-Piracy is often referred to as "theft" and this idea is a problem according to Stefan Larsson, a sociologist of law; he thinks it is a "metaphor" and it is distancing what people think and what the law is. Stefan Larson goes on to say that the "theft-metaphor" suggests that the person stolen from has lost his object, but he has not, because it has only been copied. This is an easier way to approach the "theft-metaphor" idea; when someone steals something from someone that person will have lost his possession, on the other hand when "file sharing" (Illegally download) is committed the original owner does not lose the original item. File sharing only makes a copy of the original item. The problem is internet piracy is often equated to as a "theft" because the creative owner assumes he has lost a sale.
-Law professor Stuart P. Green implies that copy right infringements is not associated with stealing at all. In order to steal something you must deprive the owner of whatever that thing for example if someone were to download a file legally belonging to the rightful owner and has used intellectual property rights on it has lost the "potential" profit that could have been made. You could argue that we can't know whether the downloader would have paid the purchase price had he not misappropriated the property.
-Megaupload.com is being sued for crimes but theft is surely not one of them. Stealing is usually described as when one person gains over someone else’s lose. Most people do not believe that illegally downloading something of the internet is equal to stealing a car; say if I were to illegally download a file from a musician without paying. Technically the musician has not lost anything but the assumption is that he has lost a possible sale. Illegally downloading a file is still a major problem in this internet era and people with original ideas and creativity who put their work or ideas on for sale should be rewarded for their hard work.
-The music and movie industry want to frame illegally downloading their files as stealing but most people do not believe the claim that illegally downloading a file online is equivalent to stealing someone's car. Piracy is more suited as trespass or unauthorized use but not stealing. Trying to push this idea through people's heads won’t work because calling "copying" is not "Theft “it only makes a copy of the original item therefore we can say that the original owner really doesn’t lose anything. A study done in 2004 claim that internet file sharing or illegally downloading is the cause of music sales decreasing but realistically downloads have close to zero effect on sales. Another "assumption is that when; for example if I were to illegally download a song without paying, I would be stealing money from the musician and this is flawed because its only an assumption that I would have paid the price for the song. Downloading a file is simply put this way; it is not theft, the owner has not lost anything, the downloader only copied the item.
-Mark Colvin, an expert in white collar crimes suggests framing internet piracy as theft is somewhat of a joke and Professor Green from Rutgers University implies that young people do not buy the idea that illegally downloading something of the internet is like stealing. If a musician for example; uploads his new song onto iTunes and I were to download the song of a file sharing site for free, the musician has not lost anything; his song is still on iTunes for everyone else to buy. The owner still has his original file. He can argue that he has been deprived of the profit he could've made by assuming that the down-loader would have been willing to pay just to have the file but that is only an assumption. The entertainment industry and parliament have really tried to push the concept of illegally downloading a file is equivalent to theft but Professor Green is still implying that it is suited as "unauthorized use" or "trespass" because saying a person has stolen something is much more serious than the situation really is.
-Basically Illegal downloads is thievery. A idea or object that is Intellectual property is knowledge or expression that is owned
by someone and protected by the law. Intellectual property laws protect creative works like music, inventions and brand names. By copying something online that was not authorized by the owner is
theft. The problem of internet piracy did not gain international attention
until Napster gained an enormous following. Piracy is most problematic towards
the entertainment industry where millions of files have been leaked by illegal downloader’s
and sharing with other illegal downloader’s. Yes the owner does not lose his
original belonging but he/she does lose the profit that he/she could have made. Napster offered music files and movie files for free which was harmful to the entertainment industry and despite vigorously fighting against online file sharing, it still remains a big problem.
Hi Leng, look at your first sentence: I didn't realise that you were blogging about INTERNET piracy.
ReplyDeleteWhat evidence do you have to say that "most people do not believe that illegally downloading something of the internet is equal to stealing a car"? Is that most of your friends? Most Americans? Most people who illegally download movies, etc? What?
Give citations for your 2004 claim.