@ PanicLord. First of I want to compliment you on the structured reply. Although I do not agree on all it was very well argumented :)
Quote:
Originally Posted by PanicLord
Well yes. I suspect burglary and money laundering are too, but that doesn't make it any less illegal or harmful to the victims.
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This is what the anti-piracy folks tell you. It's nonsense of course to compare this with burglary or money laundring. Especially in the example I posted.
Burglary you actually do harm people. In the case of -and I used the bluray example- it's the oposite. If I hadn't been able to download those titles I would never have bought the originals anyway. The thing is I would never have spent money on them, thus never watched them. If I download them now and watch them that has the same impact as not watching them (from the point of view of the copyright holders). Now I have bought quite a few titles after I saw the downloaded version. So basically this form of piracy eventually regenerates money for them.
Same with music. How many people attend concerts after they heard a downloaded song or album? Especially from new/unknown artists. Eventually they buy merchandise, cd's etc from that same artist.
Now I never claim it's legal but in all honesty it's not fair to claim that all downloaders harm an artist. When sometimes the oposite is true. And that's also what I meant with my latest statement that it's too easy to put the blame on all downloaders
Again refering to my post. The first part I tell I buy cd's unless it's a compilation album with that one missing song. Why would they do that? Sell a 15 to 20 Euro (Dutch prices) compilation album with all songs you -as a fan- already have just to get that one song. How many people would buy one song for 20Euro? It's almost theft. In fact it's legal theft and I actually appreciate it's illegal counterpart if a ddownload is possible.
According to the law this is very simple. You're either black or white. But when we use common sense then there actually is a large grey area (even if you can rightfully claim it's illegal according to the law). Then again, how many of you wait for a red light when there is no traffic?
Anyway that's my opinion in this matter :)