To steal means you take something away from someone. If I steal a car, the owner doesn't have it. If I download a song, the owner still has full powers over it. Don't forget that stealing has a profit intention (selling a car, in example). Downloading has no economical profit (if you do, then it's illegal). Downloading doesn't equal stealing.
Harvard studies, among others, reached this conclussion :
Quote:
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Downloads have an effect on sales which is statistically indistinguishable from zero
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*
You know what that means? That people who download stuff wouldn't have paid for it anyways. And the people who download and buy the same product don't count for "stadistics".
If right now I download 25 D&D books that I do not own, I'm causing zero economical harm to
WotC, since I wouldn't have bought them anyways. Oh, and I am not breaking my nation's law.
*If you want to read the full source :
The Effect of File Sharing on Record Sales
An Empirical Analysis
Felix Oberholzer-Gee
Harvard University
Koleman Strumpf
University of Kansas
PS : Comparing piracy and murder to downloading stuff screams "brainwashing" and "lack of any valid point" like no other thing.
Piratecat, I would gladly have a conversation with you, by e-mail, about the subject.
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