I just said, I believe the Tolkien family (Tolkien’s death being beyond 25 years) still hold the rights over Lord of the Rings. So there is a case for family inheritence.
Basically, if the family inherit, they should be allowed to keep it. I don’t see why a copyright law would allow an individual’s work to be public domain 25 years after death. Again, I think Tolkien’s family is still holding on to the copyrights of the work.
It depends on what they are performing. I don’t think the creaters of Stabat Mater intended a charge for a religious hymn. Mozart? Maybe, not sure.
If you videotape a service, you need permission to record and upload.
Copyright is a law that has been enacted.
What exactly is the ‘it’ which is their property and why is is their property? They certainly did not make the copy which somebody else made… Why do they own it? that is precisely the question. Is it really because of natural law as such? If this is so how can it ever be just to use anything in the public domain as MaryBeloved pointed out? Or is it only a part of natural law because it is the rule of the land? Yes, people who own copyrights do ‘own’ the material and have rights to its usage etc, but I fail to see how this ownership comes directly from natural law rather than from the laws put in place in a particular country. Beause of this I am trying to better understand why you believe it is simply because it is wrong in and of itself.
If they take a copy I have made, its theft. If they make their own copy, it is not theft. That is my entire point. Certainly we have a right to sell our inventions, but we also have a right to do things ourselves. Copyright laws legally restrict us from doing things ourselves because today the technology to replicate such material is so effective and cheap that without copyright laws such things would no longer be profitable. So as I said, I’m all for copyright laws. I just don’t confuse them with the natural law.
I meant to say “does not have a natural right”
Tolkien or someone the family sold to definitely owns his work. And after a certain time the public will steal that work from them. That is not very moral if copyright violation is theft.
I dont know what they intended but someone owns the work whether that is the public or a private entity.
You need a license from the author of any copyrighted works, not just the performers.
I’d say it’s something they produce. Patent technology is also in this form. Intellectual offspring so to speak.
Public domain is tricky, as I’ve repeated yet again, the Tolkien family still hold rights over Lord of the Rings and so forth, even after 25 years of the authors death.
It’s difficult to argue from natural law. I can only argue from the argument of loss, and that is the author does lose something in the process when he does attribute a price to it. It is his work, like the carpenter makes a chair. Who owns the concept of a chair is not at this point important. But when the carpenter makes it, and charges a price for it, and the individual takes the chair without the price. Surely the same can be applicable in sharing when the author places a price, and people deliberately circumvent it?
This does not answer the question “But how do you answer the criticism that nothing was actually “taken”?”. Please address that question, in particular showing how the copying of a file is a form of taking something away from someone. What if I set a price on the use of the letter “C”, and then someone wrote a story about “Christmas”? Could I accuse them of stealing the use of the letter “C” from me? According to your “simple” answer, that’s all it takes to make something a theft. Obviously the your answer is way too short.
Please elaborate on how that is a response to “The normal understanding of theft is that a physical something was taken from a victim who is now harmed because he no longer has that which has been taken from him.”
No, definitely not. But not for the reasons that it is theft. My reasons are the ones you left out in quoting my post #93.
I pointed out how this kind of “theft” differs from physical theft in several ways. You have not addressed any of these criticisms. If you want to call it theft you have to show that the ways in which it differs from physical theft are unimportant. You can do that by starting to list the ways in which this is like physical theft. So far I can only think of one way. The “criminal” now has something he has no right to have. But if ask “why is theft wrong” what is the answer? Well, for one thing it violates the Ten Commandments. But there is also a natural law reason for seeing that theft is wrong. And that is the obvious harm done to the victim. The fact that the criminal has profited from the theft is almost irrelevant. In fact if I were to steal a diamond necklace and then toss it into the sea, I would be just as guilty of theft as if I had stolen the necklace and kept it for my own, even though I profit from the theft in the second case but not the first case. So the fact that I did or did not profit from the theft is not nearly as important as the fact that the previous owner is now without her necklace. So in defining what is theft, it would make sense that the harm done to the victim ought to be an important component of that definition. In the case of physical theft it is impossible to steal something without simultaneously depriving the owner of that thing. But in the case of file sharing, you are postulating a kind of theft where the owner does not suffer the loss of the thing I stole. This is a significant difference that needs to be addressed before you can claim that file sharing is theft. Saying that “theft is still theft” does nothing to advance that argument because “non-theft is still non-theft”.
Me personally? I would buy his work or do without it. Your point is?..
Absolutely. Certainly it is just to reward the inventor and innovator. Copyright laws find a way of doing this, but they do not define what is or has been objective natural morality. What it creates is a monopoly, and monopolies have their own moral problems which infridge on what is just for the consumer. They should be obeyed but they should not be confused with well thought out ethical philosphies. They are simply an imperfect solution to a problem.
So the argument of loss is your only argument? Then what about this scenario: Suppose I put a copy of Photoshop software on a friend’s computer. This particular friend really isn’t interested in Photoshop and would not have bought it in any case. He is only going to use it because I asked him to try it out. In this scenario I have definitely violated the terms of my Photoshop license. But my actions did not cause Adobe to lose any money or suffer any loss whatsoever. So was “loss” really your only argument or do you have others?
No it is not applicable. That is because when I take the carpenter’s chair without paying then he has one less chair available to sell. That is an essential loss to the carpenter. But as I pointed out above there are cases where file sharing where the author suffers no loss at all. Can we at least say that those instances of file sharing are not theft?
My point is I wish to know what motivation you find in such, would it be ‘Render unto Caesar’? What does one simply do when he is faced with the choice of paying for say an mp3, or simply bypass the price and get it freely? For me, it seems entrenched that the right thing to do is either buy his work or do without it.
It’s not tricky. No individual has indefinite rights to IP. I don’t know about JR Tolkien and his family, but I’m sure that whatever law is applicable to them, they will not have these rights perpetually/indefinitely.
But how is he loosing if it is not his private property? I would say he does not earn as much as he would like, but this failure to earn as much does not necessarily equate with loss. If he suffers, makes real losses (No profits or any comfortable earnings), that is another matter altogether. But if they get $100 million profits instead of 300 million, how is he loosing considering there is no private property here?
But the concept of the chair would be the IP here, not the chair itself. The equivalent of the chair itself would be the DVDs I get from the store at the mall.
What if I just make another chair myself using the technique and style of the carpenter? He still gets to keep and sell his chair, I make mine after his concept.
So the argument of loss is your only argument? Then what about this scenario: Suppose I put a copy of Photoshop software on a friend’s computer. This particular friend really isn’t interested in Photoshop and would not have bought it in any case. He is only going to use it because I asked him to try it out. In this scenario I have definitely violated the terms of my Photoshop license. But my actions did not cause Adobe to lose any money or suffer any loss whatsoever. So was “loss” really your only argument or do you have others?
An argument from loss is what I can really only go by. What I do ask is the intention to take without contributing. Say you did have a friend who wanted Photoshop, then what?
LeafByNiggle:
I guess we could, if we come to terms on an argument by loss, although I still do not remain entirely convinced.
God Bless,
Christopher.
I cannot say entirely.
Could one merely argue through the argument of loss? Again, someone likes his work, but doesn’t pay and decides to get it without paying.
I’m not entirely sure it works like that, his work, his price.
Arguably, it’s still a loss.
Say the individual does obtain $100 million in profits from 100 million people in sales at a $1 each, that means each individual sale has earned a full potential. The medium has no loss. If however, someone decides to obtain the medium through certain means without paying for it, arguably that is a loss. Whether or not he got 100 instead of 300 would be irrelevant, someone took something without contributing.
That’s where it becomes problematic. I simply do not know on that matter.
Indeed, it’s very modern.
Certain industries would heavily disagree with you, and would capitalise upon the concept even as LeafByNiggle stated, by the very word. On the whole, I do agree with what you’re saying.
This is why I emphasise for one reason upon the loss, no matter the size of the reward, they should recieve their reward, i.e. the payment for their work.
God Bless you,
So then, are we as Catholics morally obliged to pay for music, video games, and dvds if we can find them through file sharing software?
But as NiggleByLeaf demonstrates, and if I understand him correctly, that it cannot be theft.
Can the cycle not continuously inherit, avoiding such? If not, then yes I agree.
That’s slightly problematic, since the technology at the time didn’t have this patented ideology, and so forth.
That is true, public or private.
For recording someone’s marriage? I thought it would be probably the Priest and the couple involved.
Itt would be breaking the law of the land, which is wrong