OverdueSpy steps upon the Soapbox. Here Ye! Here Ye!

I think that the point that you guys are missing here; is that the illegal downloading of music results in a loss of tangible dollars at the end of the day, which obviously constitutes theft no matter how you justify the matter. It does not really matter who uploaded the songs, because the issues revolves around an individual's inability to follow the law, or a guardian's complacency in regards to understanding or enforcing their childs internet usage.

As for the P2P file sharing networks, I wonder what the statistics are when you compare the amount of music, moves, games, hacked progams, and probably porn being shared, as opposed to other files being shared that were truly created by someone wanting to share their MS Word Document or home grown code for calculating the weight of a Scandinavian lemon based upon size, richness of color, and stem base thickness. I cannot imagine that legitimate use outweighs the illegal use. The P2P industry that, in general turns a blind eye to the illegal theft occuring with their resources or software.

One of you brought up shutting down freeways...etc.. Now let's try my scenario. It has suddenly become popular for youngsters to steal personal financial information and share it over the Internet. A friend of one of your children steals a check from the back of your checkbook, or wrote down your credit card info, and has posted the information on a P2P network, allowing anyone with the inkling to purchase goods with funds in your bank account. You attempt to use your credit card at McDonald's only to find out that it has been declined. When you check your account it is overdrawn by $600 and you have $450 dollars carged against your account in overdraft fees. Now you can't make payments for your car, house, babysitter, water, gas, electricty, Internet access, online games, or buy groceries to eat, or fuel to drive to work. (Boy that sucks doesn't it?) Are you going to attempt to prosecute the the kid that stole your information, the P2P network that is actively ignoring the theft ring, or the bank for allowing you to spend your money? (BTW this scenario probably is not very far away in our future.) Illegal file sharing sounds really innocuous until it affects you personally, eh?

We cannot justify theft except in very rare and extreme circumstances, and even then the theft must be for reasonable goods to ensure survival. Food and clothing for instance. Not big screen TVs and box upon box of designer tennis shoes. To justify theft puts our society on a very slippery slope that will rapidly decline into anarchy. We have morals, principals, and a conscience for a reason. So go out there and use them instead of ipretending to ignore the basic tennants of right and wrong.

OverdueSpy steps down from the Soapbox.