I don't think it's particularly "immoral" to shoplift a CD from Wal-Mart, and I would not think very badly of someone who did it occasionally, but I personally have never done anything like that, and probably never will. The reason is that I might get caught. The chance might be small, but I don't feel it's worth taking.
Over here it would be pretty hard to steal a CDs- or most anything from their electronics department- since they all have littler detector things inside the shrink-wrapped case, and if you try to leave with it alarms go off.
This of course causes much anguish when your dealing with some incompetent cashier who has no concept of the word toggle, and swipes the thing twice "to make sure", and of course the second swipe reactivates the thing.
Main reason I would prefer CDs is simply because it's nearly impossible to find lossless audio of some tracks/albums to download; even 320kbps MP3 sucks when you play it on good sound card or your average stereo. Also let's me decide how to tag them when I rip them, and exactly what format too. And- of course- I can always just play the CDs themselves, too.
you have more of a chance getting caught shopplifting a cd at walmart then downloading music. And when you dl music at first you get a warning. No, wait, now they try and shhut your internet off. But when they do fine you, its worse then if you actually stole the cd.
The only people that get caught downloading are the noobs who think that p2p like limewire and frostwire's networks are watched by anti-piracy organizations. Although it can be fun to share files like "emu taking a viscous dump.wmv" and see how many people download it. Then wonder to myself how many people thought I meant an emulator on linux causing a core dump. Then I go do something productive for a change.
you have more of a chance getting caught shopplifting a cd at walmart then downloading music. And when you dl music at first you get a warning. No, wait, now they try and shhut your internet off. But when they do fine you, its worse then if you actually stole the cd.
That's not the law, that's the RIAA suing people. And of course the RIAA only really has any power where the DMCA is, which is the U.S.
Regarding software, or really, anything digital; some people feel justified simply because it isn't something tangible to them- it's really just an "impression" of 1's and 0's on a disk being copied around. And yes- many things, such as windows, are a tad expensive. However, personally, I don't think that's a good justification for pirating windows, because, for other things, if you cannot afford something, you get a cheaper model- in this case, it's possible to get Ubuntu or a similar working operating system for free, so people saying that Windows is an "essential" component of a modern PC is bollocks. warranted, it's an essential component for people who only know the essentials, but that's sort of splitting hairs.
Besides, rather then pirating something like a new game, just wait until your around 80 or 90 years old, if your lucky it will have been public domain somewhere. heh
Although I imagine a 90 year old playing guitar hero would be odd. And who knows how bad the arthritis might be. And those shingles hurt something fierce.
