Is it immoral to download music illegally?

Question

I should first point out that the title is more to capture a common occurrence of the broader idea I want to address in this question. It is also somewhat incorrect in that—at least in the US—I'm not sure it's actually illegal to download music without paying (per se), but rather to share it.

My question, stated in a relatively broad, almost all-encompassing manner:

Is it immoral to acquire goods or services which are generally intangible¹ for free when the original owners of such goods or services would have otherwise profited with such an exchange?

• On one hand you are depriving the original owner of money they could have potentially made
• On the other hand you are not actually taking anything physical from their possession.

_{¹By intangible here I mean simply something that is incapable of being perceived by the sense of touch, as incorporeal or immaterial things. A digital version of a song, for example, is tangible in the sense that it is a real, existing product that has value, but intangible in that it occupies essentially no physical space (other than a handful of electrons in the capacitors of a memory module in a computer, etc.).}

I think it's easiest to demonstrate my reasoning so far through thought experiments:

Example 1:

If I walk into a movie theater (having paid), and it just so turns out that I have extremely good photographic memory such that I can rewatch the movie a saw in my head with perfect precision, does that means I am immoral for rewatching it over and over in my head without paying the owner each time? I don't think anyone would seriously say that I am acting immorally in this case. But I don't see this as qualitatively different than having taken a video camera into the theater and then rewatching the movie at home as many times as I please without re-paying the owner.

This same logic applies to many cases, such as if I hear a song on the radio. Maybe I just happen to be an acoustic genius who—after hearing a song once—possesses the ability to replay a song in my head with extraordinary precision after I've heard it once (or I was simply able to play it using my own instruments). Normally, the cost of a song on the radio is 1) you have to listen to advertisements and 2) you have to wait to hear it again. But in my special case I could eliminate all those costs after hearing the song once. Am I immoral for not subjecting myself to the advertising of the radio station?

This example becomes even more interesting when we consider the inevitable eventuality that humans will integrate technology like cameras and hard drives into their bodies and actually possess perfect memory and recording capabilities as part of their person.

Example 2:

I am a master tailor with near God-like knitting skills. I see a person walking down the street with a beautiful purple scarf. I whip out my knitting tools and fashion myself the exact same scarf in 30 seconds, directly copying every aspect of its style and design. Am I acting immorally by not paying the original owner of the scarf for using his or her exact ideas in creating my own scarf?

I don't see this example as far off from the idea of copying music. With tools which are readily available to us, we are all "Gods" when it comes to copying files. Ctrl+C, Ctrl+V; it's that easy. Should I pay the owner of a song each time I copy the song on my computer, say if I want it in my iTunes folder but also in my music folder? That doesn't seem very reasonable. Copying something itself does not seem to be the problem. It seems to be a problem when the action of copying could result in a loss for someone else. In the case of the scarf, if I was not a master tailor, I might've otherwise bought the scarf, but you can't honestly say it's immoral for me to be a good knitter, can you? I think the biggest question here in this example is:

Is aiding in the loss of a potential sale a moral wrong?

Clearly, what someone does not earn (a "non-gain") is not the same as losing money, because your current wealth is not affected. Non-gain's affect only potential wealth. Is it immoral to negatively affect someone's potential wealth?

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Note:

I want to try to avoid people's subjective opinions on whether stealing non-tangible goods is immoral or not (i.e. in one persons particular opinion rather), and focus on whether it would be considered immoral in the moral community of today (globally, or "developed nations" if that suits you better). Also, note that this question is specifically designed to avoid references to statute; it is not asking whether downloading music is stealing but rather it is morally justifiable. Lastly, I've actually not read any philosophers who have written on this subject at any length, so links to articles would be useful.

Answer 1

I do not think that there is a single answer to the question of "is it immoral to negatively affect someone's potential wealth" in the context of the moral community of today. For example, if I have a great and inexpensive widget for sale, and you have a lousy expensive widget for sale, my advertising of my widget is going to negatively affect your potential wealth. This seems to be viewed as not only perfectly okay but even desirable in market economies (which have particularly nice properties when one can assume consumers have near-perfect knowledge). Or if, for example, I am particularly annoyed with the customer service on United and encourage a friend to fly on Delta instead, I would not expect that friend to criticize me for negatively impacting United. Likewise, if I discouraged someone from taking a bus tour of Washington D.C., and encouraged them to walk instead because it would be a better experience, they'd probably appreciate it (if it was good advice). So it seems that in the context of market-based competition and engaging in exchange of goods and services it is absolutely okay to aid in the loss of a potential sale.

(As an aside, companies and individuals do often try to use copyright to head off these sorts of losses; if an embarrassing document comes to light, for example, it's common that the entity will at least try to assert its copyright to avoid having the negative information disseminated.)

If we instead restrict ourselves to the main question--is it immoral to acquire intangible goods for free--then I think there is no single answer because there is not a single community. I've heard the following argument in various guises, mostly from thoughtful but non-affluent people, specifically with regard to music:

1. I love such-and-so music.
2. I cannot afford to buy more than this much of it, and I do buy this much.*
3. Downloading the rest for free benefits me.
4. Downloading the rest for free only formally, not actually, reduces the artists' income, as I cannot afford more. There was no more potential for sales, so there is no actual harm.
5. Therefore, this activity is morally permissible.

*^{The "the artists who created this get almost none of the money" argument often modulates this claim--that is, they're happy to buy things that support the artists, but not necessarily to download music from iTunes where an overwhelming majority of the money goes to people other than the artists.}

I've also heard the following argument in various guises, mostly from affluent people who rely on the current system for their affluence:

1. Music is the work of artists (and producers and so on); that is the output of their labor.
2. Music has a tangible value (i.e. people are willing to exchange money in order to be able to listen to it).
3. Taking items of tangible value without the consent of its creators robs the creators of their livelihood.
4. Therefore, this activity is both immoral and counterproductive.

From what I have seen, there is disagreement because the premises differ (both based on self-interest): the latter group takes the value for granted and reasons from there; the former takes the creation of the work for granted and reasons from there.

Of course, neither is true in some deep sense. If we could monetize and restrict the supply of oxygen, it would become extremely valuable, but that does not mean it would be beneficial; one should not simply take for granted the value of a song under the current scheme where distribution is restricted. Likewise, even for music, but especially for expensive propositions like software creation and movies laden with special effects and stars, it is clear that models that cannot fund the creators will be destructive, and therefore that being a freeloader is aiding oneself at the expense of others (which is pretty widely considered immoral).

I have not seen any philosophically sophisticated treatment of the various considerations. Lawrence Lessig has written some of the more carefully-reasoned material taking the side that copyright as used now is having a sizable negative impact, but he is a professor of law, not a philosopher. I am unaware of an equally eloquent proponent of an opposing stance.

Answer 2

Over several decades, I've paid the music industry many times more than the average consumer, but in recent years I've almost exclusively obtained my recordings from "illegal" use of P2P and torrents on the internet.

I don't see my current behaviour as immoral, nor do I think the fact that I paid a lot in the past, or that I've had no income (and dwindling savings) recently, have any real bearing on the moral question.

Most professional musicians don't earn huge sums, but what they do earn comes mainly from live performances. When I go to a gig, I'm grateful if I know one of the band and can blag a free ticket - but I don't expect this; I respect a person's right to be paid if they're working, while I'm just there to enjoy myself.

For a top-notch album, there are always enough people in the world willing to pay, which will cover the (relatively) low costs of recording and mastering. Distribution over the net is bordering on free anyway, and if people still want the physical medium they're obviously going to have to pay for that.

The people who lose out from music piracy are primarily those in the music distribution business, not the musicians themselves. I'd be happy to see their entire business disappear, since I think they're at best dinosaurs, and at worst leeches.

Returning to the moral issue, just because a relatively small number of top entertainers (including some musicians) do in fact become staggeringly wealthy, doesn't mean an aspiring musician should feel he's being "robbed" if he doesn't receive maximum income all the way through his journey to the top (which in most cases he'll never reach). Specifically, I see no moral justification for musicians being paid again and again for repeat sales of a recording which - once completed - requires no further effort on their part.

Answer 3

It is not clear to me that the notion of a "lost sale" is coherent. How are you supposed to quantify it? Even if we were forced to assign some percentage of downloads which would have been almost-certainly-purchased, it would have to be tiny -- dwarfed by the amount of content shared in violation of copyright-holder's wishes on the matter.

In passing, as I alluded in my comments above, there is at least some contention over the idea that an illegal download is morally significant (at least when compared to implicitly supporting the arguably immoral behavior of profit-obsessed music industry executives, the underlying capitalist framework with its tendency to relentlessly exploit artists, and so forth.)

From a wider perspective, perhaps, illegal downloads might seem to be a relatively minor "concern" compared with the revolutionary transformations we are witnessing in the social and economic order today, in part due to the increased interconnectivity of people on the internet and the growing impact of globalization on everyday life. I am suggesting that artists need to focus on making products with inherent or intrinsic value, and giving people a reason to purchase; fighting piracy is ultimately an enormous waste of time.

You can read about a recent presentation by the creator of Minecraft where he makes more or less this case; he emphasizes the difference between pirating and theft and the incoherence of the "lost sale" concept, as well as the importance of giving people a reason to buy. From there:

Piracy is not theft. If you steal a car, the original is lost. If you copy a game, there are simply more of them in the world... There is no such thing as a 'lost sale'... Is a bad review a lost sale? What about a missed ship date?

Answer 4

Is it immoral to negatively affect someone's potential wealth?

This is actually a very good question if we replace "wealth" with "income".

The the answer goes like this:

1. In a free market economy, high profits (and, hence, income) can be made only by saitisfying urgent demand for things that are very scarce. For example, while water is essential to sustain life, its price is usually quite low (at least outside deserts). In certain regions water is actually a free good. OTOH, diamonds and gold, while per se useless or at least not necessary to sustain life, command high prices and those who dig and sell them make high profits.
2. Therefore, one way to possibly "negatively affect" high profits in a free market economy would be to persuade people not to demand that what is scarce. As long as this is done without force or threadening of force, there is nothing to object to that.
3. Another way would be to actually reduce the scarcity of the item in question. For example, in a town where hunger reigns, one that sells grain will make high profits. These profits will decline drastically as soon as fresh grain supplies are brought in from outside and sold.

But (3) is actually the definition of increasing wealth! By producing something people need and want, you create wealth and, inevitably, reduce future profits of all producers of comparable items.

Hence, the answer to your question is a resounding "No, it is not immoral."

If this were so, then the following activities would be immoral: quit smoking (reduce income of tobacco industry); build a house next to another (as far as free standing houses with better scenic view command higher prices); bake your own bread (think of the poor baker, dude!); inventing, building, selling and using automobiles/computers/washing machines; not using automobiles/computers/washing machines; ... you get the picture.

It is a certain caste of rent seekers that want to make us believe that "their" future profits actually are already their property right now, so that taking them away is "stealing". They have a natural alley, that helps them to pursue their special interests using force - the state.

Answer 5

Legality and morality are not necessarily in agreement. Few would argue that it is a moral choice to terminate a pregnancy because the mother does not want to be pregnant.
Morality is subjective where legality is supposed to be objective. It is not immoral to provide medical assistance to someone in need. However it may be illegal. Indeed currently a there is a dispute in California which allows for legal medicinal use of marijuana, and the Federal laws which forbid the production and distribution of marijuana.

You can make a choice to act immorally with out being immoral. The perfect example would be Kant's Moral with imperative to never deceive. However if you have offered shelter and protection to a persecuted individual, and you have the group doing the persecution at your door asking if you have seen the individual, it is an immoral act to lie and tell the persecutor no you have not seen them. But that does not define you as an immoral person.

While there are certainly some black and white examples, morality tends to become clouded in the greys. You could certainly follow Kant's imperatives to the letter and know that you have never done anything immoral. But to do so you would need to avoid any situation where you would be forced to choose between two imperatives and would likely lead to a life of solitude.

Morally, if an object is being offered by its owner then accepting that offer is not immoral. If the person claiming to be the owner is not actually the owner but the recipient did not have reason to suspect the duplicity then the recipient is not immoral. If you take something you know or believe is not the right of the person offering the item then clearly the recipient is acting immorally. The fact that the person offering the item is acting immorally does not make the action of the recipient moral. Additionally if the rightful owner is being immoral that does not mean that it is moral to deprive the owner of its rights of ownership. Under no moral consideration can I conceive of a situation where it is moral to download music that you are not entitled to.

Answer 6

This question is rather difficult, as the world economy today is, in industrial economies, becoming more and more post-industrial--so much so that intellectual property rights are becoming less and less clear. "Mine" no longer means this thing that's in my hand, etc. etc.. Of course, the moral issue will be determined by the economic solution to the problem. Value, it seems, is becoming less dependent on supply and demand and more dependent on the popularity and utility of an item (be it tangible or intangible). Of course, the item must be accessible (to be popular).

Answer 7

Morality is one of those lovely minefields of thought where cultural upbringing and history are perhaps the more relevant factors to consider.

Case in point is that in certain cultures in times past (Mongolian comes to mind), if you could get away with stealing from your enemies (or even your friends). It did not matter the harm you might have done by depriving a village of its food, or a child its mother. So long as your own and your villages needs were met, you were considered brave, strong, and with qualities to aspire to. If on the other hand you tried to get away with that kind of behavior in Western culture today, you'd be granted 2 to 15 in a less than hospitable lock-up.

Cultures change over time. The fiercely defended ideals that we cling to today might be considered quaint and rustic tomorrow, or may become even more fiercely defended and held up as moral example by some depending on how successfully defended they might be. Intellectual property issues in particular are at a very interesting point. On the one hand there are those who would claim that something like an idea, or a sound, or a style is something of value and should be guarded jealously and paid for dearly, while others argue that such ephemeral things such as ideas and thoughts, art, and suchlike should be shared freely as something that should benefit all equally. To muddy the waters, we have others still who wish to own everything and share nothing unless it benefits themselves personally, and yet another corner where there are those who wish to take what they will and see it as a form of personal entitlement regardless of whether they should or not be allowed to do so. Each has a case or a point they might make, and which they feel comfortable with from their own moral point of view. Each sees the other's view as wrong, and their own as justifiable. But immoral?

Perhaps it comes down to a question of intent. If by taking an action to obtain something illegally the intent was to profit personally, or to harm the property owner in some way, then that could be considered a theft which would be considered wrong, but not necessarily immoral. If the intention was otherwise innocent of intent to cause harm or to profit from the action, then it would not necessarily be right, and certainly not immoral. But that's almost entirely my own view, and certainly not an absolute. As to whether the item in question is tangible in any physical sense, it shouldn't really make a difference if the theft in question causes harm to someone else.

If it comes down purely to a question of morality, then intention to harm others in some manner could be considered immoral, while a lack of intent could not. A younger child stealing money from your wallet to buy sweets might not be considered to have behaved immorally, yet that same child as an older teenager stealing money to purchase drugs or sex might be seen in a entirely different way - except perhaps to our earlier ancient Mongolian who'd probably laugh it off and ask what all of the fuss is about.

Perhaps we shouldn't be asking if it is immoral to behave in the manner stated in the OP's question, but instead whether it is unethical?

Answer 8

First there was chants and song: then written music: then the phonograph: then 33 & 45 records: then tape recorders: then i pods: through all the years music has been shared socially.I would presume that music became a sale item when men became free to sell songs and lyrics openly, as a trade agreement. "Is it immoral to down load music illegally?" Is it illegal just to listen? Illegal depends who proclaimd downloading as illegal?

Shared music could be called advertizing, and social medea is used as such. If I was the person that created the music I would hope my music would be downloaded. Understanding that downloading caused and created outside vender sales to increace.

Immoral downloading is only immoral, when immoral is used as a agent of force against a free persons quest for notoriety. The greater the notoriety the more downloads. This produces more public need for inventory and more concerts sold.This would then increase the income that the artist can acquire.

Illegal in this case is the government group that believes its there right to usurp income using illegal for their parasitical use. Thats the immoral issue involved.

Answer 9

This does not seem to be a question so particular to the music industry. And it is not a question of coming into possession of something. What is purchased in a download of a music file, for instance, but also with the purchase of a DVD, a recording of an NFL game, or a newspaper clipping, is a license to use, with terms limiting the use. We have agreed to terms with the owner of the rights of use. We have made a promise. The moral question boils down to: is there a moral obligation built into every promise? I take Searle's argument for the built in obligation of a promise, in Fact and value, "is" and "ought", and reasons for action, Searle, 2008, to be successful. The specific question is, do we make a promise when we download music? I think it is obvious we do. Musicians who feel these terms are trivial self publish and make their music freely available.

The price of admission to a film includes the right to remember the experience and even to tell others about it. If the purple scarf is an original design, then copying it with an intention to sell it is wrong. Society agrees on a time period restricting selling copies of original designs, after which considering the designs to pass into public domain. Copying the scarf for your own use may or may not aggravate the designer. It would be a subjective call, and the designer should be given the opportunity to make the call.

Answer 10

I think the golden rule apply's here if you are in any way moral. Would you be ok with someone downloading a piece of your work for free.

A very interesting case to point out in this "freeness" is the opensource ( or "Free" stated by Richard Stallman as there are a few technical details i will not go into here but are interesting ) software movement. Where the freedom of code is actually an advantage to the system as a whole. Although developers spend large amounts of time on development only to give their code away it creates a transparent system where even though you have put a lot of development time in you get more out because everyone is doing the same thing and so the code base actually becomes stronger as a whole out passing small closed source systems by many factors. Security is less of a problem because everyone can see the code so anyone can fix it or point out anything that might be a problem.

Large companies like microsoft have adapted this to their model with ajax asp mvc, ( used by stackexchange.com ) and typescript ( a strongly typed javascript framework ) where anyone no matter who you are can contribute or change it as you like.

In our current society where companies sue each other over the shape of a device I think we can assume to agree that copyright laws are ambiguous, redundant and a creative retardation. Morally in the current system i think it is wrong but i also think there is another system ( another dimension if you will ) where not only is it legal to download and share forms of art, it is encouraged! Where monetary gain is not the driving force for innovation but rather creation and development of humans through their collective contributions to systems. But this is counter to the natural law of survival of the fittest, where altruism is but an off shoot of an idea.

Which that said where does the golden rule actually stand. You have been given the power to download these items, even when they are controlled by organizations that have fleets of air crafts at their disposal, and could arguably be "fitter" ( if we are determined by how much money we make ) If they are they fittest of the group how have they not either stopped this practice or created a system whereby you dont have to steal ( itunes i guess is a good example of an alternative and the "fitter" adapting / evolving to their situation )

Answer 11

It is immoral.

If a product is sold in a market economy/capitalist model, then to acquire it without monetary return for the supplier is immoral. One cannot walk into a supermarket and steal a box of corn flakes without paying for it, without facing some moral scorn. Products are not produced and sold for "social benefit", they're sold to make revenue and eventually profit.

Downloading without paying is essentially stealing, and to cite it as normal due to a digital track being intangible is silly. I see no reason for a distinction between a tangible and intangible product, provided it is intended for sale for revenue purposes.

Answer 12

Is it immoral to negatively affect someone's potential wealth? 

If they have expended effort in order to generate potential wealth, you have stolen something of their effort and work.

Clearly IMMORAL. Why all the fuss?

"Much Ado About Nothing"