Downloading music & movies? wrong?

[Flyboy]

Over the last few decades it seems that the position on downloading free music and movies has been interpreted, and codified, based on the interests of the record companies. I realize that there is the issue of intellectual property, yet this issue, downloading, seems to have taken on a life of its own.

So, other than the fact that it is illegal to download movies and music, I would like to explore the logic of this, ask a few questions, and see what others think.

In the 1980's I loaned out my records. In the 90's it was my tapes, and I made many, many tapes from the radio and made copies for my friends on my dual cassette recorder. In the 80's we had VHS players that would copy shows and movies. Now we have tv that will record shows so we can skip over the commercials. I loan my dvd's and movies out all the time. I also go to the library and borrow them all the time, as well as books, of course.

It seems that the record companies have dictated to us, using their deep pocketbooks to win in court, what has now become, seemingly, a moral value. I have heard many SDA talk about downloading as though it is immoral, thievery, and even some who have said that they'd refuse to watch or listen to downloads at someone else's home.

So, if loaning music before was considered acceptable why then (other than money, the obvious thing) is it now considered wrong? Is there a moral value here (other than following the law) that I am not seeing?

Should record companies be able to manipulate American opinion and the legal system simply for their own profit, which is what seems to have happened?

[Bravus]

Definitely an interesting question.

I recently downloaded three albums from the site of a new band I like, and paid the artists directly for them: that would always be my preferred model. They've worked hard, and been creative, and 'the workman is worthy of his hire'.

Once you add a few layers of record industry padding in between, so the artist sees very little of the money, the issue is more complex.

In your example, you bought your albums, mostly, and then loaned them out: downloading means one person can 'share' the album with 100,000 people, not 5, with a corresponding cut in sales (I know it's not as simple as that and there are arguments about whether sales actually *benefit* from downloading).

Another complication is that the record and movie industries have protected their interests with zoning, and that some things never come to Australian TV that I'd like to watch, for example.

So, in general and where possible, I'll buy from the artists and pay them directly. Where that's not possible, then as far as possible I'll buy if it's available in Australia. There are some things that are just not readily available and there's no pathway to pay (that's of a reasonable level of challenge), and in those cases I might download without paying.

It's not a simple issue, and simple answers tend not to get it done, but I do think that 'the workman is worthy of his hire' is a more productive way to think it through than 'thou shalt not steal'.

Others' mileage will vary, and that's OK.

[Flyboy]

I agree with that reply. I do agree that workmen should be paid for their work, and it is also clear that I can loan out to 100k, or even a million, people, instead of four or five, by downloading. No disagreement with either of those. But.... Let's say this. The typical downloader is what is called a 'hit and run', meaning they download and then delete the file from their computer before others can borrow that same file, thus they actually borrow but, in turn, loan to no one. Because of this many 'torrents' as they are called, die because of a lack of 'seeds' and too many 'leeches'. Downloading etiquette is that you download 1, then you upload that same file to a ratio of 1. Thus, you don't loan to 100,000 people, or a million, but only 1, unless you choose to continue lending it out after you reach the ratio of 1. So, let's say you don't make a copy of it, you watch it, and delete after uploading to a ratio of 1. Are there, or will there be, in the foreseeable future, acceptable download policies that are legal? I doubt it, mostly because that would be nearly impossible to police with to

[Tom Wetmore]

It really is a misnomer to call it file sharing. It is file multiplication by copying. Sharing is one copy being passed around allowing only one user at a time. Sharing is not prohibited by copyright laws. But they do control making multiple copies allowing simultaneous users of the original created work. That is why they are call "copy rights", or the right to copy. In a typical arrangement, the publisher of a book obtains the right to copy the created work from the author and pays the author a royalty for each copy produced and sold in a defined medium or mediums.

People mistakenly believe they are just paying for the physical object that contains the song or movie and therefore they can do with it as they please. Compare the cost of blank CD/DVDs and you can quickly see that you are really paying for something more than a disc of plastic, which is just a small fraction of the price. You are not even buying the original music or movie. You are just buying the right to use one copy of it. The full copy right notice on a purchased DVD or CD (and even a commercial download as from itunes) will give the buyer just a license to use what has been purchased - one copy. (Itunes does give a license for you to load to multiple devices that you own.) And that license to use that one copy is only for personal/home use. It does not give license to use that copy for public broadcast or exhibition, whether free or not. Such licensed copies for public broadcast or exhibition can be purchased, but the price is quite different than for private personal use.

That forms the basis for the problem with PTP file "sharing". The original upload had to have been duplicating a copy that was subject to the license to use just that one copy for personal use that gave no right to duplicate it. Every download/upload from then on simply compounds the violation of that original copyright license. What was one licensed copy is now thousands or millions of unauthorized duplicate copies.

[Gary K]

It really is a misnomer to call it file sharing. It is file multiplication by copying. Sharing is one copy being passed around allowing only one user at a time. Sharing is not prohibited by copyright laws. But they do control making multiple copies allowing simultaneous users of the original created work. That is why they are call "copy rights", or the right to copy. In a typical arrangement, the publisher of a book obtains the right to copy the created work from the author and pays the author a royalty for each copy produced and sold in a defined medium or mediums.

People mistakenly believe they are just paying for the physical object that contains the song or movie and therefore they can do with it as they please. Compare the cost of blank CD/DVDs and you can quickly see that you are really paying for something more than a disc of plastic, which is just a small fraction of the price. You are not even buying the original music or movie. You are just buying the right to use one copy of it. The full copy right notice on a purchased DVD or CD (and even a commercial download as from itunes) will give the buyer just a license to use what has been purchased - one copy. (Itunes does give a license for you to load to multiple devices that you own.) And that license to use that one copy is only for personal/home use. It does not give license to use that copy for public broadcast or exhibition, whether free or not. Such licensed copies for public broadcast or exhibition can be purchased, but the price is quite different than for private personal use.

That forms the basis for the problem with PTP file "sharing". The original upload had to have been duplicating a copy that was subject to the license to use just that one copy for personal use that gave no right to duplicate it. Every download/upload from then on simply compounds the violation of that original copyright license. What was one licensed copy is now thousands or millions of unauthorized duplicate copies.

Well, that is a pretty good summation, but falls down in a couple of areas. First, the current way the copyright law is being enforced ignores "Fair use". It has always been legal to loan a copy of a book or album you buy to someone else. You could even sell it once you were tired of it. All that is now said to be illegal. In fact, it is impossible with certain types of DRM implementations unless you break them.

With non-digital music it was legal to copy your music to another form of recording. You could legally make a cassette tape from an album and listen to the music in your car. Now, the music industry wants that to be illegal.

I see nothing dishonest or unethical with the Fair Use exceptions that have always existed, and the doctrine of First Sale, which says once you buy something it is yours as you're buying a copy of the media.

It's the big media concerns that want to change the definition of what it is you buy, from you buying a copy that you own, to you buying a heavily restricted license. That's unethical on their part and is clearly nothing but a money grab.

[Tom Wetmore]

Actually, no. You still can legally loan your original CD or book or resell it to someone else. What you cannot do is make a copy and give/sell it to someone else or keep the copy and give/sell the original for yourself. That aspect of the law really hasn't changed. This is essentially what you referred to as the "first sale" rule. I would note however the law on this point is not entirely settled as it applies to software.

As for the personal copying to another media for your own personal use, that wasn't always as certain and settled as you have stated it, and still isn't to a certain extent. Part of the problem is simply that the law is slow to change, and technology isn't. The law lags way behind technology and doesn't adapt or change until there is a problem. The digital era has dramatically magnified that problem.

And then there is Fair Use... more complex and widely misunderstood...

[Gary K]

Actually, no. You still can legally loan your original CD or book or resell it to someone else.

I wasn't just referring to cds and books. How about single song digital files, or ebooks. Many of them have DRM on them making them impossible to play/read other than on the computer/player/ereader they were first downloaded to and played on. And, the DMCA makes it illegal to break the DRM. This is all tied in with copyright enforcment laws in this day and age.

It's all about a money grab by large corporations.

[Flyboy]

I can understand the legal debate, but if the recording companies didn't think there was money involved, or if they thought they'd make more money by allowing the sharing, they would not hesitate to support the most profitable model and their lawyers, if the need arose, would craft a defense of that model.

Eventually record companies will lose this battle, they will have to figure out a way to work with, rather than against it. There is simply too much downloading, it will not be stopped without some breakthrough technology which can prevent it. Who cares about DRM on a CD when I can just google the name of that CD or DVD and download it for free in about the same time that it would take to burn the CD. DRM is pointless, irrelevant technology.

Ultimately, for moral people anyway, it may come down to simply obeying the law, regardless of the moral stand of this basically insignificant matter.... as much as I hate to have my moral values / laws set for me by big business.

[fccool]

Let's face it. It's made to be "the moral issue" because it makes someone a LOT of money. It costs a lot less money/effort to copy/sell song than to write/record/produce... perform it.

On top of that, people don't exactly download it "for free". There's a lot of money revolves around the ISP industry that makes the "speed" to be the major benefit of "downloading music, movies and files". They don't make the distinction, and they certainly benefit from "illegal" downloading.

I think that "neflix" approach would make far more sense than constantly complain about "piracy". I'm glad that companies now recognizing that they can either loose... or join the revolution:

Adobe - $35/month for Photoshop! A new way of dealing with software affordability/upgrading issues.

Netflix - $8/month for watching movies online

Several Mp3 services - $9-$20 for monthly song downloads.

Fee-based services make sense. Essentially we can add $5 as an overhead to ISPs and share the download experience, and collectively benefit from content sharing, instead of criminalizing the "illegal downloading". It's absurd. We have a generation full of "criminals" who were put in such situation because of laws that don't consider the nature of information.

It many cases it would be like putting $20 on the sidewalk, and make it illegal for anyone to pick it up and use it. The nature of digital distribution is via copying. Eventually that's how we experience the content anyway... by copying it to our own computer, and then our brain. That's how experience works, that's how knowledge works. Trying to restrict the such flow simply does not work. As producers/consumers we need to find sensible was of mutual and affordable ways to benefit from content production/consumption.

[Gary K]

Fee-based services make sense.

If you are on the service providing business. On the consumer end all it does is raise costs.

Take your Photoshop example for instance. In your example it will cost you $420 a year to use Photoshop. I'm assuming you mean something like Photoshop CS5 which you can buy from Amazon for $313 right now for use on a PC with Windows on it in the following.

If you throw away the copy you bought outright at the end of the first year it has still cost you only 75% of what the subscription fee has cost you. If you don't upgrade for 2 or 3 years the savings is anywhere from $420 to $840 plus your original 25% savings. Thus a subscription fee as a basis for your software will cost anywhere from $500 to $920 more over a 2 or 3 year period.

I call that raping the consumer. I don't see any advantage to the consumer at all, unless you call spending much more money for the same thing an advantage.

Me? I just use The Gimp. It does everything I need. I'm not about to get roped into renting software on a yearly basis, let alone a monthly basis. The shorter the rental term the higher the ultimate cost. It's always like that no matter what it is you're renting.

[fccool]

Garry,

I'm a professional who charges $$ to do the work I do. I benefit quite a bit from the software that Adobe puts out... both in terms of productivity, intuitive work-flow, and innovation.

Comparing Gimp to Photoshop is like comparing a car to a bicycle. I'd certainly love to see the link to photoshop CS5 for $313. It retails for $650.

You certainly missing the point about rent vs. own software. Production software is not merely a toy for you to play with. It's a tool you can make money with, if you know how to use it properly. For a start-up business, dropping 2000 ++ on software suite is quite a bit of money. Having flexibility of paying $150 for the same package is priceless, especially if one can generate business and turn out profit right away.

I have to respectfully disagry with your numbers, because these hardly reflect the savings Adobe offers with their new scheme. I really hope that the companies will join in and offer such option. Autodesk software is 3k for Maya. It would jump up and down if they offered it for $100/month.

Both companies put quite a bit of effort into developing new features, and upgrades almost always a must pretty much every year. Especially lately.

Sure, for consumers like yourself it may seem awkward. For small business owners like I... we are all for it. Likewise we now have the liberty of simply getting the package for the duration of certain project. Why would you buy a $1000 After Effect package, if you need it for 1 large job, as an example. It has far more advantages than may seem to you.

[Bravus]

Yeah, Photoshop full version (not upgrade) is $1200 in Australia, and just under $50 a month to subscribe. You'd pay the full price over 2 years, but be protected from all upgrade costs - and as fccool said, you can subscribe for 6 months and then stop and have Photoshop to use for a project for a quarter of the retail price.

Different strokes for different folks... but on the other hand The Gimp does everything I ever need to do as a general user who is not an artist or media producer.

[Gary K]

Garry,

I'm a professional who charges $$ to do the work I do. I benefit quite a bit from the software that Adobe puts out... both in terms of productivity, intuitive work-flow, and innovation.

Comparing Gimp to Photoshop is like comparing a car to a bicycle. I'd certainly love to see the link to photoshop CS5 for $313. It retails for $650.

You certainly missing the point about rent vs. own software. Production software is not merely a toy for you to play with. It's a tool you can make money with, if you know how to use it properly. For a start-up business, dropping 2000 ++ on software suite is quite a bit of money. Having flexibility of paying $150 for the same package is priceless, especially if one can generate business and turn out profit right away.

I have to respectfully disagry with your numbers, because these hardly reflect the savings Adobe offers with their new scheme. I really hope that the companies will join in and offer such option. Autodesk software is 3k for Maya. It would jump up and down if they offered it for $100/month.

Both companies put quite a bit of effort into developing new features, and upgrades almost always a must pretty much every year. Especially lately.

Sure, for consumers like yourself it may seem awkward. For small business owners like I... we are all for it. Likewise we now have the liberty of simply getting the package for the duration of certain project. Why would you buy a $1000 After Effect package, if you need it for 1 large job, as an example. It has far more advantages than may seem to you.

Ah, you are Australian. Only the Aussies and Englishmen I've met online have spelled my name with 2 "r"s.

The problem with the subscription fee model is that it will become the only option available after a certain length of time. Even MS want's to go to that for their OS's. The consumer is going to get shafted royally.

I can see the benefits for businesses if they have a one-off project. Renting for a month will always be cheaper than full purchase price.

However, I still see this as a money grab. These companies would not be offering this if they didn't see it as a major source of reveue growth.

You probably can't find the same price on Photoshop as I do because of your location. I googled Photoshop on Google's US servers and was pointed to Amazon's US website. You will never reach either site from Australia. However, Amazon Australia may have it priced lower than other places you'll find.

I have spent a fair amount of time on European technical forums and through that I've found European software and hardware prices are almost always at least double what they are in the US.

[Bravus]

Sorry, little bit of overlap there: I'm Australian, fccool isn't, he's in the US.

Cheapest I can find full version Photoshop CS5 on Amazon US is $659, though, which is still quite different from the numbers you quoted.

[Gary K]

Sorry, little bit of overlap there: I'm Australian, fccool isn't, he's in the US.

Cheapest I can find full version Photoshop CS5 on Amazon US is $659, though, which is still quite different from the numbers you quoted.

Yeah, Amazon tracks your location and adjusts prices accordingly. I can check Amazon for a price on something and after surfing around checking out prices never find the same price again on Amazon. They will always quote me a higher price because they know when you leave the site which url you're heading to, and when you come back they know the last url you visited, at the very least depending on the cookies you've allowed during your surfing. Browsers are quite the tattletales.

For that not to happen I have to close my browser and clear all cookies before surfing on back to Amazon. Then I find the same price.

[Flyboy]

I'm not a commercial user, just a private user, and while we are strayed from the topic a bit, here is a bit of info for those looking for cheap/free, yet legal, software.

Check out Kingsoft Office. I paid $20 USD, and it's exactly the same thing as MS, except perhaps one version behind. They also have a virus/security program. And, with the 20 buck version of Kingsoft Office you can turn .doc files into .pdf.

Also check out Foxit reader. Much, much better than the free version of Adobe Reader. You can change docs, convert, write on them, highlight, etc. Free download.

Here in China, I once asked someone where I could buy some software. They said "we don't buy software in China! You can get it for free." I was a bit surprised but have discovered this to be true. Now I hear that all the time, from both expats and Chinese.

[Gary K]

I'm not a commercial user, just a private user, and while we are strayed from the topic a bit, here is a bit of info for those looking for cheap/free, yet legal, software.

Check out Kingsoft Office. I paid $20 USD, and it's exactly the same thing as MS, except perhaps one version behind. They also have a virus/security program. And, with the 20 buck version of Kingsoft Office you can turn .doc files into .pdf.

Also check out Foxit reader. Much, much better than the free version of Adobe Reader. You can change docs, convert, write on them, highlight, etc. Free download.

Here in China, I once asked someone where I could buy some software. They said "we don't buy software in China! You can get it for free." I was a bit surprised but have discovered this to be true. Now I hear that all the time, from both expats and Chinese.

Yeah, China is well-known as a place where most of the software in use is pirated. They don't feel obligated to buy something made in another country, and the Chinese government doesn't exactly make a large effort to stop the practice.

Try LibreOffice as an Office replacement. It's completely free, and is multi-platform.

In the Linux environment all software is freely available. I've used Linux exclusively now for 7 years and I've never missed sending my money to that completely corrupt giant known as Microsoft.

[Flyboy]

Yes, I have used LibreOffice, formerly OpenOffice. It is too big for my tastes and, forgive me, but the feel of Kingsoft is much more comfortable than OpenOffice (even after using it for a year) due to its similarities to MS. I, too, don't want to use MS if I don't need to. I can appreciate that they revolutionized the world of technology, but I don't want to help them continue to get filthy stinking rich if I don't have to.

But, relating this to downloading, perhaps if the companies selling the software/music/movies would lower their prices then consumers would not be so bothered by paying fair prices for the product.

[Gary K]

Yes, I have used LibreOffice, formerly OpenOffice. It is too big for my tastes and, forgive me, but the feel of Kingsoft is much more comfortable than OpenOffice (even after using it for a year) due to its similarities to MS. I, too, don't want to use MS if I don't need to. I can appreciate that they revolutionized the world of technology, but I don't want to help them continue to get filthy stinking rich if I don't have to.

But, relating this to downloading, perhaps if the companies selling the software/music/movies would lower their prices then consumers would not be so bothered by paying fair prices for the product.

You and I are in complete agreement on this.

[Tom Wetmore]

Originally Posted By: Tom Wetmore

Actually, no. You still can legally loan your original CD or book or resell it to someone else.

I wasn't just referring to cds and books. How about single song digital files, or ebooks. Many of them have DRM on them making them impossible to play/read other than on the computer/player/ereader they were first downloaded to and played on. And, the DMCA makes it illegal to break the DRM. This is all tied in with copyright enforcment laws in this day and age.

It's all about a money grab by large corporations.

Kindle does accommodate lending e-books to other kindle users and transfer to other devises that you own. It does not copy it, but moves it, just as you would have to do if it were in print.

My complaint used to be the cost comparison between e-books and print books based on my assumption that digital should be substantially cheaper than it really is. But then when I saw a break down, it made more sense that I shouldn't demand virtually free e-books. However, there are tons of public domain e-books that are available for free and legal. A helpful breakdown of the costs - http://p.printingchoice.com/e-books-vs-real-books/

I am far from being a fan of big business, but I understand the need for DRM to force compliance with copyrights by using technology since the law is a very slow, inefficient and very expensive way regulate the right to copy. DRM is designed to prevent the violation before it happens. Taking the prescribe legal recourse is long after the fact and a million digital copy generations away from the original violator. It's like putting a lock on your front door to stop thieves from coming into your house to steal your stuff vs. leaving the doors wide open and having to resort to calling the cops to chase down the thieves and retrieve your stuff, eventually from the pawnshop or the poor sap that bought it off the thieves.

If you are in the business at any level of creating, producing or distributing any form of intellectual property all of this looks amazingly different than it does purely from a consumer point of view. Creating it requires much effort and talent. Protecting your rights to your intellectual property is very difficult. Stealing that intellectual property is incredibly easy.

[fccool]

Gary,

I'm not from Australia. I doubt you can find Photoshop for $313 anywhere... legally at least. Perhaps an upgrade, or education version. The cheapest I could find was $450, from a site legitimacy of which I'd question.

But, that's beside's the point...

I'll address you feeling of being ripped off. Comparatively... the amount it takes for companies to handle the support, put value and money into development/programming/R&D escapes the general public. It's immense! In case of Adobe... it's astronomical, because R&D is their life.

Their goal is to make my creative process as easy as possible, accommodating the features that I need and want. Photoshop is perhaps the top notch of any graphics design software, and you sort of looking at this from the perspective of you somehow being ripped off, when in terms you have many alternatives available that are free.

We are talking about Ferrarri of graphics editors . Of course it's expensive. Not because Adobe is trying to rip you off, but because they have to cover their future R&D efforts, and pay salaries. That's how business works.

Back in the day when I served as a producer of 3d animated cartoon... our company bought 10 copies of Maya for 15,000 each! Three years later the prices dropped to $3,000 and the software had much more features. The point is, with current acceleration of development "ownership" of such software would not make sense for us. From our perspective, you could say we got ripped off... but at that point of time we bought the software because it found it worth the money.

If it's not worth the money for you, and you are feeling ripped off... there's a thing called linux wich is filled with open-source solutions that perhaps could compare, but there's a reason why certain things become standard and cost certain amount. Consumers drive the pricing structure in most cases.

[Gary K]

Gary,

I'm not from Australia. I doubt you can find Photoshop for $313 anywhere... legally at least. Perhaps an upgrade, or education version. The cheapest I could find was $450, from a site legitimacy of which I'd question.

But, that's beside's the point...

I'll address you feeling of being ripped off. Comparatively... the amount it takes for companies to handle the support, put value and money into development/programming/R&D escapes the general public. It's immense! In case of Adobe... it's astronomical, because R&D is their life.

Their goal is to make my creative process as easy as possible, accommodating the features that I need and want. Photoshop is perhaps the top notch of any graphics design software, and you sort of looking at this from the perspective of you somehow being ripped off, when in terms you have many alternatives available that are free.

We are talking about Ferrarri of graphics editors . Of course it's expensive. Not because Adobe is trying to rip you off, but because they have to cover their future R&D efforts, and pay salaries. That's how business works.

Back in the day when I served as a producer of 3d animated cartoon... our company bought 10 copies of Maya for 15,000 each! Three years later the prices dropped to $3,000 and the software had much more features. The point is, with current acceleration of development "ownership" of such software would not make sense for us. From our perspective, you could say we got ripped off... but at that point of time we bought the software because it found it worth the money.

If it's not worth the money for you, and you are feeling ripped off... there's a thing called linux wich is filled with open-source solutions that perhaps could compare, but there's a reason why certain things become standard and cost certain amount. Consumers drive the pricing structure in most cases.

I found the price on Amazon. Today, using the same Google search I can't find that price again either. All the versions of CS5 are a couple of hundred more.

This is not the first time I've had this happen on Amazon. I'll be price shopping on the net, and when I come back to Amazon their price has gone up considerably.

Oh well, I wouldn't have bought it anyway, but Amazon did quote that price last night.

As to what it costs to develop software, well, companies like MS and Adobe are not in the software business because they aren't getting extremely rich. Obscenely so.

I'm aware of software development issues as I have friends who are developers, and I've done some professional system administration for someone who sold software. I'm not clueless as to what goes on in the IT industry.

As far as I'm concerned the proprietary software industry has sold the public a bill of goods. The price of software keeps on going up. It has gone up in price even has its user base has multiplied exponentially, which is counter to all known economic laws. In contrast, computer hardware has either gone down, or stayed even, in price over the years even as its power has expanded exponentially, and they have significantly more manufacturing and shipping costs than the software industry, as well as very high R & D costs themselves.

Back in the day of Win98 you could but a powerful, for that day, computer for $2000-2500. Today, you can get a very powerful computer for $2000-2500 dollars. The average Joe can get a computer with more power than he'll ever need for $500-600. That's less than what he would have paid back in the Win98 days. This doesn't even begin to account for the price increases that inflation alone should bring. This is 1990's dollars vs 2010's dollars. So, hardware prices have dropped radically.

The difference? Lack of competition in the software end of things.

MS has the lions share of the OS market. Adobe has the lions share of its market. All of these large software companies buy out, or crush their competition by any means they find convenient, and then set their prices where ever they want. They then hold their customers hostage by locking them into proprietary formats, making it very difficult to move away from their products.

The software industry basically rapes their customers, and it is done by design.

As for Linux, I'm a long-term Linux user. It's been my only OS now for 7 years. If not for the open source movement and the success Linux has had, you would be paying even more for your software than you are now, and would have even greater security problems. MS has been forced into finally beginning to address the security issues they have ignored for decades, and only because of the growth of Linux. And, the slow but sure movement towards Linux is beginning to put pressure on their price structure.

MS has pulled every dirty trick in the book to kill Linux, but they have failed, and will continue to fail in their attempts.

[Flyboy]

I am far from being a fan of big business, but I understand the need for DRM to force compliance with copyrights by using technology since the law is a very slow, inefficient and very expensive way regulate the right to copy. DRM is designed to prevent the violation before it happens.

Stealing that intellectual property is incredibly easy.

Two thoughts.

First, DRM is pointless technology. With some exceptions of course, you can give me the name of any software/music/movie and I can download it for free nearly as fast as you can copy from one CD to another. Hard to find stuff? No problem, someone has already bought it, converted the file to .avi, and uploaded it for others to use. Andy Griffith show, all 10 seasons, no problem. Little House on the Prairie, all of them, yup. War movies from the 1940's and later, easy to get. Old classic football or basketball games, sure.

Second, your use of the word "stealing" is my entire point on this thread. The big record companies have never bothered to make this an issue until they began to believe, falsely some would argue, that downloading would cost them millions of dollars. If they didn't think it would cost them anything they wouldn't be worried. With *no* other media have they been so worried about copying and sharing as with digital media. It is, plain and simple, because they have dollar signs in their eyes. It is them stealing from us, by charging unnecessarily high prices.

As I say, if they would charge fair market price then I'd be willing to pay fair market price.

[Tom Wetmore]

So, since oil companies are rapacious profiteers at our expense that line of reasoning says we should drive up to gas stations fill up and drive away without paying. After all, they are charging unnecessarily high prices. I think pharmaceutical companies are equally rapacious since the actual hard costs to produce most drugs is less than the packaging they come in. The mark-up is many times what the entertainment industry marks up CD's or DVD's. THe reason? Because they control the patent, another type of intellectual property. When the patent expires the price for the generic version is much less even though it cost the same to produce. Shall we go knock over a pharmacy to get our Lipitor for free, since they have been ripping me off for years?

DMR is not fool proof. It is like a lock. It keeps honest people honest. Crooks know how to pick locks and disable burglar alarms and DMR.

[fccool]

If oil and drugs could be honestly compared to digital copies of something, then perhaps we would not have the oil crisis... we'd just copy our way out of it.

I think that's in many cases the the issue, and that's why we should be comparing apples to apples instead of burning straw.