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Message: <blockquote data-quote="LightPhoenix" data-source="post: 1408495" data-attributes="member: 115">I'm not a lawyer, but the Fair Use clause is pretty clear on what's acceptable and what's not.  You're only allowed to make copies of your own property, not download someone else's.    It's this and similar sorts of attitudes that seem to pervade users of Kazaa and other peer-to-peer file sharing groups.  The fact is, you're committing a crime.  Let's not sugar coat it and try and justify it.  If you've downloaded a song, or a game, or a book, off of Kazaa, you are guilty of a crime.  Period. As for who gives a damn?  Who was it earlier in the thread that was talking about his book?  True, I also believe the argument that the people that download weren't going to buy it anyway, and so that's not revenue lost.  However, knowing that there's an easy way to pirate various electronic media, do you really think that the majority of people interested will actually buy something as opposed to pirate, especially when no one (in theory) will know?  The attitude of "who cares?" is exactly the reason that file sharing has become a serious problem far beyond the base level of piracy that normally occurs.   Well, I'm not particularly fond of the DCMA, personally.  I think it needs a lot of refinement before it really becomes and fair and effective bit of law. As for my government being slow to act?  Or others?  Quite honestly, I don't particularly think there's anything they can do about it at this point.  Peer-to-peer networks have been ruled as legal in court, so they can't go after the people who enable others to pirate stuff.  Going after individual people would not only be a monumental task that would be sure to overload legal systems to the point of absurdity, but rediculously, almost prohibitively expensive as well. My personal thoughts on the matter are that we have a sort of triangle of blame here, at least with regards to music.  On the one hand, I feel the recording industry has been bilking both artists and fans alike, seriously overcharging for music with artists seeing very little of the profit.  On the second, downloaders are responsible for their own actions, and just because you're not likely to get caught doesn't make it any less illegal.  Finally, the makers of these peer-to-peer programs are responsible for enabling others to pirate music easily, knowing full well that's what their programs would be used for. What we're seeing now is a sort of essential paradigm shift, where technology coupled with resentment have forced the RIAA to adapt.  No single genre of entertainment has been as badly affected as the music industry, which says something about the RIAA right there.  Case in point, my future brother-in-law just recently got a computer, and his first question to me was how to download and play music.  I hardly think his is an uncommon tale either.  As technology, and specifically computers, continue to become more and more mainstream, this problem is just going to increase in magnitude.  Unfortunately, instead of trying to adapt, what's happening is the RIAA is trying to stick to it's policies of ripping off everyone involved, threatening lawsuits and generally trying to bully everyone back into their camp. We do see some compromises - Apple's iTunes is a great example.  Unfortunately, like I said before, why will people pay for something they can easily get for free?  Ultimately, something somewhere has to give.  Right now though it doesn't seem like any side involved wants to do so.  And so the problem just keeps building and building, until it's out of anyone's control.  Which is pretty much where we are now. Personally, where I'd like to see it go is cutting out the RIAA altogether.  Artists sell their music on their own labels (if they so choose) on programs like iTunes (which they already can), keep 100% of the profits for the work they've done and the talent they have.  Record labels basically still handle distribution and promotion, but for the most part the former is obsolete given iTunes and the ability to burn your own CDs.  Peer-to-peer networks like Kazaa are forced to take action against illegal file sharers, or face criminal charges, since they know that's what it's being used for and aren't doing anything to stop it.  Some will adapt a sort of iTunes-like scheme, where you purchase a song but instead of downloading it from a central server (like iTunes) you download it from peers.  Others will be arrested and tried for their crimes.</blockquote>

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