Pirate Bay founder Gottfrid Warg gets lengthy jail term

[brian_23452]

fuck these bastards,nobody should pay for music or film unless its made by small independent labels

What is the incentive for artists to produce if everyone is stealing?

Music existed for how many literally thousands of years before copyright laws came into being?  

Exactly.

Do you really believe that  Johnny Galecki, Jim Parsons and Kaley Cuoco-Sweeting each deserve $1,000,000 for every 22 minute episode?  I sure don't, and will never pay for any of their work, although I will download and enjoy it.

The reason they can command such a high "salary" is because they can draw in enough viewers to watch the big bang theory. When there are more viewers, CBS can charge more for advertisements.

Also it can be argued that if you are enjoying something, then you are receiving a benefit from it, if you are receiving a benefit from something without paying (even in the form of allowing advertisements to be served to you) then you are in the wrong

Morality as a system only works when all parties involved in the system follow the rules.  As we have seen time and time again, corporations do not follow any sort of moral code, doing what ever is most profitable regardless of what "moral" harm that may cause to other people.  As such, when I interact with corporations, I behave the same way.  The short answer is, corporations do whatever they can legally (and all to often, illegally) get away with and do not allow morality to interfere; if I can get away with watching their product for free I will do so, and will also not allow morality to interfere. 

[jaysabi]

fuck these bastards,nobody should pay for music or film unless its made by small independent labels

What is the incentive for artists to produce if everyone is stealing?

Music existed for how many literally thousands of years before copyright laws came into being?  

Exactly.

Do you really believe that  Johnny Galecki, Jim Parsons and Kaley Cuoco-Sweeting each deserve $1,000,000 for every 22 minute episode?  I sure don't, and will never pay for any of their work, although I will download and enjoy it.

It doesn't matter what you think they're worth, you're not paying them, and you further don't pay to watch a show that is on the public airwaves. I don't think this is a good example.

[jaysabi]

It's amusing the gymnastics people go through to justify electronic stealing.

It's amusing the gymnastics people go through to equate a civil, financial, business decision like copyright law with a moral issue like theft. 

I am not a net defender of IP laws, as they are protectionist and anti-innovation, but that doesn't justify people who's criticism of IP law is really just an excuse to steal movies and music they don't think they should have to pay for.

If you have a valid criticism of the system, I'm quite open to hearing it. I'm already pre-disposed to not agree with IP law. But I don't agree with people who think there should be no consequence for putting the work of others on the internet (be it movies or music or writing) without the owner's permission, which is what things like Pirate Bay are, or that people have a right to download that work without paying the owner for it because 'internet freedom.'

Because it isn't stealing.  Stealing is a moral issue; we as a society have defined it as being "wrong" since the begining of civilization.  Copyright violation is an invented crime, quite new in terms of human history.  It is not "inherently" morally wrong (the romans had a phrase for this type of law, malum prohibita); it is "wrong" simply because the people who stand to profit from calling it wrong, declared it to be so. 

Now, if you want to call it what it is, a civil matter, I have no fight with that.  But don't tell me it is morally wrong.  Morality only works when we are all playing by the same rules anyways, and when it comes to large corporations, they don't play by ANY rules so it is kind of moot as far as I am concerned.

Stealing is "inherently wrong." If I have a tangible object, you have no right to it. It doesn't matter if I made it or purchased it, it belongs to me. If you take it without my permission, that is "inherently wrong." I don't see the distinction between something I physically made or some form of art I made. If I made a movie, I own it, the same as if I crafted a physical object. My livelihood is dependent on my ability to sell tickets to see it, so I choose not to grant people permission to see it without paying me for it. If they don't want to see it at my price, the market will sort that out. Either I'll have to lower the price or stop making movies if I can't make a living at it. But these are based on voluntary exchanges. You deciding you have the right to see my work just because doesn't hold up, that's not a voluntary exchange, and that makes it stealing. It's property law; you're taking property that you have no right to. Doesn't matter if the owner is a starving artist or a mutli-national, mutli-billion dollar corporation. You don't have a right to take things you don't own, and you have not asserted any legitimate claim otherwise.

[practicaldreamer]

Stealing is "inherently wrong." If I have a tangible object, you have no right to it. It doesn't matter if I made it or purchased it, it belongs to me. If you take it without my permission, that is "inherently wrong." I don't see the distinction between something I physically made or some form of art I made. If I made a movie, I own it, the same as if I crafted a physical object. My livelihood is dependent on my ability to sell tickets to see it, so I choose not to grant people permission to see it without paying me for it. If they don't want to see it at my price, the market will sort that out. Either I'll have to lower the price or stop making movies if I can't make a living at it. But these are based on voluntary exchanges. You deciding you have the right to see my work just because doesn't hold up, that's not a voluntary exchange, and that makes it stealing. It's property law; you're taking property that you have no right to. Doesn't matter if the owner is a starving artist or a mutli-national, mutli-billion dollar corporation. You don't have a right to take things you don't own, and you have not asserted any legitimate claim otherwise.

The Culture Industry

TL;DR "... popular culture is akin to a factory producing standardized cultural goods — films, radio programmes, magazines, etc. — that are used to manipulate mass society into passivity. Consumption of the easy pleasures of popular culture, made available by the mass communications media, renders people docile and content, no matter how difficult their economic circumstances. The inherent danger of the culture industry is the cultivation of false psychological needs that can only be met and satisfied by the products of capitalism"



As for the market deciding the price - well, it is in a way, even with the "stealing" - most people are prepared to pay nothing at all.

I reckon the way forward is the Thom Yorke approach FWIW.

[Swordsoffreedom]

No doubt he was targeted due to his involvement with pirate bay.

The entertainment industry has a lot of political power.

Meanwhile, I will continue to torrent movies in his honor.

Yep

Information needs to be given to creators not distributors

Till then models used by the entertainment industry need to be demolished and replaced with new systems for the modern age
Which is happening slowly but gradually now in my opinion.

[brian_23452]

It's amusing the gymnastics people go through to justify electronic stealing.

It's amusing the gymnastics people go through to equate a civil, financial, business decision like copyright law with a moral issue like theft. 

I am not a net defender of IP laws, as they are protectionist and anti-innovation, but that doesn't justify people who's criticism of IP law is really just an excuse to steal movies and music they don't think they should have to pay for.

If you have a valid criticism of the system, I'm quite open to hearing it. I'm already pre-disposed to not agree with IP law. But I don't agree with people who think there should be no consequence for putting the work of others on the internet (be it movies or music or writing) without the owner's permission, which is what things like Pirate Bay are, or that people have a right to download that work without paying the owner for it because 'internet freedom.'

Because it isn't stealing.  Stealing is a moral issue; we as a society have defined it as being "wrong" since the begining of civilization.  Copyright violation is an invented crime, quite new in terms of human history.  It is not "inherently" morally wrong (the romans had a phrase for this type of law, malum prohibita); it is "wrong" simply because the people who stand to profit from calling it wrong, declared it to be so. 

Now, if you want to call it what it is, a civil matter, I have no fight with that.  But don't tell me it is morally wrong.  Morality only works when we are all playing by the same rules anyways, and when it comes to large corporations, they don't play by ANY rules so it is kind of moot as far as I am concerned.

Stealing is "inherently wrong." If I have a tangible object, you have no right to it. It doesn't matter if I made it or purchased it, it belongs to me. If you take it without my permission, that is "inherently wrong." I don't see the distinction between something I physically made or some form of art I made. If I made a movie, I own it, the same as if I crafted a physical object. My livelihood is dependent on my ability to sell tickets to see it, so I choose not to grant people permission to see it without paying me for it. If they don't want to see it at my price, the market will sort that out. Either I'll have to lower the price or stop making movies if I can't make a living at it. But these are based on voluntary exchanges. You deciding you have the right to see my work just because doesn't hold up, that's not a voluntary exchange, and that makes it stealing. It's property law; you're taking property that you have no right to. Doesn't matter if the owner is a starving artist or a mutli-national, mutli-billion dollar corporation. You don't have a right to take things you don't own, and you have not asserted any legitimate claim otherwise.

1.  Stealing isn't inherently wrong.  Look at every single other species on the planet, they all take whatever they can get without any sort of moral dilemma.  Look at Human beings, for the overwhelming majority of the time we existed, we did the same thing.  With the rise of civilization we "decided" we were better off agreeing to a moral code, so much so that it is now ingrained in us.  I won't take your stuff and you won't take mine.  I can't say this enough though, it only works if we are all playing by the rules!  Corporations do not follow the code, and so they do not deserve to have it followed with them either.  I mean you're free to follow whatever moral code you want to of course, as am I.  

2.  It isn't stealing.  For most of human history, if I could play a song, I was free to play it.  You didn't own it anymore than you owned how to bake a loaf of bread, or fashion a wheel.  Somewhere along the line, very recently, groups of people *declared* that such a thing was immoral (not coincidentally, they stand to profit heavily from convincing you and I that it is immoral).  As I tried to mention earlier, the Romans, upon whom much of our legal code is bases, specifically had a term for this type of law to differentiate it from moral laws like stealing.  There is simply no precedent anywhere in western law for it to be stealing, and in fact quite the precedent for it to be nothing more than a procedural issue (like illegal parking).  

3.  You bring up an interesting point regarding free trade and western style free market economics.  In theory yes, the free market will sort out the price of these things, and if the market determines some guy is worth 720 dollars a minute we consider that "fair".  Of course western style, free market economics is very rarely free.  In theory you would compete by providing a better product, or a lower price but in fact you demonstrate how it *really* works.  Pass laws to make it illegal for anyone else to compete with you rather than provide a superior product at a superior price.  But now we are getting way off topic.  

[jaysabi]

Stealing is "inherently wrong." If I have a tangible object, you have no right to it. It doesn't matter if I made it or purchased it, it belongs to me. If you take it without my permission, that is "inherently wrong." I don't see the distinction between something I physically made or some form of art I made. If I made a movie, I own it, the same as if I crafted a physical object. My livelihood is dependent on my ability to sell tickets to see it, so I choose not to grant people permission to see it without paying me for it. If they don't want to see it at my price, the market will sort that out. Either I'll have to lower the price or stop making movies if I can't make a living at it. But these are based on voluntary exchanges. You deciding you have the right to see my work just because doesn't hold up, that's not a voluntary exchange, and that makes it stealing. It's property law; you're taking property that you have no right to. Doesn't matter if the owner is a starving artist or a mutli-national, mutli-billion dollar corporation. You don't have a right to take things you don't own, and you have not asserted any legitimate claim otherwise.

The Culture Industry

TL;DR "... popular culture is akin to a factory producing standardized cultural goods — films, radio programmes, magazines, etc. — that are used to manipulate mass society into passivity. Consumption of the easy pleasures of popular culture, made available by the mass communications media, renders people docile and content, no matter how difficult their economic circumstances. The inherent danger of the culture industry is the cultivation of false psychological needs that can only be met and satisfied by the products of capitalism"



As for the market deciding the price - well, it is in a way, even with the "stealing" - most people are prepared to pay nothing at all.

I reckon the way forward is the Thom Yorke approach FWIW.

They're not prepared to pay nothing and go without, they're prepared to steal in order to pay nothing. That says nothing about the market price. If the technology wasn't available to steal easily, they would either go without or pay for it, and that would help determine the market price. Stealing does have an effect on the price, but you can't say that stealing is a component of the market price because the market price is based on voluntary exchange, not theft.

But none of that really addressed my points about theft anyway.

[jaysabi]

It's amusing the gymnastics people go through to justify electronic stealing.

It's amusing the gymnastics people go through to equate a civil, financial, business decision like copyright law with a moral issue like theft.  

I am not a net defender of IP laws, as they are protectionist and anti-innovation, but that doesn't justify people who's criticism of IP law is really just an excuse to steal movies and music they don't think they should have to pay for.

If you have a valid criticism of the system, I'm quite open to hearing it. I'm already pre-disposed to not agree with IP law. But I don't agree with people who think there should be no consequence for putting the work of others on the internet (be it movies or music or writing) without the owner's permission, which is what things like Pirate Bay are, or that people have a right to download that work without paying the owner for it because 'internet freedom.'

Because it isn't stealing.  Stealing is a moral issue; we as a society have defined it as being "wrong" since the begining of civilization.  Copyright violation is an invented crime, quite new in terms of human history.  It is not "inherently" morally wrong (the romans had a phrase for this type of law, malum prohibita); it is "wrong" simply because the people who stand to profit from calling it wrong, declared it to be so.  

Now, if you want to call it what it is, a civil matter, I have no fight with that.  But don't tell me it is morally wrong.  Morality only works when we are all playing by the same rules anyways, and when it comes to large corporations, they don't play by ANY rules so it is kind of moot as far as I am concerned.

Stealing is "inherently wrong." If I have a tangible object, you have no right to it. It doesn't matter if I made it or purchased it, it belongs to me. If you take it without my permission, that is "inherently wrong." I don't see the distinction between something I physically made or some form of art I made. If I made a movie, I own it, the same as if I crafted a physical object. My livelihood is dependent on my ability to sell tickets to see it, so I choose not to grant people permission to see it without paying me for it. If they don't want to see it at my price, the market will sort that out. Either I'll have to lower the price or stop making movies if I can't make a living at it. But these are based on voluntary exchanges. You deciding you have the right to see my work just because doesn't hold up, that's not a voluntary exchange, and that makes it stealing. It's property law; you're taking property that you have no right to. Doesn't matter if the owner is a starving artist or a mutli-national, mutli-billion dollar corporation. You don't have a right to take things you don't own, and you have not asserted any legitimate claim otherwise.

1.  Stealing isn't inherently wrong.  Look at every single other species on the planet, they all take whatever they can get without any sort of moral dilemma.  Look at Human beings, for the overwhelming majority of the time we existed, we did the same thing.  With the rise of civilization we "decided" we were better off agreeing to a moral code, so much so that it is now ingrained in us.  I won't take your stuff and you won't take mine.  I can't say this enough though, it only works if we are all playing by the rules!  Corporations do not follow the code, and so they do not deserve to have it followed with them either.  I mean you're free to follow whatever moral code you want to of course, as am I.  

2.  It isn't stealing.  For most of human history, if I could play a song, I was free to play it.  You didn't own it anymore than you owned how to bake a loaf of bread, or fashion a wheel.  Somewhere along the line, very recently, groups of people *declared* that such a thing was immoral (not coincidentally, they stand to profit heavily from convincing you and I that it is immoral).  As I tried to mention earlier, the Romans, upon whom much of our legal code is bases, specifically had a term for this type of law to differentiate it from moral laws like stealing.  There is simply no precedent anywhere in western law for it to be stealing, and in fact quite the precedent for it to be nothing more than a procedural issue (like illegal parking).  

3.  You bring up an interesting point regarding free trade and western style free market economics.  In theory yes, the free market will sort out the price of these things, and if the market determines some guy is worth 720 dollars a minute we consider that "fair".  Of course western style, free market economics is very rarely free.  In theory you would compete by providing a better product, or a lower price but in fact you demonstrate how it *really* works.  Pass laws to make it illegal for anyone else to compete with you rather than provide a superior product at a superior price.  But now we are getting way off topic.  

I'll keep your enumeration for the sake keeping it organized.

1. I still maintain stealing is inherently wrong. Look at every single other species on the planet, and differentiate what makes us different from them: Meta-cognition and the ability to understand right from wrong. Animals don't act "morally" or "immorally" because they don't have empathy. A tiger needs to eat, it kills and eats and has no ability to understand it caused tremendous pain to whatever it just ate. People have empathy, and the ability to understand how their actions harm other people. And choosing to harm other people is "inherently wrong," whether it is physically, economically, or otherwise.

2. I take your points well on the ability to play a song as being analogous to knowing how to bake a loaf of bread. I agree with you in these instances. I'm not talking about this though. If you want to reenact a movie you've seen and charge admission for it, I see no reason you should be stopped. If you want to play a song ("protected by copyright") and charge for your performance, I also see no reason the law should stop you. But I'm addressing the instances in which this is not the case, like taking a movie or song wholesale and consuming it without paying for it. That's stealing, because it's not based on voluntary exchange.

3. I agree with you. I'm against IP laws that are anti-innovation or anti-competition. I do not believe Pirate Bay or P2P networks fit this model however. These are straight theft enablers.

[practicaldreamer]

If the technology wasn't available to steal easily, they would either go without or pay for it,

But it is - and from here on in, it always will be.

No way around it.

The market has changed.

[jaysabi]

If the technology wasn't available to steal easily, they would either go without or pay for it,

But it is - and from here on in, it always will be.

No way around it.

The market has changed.

But we're not talking about what is or isn't. We're talking about what is right and wrong based on the theory of how things originate. If you pass a store with an open door and don't see anyone around, that doesn't change the fact the door is open and there is no one around. That also doesn't make taking whatever is inside acceptable.

[practicaldreamer]

Is bitcoin stealing value from the creators of fiat ?

[brian_23452]

Stealing is "inherently wrong." If I have a tangible object, you have no right to it. It doesn't matter if I made it or purchased it, it belongs to me. If you take it without my permission, that is "inherently wrong." I don't see the distinction between something I physically made or some form of art I made. If I made a movie, I own it, the same as if I crafted a physical object. My livelihood is dependent on my ability to sell tickets to see it, so I choose not to grant people permission to see it without paying me for it. If they don't want to see it at my price, the market will sort that out. Either I'll have to lower the price or stop making movies if I can't make a living at it. But these are based on voluntary exchanges. You deciding you have the right to see my work just because doesn't hold up, that's not a voluntary exchange, and that makes it stealing. It's property law; you're taking property that you have no right to. Doesn't matter if the owner is a starving artist or a mutli-national, mutli-billion dollar corporation. You don't have a right to take things you don't own, and you have not asserted any legitimate claim otherwise.

The Culture Industry

TL;DR "... popular culture is akin to a factory producing standardized cultural goods — films, radio programmes, magazines, etc. — that are used to manipulate mass society into passivity. Consumption of the easy pleasures of popular culture, made available by the mass communications media, renders people docile and content, no matter how difficult their economic circumstances. The inherent danger of the culture industry is the cultivation of false psychological needs that can only be met and satisfied by the products of capitalism"



As for the market deciding the price - well, it is in a way, even with the "stealing" - most people are prepared to pay nothing at all.

I reckon the way forward is the Thom Yorke approach FWIW.

They're not prepared to pay nothing and go without, they're prepared to steal in order to pay nothing. That says nothing about the market price. If the technology wasn't available to steal easily, they would either go without or pay for it, and that would help determine the market price. Stealing does have an effect on the price, but you can't say that stealing is a component of the market price because the market price is based on voluntary exchange, not theft.

But none of that really addressed my points about theft anyway.

It says everything about how corporations typically work in a supposed "free market", actually.  Someone else is providing the exact same product as you are, albeit somewhat inferior in quality, and is destroying you on price.  Do you improve the quality of your product?  Do you reduce the price to one that is competitive?  No and no, you pass a law to make it illegal for that person to compete with you. 

[brian_23452]

It's amusing the gymnastics people go through to justify electronic stealing.

It's amusing the gymnastics people go through to equate a civil, financial, business decision like copyright law with a moral issue like theft.  

I am not a net defender of IP laws, as they are protectionist and anti-innovation, but that doesn't justify people who's criticism of IP law is really just an excuse to steal movies and music they don't think they should have to pay for.

If you have a valid criticism of the system, I'm quite open to hearing it. I'm already pre-disposed to not agree with IP law. But I don't agree with people who think there should be no consequence for putting the work of others on the internet (be it movies or music or writing) without the owner's permission, which is what things like Pirate Bay are, or that people have a right to download that work without paying the owner for it because 'internet freedom.'

Because it isn't stealing.  Stealing is a moral issue; we as a society have defined it as being "wrong" since the begining of civilization.  Copyright violation is an invented crime, quite new in terms of human history.  It is not "inherently" morally wrong (the romans had a phrase for this type of law, malum prohibita); it is "wrong" simply because the people who stand to profit from calling it wrong, declared it to be so.  

Now, if you want to call it what it is, a civil matter, I have no fight with that.  But don't tell me it is morally wrong.  Morality only works when we are all playing by the same rules anyways, and when it comes to large corporations, they don't play by ANY rules so it is kind of moot as far as I am concerned.

Stealing is "inherently wrong." If I have a tangible object, you have no right to it. It doesn't matter if I made it or purchased it, it belongs to me. If you take it without my permission, that is "inherently wrong." I don't see the distinction between something I physically made or some form of art I made. If I made a movie, I own it, the same as if I crafted a physical object. My livelihood is dependent on my ability to sell tickets to see it, so I choose not to grant people permission to see it without paying me for it. If they don't want to see it at my price, the market will sort that out. Either I'll have to lower the price or stop making movies if I can't make a living at it. But these are based on voluntary exchanges. You deciding you have the right to see my work just because doesn't hold up, that's not a voluntary exchange, and that makes it stealing. It's property law; you're taking property that you have no right to. Doesn't matter if the owner is a starving artist or a mutli-national, mutli-billion dollar corporation. You don't have a right to take things you don't own, and you have not asserted any legitimate claim otherwise.

1.  Stealing isn't inherently wrong.  Look at every single other species on the planet, they all take whatever they can get without any sort of moral dilemma.  Look at Human beings, for the overwhelming majority of the time we existed, we did the same thing.  With the rise of civilization we "decided" we were better off agreeing to a moral code, so much so that it is now ingrained in us.  I won't take your stuff and you won't take mine.  I can't say this enough though, it only works if we are all playing by the rules!  Corporations do not follow the code, and so they do not deserve to have it followed with them either.  I mean you're free to follow whatever moral code you want to of course, as am I.  

2.  It isn't stealing.  For most of human history, if I could play a song, I was free to play it.  You didn't own it anymore than you owned how to bake a loaf of bread, or fashion a wheel.  Somewhere along the line, very recently, groups of people *declared* that such a thing was immoral (not coincidentally, they stand to profit heavily from convincing you and I that it is immoral).  As I tried to mention earlier, the Romans, upon whom much of our legal code is bases, specifically had a term for this type of law to differentiate it from moral laws like stealing.  There is simply no precedent anywhere in western law for it to be stealing, and in fact quite the precedent for it to be nothing more than a procedural issue (like illegal parking).  

3.  You bring up an interesting point regarding free trade and western style free market economics.  In theory yes, the free market will sort out the price of these things, and if the market determines some guy is worth 720 dollars a minute we consider that "fair".  Of course western style, free market economics is very rarely free.  In theory you would compete by providing a better product, or a lower price but in fact you demonstrate how it *really* works.  Pass laws to make it illegal for anyone else to compete with you rather than provide a superior product at a superior price.  But now we are getting way off topic.  

I'll keep your enumeration for the sake keeping it organized.

1. I still maintain stealing is inherently wrong. Look at every single other species on the planet, and differentiate what makes us different from them: Meta-cognition and the ability to understand right from wrong. Animals don't act "morally" or "immorally" because they don't have empathy. A tiger needs to eat, it kills and eats and has no ability to understand it caused tremendous pain to whatever it just ate. People have empathy, and the ability to understand how their actions harm other people. And choosing to harm other people is "inherently wrong," whether it is physically, economically, or otherwise.

2. I take your points well on the ability to play a song as being analogous to knowing how to bake a loaf of bread. I agree with you in these instances. I'm not talking about this though. If you want to reenact a movie you've seen and charge admission for it, I see no reason you should be stopped. If you want to play a song ("protected by copyright") and charge for your performance, I also see no reason the law should stop you. But I'm addressing the instances in which this is not the case, like taking a movie or song wholesale and consuming it without paying for it. That's stealing, because it's not based on voluntary exchange.

3. I agree with you. I'm against IP laws that are anti-innovation or anti-competition. I do not believe Pirate Bay or P2P networks fit this model however. These are straight theft enablers.

1.  But you haven't really explained why it is wrong.  What makes you the arbiter of what is right and what is wrong?  Now we are getting somewhere though.  Empathy.  As you say, people have this ability.  But what is a corporation?  It isn't a person, despite what US case law will tell you.  And they clearly do not experience empathy.  So why would I experience any empathy for it?  It isn't a person, and it clearly does not experience any sort of empathy, nor does it follow this moral code.  And so I will say again, in my interactions with corporations, I also do not experience any empathy or follow a moral code.  It's like picking up a pretty pebble from the ground, I'm not stealing from the ground because the ground isn't a person.

2.  But it clearly isn't stealing.  I really can't say this any other way.  Since the dawn of human civilization, human beings have done *exactly* what you described, and no where, anywhere, did anyone ever regard it as stealing (except perhaps the originators of the material.  No idea what they thought).  All of a sudden, music is a multi billion dollar business, and all of a sudden, the people who profit from that business unilaterally declare it to be morally wrong to copy their work (in itself obtained in often explotive relationships with the original artists or outright "stolen").  This declaration does not simply make is so, though. 

3.  Another way to look at it is they provide the same service as the corporation, but for less cost. 

[jaberwock]

3 and a half year on a swedish prison is like a good resting and meditating pause in your life.

Not that bad

[jaysabi]

Stealing is "inherently wrong." If I have a tangible object, you have no right to it. It doesn't matter if I made it or purchased it, it belongs to me. If you take it without my permission, that is "inherently wrong." I don't see the distinction between something I physically made or some form of art I made. If I made a movie, I own it, the same as if I crafted a physical object. My livelihood is dependent on my ability to sell tickets to see it, so I choose not to grant people permission to see it without paying me for it. If they don't want to see it at my price, the market will sort that out. Either I'll have to lower the price or stop making movies if I can't make a living at it. But these are based on voluntary exchanges. You deciding you have the right to see my work just because doesn't hold up, that's not a voluntary exchange, and that makes it stealing. It's property law; you're taking property that you have no right to. Doesn't matter if the owner is a starving artist or a mutli-national, mutli-billion dollar corporation. You don't have a right to take things you don't own, and you have not asserted any legitimate claim otherwise.

The Culture Industry

TL;DR "... popular culture is akin to a factory producing standardized cultural goods — films, radio programmes, magazines, etc. — that are used to manipulate mass society into passivity. Consumption of the easy pleasures of popular culture, made available by the mass communications media, renders people docile and content, no matter how difficult their economic circumstances. The inherent danger of the culture industry is the cultivation of false psychological needs that can only be met and satisfied by the products of capitalism"



As for the market deciding the price - well, it is in a way, even with the "stealing" - most people are prepared to pay nothing at all.

I reckon the way forward is the Thom Yorke approach FWIW.

They're not prepared to pay nothing and go without, they're prepared to steal in order to pay nothing. That says nothing about the market price. If the technology wasn't available to steal easily, they would either go without or pay for it, and that would help determine the market price. Stealing does have an effect on the price, but you can't say that stealing is a component of the market price because the market price is based on voluntary exchange, not theft.

But none of that really addressed my points about theft anyway.

It says everything about how corporations typically work in a supposed "free market", actually.  Someone else is providing the exact same product as you are, albeit somewhat inferior in quality, and is destroying you on price.  Do you improve the quality of your product?  Do you reduce the price to one that is competitive?  No and no, you pass a law to make it illegal for that person to compete with you. 

Not providing a substitute, providing the thing you created. Arguing this with name-brand vs. generic drugs is one thing. Arguing it with digital content is another. On digital content, you have nothing to stand on.

[jaysabi]

Stealing is "inherently wrong." If I have a tangible object, you have no right to it. It doesn't matter if I made it or purchased it, it belongs to me. If you take it without my permission, that is "inherently wrong." I don't see the distinction between something I physically made or some form of art I made. If I made a movie, I own it, the same as if I crafted a physical object. My livelihood is dependent on my ability to sell tickets to see it, so I choose not to grant people permission to see it without paying me for it. If they don't want to see it at my price, the market will sort that out. Either I'll have to lower the price or stop making movies if I can't make a living at it. But these are based on voluntary exchanges. You deciding you have the right to see my work just because doesn't hold up, that's not a voluntary exchange, and that makes it stealing. It's property law; you're taking property that you have no right to. Doesn't matter if the owner is a starving artist or a mutli-national, mutli-billion dollar corporation. You don't have a right to take things you don't own, and you have not asserted any legitimate claim otherwise.

1.  Stealing isn't inherently wrong.  Look at every single other species on the planet, they all take whatever they can get without any sort of moral dilemma.  Look at Human beings, for the overwhelming majority of the time we existed, we did the same thing.  With the rise of civilization we "decided" we were better off agreeing to a moral code, so much so that it is now ingrained in us.  I won't take your stuff and you won't take mine.  I can't say this enough though, it only works if we are all playing by the rules!  Corporations do not follow the code, and so they do not deserve to have it followed with them either.  I mean you're free to follow whatever moral code you want to of course, as am I.  

2.  It isn't stealing.  For most of human history, if I could play a song, I was free to play it.  You didn't own it anymore than you owned how to bake a loaf of bread, or fashion a wheel.  Somewhere along the line, very recently, groups of people *declared* that such a thing was immoral (not coincidentally, they stand to profit heavily from convincing you and I that it is immoral).  As I tried to mention earlier, the Romans, upon whom much of our legal code is bases, specifically had a term for this type of law to differentiate it from moral laws like stealing.  There is simply no precedent anywhere in western law for it to be stealing, and in fact quite the precedent for it to be nothing more than a procedural issue (like illegal parking).  

3.  You bring up an interesting point regarding free trade and western style free market economics.  In theory yes, the free market will sort out the price of these things, and if the market determines some guy is worth 720 dollars a minute we consider that "fair".  Of course western style, free market economics is very rarely free.  In theory you would compete by providing a better product, or a lower price but in fact you demonstrate how it *really* works.  Pass laws to make it illegal for anyone else to compete with you rather than provide a superior product at a superior price.  But now we are getting way off topic.  

I'll keep your enumeration for the sake keeping it organized.

1. I still maintain stealing is inherently wrong. Look at every single other species on the planet, and differentiate what makes us different from them: Meta-cognition and the ability to understand right from wrong. Animals don't act "morally" or "immorally" because they don't have empathy. A tiger needs to eat, it kills and eats and has no ability to understand it caused tremendous pain to whatever it just ate. People have empathy, and the ability to understand how their actions harm other people. And choosing to harm other people is "inherently wrong," whether it is physically, economically, or otherwise.

2. I take your points well on the ability to play a song as being analogous to knowing how to bake a loaf of bread. I agree with you in these instances. I'm not talking about this though. If you want to reenact a movie you've seen and charge admission for it, I see no reason you should be stopped. If you want to play a song ("protected by copyright") and charge for your performance, I also see no reason the law should stop you. But I'm addressing the instances in which this is not the case, like taking a movie or song wholesale and consuming it without paying for it. That's stealing, because it's not based on voluntary exchange.

3. I agree with you. I'm against IP laws that are anti-innovation or anti-competition. I do not believe Pirate Bay or P2P networks fit this model however. These are straight theft enablers.

1.  But you haven't really explained why it is wrong.  What makes you the arbiter of what is right and what is wrong?  Now we are getting somewhere though.  Empathy.  As you say, people have this ability.  But what is a corporation?  It isn't a person, despite what US case law will tell you.  And they clearly do not experience empathy.  So why would I experience any empathy for it?  It isn't a person, and it clearly does not experience any sort of empathy, nor does it follow this moral code.  And so I will say again, in my interactions with corporations, I also do not experience any empathy or follow a moral code.  It's like picking up a pretty pebble from the ground, I'm not stealing from the ground because the ground isn't a person.

2.  But it clearly isn't stealing.  I really can't say this any other way.  Since the dawn of human civilization, human beings have done *exactly* what you described, and no where, anywhere, did anyone ever regard it as stealing (except perhaps the originators of the material.  No idea what they thought).  All of a sudden, music is a multi billion dollar business, and all of a sudden, the people who profit from that business unilaterally declare it to be morally wrong to copy their work (in itself obtained in often explotive relationships with the original artists or outright "stolen").  This declaration does not simply make is so, though. 

3.  Another way to look at it is they provide the same service as the corporation, but for less cost. 

I'm gonna cut out some of the early responses to try to keep the quoting from being super long, but also retain the relevancy of the responses that preceded this.


1. It is wrong because we have empathy. If I punch you in the face, I know that causes you physical harm because I can empathize with or reasonably project what being punched in the face feels like. Because I know it causes physical harm, choosing to do so makes it wrong. All moral questions boil down to one thing: does it hurt someone else? If yes, it's morally wrong. If not, it is not morally wrong.

Does smoking marijuana harm anyone else? No, then it is not wrong. Does taking someone's money without their permission harm anyone else? Yes, then it is morally wrong. And all questions of financial harm have to do with voluntary exchange. If I give you permission to watch the movie I created without paying me for it, it's not wrong. If I did not give you that permission, you're taking it and it's not voluntary, and that makes it wrong.

2. Using absolutes like "no where, anywhere, did anyone ever regard it as stealing" almost automatically render your assertion false. I guarantee that in the course of human civilization (before music became a multi-billion dollar industry), someone copied a song someone else wrote and the author considered it stealing. That's human nature to want credit for what you create, even if the "currency" is only the acknowledgement that you created it. And again, I'm not talking about you performing the song. I'm talking about you taking something someone has not given you permission to take and disseminated it without compensation, like the specific recording an artist makes. It doesn't matter if music being a vocation is a recent development in the course of all human history. There is now the implicit (and explicit) understanding that musicians create music as their economic contribution to society, and they do so with the expectation to be economically compensated as part of a voluntary exchange. The person who builds something, owns it. The person who creates something, owns it. You don't get to just say, "Well this thing you created sure is nice, and I don't need your permission to take it because that's the way it's always been." That's wrong. That's stealing.

Like your bread analogy, knowing how to bake bread and knowing how to play a song someone else wrote are knowledges that cannot be owned. But the specific loaf you baked, or the specific recording of the song you wrote, you DO own. Someone using that loaf of bread or that recording of the song you wrote without your permission is wrong. It's stealing.

3. They don't provide the same "services." They provide stolen goods. The electronic version of the song is a unique item they did not create and do not have permission to provide to anyone else. Because their exchange is not voluntary, it is stealing.

[brian_23452]

Stealing is "inherently wrong." If I have a tangible object, you have no right to it. It doesn't matter if I made it or purchased it, it belongs to me. If you take it without my permission, that is "inherently wrong." I don't see the distinction between something I physically made or some form of art I made. If I made a movie, I own it, the same as if I crafted a physical object. My livelihood is dependent on my ability to sell tickets to see it, so I choose not to grant people permission to see it without paying me for it. If they don't want to see it at my price, the market will sort that out. Either I'll have to lower the price or stop making movies if I can't make a living at it. But these are based on voluntary exchanges. You deciding you have the right to see my work just because doesn't hold up, that's not a voluntary exchange, and that makes it stealing. It's property law; you're taking property that you have no right to. Doesn't matter if the owner is a starving artist or a mutli-national, mutli-billion dollar corporation. You don't have a right to take things you don't own, and you have not asserted any legitimate claim otherwise.

The Culture Industry

TL;DR "... popular culture is akin to a factory producing standardized cultural goods — films, radio programmes, magazines, etc. — that are used to manipulate mass society into passivity. Consumption of the easy pleasures of popular culture, made available by the mass communications media, renders people docile and content, no matter how difficult their economic circumstances. The inherent danger of the culture industry is the cultivation of false psychological needs that can only be met and satisfied by the products of capitalism"



As for the market deciding the price - well, it is in a way, even with the "stealing" - most people are prepared to pay nothing at all.

I reckon the way forward is the Thom Yorke approach FWIW.

They're not prepared to pay nothing and go without, they're prepared to steal in order to pay nothing. That says nothing about the market price. If the technology wasn't available to steal easily, they would either go without or pay for it, and that would help determine the market price. Stealing does have an effect on the price, but you can't say that stealing is a component of the market price because the market price is based on voluntary exchange, not theft.

But none of that really addressed my points about theft anyway.

It says everything about how corporations typically work in a supposed "free market", actually.  Someone else is providing the exact same product as you are, albeit somewhat inferior in quality, and is destroying you on price.  Do you improve the quality of your product?  Do you reduce the price to one that is competitive?  No and no, you pass a law to make it illegal for that person to compete with you. 

Not providing a substitute, providing the thing you created. Arguing this with name-brand vs. generic drugs is one thing. Arguing it with digital content is another. On digital content, you have nothing to stand on.

I have everything to stand on.  As has been mentioned several times already, for thousands of years it was perfectly acceptable to copy someone else's discovery.  Music still got made, books were still written, drugs were still discovered, inventions were still invented, etc.  Then, all of a sudden and fairly recently, the powers that be realized they could make more money if they were the only providers of a particular good, and so they made it illegal, and have attempted to make it immoral (it appears you were convinced).  But simply declaring it to be so, just not make it so. 

[jaysabi]

Stealing is "inherently wrong." If I have a tangible object, you have no right to it. It doesn't matter if I made it or purchased it, it belongs to me. If you take it without my permission, that is "inherently wrong." I don't see the distinction between something I physically made or some form of art I made. If I made a movie, I own it, the same as if I crafted a physical object. My livelihood is dependent on my ability to sell tickets to see it, so I choose not to grant people permission to see it without paying me for it. If they don't want to see it at my price, the market will sort that out. Either I'll have to lower the price or stop making movies if I can't make a living at it. But these are based on voluntary exchanges. You deciding you have the right to see my work just because doesn't hold up, that's not a voluntary exchange, and that makes it stealing. It's property law; you're taking property that you have no right to. Doesn't matter if the owner is a starving artist or a mutli-national, mutli-billion dollar corporation. You don't have a right to take things you don't own, and you have not asserted any legitimate claim otherwise.

The Culture Industry

TL;DR "... popular culture is akin to a factory producing standardized cultural goods — films, radio programmes, magazines, etc. — that are used to manipulate mass society into passivity. Consumption of the easy pleasures of popular culture, made available by the mass communications media, renders people docile and content, no matter how difficult their economic circumstances. The inherent danger of the culture industry is the cultivation of false psychological needs that can only be met and satisfied by the products of capitalism"



As for the market deciding the price - well, it is in a way, even with the "stealing" - most people are prepared to pay nothing at all.

I reckon the way forward is the Thom Yorke approach FWIW.

They're not prepared to pay nothing and go without, they're prepared to steal in order to pay nothing. That says nothing about the market price. If the technology wasn't available to steal easily, they would either go without or pay for it, and that would help determine the market price. Stealing does have an effect on the price, but you can't say that stealing is a component of the market price because the market price is based on voluntary exchange, not theft.

But none of that really addressed my points about theft anyway.

It says everything about how corporations typically work in a supposed "free market", actually.  Someone else is providing the exact same product as you are, albeit somewhat inferior in quality, and is destroying you on price.  Do you improve the quality of your product?  Do you reduce the price to one that is competitive?  No and no, you pass a law to make it illegal for that person to compete with you. 

Not providing a substitute, providing the thing you created. Arguing this with name-brand vs. generic drugs is one thing. Arguing it with digital content is another. On digital content, you have nothing to stand on.

I have everything to stand on.  As has been mentioned several times already, for thousands of years it was perfectly acceptable to copy someone else's discovery.  Music still got made, books were still written, drugs were still discovered, inventions were still invented, etc.  Then, all of a sudden and fairly recently, the powers that be realized they could make more money if they were the only providers of a particular good, and so they made it illegal, and have attempted to make it immoral (it appears you were convinced).  But simply declaring it to be so, just not make it so. 

Sorry, I've already debunked this claim. See above responses. Stealing is still immoral. Taking something without permission is still stealing. No matter how much you don't want to pay for the stuff you torrent, it will never be right.

[brian_23452]

Stealing is "inherently wrong." If I have a tangible object, you have no right to it. It doesn't matter if I made it or purchased it, it belongs to me. If you take it without my permission, that is "inherently wrong." I don't see the distinction between something I physically made or some form of art I made. If I made a movie, I own it, the same as if I crafted a physical object. My livelihood is dependent on my ability to sell tickets to see it, so I choose not to grant people permission to see it without paying me for it. If they don't want to see it at my price, the market will sort that out. Either I'll have to lower the price or stop making movies if I can't make a living at it. But these are based on voluntary exchanges. You deciding you have the right to see my work just because doesn't hold up, that's not a voluntary exchange, and that makes it stealing. It's property law; you're taking property that you have no right to. Doesn't matter if the owner is a starving artist or a mutli-national, mutli-billion dollar corporation. You don't have a right to take things you don't own, and you have not asserted any legitimate claim otherwise.

1.  Stealing isn't inherently wrong.  Look at every single other species on the planet, they all take whatever they can get without any sort of moral dilemma.  Look at Human beings, for the overwhelming majority of the time we existed, we did the same thing.  With the rise of civilization we "decided" we were better off agreeing to a moral code, so much so that it is now ingrained in us.  I won't take your stuff and you won't take mine.  I can't say this enough though, it only works if we are all playing by the rules!  Corporations do not follow the code, and so they do not deserve to have it followed with them either.  I mean you're free to follow whatever moral code you want to of course, as am I.  

2.  It isn't stealing.  For most of human history, if I could play a song, I was free to play it.  You didn't own it anymore than you owned how to bake a loaf of bread, or fashion a wheel.  Somewhere along the line, very recently, groups of people *declared* that such a thing was immoral (not coincidentally, they stand to profit heavily from convincing you and I that it is immoral).  As I tried to mention earlier, the Romans, upon whom much of our legal code is bases, specifically had a term for this type of law to differentiate it from moral laws like stealing.  There is simply no precedent anywhere in western law for it to be stealing, and in fact quite the precedent for it to be nothing more than a procedural issue (like illegal parking).  

3.  You bring up an interesting point regarding free trade and western style free market economics.  In theory yes, the free market will sort out the price of these things, and if the market determines some guy is worth 720 dollars a minute we consider that "fair".  Of course western style, free market economics is very rarely free.  In theory you would compete by providing a better product, or a lower price but in fact you demonstrate how it *really* works.  Pass laws to make it illegal for anyone else to compete with you rather than provide a superior product at a superior price.  But now we are getting way off topic.  

I'll keep your enumeration for the sake keeping it organized.

1. I still maintain stealing is inherently wrong. Look at every single other species on the planet, and differentiate what makes us different from them: Meta-cognition and the ability to understand right from wrong. Animals don't act "morally" or "immorally" because they don't have empathy. A tiger needs to eat, it kills and eats and has no ability to understand it caused tremendous pain to whatever it just ate. People have empathy, and the ability to understand how their actions harm other people. And choosing to harm other people is "inherently wrong," whether it is physically, economically, or otherwise.

2. I take your points well on the ability to play a song as being analogous to knowing how to bake a loaf of bread. I agree with you in these instances. I'm not talking about this though. If you want to reenact a movie you've seen and charge admission for it, I see no reason you should be stopped. If you want to play a song ("protected by copyright") and charge for your performance, I also see no reason the law should stop you. But I'm addressing the instances in which this is not the case, like taking a movie or song wholesale and consuming it without paying for it. That's stealing, because it's not based on voluntary exchange.

3. I agree with you. I'm against IP laws that are anti-innovation or anti-competition. I do not believe Pirate Bay or P2P networks fit this model however. These are straight theft enablers.

1.  But you haven't really explained why it is wrong.  What makes you the arbiter of what is right and what is wrong?  Now we are getting somewhere though.  Empathy.  As you say, people have this ability.  But what is a corporation?  It isn't a person, despite what US case law will tell you.  And they clearly do not experience empathy.  So why would I experience any empathy for it?  It isn't a person, and it clearly does not experience any sort of empathy, nor does it follow this moral code.  And so I will say again, in my interactions with corporations, I also do not experience any empathy or follow a moral code.  It's like picking up a pretty pebble from the ground, I'm not stealing from the ground because the ground isn't a person.

2.  But it clearly isn't stealing.  I really can't say this any other way.  Since the dawn of human civilization, human beings have done *exactly* what you described, and no where, anywhere, did anyone ever regard it as stealing (except perhaps the originators of the material.  No idea what they thought).  All of a sudden, music is a multi billion dollar business, and all of a sudden, the people who profit from that business unilaterally declare it to be morally wrong to copy their work (in itself obtained in often explotive relationships with the original artists or outright "stolen").  This declaration does not simply make is so, though. 

3.  Another way to look at it is they provide the same service as the corporation, but for less cost. 

I'm gonna cut out some of the early responses to try to keep the quoting from being super long, but also retain the relevancy of the responses that preceded this.


1. It is wrong because we have empathy. If I punch you in the face, I know that causes you physical harm because I can empathize with or reasonably project what being punched in the face feels like. Because I know it causes physical harm, choosing to do so makes it wrong. All moral questions boil down to one thing: does it hurt someone else? If yes, it's morally wrong. If not, it is not morally wrong.

Does smoking marijuana harm anyone else? No, then it is not wrong. Does taking someone's money without their permission harm anyone else? Yes, then it is morally wrong. And all questions of financial harm have to do with voluntary exchange. If I give you permission to watch the movie I created without paying me for it, it's not wrong. If I did not give you that permission, you're taking it and it's not voluntary, and that makes it wrong.

2. Using absolutes like "no where, anywhere, did anyone ever regard it as stealing" almost automatically render your assertion false. I guarantee that in the course of human civilization (before music became a multi-billion dollar industry), someone copied a song someone else wrote and the author considered it stealing. That's human nature to want credit for what you create, even if the "currency" is only the acknowledgement that you created it. And again, I'm not talking about you performing the song. I'm talking about you taking something someone has not given you permission to take and disseminated it without compensation, like the specific recording an artist makes. It doesn't matter if music being a vocation is a recent development in the course of all human history. There is now the implicit (and explicit) understanding that musicians create music as their economic contribution to society, and they do so with the expectation to be economically compensated as part of a voluntary exchange. The person who builds something, owns it. The person who creates something, owns it. You don't get to just say, "Well this thing you created sure is nice, and I don't need your permission to take it because that's the way it's always been." That's wrong. That's stealing.

Like your bread analogy, knowing how to bake bread and knowing how to play a song someone else wrote are knowledges that cannot be owned. But the specific loaf you baked, or the specific recording of the song you wrote, you DO own. Someone using that loaf of bread or that recording of the song you wrote without your permission is wrong. It's stealing.

3. They don't provide the same "services." They provide stolen goods. The electronic version of the song is a unique item they did not create and do not have permission to provide to anyone else. Because their exchange is not voluntary, it is stealing.

1.  I guess you are using a different definition of morality than I am.  "a particular system of values and principles of conduct, especially one held by a specified person or society.", from dictionary.com.  Many, many societies have moral codes that specifically allow, condone, or even require harming other people.  As well, there are many things I can do that cause direct or indirect harm that I doubt anyone would consider morally wrong.  If we all just flat out ignore your music so that you go out of business, that harms you.  But we aren't morally obligated to buy it.  But to address the empathy, we are talking about corporations.  A corporation is not a person and therefore cannot experience pain or suffering.  If I punch you in the face, you experience suffering.  We can agree that this is generally wrong.  If I punch the wall in my basement though this isn't a moral wrong, because no one (except maybe me) suffers.  So it is with the corporation.  It isn't a person with feelings, so no need to worry about "hurting" it.
Not sure what marijuana really has to do with this; I do find it interesting that you bring it up given that the same SCOTUS that upheld all these copyright laws specifically ruled that it's use DOES harm other people.   Regarding the movie you mentioned, I didn't take it though.  You still have it.  I simply copied it, just like the bread we were talking about (which you agreed was fine).

2.  If you reread what I wrote, I specifically excluded the original artists.  I'm sure they too, just like today, wished they could created an artificial monopoly to drive up the price of their product.  The difference is that for most of history, society did not agree with that.  I perhaps should have worded it less aggressively; what I was trying to get at though is that for most of human history is was morally acceptable to copy someone else's invention, song, poem, whatever.  And rightfully so!  Imagine where we would be if a corporation had a patent on something like the wheel.
But I haven't taken it!  You still have the song.  All I did was copy it.  I guess what I am saying is, if you chose a profession that is so easy to copy, it is only natural that you not expect much compensation.   You're taking the typical corporate response to natural competition and attempting to legislate it out of existence, instead of asking yourself "what can I do to encourage people to purchase MY work instead of a copy".

"Like your bread analogy, knowing how to bake bread and knowing how to play a song someone else wrote are knowledges that cannot be owned. But the specific loaf you baked, or the specific recording of the song you wrote, you DO own. Someone using that loaf of bread or that recording of the song you wrote without your permission is wrong. It's stealing."

No.  If I come into your recording studio and physically take your CDs, that is stealing.  If I purchase your CD and then copy it, it is *exactly* like purchasing a loaf of your bread and copying that.  

3.  No, it is an easily reproducible arrangement of 1s and 0s on a physical medium.  Metaphorically, just like the recipe for bread.

[brian_23452]

Stealing is "inherently wrong." If I have a tangible object, you have no right to it. It doesn't matter if I made it or purchased it, it belongs to me. If you take it without my permission, that is "inherently wrong." I don't see the distinction between something I physically made or some form of art I made. If I made a movie, I own it, the same as if I crafted a physical object. My livelihood is dependent on my ability to sell tickets to see it, so I choose not to grant people permission to see it without paying me for it. If they don't want to see it at my price, the market will sort that out. Either I'll have to lower the price or stop making movies if I can't make a living at it. But these are based on voluntary exchanges. You deciding you have the right to see my work just because doesn't hold up, that's not a voluntary exchange, and that makes it stealing. It's property law; you're taking property that you have no right to. Doesn't matter if the owner is a starving artist or a mutli-national, mutli-billion dollar corporation. You don't have a right to take things you don't own, and you have not asserted any legitimate claim otherwise.

The Culture Industry

TL;DR "... popular culture is akin to a factory producing standardized cultural goods — films, radio programmes, magazines, etc. — that are used to manipulate mass society into passivity. Consumption of the easy pleasures of popular culture, made available by the mass communications media, renders people docile and content, no matter how difficult their economic circumstances. The inherent danger of the culture industry is the cultivation of false psychological needs that can only be met and satisfied by the products of capitalism"



As for the market deciding the price - well, it is in a way, even with the "stealing" - most people are prepared to pay nothing at all.

I reckon the way forward is the Thom Yorke approach FWIW.

They're not prepared to pay nothing and go without, they're prepared to steal in order to pay nothing. That says nothing about the market price. If the technology wasn't available to steal easily, they would either go without or pay for it, and that would help determine the market price. Stealing does have an effect on the price, but you can't say that stealing is a component of the market price because the market price is based on voluntary exchange, not theft.

But none of that really addressed my points about theft anyway.

It says everything about how corporations typically work in a supposed "free market", actually.  Someone else is providing the exact same product as you are, albeit somewhat inferior in quality, and is destroying you on price.  Do you improve the quality of your product?  Do you reduce the price to one that is competitive?  No and no, you pass a law to make it illegal for that person to compete with you. 

Not providing a substitute, providing the thing you created. Arguing this with name-brand vs. generic drugs is one thing. Arguing it with digital content is another. On digital content, you have nothing to stand on.

I have everything to stand on.  As has been mentioned several times already, for thousands of years it was perfectly acceptable to copy someone else's discovery.  Music still got made, books were still written, drugs were still discovered, inventions were still invented, etc.  Then, all of a sudden and fairly recently, the powers that be realized they could make more money if they were the only providers of a particular good, and so they made it illegal, and have attempted to make it immoral (it appears you were convinced).  But simply declaring it to be so, just not make it so. 

Sorry, I've already debunked this claim. See above responses. Stealing is still immoral. Taking something without permission is still stealing. No matter how much you don't want to pay for the stuff you torrent, it will never be right.

But see you haven't.  All you have done is repeat the claim over and over.  Obviously, we have both shared both our sides and will never convince the other.  So I'll just sum up my point which is essentially, you can unilaterally declare something immoral all you want, and can even believe it if you choose.  That does not however, make it so.  And no matter how much you want to impose an artificial monopoly on your product to artificially drive up the price, people will still only pay you what it is really worth.  And it ain't no 720 dollars a minute (this is a better example, as I don't actually listen to music).