[acg]

If copyright were just to protect the investment of a company in development of an artist or product I'd broadly agree with this argument.

Where copyright seems objectionable to me, is where the initial cost of development was non-existent or large profits have been made for years. For example:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Happy_Birthday_to_You#Royalty_a...

For some copyright to last 95 years seems more like profiteering than protection of the creative industries considering creation is often based on the work of others.

I don't condone piracy, but I think piracy would be far less socially acceptable if: - the creator can be seen to benefit from their work - copyright better resembled its original intent of protecting investment in the creation of something new and not staking ownership over the work of others.

[jiggy2011]

Playing "happy birthday to you" in public might be a legit act of civil disobedience .

Pirating last weeks blockbuster isn't.

[bitmonk]

That's an opinion. Stating opinion as fact is a worthless contribution, in fact a detriment, to healthy discussion.

I wouldn't argue that there's moral high ground here, I'd simply put it this way:

  Anyone who thinks there is a better way to keep people from pirating music than to make the legal means of acquisition simple, affordable, and to not play games with release dates, is a fucking idiot.

[jiggy2011]

What's your point? I should prefix every sentence with "I think", people here are smart enough to put things in context.

Legal means of acquiring music is pretty simple. Legal DRM Free MP3 downloads are built into my music player and I'm a linux user.