Will 'free' File Sharing Ever Be Legal?

[Levi- The perfectionist]

You've probably all heard by now the recent news that the "Pirate Bay" organizers have been forced by the Swedish court to pay $30,000 Kronor ($5 Million) in damages to companies such as Warner Brothers, Sony, EMI etc...

The event has caused hundreds to line the streets of Sweden in protest.

Pirate Bay's Chairman and Founder claimed;

"The establishment and the politicians have declared war against our whole generation,"

The comment outlines the popularity amongst our generation to steal, the Pirate Bay has over 22Million users worldwide.

(For the sake of keeping this thread alive, don't state if you do download torrents...or methods of doing so, I just acknowledge that it happens)

There can be no doubt that file sharing in its current form is illegal.

And while it would all fun and games to agree with the chairman;

""file-sharing for the people"...

At the end of the day, if nobody pays then nobody gets paid... eventually we will have a non existant film, music and software industries.

There have been a few attempts to make downloading content free 'legal', by using advertising and the like to fund.

Even the band Radio head offered a recent album for "Whatever you think it's worth" online.

Then theres the concept of the download buffet, a la iTunes "Unlimited" where by users pay an upfront amount and can download unlimited amounts.

^ ... We're yet to see any of these become a real commercial success...

So what do you think?

Will file sharing ever be legal?

How?

[Wuzzie]

I'm backing a suprise appearance to post in the article. Dunno if anybody knows over ever knew me =P

I don't think The Pirate Bay should have to pay up their money. They are providing a torrent search website and it is the community of people using it who are breaking the laws. I know it is kind of wrong, but here in Australia, you can buy bongs, hookahs, etc. to smoke drugs. It's 100% legal. It's just the drugs themselves that are illegal. I really don't care about that much, but why should this be different?

However, at the same time I do think it would be completely wrong if it was decided to make this type of file sharing free and legal, always. The people who make movies and music deserve their money. We can't expect everything in this world for free. I know the big companies like WB may not be paying their Artists an equal or greater cut than what they are taking of the money, but the artists should still be receiving something.

So basically, I wouldn't care if they were hunting down individuals who pirated things, but The Pirate Bay should not have to pay for it. That like saying "Jeff slept at your house once. Now he's murdered somebody. You have to do the time" -- Yeah, that's fair.

~Wuzzie.

[mps69]

Good to see you guys back.

I personally think file sharing will go on no matter what happens, it's just how out of control or under the counter it will become.

The media companies should have came on board when the whole thing kicked off over tens years ago instead of just stick their head in the sand and saying "it's a fad, no one will continue with this, it will go away".

Then it would have been the norm to download files from dealers, rather than users go hunting else where. I suppose hindsight is 20/20, but there has been a massive knee jerk reaction to the whole thing. The fat cats have finally realised they might not be getting as much money as they did in the past. Lets face it the actors and music artist for years have been getting a pretty raw deal from the suits up stairs. Now the artist, who are at the front line and deal with their fans, are getting to dictate how their music or movies should be distributed. Good on them I say.

It has also been proven in the past time and time again when ever one file sharing site/program gets stopped there are several other ready to take over.

As for Pirate Bay, I agree, it's all a bit harsh, did they have the torrents no.

Will Google ever be fined for directing users to torrent site or other file sharing site. For me it's the same thing.

[foxofinfinety]

in some area's it's legal!

I live in the netherlands and it's legal here

eh uploading (so shearing) is downloading though...

[Levi- The perfectionist]

The heart of my question is this...

in its current form, file sharing is stealing. Regardless of whether governments declare it legal or not...

but is there a way that file sharing will ever 'pay' the artist?... ie- a win-win situation where both customer and creator are happy...

[matonga]

The problem is, people doesn't want to pay. So, what alternative benefit -instead of money- can the artist be given, that consumers are promptly to provide?

Currently I dunno, nobody will want to pay the artist's house rent, taxes, food, etc... either.

So in long term it will be a loose-loose situation instead. People must get acostumed to pay for what they want, or we'll all ending listening to music which includes commercials in it's lyrics, and movies about soda drinks, certain car manufacturer, etc..., I don't mean like the movie star will drive an Audi (for e.g.) but the Audi car itself starring the movie and being all about the car.

[KAWSquared]

Didn't I already pay all that money in the bailout package?

Seriously though, here in Canada, file-downloading is LEGAL. DOWNLOADING. Not uploading. You're allowed to download anything you want as long as you don't redistribute it.

[Levi- The perfectionist]

but does that make it right?

[KAWSquared]

Well, what I do is, I download the album to listen to it. If the artist did a good job, I'd buy it.

[Levi- The perfectionist]

Thats fair enough. Just don't say it here Kaw

But people who 'download' and dont pay, just because the government says its legal, doesnt make it right.

Like, imagine if you lived in the time of Hitler and he says to you its legal to kill jews, does that make it right?

[mps69]

The heart of my question is this...

is there a way that file sharing will ever 'pay' the artist?... ie- a win-win situation where both customer and creator are happy...

I think the answer to this will always be no, unfortunately, or very doubtful.

No matter how good the intentions of the companies they will always want the most money from the least amount of sharing, companies are not charity cases.

The flip side is the consumer will always want the maximum sharing downloads for the least amount of money, consumers don't have an bottomless pit of money.

You also have to consider the global market, why should someone in the US be able to share a file cheaper than someone in Europe.

Until we have a global monitory system someone will always loose and it's normally the consumer again, hence the reason why we're in the situation we're in.

Until Gene Roddenberry's Star Trek dream of humans having no material or economic drive comes true, the human nature will always want something for nothing or very little.

[Levi- The perfectionist]

'Advertising' as I see it, is the most renewable form of money in existence.

but how to make it relevant to companies and consumers around file sharing remains to be seen.