Quote:
Originally Posted by Cyberguy34000
And so, I would like to ask the CD community, as citizens of a democracy... Are these laws just? In what ways do they benefit us? Harm us? What are their pros and cons? Essentially, what are your opinions on all this?
-Chris
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2 cents:
Laws are made for a reason. A good majority of them have good reason, and are therefor just. Others make people wonder "what were they thinkin'?" and therefor not just at all.
As far as what is being debated here, which I could probably assume is on copyrighted material with valuable information, art, music, etc. I am pretty split on the issue. There is some material, which is spread through mass media enough to not need the free marketing potential of piracy, that doesn't need to be freely downloaded. Save up some change and buy it. Other material is made by people with such low budgets or lack of popularity that the best way to make it even possibly profitable is through the net.
In either case, I believe the best possible scenario is to serve up the best of both worlds: do some free marketing and sacrifice some material for spreading through the net, and profit off of even better material by selling it. I think the music industry learned from its major error when sales plummeted after they got the RIAA to crack down on so many people: they cracked down on what could have been free marketing, and thus paid in sales losses. (check me if I am wrong, but I do remember a story like this a long while back)
The benefits of these laws don't seem apparent until one steps back and looks at the big picture. We could offer everything for free, but then that would only mean the money would stop flowing, and just like bodies die when blood stops flowing, so will the economy, and thus a depression. It is really that simple. Yes, we should have free stuff, but not so much where the economy just halts due to the lack of money flow.
-Joe