Color it by any technicality you want, but it is taking something from somebody and in common vernacular, that is theft.
> but it is taking something from somebody
Here is where the inaccurate language harms discussion. Nothing is taken from the author. The author still has just as much as they had before the unlawful copying, apart from lost opportunity. They have lost a potential sale.
The analogy with theft breaks down quickly, and using the language of theft (or worse, insisting that it is really identical to theft) hinders clear thinking about the issue. Yes, it's a useful rhetorical device, since infringing on someone's physical property rights produces a strong emotional reaction. However, that strong emotional reaction doesn't foster rational discussion.
The only thing actually taken from the tool creator is opportunity cost. If you set up a cluster of two machines that illegally copy back and forth as fast as GigE allows, things aren't taken from the tool's creator at a higher rate.
Here's a relevant quote on winxp's 'pirated' audio,
-- According to Benjamin Kern, attorney at Chicago-based law firm Gordon & Glickson LLC, the use of a pirated version of Sound Forge can result in a copyright infringement claim : "Other legal issues, such as patent infringement, trade secret misappropriation and contract breach may also be relevant, but copyright infringement is the most prominent," --
No high seas murder or plundering involved.
Consider if you made ... something to sell. Something great, that you know people want. But no one bought it. But they want it, they just waited you out until you gave up and threw it away, and then yoinked it from your trash.
It's a violation of social decency, as much as pilfering something from your home -- maybe more so. The mere act of physical appropriation can't be the most important thing, since we don't complain about stealing some dirt or water from your property, and we don't complain about, say, chopping down a tree.
Perhaps a better word for copyright violation is vandalism, not theft. It destroys the value of someone's work, the taking isn't the important part.
excuse me, I'm a representative from the Word Industry Association of America (WIAA). My client actually owns the publishing rights to the word "pilfering", as his 8x-previous ancestors were the first recorded authors to use that word in print.
We take our IP very seriously, and it appears you are using a word to which you do not own the license, which is, as you know, theft. We can settle this now for a small $3800 license fee plus a 20% attorney's fee or we can risk going to trial which on average costs 5x as much.
Please consider this legal notice and send an official response withing 7 business days to avoid a protracted legal battle. Thank you.
Which isn't a very strong argument, since you also lose a potential sale if someone decides to purchase your competitor's product rather than your own. And hopefully no one would call that "stealing."
I used to be in the camp in philosophical support of piracy, and I still pirate some of my media. But, I no longer try to excuse the behavior behind a thinly veiled philosophy.
Maybe it's not stealing, but it sure isn't harmless.
That's true, but the firm's bottom line is the same regardless of whether they lost a sale to piracy or lost a sale to a competitor.
> I used to be in the camp in philosophical support of piracy, and I still pirate some of my media. But, I no longer try to excuse the behavior behind a thinly veiled philosophy.
Then either I'm on the same philosophical road as you but further back, or my philosophical support is stronger than yours was.
Yes, the firm's bottom line remains the same. But the difference between losing a sale to a competitor and losing a sale to piracy has vastly different consequences. When losing a sale to a competitor, there is competition and money continues to flow into "Product Market X", fueling competition and innovation. When a potential purchaser in "Product Market X" gets the best firm's product for free, it hurts competition and innovation by decreasing the sale to the best company.
>Then either I'm on the same philosophical road as you but further back, or my philosophical support is stronger than yours was.
Only time will tell. I totally agree information should be shared and spread for the good of humanity, but there needs to be some returns for people that seek it (to a reasonable amount of money... Adobe can get bent).
So every time I download Linux, I am stealing?