Yes and no but I read an article on the band - Metallica complaining about it and they are a music artist not label.

It should be legal.
As said before, i'm sure, the artists whom whine about it are probably already making enough money anyways, or aren't really in it for their "love of music". I do not consider it "stealing", either. Music is a form of art, art is meant to be shared with the world. That's what a music artist should be concerned with anyways, if their message is getting across, if they're making music that others can relate to, that they'll want to share. Music artists should thank downloaders, they're most likely increasing their fan base.

And it's not like bands don't make money from other things anyways: merch, concert tickets, public appearances, etc

Not to mention, downloading music free will never be stopped.

Why is it that we're allowed to tape something that we hear on the radio, but not download a song? Why!? We'd still have the song to listen to forever (for free), either way, so i honestly don't understand the difference. Furthermore, if we can legally read books for free at the library any time, why can't we do this? Sure, if we get books from the library we technically don't OWN them, but we honestly might as well considering you could renew the book every day.

^ Woah, I actually agree.

But then again, doesnt a majority of a artists income come from actual music sales?

I think its fine if someone's just going to download a song or two from a certain artist... but if you're going to download an ENTIRE album, you should just buy it.

It doesn't matter if it's illegal or not. People will still do it, no matter what it is.

The musician is out to get paid, son. You don't sign a contract so that your music will be heard. You do it to live in a feckin' mansion.

Right, but there's still the problem of the hassle that downloaders would have to go through if they're caught.

No law against it, no problem.

I think this whole problem started when students were found file sharing with other students across the college server.

So, is it illegal to copy a CD, or to file share in general or across an outside server?

I'm doing (trying to do) a persuasive paper on this.

Any help/links/books/suggestions would be muchly appreciated.

It shouldn't be legal (Although I do it all the time =P), because people make money out of cds and music purchased on iTunes.

But if it ever becomes legal to download, then people are going to slowly purchase less and less music, resulting in no salary/payment for artists. And for alot of artists, that's why they do it - for the paycheck.

I think there was an article on how metallica was against it, maybe that would help, just type in "metallica and napster" in google or something like that.



Well, that's why metallica was complaining about people downloading their music for free. If you download music for free you are not going to want to go out and buy their album which hurts their record sales.

^i'm doing an argument for it to be legal though. but thanks for the help

Wow, here where I live it cost about 30$ or 22Euro for a cd

It probably shouldn't be legal. I do find it really annoying when I have to pay for songs on iTunes or whatever, but I suppose the artists do need to profit somehow. Say they only had one good song on an album, well, why would you want to buy the album when you only wanted one song? So that way, when someone downloads that one song, they get some sort of profit from it.

It shouldn't be legalized...but I kind of want it to be....

I think it should be legal. Buying a CD for 13 dollars is ridiculous because usually you only like 1 or 2 songs of theirs. Its pointless to buy an entire CD for a good 13-15 dollars if you will only listen to one song off of their album. Why buy the CD if you can download the songs you like for free? I understand where they're coming from when they say your stealing money away from the artists, but they're going to be rich off their concerts anyways...whats a few dollars lost from downloading free music.

I'm sorry, I'm kinda skipping past some of the arguments, so forgive me if a lot of this is redundant.

I don't think the free downloading of artist music should be legalized to an extent.

Now, I used to always love downloading "free" music, but I've since reformed somewhat. I have no problem copying a friend's CD if they let me, but I'm not actively going on Kazaa or some other program and deliberately trying to download entire CDs for free. Now, most of the time I'll just use iTunes or whatever is popular that week. I'm in college and we have Ruckus, which is pretty nice, except you can't download to your iPod. I'm fine with that. I do like to buy a CD if the cover art is awesome and I just find the album to be just that great.

If an artist wants to offer up a few songs for free. I'm all for that. Many underground artists/new to the scene people frequently offer up 3 or 4, sometimes more of their songs for completely free, they only ask that you support them when they finally release CDs or what not, or to even go out and buy the CD even if you do only like one or 2 songs.

In the long run, not buying CDs and stealing the music from P2P programs is wrong. And it is stealing. CD sales still play a very big role in the industry. And the sale from CDs are not just benefiting the artist. How would you feel if someone only wanted to pay you for part of your work? I don't think you'd be too happy.

I'm not saying downloaded music should be so insanely regulated, we do need a little leeway, but it shouldn't be completely legalized.

though this thread brings up some good points i think it's been overly complicated. everyone knows why it's illegal, cuz it's stealing. so here's the simple resolution, if you're fine with stealing then download music, if you aren't then don't.

then there are those robbin hoods who justify it through the incomes of the artist or others who say that sampling is different from stealing. sure, you're right! so download all the music your computer can handle while you slowly establish your rightfull place in hell!!!!

Well, if you only want 1 or 2 songs, use itunes.

because the artist makes no profit out of it.
and because we aren't taxed on it, therefore the government gets no money....and so it becomes illeagal..

illegal

the music industry loses so much money. i know there rich but this also fluctuates our economy.

I think it's wrong, but I'm gonna do it anyway. I don't have enough money to buy music.

books also contribute/distribute knowledge. should those be free? there's massive consequences. it's not like there is a complete ban on music or other such things being freely distributed, just when the author or whatever asks for the rights. which is a lot, but yeah.

Mozart didn't ask people to pay him to play his music. Nor did Bach... so I say, screw payin for music, musicians should see music as an art, not a damn job. Thus is why I download their music and enjoy em without payin them for it.

omg who cares about telling the whole world that you can get fined for downloading free music. i mean not everyone will get caught so might as well take the chances :)

i personally dont think that itunes should be charging a dollar for a song. A DOLLAR? if you look around, you'll see that TV shows cost less than 2 dollars. 2 dollars for a whole 45 minutes and a dollar for 4 minutes? what is that??

I Am On The Illegal Side... Because If You Spend Months On A Music Video Or Audio And The Everyone Was Downloading It For Free..How Would The Benifit You...

Reputation.