None of us has ever said it wasn't illegal. I really don't think anyone has argued against it being a type of stealing, just that it's not theft in the same sense as stealing a physical object, which you keep equating it to. They're just not quite the same. It does not make piracy better that there is no physical object being stolen, but it's not quite the same as breaking into someone's house to steal their jewelery.
This whole thread is about justifying the stealing of someone's Intellectual Property. Stealing is illegal! There are words about the moral high ground, there are pleas to stop calling it stealing, there are words like "kind of stealing", a "type of stealing", there are yes, HOWEVER explanations. If you are stealing from a bad person
you are still stealing. Just to be clear. If you legally check out a book, movie or CD at a library you are not stealing. You are operating within the law within the contract between the distributor, the artist, and the library - You are not stealing, you are not doing anything illegal. If your buddy sends you 5,000 songs it is probably stealing, which is illegal. If you know it is a "Type of Stealing" and using a library is not a "Type of Stealing" is there really an argument?
No one has said that that makes it ok to pirate stuff. Once again, I went out of my way to clearly state that I think both sides are wrong and that neither has the moral high ground. Do you view the world in such black and white terms that a gray area is impossible to understand?
So the owner of the IP does not have the moral high ground if someone steals their IP? I think the courts, jury and most of society would disagree with you.
To address whether others are questioning whether anything is stolen or illegal, we can start with the OP's first post.
Nothing is stolen in either scenario.
Their IP is stolen. The owner of the IP has not given the pirate permission to take, use or distribute their Intellectual Property. The owner of the IP and the laws surrounding IP have given the library permission to lend out the IP. They are paying the owner of the IP for that right and are doing so within the scope of the law.
Here's a tough question for you . . . how is it morally wrong to download a book/movie that is available and has copies free at the public library? Who is being harmed in any way by doing so?
The owner of the IP has sold the IP to the library with a legal binding contract. The owner of the IP has done this so that they can get revenue from the library. The owner of the IP has lost revenue if people are not willing to buy the IP because it is readily available in a pirated form.
Then we get back to the bad guy squeezed the little guy so we(not you, as you already said that you wouldn't pirate) should be able to steal from the bad guy arguments.
But the biggest labels? They do their best to screw everyone else over, and have used their lobbying power to stack the deck in their favor. You're never going to make me feel bad for them. Notice I'm not saying that I endorse piracy, just that I can understand it and don't have any empathy for the giant record labels.
Then we are back to Nothing is "Stolen" even though it is acknowledge that the owner of the IP would lose "Theoretic" revenue argument.
With piracy nobody loses property. The part that ends up being 'stolen' is the theoretical money that theoretically would have been paid if the person committing piracy would have purchased the item were it not available for free.
This one is interesting as it pretty much condones a hacker penetrating a bank and sending all of their cash through a wire transfer to another person. Nothing tangible has been stolen, just theoretic money.
Then we hit the I am not for Piracy,
HOWEVER argument:
I'm STILL not arguing that I think piracy is right and good. There are people who lose out through piracy, including plenty of artists. HOWEVER, ignoring that there are some people who benefit from piracy and saying that it's completely morally, always 100% wrong because no artists ever gain anything from it is also rather silly. So find a non-moral argument about why piracy is wrong. That will be far more convincing.
Those who are losing out are the owners of the IP. There is no way to say that the big label/producer/distributor who owns the IP is better off by people stealing their Intellectual Property. Throw in a "you are silly" for thinking that it isn't ok to steal from the owner as some other party may benefit. Probably the person that got the IP for free vs. having to pay for the IP.
Then there is the I never said it was ok, but if you steal from the owner of the IP, which allows you to go to the concert then you are in morally muddy waters argument:
I was never arguing that piracy isn't stealing. Not once. Nor did I ever say that it's right. I simply said that talking about it from a moral standpoint is silly because the big record labels aren't exactly in the right either. They gouge artists all the time because they know they can. If someone else wants to steal the album so that they can afford to go to the artist's concerts instead, I think it is at best morally muddy waters because there's an argument to be made for both sides. I do not personally endorse either side. That's it. That is my whole point right there, in one sentence. I do not endorse piracy, nor do I believe the people behind the corporate labels are going to have to eat Ramen for the rest of their lives because some people pirate. I do not endorse, condone, or sympathize with either group of people. Is that clear enough for you?
Again you start off saying that you don't condone it, but the rest of your post is why you think it might be morally ok. You also are more definitive that you would not sympathize for the party that got their IP stolen as they won't have to eat Ramen for the rest of their lives. Having their asset value destroyed by people stealing it is ok as they are rich and won't be eating Ramen argument is interesting.
Of course GuitarStv went down the legal path that because IP is not tangible it is ok to steal. That we have a weak argument with that approach.
Since we're not talking about property here, can we stop using the word 'stolen' and equating it with property theft in this discussion? With theft you are depriving someone of something, with piracy you are theoretically depriving someone of the potential to receive money. Physical theft is related but quite different than piracy. Note - I am not saying that piracy is good or OK, just that equating it with property theft is nonsensical and weakens your argument.
Don't call it stolen if it is only Pirated argument. So what if the owner spent money to create, acquire, or build the IP it is not stolen if others take it and distribute it to others if it is not tangible.
And after he and you have claimed that you are not advocates for Piracy, he claims that Piracy is kind of illegal. Tell the judge that one:)
Piracy is kind of illegal. That's something I understood before my initial post.
Not sure what Kind of Illegal is, maybe it is everyone is doing it so it can't be too bad. Definitely not in the murder category!
Then he goes with the straw man argument of in Canada it is legal to make copies of CD, movies, games of IP that he currently owns. And calls it piracy for argument sake.
Legally I can make copies of video games, CDs, or movies in Canada for backup. To give a perfectly moral usage of piracy which is not stealing . . . I ripped all my movies to .mkvs many years ago to store them on my computer at home. The ripping procedure would take forever. Eventually (about half way through this procedure) I figured out that I could download the movie in less time than ripping it on my own. So I downloaded the remaining movies to save time.
Can you explain how this piracy was an example of stealing, or hurt the copywrite owner in any way? The movies were paid for. This is why I don't think you can always equate piracy with stealing.
Piracy is not making a legal copy of something that you own. You are legally able to make a copy of the IP that you have purchased for backup. You are not legally able to give or provide this backup to anyone else. If it sits in your safe, then it is not piracy. If it is given to your friends and family then it is piracy. You can't call it piracy, so that way you can prove that piracy is always stealing. One is stealing and one is legally making a backup copy of the IP that you purchased.
I hope that you now understand why there is a difference between using a library and digital piracy.