Theft of cable... or is it?

[wisco]

It is a violation to download if you do not own.

I never said it wasn't, but they can't PROVE that you don't own it. That's why they can't/don't go after the downloaders, they go after the uploaders.

Also, if you do not hold the copyright is illegal to distribute it. "sharing" is distribution. Just because "sharing" sounds nice, it doesn't make it any more legal.

Imagine Apple buys one copy of Windows 7. They then "share" it with the world for free. They are depriving Microsoft of that revenue. The same is true for music. The copyright owner owns the content and the means of distribution. What they sell you as a consumer is a license to use it for personal use.

Didn't I say exactly this? Lemme check...

Where they nail people is on the SHARING. It is illegal to share copyrighted material.

not illegal to download, but illegal to share.

It appears I said it twice, so why are you trying to point out to me something I already know?

[wisco]

Software companies are always going after each other for "stealing" or replicating code. As I recall, Apple and MSFT have had a few battles in the past.

Google is going after Microsoft now too. It appears "Bing" was replicating search results exactly like Google, so Google made up some off the wall keyword like "xbmuudsopa" and lo and behold a few days later Bing returned the exact results that Google did.

Microsoft has a history of stealing the products of others, making a few minor changes, and marketing it as their own.

[MikeG]

not illegal to download, but illegal to share.

It appears I said it twice, so why are you trying to point out to me something I already know?

It is incorrect to say it is "not illegal to download." Juxtaposing them as you did is incorrect. The "sharer" is often targeted because of the volume of copyrighted material. If a 1000 people hit the sharers single song, he is complicit in 1000 different transactions. The downloaders are each involved in 1. The monetary value of the theft is thousands of dollars for the sharer but only a few dollars for the downloader. That's the reason for the difference in prosecution.

It's like prostitution. Police go after prostitutes more than johns. But saying that it's "not illegal to use a prostitute, but it is illegal to be one" would be wrong. There are reasons to target certain aspects of crime that has two parties.