[belorn]

Lets not talk about ethics in the context of copyright. 95 years after the authors death. laws done by lobbyists against any common sense. No cost-benefit analyses. No safe guards against abuse.

A few month ago, a court decided it was legal to send copyright extortion letters to people. The hours after the sentence was done, more letters were immediately sent out with more unverifiable claims, and the court website went down from all the victims asking what the heck the court did.

I current pay a tax (Sweden) for a additional permission of private copying. The idea was that people should be able to do a backup of media they legally own, and be able to transfer media between different places like the car, the home and so on. DRM however prevent this, but the law is still there, allowing something for which technology has made impossible. Worse, the lobbist created a exception so that the permission doesn't even trigger if there is DRM. I am only allowed to copy non-DRM media, but the artist get paid regardless if they publish on DRM media or not.

Is it ethical to demand payment for something for which is then not delivered? Is it ethical to ignore a unethical monopoly? Is it moral to respect unjust laws? Is it moral to break unjust laws?

[duaneb]

> Lets not talk about ethics in the context of copyright. 95 years after the authors death. laws done by lobbyists against any common sense. No cost-benefit analyses. No safe guards against abuse.

The content in question is new. Ethics definitely play a role. For the record, I tend to be on the side of "if you can't buy it legally, get it illegally", but if there is any ethical role for copyright it is visible here.

[belorn]

If we were to create a moral acceptable copyright law, then new content would be the staring point. That discussion has not started yet, and the pirate party movement who were one of the early starter for a copyright reform has had problems competing against the more popular political issues such as banking crisis and refugee crisis.

Asking people to respect copyright law in current environment is a thought sell. The publishers for GoT are part of those who are currently corrupting and stealing, so from a ethical stand point I have little sympathy saved for them. One could argue that two wrongs don't make it ethical, but then I would argue that respect can't be demanded, only earned. The argument of the article and the lack of a fair product also points toward a lack of mutual respect.

Had this been a self-published indi movie, things would likely look a bit different.