Posted on 07/03/2005 8:35:03 PM PDT by wagglebee
Two-thirds of U.S. college students see nothing unethical about downloading digital copyrighted files without paying, a survey found.
In addition, 52 percent think downloading music without paying is acceptable behavior in the workplace, according to the survey released by Business Software Alliance.
The survey reveals 45 percent of students are using campus networks for downloading activities.
Downloading music is a gateway to downloading software, the survey found. Among students who say they would always download music or movies without paying for them, 27 percent said they regularly download software from a peer-to-peer network.
Generation Y has largely grown up using the Internet and the majority of this group is extremely comfortable with technology, said Diane Smiroldo, BSA's vice president for public affairs. Unfortunately, this survey shows students who engage in these illegal behaviors are likely to continue after college and when they enter the business world.
The survey, conducted by Ipsos Public Affairs, polled 1,000 students and 200 university faculty and administrators' digital piracy attitudes and behaviors.
Support civil disobedience.
Well, okay Skippy, give me the account number to your little trust fund and a copy of your signature and other pertinent ID and tell me if you still feel it's okay.
Oh, you ,mean it's okay only if YOU steal something you feel you are entitled to? Something you feel you should not have to pay for?
Its definitely unethical but I just have a hard time feeling sorry for the victims.
Yeah - just wait until they find that the company that they work for has to lay them off because the bottom line is being eroded by illegal downloading pirates.
With victims like Madonna, Bono, Britney Spears, and dare i say Will Smith... HOW CAN YOU FEEL REMORSE???
If it's illegal, it shouldn't be done. But the laws on copying should be relaxed. It is illegal, but it's not STEALING. Stealing is when you have something, I take it from you, and you LOSE IT. If I like your program, and I copy it, you don't lose anything. Only in theory--that you lose the royalties. But if I can't copy it, I still won't buy it. And I largely avoid paying for things! Since copying is illegal, I mostly stick to free music, free websites, and library books.
Lets see these moral and intellectual giants do something really challenging: identify North Dakota on a map of the USA, Ireland one a map of Europe, and New Zeland on a map of the world.
Or, since they are supposedly so technologically "astute," tell us what this is:
Lets be fair, no matter how great the disconnect between what they think they know, and what they actually know, they tend to have remarkable self esteem. :-)
It's easy to have high self-esteem when your entire life you've been taught things like:
There is no such thing as right and wrong.
There are no losers, everyone is a winner.
On top of that, they are never really challenged. That's one reason I think lib types react so poorly when questioned - it's really something they can't cope with because they seldom have had to.
The copyright laws have been warped out of shape by big business payoffs to congress....
Copyright was never intended to be forever...and that is exactly what it has become.
Every time Micky Mouse was due to fall out of copyright the copyright terms were extended :-(
The founding fathers were against things like the 'Literary Guilds' of europe... but that is exactly what we have now.
If Copyright extensions had not been bought and paid for then I would support a reasonable term...say the same as for patents...for the advancement of culture and technology..etc.etc
But since the holders of vast copyright portfolios have perverted the system of copyrights by payoffs, I just don't give a damn who steals their stuff.... they come with unclean hands to accuse others of wrongdoing.
I was being somewhat sarcastic and possibly overly stereotypical. However, your son is obviously an exception, while the norm is far more similar to what we have been describing.
Typical post-modernist mindset "What's wrong for you is not wrong for me."
That's a distinction without a difference.
One last thought, if two-thirds of college students think there is nothing wrong with doing something illegal, there is a problem. I am not saying that I did nothing wrong when I was in college, because I certainly did, but I knew it was wrong.
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