Karma of file sharing

[carrie]

Very interesting question:

- what is karma effect of file sharing?

- what is karma effect of giving copyrighted files to other people

[ayadew]

A thought of gratitude can be an equal 'payment'.
Simply because our society is built around a system where service is bound to an imaginary value of money you don't have to follow it.

[Questioner]

If someone says how they would like to be appreciated for what they offer, and you refuse to honor that preference, is there any karma involved? This is the larger ethical question.

[Ali Quadir]

This is a difference between desired form of appreciation and actually given form of appreciation.

Also if you look at it, in the sharing of music those who share the most music are also those who spend the most money on it. So the two are intricately connected. You can't punish the thief without punishing the customer.

If you're an artist and produce beauty. Then people are going to share this beauty. Sometimes they'll pay for it sometimes they don't. The people who steal your work are ironically also the people who pay your bills.

Interesting figures are coming out. I recently read an article where it was suggested that an artist needs only 1000 loyal fans to live comfortably. So artists should focus on fan base nurturing as opposed to just gaining as much notoriety as they can. And artists are trying funny experiments like writing a book and then people can sign up and pledge a certain amount of money, none of it will be actually given until the book is written, once enough is pledged they write the second book, so the artist knows how much he's going to earn even before setting out on writing the book. That's even better than most book publishing companies can do

The old forms of doing business are dying. But there's goldmines out there for the creative.

Maybe you can catch phrase future entertainment industry as "Hire a hero"

[Lavazza]

I've been attempting to pay my income taxes with thoughts of gratitude for several years now. They <i>still</i> don't have a button for it on their website though...

[ayadew]

I've been attempting to pay my income taxes with thoughts of gratitude for several years now. They <i>still</i> don't have a button for it on their website though...

We are all part of eachother's fractal.

[Questioner]

I want to revive this topic, because it touches on some larger issues.

It's very clear that in the U.S. and many other nations, copyright law makes file sharing illegal. Now to consider activity that is known to be clearly illegal, there has to be some kind of premise or rule that one uses to make that decision.

An anarchist point of view is that laws, governments, courts are all manipulations that corrupt, evil people use to justify enslaving the gullible. Whether or not there is a law about something means nothing, except to calculate the odds of getting caught and punished by those who believe in the fictions. Copyright law would be something for an anarchist to ignore, just as any other law, unless the risk of getting caught and punished is too inconvenient.

A libertarian or Objectivist point of view is that laws, governments, courts are necessary institutions for society, and moral as far as they protect individual property rights and safety, but immoral if they go beyond the shared use of force in self-defense. The abstraction of intellectual property rights may or may not be seen as something that is morally valid.

Perhaps the mainstream point of view professed in society is that government is there to help us and to do good, and we should comply with the current law and work within the system to change it.

A more authoritarian point of view would agree with the Apostle Paul that all government is instituted by God and should be respected. Copyright law would be part of what Jesus referred to as "rendering to Caesar what belongs to Caesar."

From the perspective of the Law of One, which attitude towards copyright law best helps you polarize and grow in the spiritual direction you choose?

In this post I'm only discussing the legal aspects. Practical matters of whether or not the money helps the artist is something for another post.

[Lavazza]

Hey Questioner!

There was a good length of dialog on the topic of copyright laws and digital file pirating / sharing earlier this year in a thread I started called "Argh!" (here: http://www.bring4th.org/forums/showthread.php?tid=385)

Starting around post 5 or 6 we started chatting about the RIAA and copyrights, etc. Although we tried very hard to make our respective other-selves fully aware of each others' points of view, I'm not sure that any opinions actually changed- although perhaps more understanding came about.

After having discussed it in such a lengthy fashion already I'm a bit reluctant to enter in to the fray again, but I will mention that I think that your comment about not honoring the preferred method of appreciation requested (cash) from the one providing the service (originator of content) is perhaps the most relevant item to examine. Indeed, the obvious "problem" this situation creates is exactly the crux of where I draw my opinion.