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This page/section was originally written for the most pointless university subject on earth: COMP1800 at UQ. Yes, I'm aware that it isn't really all that great. No, I don't care, because somehow I managed to get full marks for it. (Yes, I wonder about that myself).
Although some people or lobby groups would like you to believe otherwise, piracy, or copyright infringment, as it will henceforth be called, is not a new problem for society to face. Underneath I will attempt to cover the issues raised over piracy, and what we are exactly to do about it, both as a society as a whole and as computer users, who most likely have, or continue to infringe copyright.
Copyright infringment is simply the use of a resource without the author's permission. Piracy, on the other hand, is robbing on the seas, often murdering and raping victims. Unless you are intending to liken copyright infringment to this, to call copyright infringment piracy is a dysphemism1,2. A disgusting example of dysphemism is this propaganda published by the RIAA3:
Old as the Barbary Coast, New as the Internet - No black flags with skull and crossbones, no cutlasses, cannons, or daggers identify today's pirates. You can't see them coming; there's no warning shot across your bow. Yet rest assured the pirates are out there because today there is plenty of gold (and platinum and diamonds) to be had. Today's pirates operate not on the high seas but on the Internet, in illegal CD factories, distribution centers, and on the street. The pirate's credo is still the same--why pay for it when it's so easy to steal?
Matt Haughey, posting on Metafilter:
Stealing is walking into a Art Gallery and taking a painting under your arm and leaving.
Copyright Infringement is going to a national gallery and taking a digital photograph of a painting, then going home and printing it for placement on your wall.
One involves the theft of property, making it so there is 1 less painting in a gallery, the other does not. In either case, no money exchanges hands with the gallery, but in the second case there was potential for a sale of a painting.
We can further explain this by using the following analogy. If you have a coffee plunger, and I take it from you then it's theft. Try making some coffee. You can't, as you no longer have it.
If, however, you have the design for a plunger, and I take photographs of these, I haven't physically stopped you from creating your plunger. You can still make - I can also make it too. The difference between copyright infringement and theft is the difference between you attempting to use the plans or the plunger - one has caused an actual loss, the other has caused a potential loss, due to future competition, for example.