• massive_bereavement@fedia.io
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      1 day ago

      They call it stealing because the real legal term is unlawful copying or reproducing without copyright permits, and that sounds closer to a misdemeanor.

      If we claim someone has stolen thousands of songs causing millions of dolars in damages it does look like a felony, and that is the way they’ve chosen to scare us.

      • very_poggers_gay [they/them]@hexbear.net
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        1 day ago

        If we claim someone has stolen thousands of songs causing millions of dolars in damages

        An even funnier premise in the streaming era, where artists get paid like $0.005 per stream. You’d have to rack up 20,000 plays across these “stolen” songs before it “costs” the artist $100

    • SatyrSack@quokk.au
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      1 day ago

      I feel the same way about people applying terms like “theft” to events of intellectual property misuse like copying another artist’s art style, reusing another comedian’s jokes, etc. Those things are problems of their own, but should not be called “theft”.

      • borkborkbork@piefed.social
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        16 hours ago

        when people do it, it’s interpretation - it’s only theft if they’re portraying themselves as the original artist, trying to leverage someone else’s work for profit.

        now, when machines do the same thing, I think that very much is theft and should be illegal.

      • userse31 [it/its, he/him]@hexbear.net
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        1 day ago

        Gatekeeping technology is a personal irritation of mine.

        The famicom and capacitor electrolytes should not belong to individual companies, they belong to all of humanity.

    • aaa@lemmy.zip
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      1 day ago

      Not that I agree with the following, but I feel like many say piracy is theft because one is “stealing” potential income, not stealing the material itself. I vaguely remember someone on YouTube even said using Adblock is akin to piracy, as one is watching content without paying for it (and the assumption is one should pay)