Journal Spock the Baptist's Journal: Why Copyright violation is NOT theft. 3
My Father was a master aircraft mechanic. He could build some really amazing things with just a few tools. After retirement my Dad end up building several items of furniture for my Mom.
Mom would see something that she liked in one of the local furniture stores and take several pictures of it with her camera. She would have the photos developed, and then show the photos to my Dad.
He would then go to the furniture store and take between a half-dozen, and a dozen measurements of the item of furniture, and make 3 or 4 freehand sketches of said item. He would then *repair* to his shop in the backyard and construct an exact copy (at least in terms of appearance and functionality) of the afore mention item of furniture.
Did my Dad 'steal' anything in the above process?
No of course not. He ****COPYED**** the item of furniture, he did NOT steal it.
Furniture stores would have gotten absolutely nowhere if that had tried to prosecute him for theft. The fact is that while I'm sure that would have not liked having an item of furniture that they had for sale copied they would have never accused my Dad of theft, and risked having a slander suit slapped on them.
My Dad did nothing wrong, nothing illegal.
Under law *copying* copyrighted material may, depending on the circumstances, be illegal, but it is NOT theft.
Re:Drone (Score:2)
What some folks seem to miss all to easily is whether or not the exchange is consensual. If it isn't, then word games about what is and what isn't "theft" are irrelevant. The word we are looking for here is VIOLATION. The most important thing is not legality, it is consensuality.
No Drone, just fact. (Score:2)
Theft does not exist absent the deprivation of property. To make a copy of a thing in no way deprives an owner of his/her property. Deprivation is a *necessary* condition of theft. As far as content is concerned if one copies content then that is ****copying**** the content, not stealing it. This as the owner of the content is in no way deprived of the content. Which is to say that the content is still available to the owner.