this post was submitted on 19 Jul 2023
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Piracy: ꜱᴀɪʟ ᴛʜᴇ ʜɪɢʜ ꜱᴇᴀꜱ
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That's dumb. If you are supposed to pay for something and you just take it instead, you stole it. You can argue word meanings and technicallies all day, but it's a lot easier to just be real about what we are doing here.
It is copyright violation, not stealing. Yes, it is damaging to the content creator, under current economic and law structure, but it is not stealing. If you burn a house belonging to the content creator, you do not call it stealing, just because it is damaging to them. So, why do you insist on calling it stealing here?
On a side note, one can incision a society where there is no copyright. In that society it would be completely lawful and “non-damaging” to copy things. Copyright is an artificial construct that we choose to have, but it does not mean that we can not rejected (we, as in the whole society, not individual)
One can even argue that the tools needed to avoid IP are already here: crowdfunding models, commissions, and Patreon-esque income, and likely in the near future, universal basic income - you can consider the government/taxes subsidising your ability to create art if you're starting from zero skills/connections/reach or from scratch with a specific project. With these, why does the author even retain total IP? Their project is funded by the community, so it'd make sense that the creator and the community had a more symbiotic relationship rather than the parasitic one where the author is effectively a digital landlord and dictator with complete control over the project.
Burning down someone's house is closer to stealing than copyright infringement, though. Afterwards, they don't have a house anymore, but with copying they'd still have the data.
I prefer to compare it to joyriding. There are separate crimes for theft of a car and for joyriding. If you get caught taking a car, you might argue that you just wanted to go for a drive, and never intended to permanently deprive the owner. In that case, it would be hard to convict you of theft, because theft requires an intent to deprive the owner. Instead, they go for joyriding, which has a different bar.
Even then, though, joyriding is still a crime. Basic copyright infringement is not a crime, it's a civil offense.
Joyriding depreciates the car. Plus most of the time the gas is not refilled. This is stealing.
Scratching a car also depreciates its value, would you argue that is stealing also?
I wasn't trying to give a perfect analogy, anyway. Joyriding is a lesser form of theft, with a lower barrier to conviction. Copyright infringement also has a lower barrier to conviction, however it's completely different to theft (and joyriding) in that it is not a crime.
Stealing requires using something for yourself. Like that gasoline was used or joyriding itself was used. Scratching a car is just vandalizing. What object you are stealing by vandalizing?
Isn't scratching a car stealing the resale value? The owner has to pay to get it fixed to restore the value. Therefore, vandalism is theft. Quod erat up your demonstrandum :)
Also, assault is theft (of peace of mind), rape is theft (of trust), flaying someone alive is theft (of skin).
If you want to stretch the definition of theft to include any harm, even without depriving someone of their property (i.e. the actual definition), you make the word meaningless. There are already words for other crimes.
In order for it to count as a theft, one has to take something from a person and use it yourself in such way that the other person can not use that anymore (unless it is somehow returned it). So, at least two conditions should be satisfied, not just one. In case of gasoline, it is clear cut. In case of joyriding, you are stealing a portion of car's life. The owner can not use that portion on themselves anymore (thus depreciation), but you did.
Scratching car - you did not take anything and used for yourself. Same goes for other things you mention, except possibly the flaying, if you really take that skin for yourself and use it somehow for your benefit. Make a lamp or something. Obviously, flaying would not be just stealing even in this case, because you have induced suffering as well (and possibly death).
You argued that joyriding was theft because it depreciates value.
At least two conditions are necessary. Your are benefiting, and the other person has damages.
That's still not right. Theft is taking something with the intent to deprive the owner.
The US has twisted it somewhat and made it more vague, where depriving the owner of opportunity is sometimes a thing, but really that's just bullshit that rightsholders have shovelled in - it doesn't fit the core principles behind the law, and the rest of the world does not follow that. Much like how they're trying to make copyright infringement be tantamount to theft (which is also being pushed onto other countries).
Why do you support their profit-driven greed in changing the law against your social interests?
I disagree. If I am hungry and I still an apple from the store, I might even feel very guilty about it, and definitely there was no intent to deprive the owner.
What? Where? How?
The very act of taking the apple and eating it deprives the owner, you can't argue you had no intent to do something that you clearly did do. You might regret it, you might internally rationalise and try to justify it, but the fact is you made a choice to deprive the owner.
By trying to label copyright infringement as a crime when it is not, in the black and white letter of the law, you are supporting the media industry's efforts to rewrite the law.
There are plenty of examples of doing things without intent. Hell, you can kill somebody without intent of killing. Why stealing is different? While I suspect most of the stealing happens with the knowledge that you will deprive the owner, the intent might not be there. And why does it matter anyway? Even if you did not know that you are stealing (eating an apple that you thought was yours) it is still a stealing.
As for “trying” to label copyright infringement as a crime, I did not do that, I just stated that it is unlawful. (I do not know if it is a crime, but likely is). It is simple fact that the current law of the land is such that you can be penalized for copyright infringement. And in fact I stated it could have been different, that we could have different laws. I also stated that copyright violation is NOT a stealing, despite of the fact that you deprive the creator of the potential revenue. That’s simply because you do not take anything from a person. Just because you deprived somebody from potential revenue does not make it illegal or even immoral. There are plenty examples of completely moral and legal ways to deprive others from potential revenue, for example, business competition. If you win a contract, you deprived your competitors from potential revenue.
So let me reiterate my position stated here in this thread: copyright violation is illegal. By law of the land. I did not claim that it is immoral. I did not claim that it should continue to be illegal. (I did not claim the opposite either).
Because you can't usually take something by accident. If you did, and you could reasonably demonstrate that it wasn't intentional (rather than just saying "oh I didn't know it was in my pocket"), then you might not be convicted of theft.
You're right, you didn't say that. I apologise, I lost track of who I was replying to in this long thread (I wish Lemmy would give you a ?context=3000 thing like reddit did).
Copyright infringement is indeed illegal, in any form. It is a civil offense at the base level, meaning the rightsholder has to prosecute it themselves, however it can escalate to a criminal offense if certain conditions are met. This never used to be the case, back when all the Napster trials happened it was only ever a civil offense, however over the last decade or so media companies have been successful in lobbying the government and changing the law. I just hope they don't manage to change it further - rights like the right to record live TV on video were hard won and shouldn't be undermined.
Ok, I do not think we have disagreements.
If you stole a car, you physically took something away from somebody. If you download a car, the original is still there - you’re just making an exact copy for yourself for free. Same if you swiped a candy bar at a gas station - you’re depriving that gas station the use of their property, which is to sell and make money. If you download a candy bar, nothing is taken and the gas station can still sell the original.
So let’s be crystal clear here: what’s happening is not theft, because nothing was taken and the owner is not deprived of the use of their property. Can you argue that you’re getting something for free when you shouldn’t? Yes, and that’s more in line of denying profits rather than actual theft.
We're talking about the crime of theft and the civil offense of copyright infringement. There is no argument about word meanings or technicalities, just what the law actually says.
Media companies want copyright infringement to be considered theft, and they've lobbied the government to try and change the definition in their favour, but the fact is the law distinguishes between them. Copyright infringement is wrong, but it is not a crime and nor is it theft.
If you're selling apples, and I steal and eat an apple, that's theft. You no longer have an apple, you had a cost price for that apple and you can't sell it anymore to make the profit you would have made. Meanwhile, if you sell a game and I copy that game, you still have your original copies. Yes, you haven't had the money I might have paid for a copy, but it hasn't cost you anything and you still have an infinite number of copies to sell. If I was never going to buy the game from you anyway, then you wouldn't have even got that either way.
The US is weird though, in that the courts award statutory damages for copyright infringement. If you fileshare a few songs to a pool of users they might stack up the fines for each user you shared to up to hundreds of thousands of dollars - nevermind that they never would have made that money from selling to all of those people you shared it with. In the rest of the world, they deal with actual damages, and claims for copyright infringement were rarely if ever very large.
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I'm pretty sure criminal copyright has a value threshold of like $1,000, or it has to be done for profit. But I cba looking up the law right now.
It also varies across the world, different countries have different legislation. However at its core, copyright infringement is a civil offense, criminal copyright infringement is an exception (and a relatively new one at that) but not the norm.
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By your own definition, if you TAKE it, you stole it. Nothing is taken.
So you're doing something you personally believe is unethical and your argument is that we should also follow your belief that it is unethical, while we continue to do it? If you genuinely feel it's unethical, why are you even doing it? Just stop lol
That's always the most frustrating part about these "debates." So many people make up BS excuses they know are just excuses instead of just owning up to what they - and probably we - are doing. Just take responsibility for your actions. Don't insult my intelligence with stuff we both know is nonsense.
"It's for game/movie/TV preservation!" - someone who has no archival experience or affiliation with a group that makes use of this media which also happens to only consist of things the individual enjoys.
"The record companies are screwing artists over!" - someone who has put no effort into finding other ways to support the artist and pirates from artists who have good relationships with their labels or even self-publish.
"I didn't take anything from the person!" - someone who wouldn’t want their writing/art/etc. taken and shared without their permission.
It's just not stealing, you guys can whine all you want and twist the meaning of stealing to a fifth graders understanding but it doesn't change the fact that it is not stealing. Is it wrong or right? That's another debate that is worth having,but weather or not it's "stealing" has an obvious answer which is no. There is no debate
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What's ridiculous about it? Morals are subjective.
If I copy a movie that came out 80 years ago and everyone involved with it is now dead, who am I supposedly 'stealing' from or depriving of anything? Some faceless corporation who claims ownership over someone else's work? How about cases where a movie or show isn't available to buy in your area? Who's getting deprived of anything there?
You can keep your morals to yourself where they belong.
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