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> You're seriously trying to argue that people who commit copyright infringement do so maliciously, i.e. with the intent of harming the copyright holder? That s

> You're seriously trying to argue that people who commit copyright infringement do so maliciously, i.e. with the intent of harming the copyright holder? That seems... novel. And not very plausible. If true, however, it would be much more effective to ignore the work altogether, thus denying the copyright holder both direct income and free publicity. Your incredulity seems intellectually dishonest. If not malicious, how would you describe enjoying a {book, movie, song, program, ...} that someone has offered for sale without paying for it? Granted, it's not as clear cut as theft. You aren't depriving anyone of an item that they own. Granted, the author may in some cases benefit indirectly from copyright infringement, e.g., when you go tell your more honest friends about it, and they go off and buy a copy for themselves. But in a world where the vast majority of the folks who create these kinds of works need to get paid, and the way they get paid is by selling copies, consuming their work without paying for it seems really fundamentally unfair to them.

nybble41 7y ago
> If not malicious, how would you describe enjoying a {book, movie, song, program, ...} that someone has offered for sale without paying for it? The natural state of the world? There is no natural right to control the distribution of things that you publish. Copyright is an artificial privilege created for the sake of social engineering. If one thing is certain it's the fact that there is no actual malice in the act, so calling it "malicious" is intellectually dishonest. Even labeling it as freeloading would be incorrect since there is no cost ("load") imposed on anyone else. It makes zero difference to the copyright holder's material wellbeing whether you obtain an unauthorized copy or just ignore the work altogether. It's understandable that people would like to be paid for nothing more than giving permission for something that doesn't actually affect them at all, but there's no just basis for it. Obviously people should get paid for the labor involved in creating new works, to the extent that there is a demand for them. That does not in any sense imply that they should be able to control the distribution of works which have already been created and published. There are plenty of other models (including patronage, crowdsourcing, bounties, and work for hire) which would permit creators of works to get paid fairly without control over distribution. Copyright in general and DRM in particular are among the worst choices, not only because they are unjust but also because they impose massive negative externalities on the rest of society for relatively little gain.

nybble41 7y ago

> If not malicious, how would you describe enjoying a {book, movie, song, program, ...} that someone has offered for sale without paying for it? The natural state of the world? There is no natural right to control the distribution of things that you publish. Copyright is an artificial privilege created for the sake of social engineering. If one thing is certain it's the fact that there is no actual malice in the act, so calling it "malicious" is intellectually dishonest. Even labeling it as freeloading would be incorrect since there is no cost ("load") imposed on anyone else. It makes zero difference to the copyright holder's material wellbeing whether you obtain an unauthorized copy or just ignore the work altogether. It's understandable that people would like to be paid for nothing more than giving permission for something that doesn't actually affect them at all, but there's no just basis for it. Obviously people should get paid for the labor involved in creating new works, to the extent that there is a demand for them. That does not in any sense imply that they should be able to control the distribution of works which have already been created and published. There are plenty of other models (including patronage, crowdsourcing, bounties, and work for hire) which would permit creators of works to get paid fairly without control over distribution. Copyright in general and DRM in particular are among the worst choices, not only because they are unjust but also because they impose massive negative externalities on the rest of society for relatively little gain.