Weird. The most common refrain here about copyright violations is that it isn't theft since nothing has been taken from you and you don't have any less than you did before.
Does that only apply to content creators outside this community?
Does that only apply to content creators outside this community?
If you download Game of Thrones to watch on your laptop, there is a long and circuitous argument we can have about exactly how much you're harming HBO, but it's pretty clear that the only thing you're gaining is the ability to consume the TV show you've pirated. If your business's web site is based on someone else's code without proper licensing, and that design is presumably a factor in customers choosing to patronize you, you now have a tangible financial gain that is owed (at least in part) to a copyright violation.
It's a flawed analogy, but this is less like downloading an episode of Game of Thrones and more like selling bootleg DVDs of the show.
Are they to be condemned?
2) I copy what you have, claim it as my own, and make money off it.
These scenarios are not synonymous.
Calling it "stealing" is political propaganda as part of an agenda aimed at poisoning any constructive debate about the future of copyright in the information age.
Language matters, especially in this context, where people go to jail for doing no harm whatsoever.
Years ago, I met with a potential client who was really upset that a competitor had hacked them and "stolen" all of their image assets and that's why they hadn't launched their site yet. After pressing on, they told me that the files were stolen, and were therefore gone from their server. I decided to pass on that project.
In retrospect, I probably should have offered my services to "steal" them back.
I think in that situation your design can be effectively stolen - if you can no longer use it, because someone else in your field is using it and your own use would look like plagiarism. They have it and, crucially, you can no longer use it with commercial effect.
Legal, but trashy.
Also it has to be a copy, not a close similarity.
This community almost universally finds copyright infringement to be fine, but plagiarism to be not-fine. There is nothing inconsistent in this position and, while you don't have to agree with it, it's an entirely reasonable opinion to hold.
In other words, if you redistribute stuff without permission, it's generally not that heinous, but if you take credit for it too, you'll get severe looks of disapproval.
What about software? I can't think of any example, for instance, where this community reacted to a story of a GPL violation by almost universally saying it is fine.
So opposing copyright in general but supporting the GPL is actually an entirely consistent and rational position.
2) Even if it were, I'm sure film-industry workers have a very different consensus.
Therefore, most people are just talking their book. Web graphics and css are terribly precious, but we'll militantly defend megaupload.com, who profited hugely from enabling copyright infringement, because we want nice things. It's only simple when it suits us to think it is.
1) Since the two sites would look the same, I could be mistaken for the copycat.
2) My users who go to both sites could be confused, possibly thinking they're related.
Those are two differences I can think of, though I don't particularly support torrenting, either.
On the other hand, using someone else's copyrighted material and passing it off as your own, using it as the public face of a venture, that's deriving massive benefits from its use.
Besides, wasn't someone complaining about how no one ever actually practices code reuse a few articles back? ;-)
They did use the word "stole" but they used it in a casual, non-legal sense and followed up with an explanation of exactly what they mean. It's completely different from a sustained propaganda campaign that explicitly tries to equate the crime of theft with copyright violation, which is what the MPAA and RIAA did.
Censuring them for using the word "steal" in this case is just nitpicking. That's why no one's doing it. It has nothing to do with "only applying to creators outside the community"