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Music sharers to face lawsuits - We just got screwed!!! (pg. 6)
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| Skipper |
| The best excuse for file downloading I've heard yet is "CDs are bad for the environment!" |
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| DigiNut |
| quote: | Originally posted by Skipper
if you want the CD as a back-up, or you want a copy on your computer, just COPY THE FILES FROM THE CD TO YOUR COMPUTER. You don't NEED to download from a P2P server and you certainly don't need to SHARE them if you're only using them as a backup. |
So I shouldn't share, solely by virtue of the fact that I don't need to? If I download from P2P, it's because someone else shared it. People need to share, otherwise it defeats the purpose. How is that stupid?
I can't remember ever saying that I was only using them as a backup, either. If you're going to argue, then argue with what I actually said, don't put words in my mouth.
| quote: | Like, why do people download music instead of buying it IF it is readily available in stores? Why?? Because it's FREE? Just admit it people, you don't want to pay for something that YOU SHOULD BE PAYING FOR. That music is copyrighted, and just because there isn't a security guard there watching or a camera up in the ceiling, doesn't mean that what is going on is ok.
People skirt around the issue, blaming the record companies for their own actions...like, why can't you just pay for the freakin' CD?! |
Speaking of skirting around the issue, I notice how you've conveniently ignored the entire argument relating to intellectual property vs. physical property. Music is thought - it's public domain. The recording, the physical CD, may be a salable good, but once it's ripped off there, it's just music, it's no longer a product. The only "fault", if you must find it with someone, lies with the original ripper.
You're also ignoring the fact that it's been statistically shown that people still pay for the CDs! You hedge your entire argument on a false assumption that people only download music instead of buying CDs. Lots of people do both. How does it make sense to say that someone who downloads a song which is essentially in the public domain, and then later on proceeds to buy the full CD which it came on, has stolen the original song?
In this country, we paid (by virtue of a levy) for the legal right to make backups of copyrighted material. We also have the right to do anything we want to that backup, including lend it to someone else (this is no different from, say, broadcasting it on the radio), and if that other person decides to make their own backup, that's their perogative.
The RIAA thought that THIS version of copying was "okay" for the longest time - they never chased after people who copied videotapes. The reason they're suddenly pissed off now is that no quality is lost in the copying of MP3s. The RIAA was too stupid in the beginning to understand this, and now they're rightly pissed off - but they were the ones that refused to have anything to do with the technology, so it's their own damn fault.
Repeating yourself over and over again doesn't make your argument more valid. There's a very blurry line between singing nursery rhymes and copying MP3s - they're both forms of music transmission, and it's difficult to say we should have to pay for one and not the other. The RIAA (or CRIA) is suing for copyright infringement, not pressing charges for larseny - you understand that right? It's not "stealing". It's copyright law. (edited)
The artist doesn't really get screwed - he or she makes off royalties anyway, they get their money from being commissioned to actually perform in the studio.
Did you read any of the links I posted? |
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| alec |
| by profiting enjoyment out of music, movies or games, you've taken away from the producers of such media! |
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| DigiNut |
| quote: | Originally posted by alec
by profiting enjoyment out of music, movies or games, you've taken away from the producers of such media! |
Sorry, but personal enjoyment isn't considered a "profit" by any legal or business entity. You're not "cheating" the entertainment industry by downloading music any more than you are by reading a book instead. You're simply finding another way to be entertained. By this logic you could say that "window shoppers" are "profiting enjoyment" out of the products on display, and are therefore stealing something from the store owners. It's bull.
No money = no profit. I'm not making money from any downloading/sharing. |
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| alec |
If I go out and buy Armin Van Buuren - 76 for 20$, which I did, and you go out and download it and get the exact same product for free, how is that not stealing, you can even download the cover art and print it if you want!
If you write up a lab and give it to your friend to compare and he shares it with everyone in the class who copy your answers and hand it in as their own, don't you feel a little ripped.
Why do you think plagiarism is considered stealing, you're not physically taking anything except the concept of words! |
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| DigiNut |
| quote: | Originally posted by alec
If I go out and buy Armin Van Buuren - 76 for 20$, which I did, and you go out and download it and get the exact same product for free, how is that not stealing, you can even download the cover art and print it if you want!
If you write up a lab and give it to your friend to compare and he shares it with everyone in the class who copy your answers and hand it in as their own, don't you feel a little ripped.
Why do you think plagiarism is considered stealing, you're not physically taking anything except the concept of words! |
Plagiarism is not considered stealing! That's where the problem with your argument lies.
The part of your posted I highlighted - about copying a lab, yes you're right, I would feel ripped. But you know what? There's nothing I can do about it. What he did was not illegal, I can't sue him for it - my answers were my thoughts, they were in the public domain. Was I ripped? Yes. Did he commit a criminal act? No! Plagiarism is against school policies, but it is not the equivalent of "stealing".
Also, the part that you've totally misrepresented is the fact that they try to pass off those answers as their own. When people share music, they aren't trying to take credit for it - they're giving all credit to the original author and label.
If I download Armin's CD for free, it is not stealing from anyone, because it was freely given to me. It is only stealing if the person I got it from was charging a price for it.
Try again, alec. |
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| alec |
| You are corrupted, I'm gonna go study now |
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| Skipper |
Aaron, I do apologize for not clarifying that some of my posts were not directed to you and your arguments.
Where did you get that definition of intellectual property? I don't understand how the content of a CD could become public domain once it is ripped from a copyrighted CD. The entire definition of intellectual property rests on the concept of intellectual property being INTANGIBLE. The product is not the CD, it's the content, regardless of where it resides.
Why would anyone download from a P2P if the intent was only for backup though? That is the biggest argument I have heard so far - and, as far as I know, backing up for personal use is legal. But you don't need to be on a P2P to do this.
The fact is, a lot of people do not pay for the music they download. Those are the people I have issue with. you download instead of buy, and it's not right. This can hardly be comparable to window shopping Aaron - when you window shop, you don't actually GET the product that you would have otherwise bought. |
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| crazedcanuck |
Well, I wake up and have 20 TA forums emails in my box from this thread lol...
Diginut, you and I seem to be repeating ourselves, with no concrete arguement from those we are sparring with. Lots of good links, nice work btw.
And Alec, you went out and bought Armin for $20 and recieved the PHYSICAL cds, the case, art work, etc.
Someone who downloads it gets none of that, and also the mp3 is a entirely different song then then what's on the disc you bought, so how are they getting the same thing for free? |
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| DigiNut |
| quote: | Originally posted by Skipper
Aaron, I do apologize for not clarifying that some of my posts were not directed to you and your arguments. |
Understood, and no need for apologies, I was simply clarifying my position and some inconsistencies in your argument.
| quote: | | Where did you get that definition of intellectual property? I don't understand how the content of a CD could become public domain once it is ripped from a copyrighted CD. The entire definition of intellectual property rests on the concept of intellectual property being INTANGIBLE. The product is not the CD, it's the content, regardless of where it resides. |
Exactly my point. The only physical product is the CD. The music itself is intellectual property. Now, if a customer had to pay to download this MP3, and then they copied it and gave it to other people, this might be a problem because the MP3 was actually a salable good in the first place. However, the MP3s that were ripped from CDs or downloaded from other people on the internet are not the property of the RIAA, but the property of the person who ripped/downloaded them, and he/she is choosing to share that - the only real "other" property that exists within those MP3s is the intellectual property of the original author, and since he or she is still being given full credit for creating and performing the work, no IP laws are being broken here.
| quote: | | Why would anyone download from a P2P if the intent was only for backup though? That is the biggest argument I have heard so far - and, as far as I know, backing up for personal use is legal. But you don't need to be on a P2P to do this. |
I think you misunderstand their argument. They rip the songs as backups. They go on P2P to get music, that has nothing to do with their own backups. However, they may choose to share their own backups with the other P2P users who are sharing their backups. Call it a token of gratitude. The "personal use" of a backup does extend to sharing it with other people, so it's legal.
| quote: | | The fact is, a lot of people do not pay for the music they download. Those are the people I have issue with. you download instead of buy, and it's not right. This can hardly be comparable to window shopping Aaron - when you window shop, you don't actually GET the product that you would have otherwise bought. |
Let me ask you this, Sarah: When you compile a demo CD with tracks you bought on Vinyl, you haven't broken any laws there - but if you then make copies of that CD and hand them out to people, wouldn't you say you're in violation of the same copyright laws that we MP3 downloaders are?
Not only that, but you're actually distributing them in CD form. Even worse. If you give me that CD, you've given me 20 tracks for free, which in theory I could copy and give to millions of other people. It's your mix, but those aren't your tracks - how is this any different from sharing them online, aside from the fact that you're doing it on tangible media?
Some food for thought there. |
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| Crazy Serb |
| quote: | Originally posted by Skipper
Like, why do people download music instead of buying it IF it is readily available in stores? Why?? Because it's FREE? Just admit it people, you don't want to pay for something that YOU SHOULD BE PAYING FOR. |
Hahhaa, you're hillarious...
Don't want to pay for something we should be paying for? Who says I should be paying for music? I do actually pay for it, once I find a great album to buy, but to waste my money on all the music that comes out in the store and then return it 2 days later complaining it was garbage? Pffft, waste of my time, when I could simply download that album/song on the net, listen to it at home and if I don't like it, guess what, conveniently DELETE it - no money or time wasted.
And why do people download music? Sure, some download it just because it's available out there and it's free, but some of us download it just so we can preview the albums without throwing all that money on them first. Heck, I would've never bought some of the CDs I've got based only on the artist/tracklist if I didn't hear it beforehand on MP3 or something. I think the MP3 has even helped the consumer make better choice these days, because I do remember a while ago when MP3 technology wasn't around, and when buying a CD from a store was like a gamble - throw them $20-30, get an album that you think/hope is good, go home, listen to it, and usually come to a realization that there's only 1 song on the whole album that's worth listening. Now, that seems a bit unfair, don't you think? I'd rather pay $0.99 to PureTracks.ca today for just that one song instead of shelling out the money for the whole album.
I also couldn't agree more with Diginut on this issue. There simply isn't any correlation between file sharing and CD sales. Hell, I could even say the CD sales are down due to high cost of CDs, reduced quality of songs/albums put out by artists, market oversaturated with not so quality artists, inflation, economic situation in the country, war with Iraq, fear of terrorists, etc. It's just putting two sets of data that have no direct correlation whatsoever. |
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| Durafei |
| quote: | Originally posted by DigiNut
Plagiarism is not considered stealing! That's where the problem with your argument lies.
The part of your posted I highlighted - about copying a lab, yes you're right, I would feel ripped. But you know what? There's nothing I can do about it. What he did was not illegal, I can't sue him for it - my answers were my thoughts, they were in the public domain. Was I ripped? Yes. Did he commit a criminal act? No! Plagiarism is against school policies, but it is not the equivalent of "stealing".
Also, the part that you've totally misrepresented is the fact that they try to pass off those answers as their own. When people share music, they aren't trying to take credit for it - they're giving all credit to the original author and label.
If I download Armin's CD for free, it is not stealing from anyone, because it was freely given to me. It is only stealing if the person I got it from was charging a price for it.
Try again, alec. |
I think RIAA is doing the right thing.
Artists and people in recording industry spend lots of time WORKING. Working implies that they should get paid for it. They probably DO get paid for it, but it's still unfair to those artists when some people just download their work without paying for it. Of course some people download music first, and then buy it. But what about all those who don't buy music after downloading it?
RIAA can't possibly know who buys music after downloading and who doesn't. So they want to stop sharing completely. Makes sense! RIAA could probably come up with another solution. But they didn't - and you have to live with it.
And when you download Armin's CD - you are stealing. Just imagine that you had a CLONE machine. CLONE machine would take a product, and make a clone of that product. Now you come to your friend's home and see a TV set that cost millions of dollars(well, the TV itself is cheap, but to build that model, to research it, to test it cost millions) and you just CLONE that TV. Didn't you just steal it? |
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