4 ms·
Copyright infringement is simply not the same as theft since with theft the original owner loses their copy (one can look up both terms on Wikipedia for details
by Fnoord 7y ago
Copyright infringement is simply not the same as theft since with theft the original owner loses their copy (one can look up both terms on Wikipedia for details). Any claim they are the very same with a straight face is dishonest at best.
- yonixw 7y agoI don't like this claim. It is very semantic. With your train of thoughts we can go very far. How about breaking patents? How about stealing your password? None of them should be illegal because you don't loose anything physical. Our law system sees theft as something that need adjusting to technology. So I can say with a straight face that in 2020, theft do include reading article that you didn't pay for.
- iso1210 7y agoOP isn't saying copyright infringement shouldn't be illegal, just that it's not theft. Conflating depriving someone of their property with copying someone's work is bad -- it is not the same thing.
- Fnoord 7y agoI never said copyright infringement should be legal or endorsed (though it should be noted HN specifically allows posting workarounds for paywalls, but not complains about them); just that it is something different than theft. Calling it theft is dishonest. > How about breaking patents? We don't call it theft; we call that patent infringement. We have patent laws for that (in at least US and EU and probably [almost] everywhere in the world). > How about stealing your password? We don't call that theft, we call it "breaking into computers" (I only know the technical term for it in my native language, not English). If you use a password to log into an account you don't have legal access to, this is breaking into computers. We have laws for that (in at least US and EU and probably [almost] everywhere in the world). > Our law system sees theft as something that need adjusting to technology. No, it does not, it has different laws for all the three examples in this discussion, two of which you brought up. You clearly do not know or understand how your law works. The respective Wikipedia articles explain the differences.
- yonixw 7y agoI don't understand you. If you wanted to specify that each case (theft;copyright) has its own law then you should say that the comparison is "wrong\mistaken". But you said "dishonest". I took it as you trying to justify something. Like saying that one is not as bad as the other. So I answered that they all can be sued for damages and are the same morally (given law as a base).
- Fnoord 7y agoIn my country (I can't speak for USA), copyright falls under civil law, and theft under criminal law. The laws and punishments are different precisely because they are not the same morally. You don't have to compare copyright infringement to theft to make your point. Copyright infringement can be proven to cause damage on its own merit, with its own law. Articulating these are different does not equal saying the law is insignificant, that's a straw man. Besides that, we're talking about alleged copyright infringement. You need to start using the appropriate technology if you want your point to be taken seriously. If it does not interest you to be correct when you're speaking about law, please refrain from making statements regarding law.
- zzzcpan 7y agoIt's not copyright infringement either. They are basically looking at your user agent features, country or whatever to sell you subscription, it's like upselling or even freemium. It's weird that people even entertain the idea of calling theft or copyright infringement the act of not going through someone's silly selling technique.
- Fnoord 7y agoLet me rephrase: it is at worst (or allegedly) copyright infringement.
- tzs 7y agoIn common English usage, terms such as "theft" and "steal" and "rob" have more expansive meanings than they do specifically in a legal context. For example the commonly accepted and used term "identity theft", which does not actually involve depriving the victim of their identity. Similarly, we commonly talk about credit card numbers or passwords or email addresses being "stolen" in a data breach, even though you still have them after they are "stolen". Actually, even in legal contexts "theft" does not always require depriving someone of the thing stolen. Example: "theft of trade secrets". The person whose trade secret is "stolen" still has the information.
- Fnoord 7y agoThe fact common language is inaccurate does not excuse it from being wrong. Example: the phrase "begging the question" is often misused when "raising the question" is meant. Identities and data can be copied, not stolen. All examples you mentioned are "theft <X>" or "theft of <Y>" At the very least the term "theft of copyright" is somewhat descriptive, and does not equal it to theft, but that was not the descriptive term which was used.