copyrighted materials you already own a legitimate copy of. This means downloading a torrent of that Foo Fighters (or whatever music you like) cd you have lying on your desk is ok.

Downloading that cd because you don't feel like buying it legitimately is technically still illegal, though you are unlikely to get into any trouble for it unless you start distributing it on a large scale or something like that.

However, software (including games) is an exception to this rule. You are still allowed a copy, but only if you make it yourself (i.e. no downloading or getting it from a friend or such) and only to have a backup in case the original gets destroyed. But again, you're very unlikely to get into any legal trouble for it.

 

[Quaxar]

Downloading films/games/music for your own use when normally you would need to pay is robbery, and robbery is illegal. I think they should crack down on this even harder than on actual robbery, as this is easier.

Not sure if you realize that we're not talking about piracy where you sail a ship up to a store and fire at them until they surrender their data. That would be fairly easy to counter with fitting every store near a body of water with cannons of its own... possibly fencing lessons for the cashiers. Then make the whole thing watertight, put a sail on the roof and off into glorious battle.

Also, since when is the fact that it's easier a reason for harder punishment? Are you saying that taking a pen from a bank should be punished harder than taking all the money out of the ATM since the fact that nobody was there to guard that pen made it more unfair?

 

[bastardofmelbourne]

I'd say there's some morality in play with more moderated copyright laws.

The idea that it's unfair for person A to come up with something and person B to then steal it and reap the profits is a moral one. And that's what copyright laws were originally based on, I think.

Believe it or not, copyright was originally (c. 17th century) vested in the printer rather than the author. This was done for censorship purposes; the government controlled the Stationers' Company, which had a monopoly on the licenses by which the printers were allowed to print, and thus could prevent the printing of seditious or irreligious material. We mostly have John Locke to thank for the liberalisation of copyright such that it vested in the author first and the publisher second; he had politically powerful friends and even more powerful ideals.

This is the irony; Locke's motivation for breaking the Company monopoly was grounded in his belief that the free exchange of ideas was vital for a culture's intellectual growth, and that the more restrictions there were on copyrighted material the less likely it was that such a free exchange would occur. He thought the idea of copyright persisting past the death of the author to be completely absurd.

Fast forward to today, take a look at the RIAA and the MPAA versus the Pirate Bay and Richard Stallman. Which one is closer to John Locke and which one is closer to the Stationer's Company?

This is why it's really silly to talk about copyright infringement in moral terms. The moral foundation for copyright has been inverted over the course of history.

Downloading films/games/music for your own use when normally you would need to pay is robbery, and robbery is illegal. I think they should crack down on this even harder than on actual robbery, as this is easier.

Robbery =/= copyright infringement.

Herp a derp

 

[Esotera]

Hell yes, it's not piracy if it's legal. As long as there's some sort of tax on blank media/computers that goes directly back to content creators, then unrestricted sharing is way preferable to our current system, because of all the free culture & research that would be openly available.

 

[Dangit2019]

The legality of it isn't what declares it right or wrong. Just because prostitution's legal in Las Vegas doesn't make it suddenly good because the law said so.

For me, if an artist clarifies that they want their music to be heard, not bought, than I'll be able to sleep at night. If an artist is just starting up and they need the help, I'll support them with the money. It's just not black and white.

 

[Genocidicles]

As long as there's some sort of tax on blank media/computers that goes directly back to content creators, then unrestricted sharing is way preferable to our current system, because of all the free culture & research that would be openly available.

This is probably the best way to go about it.

Piracy cannot be stopped, so doing the closest thing to taxing it is the best way for content creators to be rewarded for their efforts.

And it would certainly stop people being given ridiculous fines for uploading a couple of songs.

 

[Veylon]

I've never seen that legality had any claim on morality. We make laws to encourage moral behaviors and discourage immoral ones, not the other way around. Otherwise, it gets awfully hard to find any good guys in history.