The problem with intellectual "property" is that it is not transferred in physical form, and its real market value, once it is mass produced, diminishes to nearly zero. Did Mozart commit a mortal sin when he memorized Allegri's Miserere? Were the members of the audience committing a mortal sin when they hummed the melody on their way home from the Maundy Thursday vespers? Or did Mozart sin when he wrote the music down from memory? And would it have been wrong if he used a machine to do the task for him?

It would have been a sin if Mozart went into the sheet music printing business, making money from Allegri's Miserere in competition with Allegri in order to deprive Allegri of his hard earned living. It would have been a worse sin still if Mozart claimed to have written the music himself.

However since Allegri did not publish the sheet music, those who could not travel or had no money had no chance of hearing it and were never really a part of the market. If they heard performances of the piece in far off places then Allegri could not have felt any tangible property loss. Even if Allegri charged money to have his pieces performed under his direction, he would arguably have not lost anything if the whole of Christendom imitated him.

The principle of the now hopelessly outdated copyright laws was to allow the artists a chance to make a living from their creativity, but recognizing that the artwork itself (being mass produced) lost its value after a time and became a part of the public domain. This process, once gradual, is now very fast. The profits made from CD (or MP3) sales peak quickly and then rapidly wane, but not really due to piracy, but because the speed and efficiency of distribution are so great. Research shows that the percentage of discretionary income that the public spends on entertainment has not diminished over time, therefore the mass media entertainment industry is not suffering tangible losses but are simply crying poor.

I personally try to pay for music that I actually want to have in my collection. (usually religious music or great or rare classical performances) If I am sampling things, I download them and if they are really good, I go ahead and buy physical media so I can put it on my shelf, otherwise it all gets deleted after a while when I clean up.

If you have something to which you believe you have no right, the best thing to do is simply delete it and purchase it from another source.  Now you have the right to the item and you have fulfilled any issue of restitution.

In today's environment, the legal rights to certain pieces of music could belong to people who have no real connection to the original music other that the fact that they have purchased the rights.  In fact, I would venture to say that this is true of most electronic media.  In any event, once you have deleted the item you believe was improperly copied, it is gone and the idea of restitution is no longer an issue.  Or, if you purchase the item, you have fulfilled any obligation.

From a pragmatic point of view I agree, render to Caesar what is Caesar's, in a way. But I don't subscribe to the idea that all copying of music is necessarily theft.

I seem to remember having said somewhere on the site that downloading music is not theft, and I wanted to come back and give a more nuanced view, so as not to lead anyone astray. But actually my original post was fairly nuanced.

I don't want to read through all my junk, but if I did say that it is not theft, I am not so sure at this point. Don't follow my advice -- ask a priest.

Is downloading a CD and listening to it once theft? I don't know. If you burn a CD and intend to keep it and you are positive you are never going to buy the thing, that seems more clearly like theft to me. But even then, you often can't prove the artist has lost income due to your actions; because just the fact that you were intending to keep the burned CD, does not mean that you would have bought it if that were the only way to get it. Maybe you just downloaded it because it was easy and available but you are not interested enough to buy it.

Now, if you KNOW you want that CD in your collection, and you keep the burned copy and don't ever buy it, because you don't want to pay for it, that would probably be theft. You would not know if it were venial or mortal since you usually don't know the finances of the artist; therefore it probably would rarely be mortal. But it seems like theft to me.

Maizar rhetorically asks if it's theft if you sing Happy Birthday or whistle a Mozart tune on the way back from the opera. Well, there is no chance of anyone losing money there, because no one is going to pay to hear you whistling Mozart, but they will pay to see the opera conducted by a great maestro. But then he goes on to say that he buys something that he really wants. I think the demands of the conscience are clear there.

Raoul,

You're back!  :smile:

.

Now, I know this thread isn't about Roul76, but I expect he may agree,
that he has sort of been given the spotlight here for a minute or two.  

I recall reading his signature area previously an had thought it was
self-centered to put all that in there.  But now, I see I was wrong.

Maybe I've had a kind of transformation, too?  

It's looking like this right now (he can change it any time):


.........................
A general rule is that all my posts before 2011 are dangerous to read. At the time I was nothing short of a frothing Pharisee. Please ignore my old posts against NFP and implicit faith, both of which are true teachings, as well as Fatima and Lucy's later revelations, which I now see are of continuing paramount importance in the history of the Church.

I also apologize for my lack of prudence when speaking about clergy in the past, I didn't know where the line was and often judged intentions instead of actions and words. My deepest apologies to Pius XII especially, who I judged in the harshest light and accused of being a communist infiltrator, and to Innocent XI and Pius XI, for any irrational suspicion or condemnation of their intentions. I also believe I spread a rumor about Innocent XI that I had read in a book, probably non-Catholic, which I would retract if I could.

I also apologize with profoundest regret to Abp. Lefebvre and Bp. Fellay, the nuns who left CMRI, for assuming malign intentions about them and calling them "witches" in my exaggerated style at the time; Father Cekada and the SSPX priest Fr. Boulet for suggesting or saying they were deliberately intellectually dishonest, Bp. Vezelis for spreading a rumor about him that is not verified; I also apologize to Fr. Martin Stepanich, Mgr. Fenton, Father Brian hαɾɾιson, Cardinal Newman, De Lugo, Suarez, Erasmus, and anyone else I have forgotten, for saying or suggesting they were heretics and/or infiltrators due to my former errors. I was also very harsh on Dietrich von Hildebrand and Cardinal Gibbons. During all this time, I was under the influence of major scruples, probably without even knowing what that meant, as well as general paranoia, seeing evil everywhere, and had a distorted, extreme view of the Crisis.





I'd like to ask Raoul, if he wouldn't mind providing any information
today about why he had developed some of these negative attitudes
in the past, but SPECIFICALLY,  that the "later revelations" of Sr. Lucia
of Fatima had been somehow less credible.  

The reason I ask this is I've run into very opinionated people who also
say that, and that the Church only approved the 1917 visions, but did
not approve the later ones, etc.  And they won't hear anything about
the story to affect their opinion.  So, since Raoul has now admitted to
have been wrong on that, I'd like to know what made him think that
way in the first place (against her later 'revelations') and what made
him realize that he had been off track??