Mewing from the Crypt

I disagree. If I wrote a novel, and you got hold of a digital copy of it without my permission, I'd feel like you'd stolen from me. Not the novel, obviously, that you'd have "merely" copied illegally, but the chance to give, sell or show my property to you has been taken from me nonetheless. You can steal things that aren't physical, and if you download something illegally, you're stealing the owner's right to control the item.

That said, I do agree that the distinction is worth pointing out - you are of course right that one does not ever remove any physical piece of property from anyone through doing this. But I feel you're making it a little bit too easy but saying you steal _nothing_. 'Cause in my opinion, you do.

I'm afraid I disagree as well. Yes, you don't steal a physical object, but you do steal the intellectual property, violating their right to control copies, and ensuring that the people involved in its creation don't get the compensation they're due.

To go with a practical example; do you really feel Wil Wheaton has no legitimate complaint here?

I still disagree with you, sorry. I see your point that you can't own anything abstract, but I think you can. I own the right to do as I please with my own creations and restrict whoever else can do the same. If you copy them, suddenly you can do this too. You have in effect stolen my ability to be in charge of what happens to my creation. I had it, you've got it, and I don't have it anymore. That's stealing, abstract or not.

I'll agree that naming it copying or violation or rights is more accurate in that it is broader and thus encompasses everything the action entails. But I'm sorry, "stretching the metaphor" isn't a good enough argument to make me understand why one of the things such an action entails is indeed stealing. I wasn't using a metaphor at all. If I have something and you remove it by taking it for yourself, you have stolen it. There's no metaphor, that's a description of what you did.

So yes; the stealing-bit is only one of the violations done, and perhaps one of the less important aspects of it. Naming the entire act as such is thus misleading. But I seriously don't see how stealing isn't part of it.

I'm not talking about a right, I'm talking about an ability.

1. I have written a short story.
2. I have the ability to do with it what I want, share it with whom I want and not with whom I do not want, in whatever way I want.
3. You gain hold of a digital copy of it.
4. I no longer have the ability of 2. I have the ability to do SOME things with it, sure, maybe even many things, but I no longer have the ability to control it.
5. The parts of my ability to control I'm now lacking? You have those.
6. You've stolen from me.


And following your argument, profit-pirating would not be stealing either, just so that's said - so there's no reason for you to add "non-profit" in there.

But yes, we're in agreement in the sense that I support your efforts to nuance the question. (That's hardly surprising, as I've more or less yet to encounter any question at all where I'd not appreciate some nuance.)

But I'm in complete disagreement with your sentiments regarding the concept of stealing. Ownership is an abstract in and of itself, and claiming that "stealing" is only a valid description when it refers to material items to me seem fundamentally ludicrous. It narrows the term down in a way that makes no sense with its basic definition, and which serves no purpose other than to force someone to make up a new word for what then would by anyone, anywhere be defined as "stealing of abstracts" anyway. If I own a vase or the ability to read minds or the story of an alcoholic beaver's century-long feud with a Dutch oil painting is utterly besides the point. If I had it, you take it, and I don't have it anymore, you've stolen. "You still have parts of it" doesn't qualify as an argument - if you chop off the top half of my vase and take that, you might leave me a functional vase, but you've still STOLEN something from me.

And so there's no confusion, this time I did indeed use a metaphor. By stunning coincidence that fantastically serves to also underline my point, the metaphor seems to also be a simile between the stealing of abstract and material ownership. 'Cause if you can own both, which you seem to acknowledge you can, you can also steal both.

The discussion is not vital to your original point, which I basically agree with, but it does strike me as rather important - your definition of "stealing" seems to be rather contrary to the intuitive definition of "transmission of item without owner's consent" when you willfully rule out the non-consenting transmission of abstract items from the term.

No, no, no, you misunderstand me. I can share it with those I want to, yes. But I can no longer NOT share it with those I do NOT want to. You've not taken all of 2, but part of it, as I repeatedly tried to illustrate. What I feel is irrelevant; at one point I can do something, and at another I cannot because of your taking it away. Sorry if it wasn't clear.

If I made the vase, you stole the idea of it by copying it, yes. It was a concept defined in part by being only mine. By taking it, now it is also yours. You've stolen part of what it was, and I cannot get it back without either your consent or stealing it back. If I had simply bought the vase, then you're absolutely right, by copying it you haven't stolen anything. My argument builds exclusively on the ownership of ideas and creations by their creators.

I absolutely see your argument, but I'm sorry, I just don't agree. Sure, you've not gained the exact same ability of control that I've lost, but you've gained some and I've lost some, and it relates to the same item because of an action you did. That's stealing. If you steal my car, you can't use it in the exact way I did without risking incarceration, so you'd have to change the plates and such. You haven't gained the exact item I lost, but you've still stolen it, because you've gained something that I used to have, and I've lost something because of it. The mere fact that it has exchanged hands, though, will influence what its properties are, and thus I feel your "I can't do exactly the thing you now cannot either"-argument doesn't hold. You can do certain things with something I owned. I can not do certain things with something I owned. You've stolen from me.

But at least we agree on the vase-bit, more or less.

If this is your roundabout way of telling me you two have sliced my vase in half, I shall be very miffed.

It totally did, it eyed me with malicious intent!

Of the four, I totally relate most to the pirate.


Sailing for adventure on the big blue wet thing!