Slashdot Mirror
File Sharing Remains a Perk of College Life
An anonymous reader points out a story on the effect of a new law on file sharing on campuses — in short, it may not make much difference. "Students who are about to graduate often hand down the tricks of stealing music and movies to the next senior class. ... At the College of New Jersey, that means surreptitiously finding a new home each year for a computer holding an enormous directory of illegal files on the campus. ... The machine runs software called Direct Connect, which lets people on a local network easily trade files among their hard drives in a way that is usually undetectable to anyone outside the network. ... Educause recently unveiled a website with information about the new regulations. It provides case studies from six 'role-model campuses,' listing the steps they are taking to combat piracy. Another page lists 57 legal sources of music and movies on the Web. But when asked which campuses have forged new policies in reaction to the law, Educause officials were unable to name any."
No, you should be in jail.
"Copyright infringement remains different from stealing. As in "we will stop stealing when you stop calling it stealing"."
Why don't you come up with another excuse? When one excuse doesn't work anymore, copyright infringers will always have another to justify why they deserve something for free.
Copyright infringement isn't stealing. It's counterfeiting, which is worse. When you steal a physical product, like a tv, the company that makes it can still sell more tvs.
When there is mass counterfeiting of music, software, or games, it has the potential to destroy the original business. If piracy is not prevented, people get the idea that it's okay to just get your stuff for free. Over time, this will devalue it because most IP is only worth what people are willing to pay.
When Napster first came out, people said that the artists weren't making enough money and that albums were way too expensive (this is why they downloaded music for free). Now that any artist can make a living online without a recording contract and you can pretty much get any song for 99 cents or less on services like iTunes, there are a whole new set of excuses.
The community won't be happy until there are no restrictions on all music, books, software, and games and it's all free (costing $0), which is pretty fucking selfish.
The whole problem with public subsidies in any and all areas is that anyone who needs one shouldn't get one, and those who could make good use of the money don't need it.
Nobody was talking about public subsidies for musicians - just the idea of selling recordings of music on the free market. For some bizarre reason, some people think that recordings shouldn't able to be sold, and the only legitimate way to charge for music is through concerts.
Yes, it is a truly strange sentiment, but one that constantly comes up on slashdot.
... and then they built the supercollider.