I admit I am on the horns of a dilemma regarding music file sharing: I think it's inevitable, impossible to stop, the methods being used to stop it including the DMCA are far more damaging and dangerous to the nation as a whole than the "crime" itself, there are very real gray areas of what is and what is not allowable under the fair use provisions of copyright, there is currently no viable legitimate alternative available (although the pay systems ARE improving), AND I am not convinced that file sharing damages CD sales.
That's a lot of if's and caveats and mitigating circumstances.
However, upon being pinned down and baked like a pig at a luau (see comments section) yesterday regarding my position on file sharing, I will have to conclude that regardless of all the above-mentioned factors and more, appropriating copyrighted material without permission for one's own use is not a moral act.
It is not stealing, for stealing means obtaining a unique object through illicit means, depriving the lawful owner of the use of that object or income from its use or sale. This does not happen with file sharing because nothing is lost, but this does not make it morally right.
I see file sharing as more akin to purposeful deception, which may or may not be illegal depending upon the circumstances, but is never morally right.
So while I concede that unauthorized file sharing shouldn't be defended from a wrong vs right position - it is morally always wrong - it is not without meaning to defend it from a relative-wrong position, and under certain circumstances, there are enough mitigating factors to push it up close to the morality Mason-Dixon line, if not over it.
With those thoughts in place, let us now take a look at this story about Dartmouth College introducing "voice over Internet protocol" (VoIP), which essentially turns a computer into a telephone:
- This week, as classes begin, the 1,000 students entering the class of 2007 will be given the option of downloading software, generically known as softphones, onto Windows-based computers.
Article comments
1 - Kel
Ok, I'll bite.
It is technically correct that file sharing is not a theft crime (or "stealing"), but not exactly for the reasons you state. Theft typically requires that a person take someone else's property with the intent to permanently deprive that person of it. So, since file sharing involves a copy, the sharer doesn't commit theft because he doesn't deprive the artist of the work (as compared to walking out of a store with a CD).
But theft does not require that someone "deprive the lawful owner of the use of an object or income from its use or sale." If I have an orange grove with too many oranges for me to ever eat and I'm rich so I never sell any of the excess, the person who comes along and picks a bucketful of oranges is still committing theft.
That is because property rights typically include both the right to use and also, importantly, the right to exclude. For a fascinating back and forth between a couple very smart law professors about this issue and the justifications for intellectual property , see the following links:
http://volokh.com/2003_09_07_volokh_archive.html#106337644830524885
http://lsolum.blogspot.com/2003_09_01_lsolum_archive.html#106338119420336709
http://volokh.com/2003_09_14_volokh_archive.html#106355331874996741
http://lsolum.blogspot.com/2003_09_01_lsolum_archive.html#106349932466050651
http://volokh.com/2003_09_14_volokh_archive.html#106397940862861555
So while file sharing is technically copyright infringement and not theft (I imagine b/c when theft was originally defined in the English common law centuries ago, file sharing wasn't an issue), it is from a moral perspective still wrong. The file sharer denies the artist his right to exclude others from his property (and in doing so reduces the value of his work, along with the incentive to create works generally).
As to fair use, I'm no copyright expert, but is it really a gray area when some downloads songs from a P2P network from someone they don't know on the other side of the country (or world for that matter)? I seriously doubt it. And if it is, it surely shouldn't be.
Viable legitimate alternatives? How about buying the CD or vinyl?
Does file sharing damages CD sales? Before file sharing, people would often buy albums (especially pop) for only two or three songs that they liked. I can't imaging that same person buys the album today, assuming he is a file sharer.
Finally, the WiFi/blanket fee example is an interesting one. I would only suggest that file sharer in that example is the person who somehow gets access to the network without paying the blanket fee. And why should he? Don't many, if not all, of the same rationales for file sharing apply to the person who freerides on the WiFi network?
2 - bhw
I may have been one to bake you at the luau, but today I'm not in the mood to bite the very thing I helped cook. 8-)
I love the idea of VoIP for phone use, as well as the idea of the blanket charge for services like it. Including file sharing of music. Consumers *love* package deals, especially if the packages gives them a lot of what they want and only very little of what they don't want [for example, I'm not crazy about my cable TV package -- too much of what I don't want].
I also think the RIAA is in many ways biting the hand that feeds it, but that's their mistake to make. In the meantime, their lawsuits have at least brought the issue of copying copyrighted material off the 'net to the forefront. I think a lot more young people who truly didn't know the legalities around taking something from the 'net without asking the actual owner, will now be more aware of it. If they choose to do it, then at least they knowingly choose to do it. Maybe it will help slow down plagiarism and similar forms of cheating at colleges, too.
3 - Eric Olsen
no disagreement on any of those thoughts