"Piracy" Should be Legal

On Con's response to "Creative works are an abstract existence akin to property":The U.S. government cannot take away an individual's property while they are alive, nor can they take the property fom the individual's descendents or inheritors. Copyright is often passed down from the author to their relatives, or to an organization after the author's death. If we are to consider creative works property, then there is no justification for the revoking of copyrights after the author's death, especially when another individual has the copyright. However, the U.S. consitution states the copyright shall only last a limited time.Let's say Donald writes a fantastic book called "Foo." He lives a fine life, dies, and as per his will, his son, Gregory, becomes the copyright holder of "Foo." Seventy years later, when Gregory is an old man himself, the state suddenly revokes him of the copyright of "Foo--" as per the constitution-- and places it under the public domain. If we are to consider creative works "property," then the state has just stolen Gregory's property. However, the constitution says that the state cannot do so to property. Herein lies the contradiction. Either the state can take property without compensation, or "intellectual property" isn't really property at all. On Con's response to "Every shared copy is a lost sale":I did not say that a 3% was not a large decrease in revenue. It is certainly a large decrease-- I said, verbatim,"Despite these numbers, the change in revenue for the industry was only -3%. 'Pirated' copies outdid purchased copies by 21 times, yet there was only a -3% change."I was not implying that -3% was small, I was implying that the decrease should have been much, much larger if every copy was indeed a lost sale. Since the decrease wasn't as significant, the obvious conclusion is that a large amount of "pirated" copies are not the primary method the "pirate" used to receive a copy of the song. It's possible that they purchased a CD after liking the songs, it is possible that they downloaded copies after they lost a CD, it is possible that they wanted a digital copy along with their CD. Another issue with the "every copy is a lost sale" argument is the assumption that every unauthorized copy of a cultural work is so that the copier can avoid purchasing an actual copy of the cultural work. There is no evidence that every copy wasn't followed by or preceded by a purchase of the media by the "pirater," yet the RIAA considers every "pirated" copy a lost sale. RIAA's data for "economic losses" are founded on pure imagination, because of the critical assumptions made. Because of this, the RIAA's data for "losses to piracy" and "jobs lost to piracy" are based on an inaccurate structure without nuance.On Con's response to "If sharing isn't illegal, artists won't create culture":I agree-- financial reward certainly does help the quality of culture, and it certainly does help make sure that it continues to be made.Now, to address Con's less agreeable statement:"In a world without copyright, piracy would become so common that a lot fewer people could expect to earn a living as writers, resulting in a significant reduction in the amount and quality of new literary fiction being published. "A world without copyright? That is not what I am arguing for at all. Copyright is obviously beneficial to authors and the public-- I am only arguing that non-commercial redistribution of copyrighted works be legal. That is greatly different than no copyright at all. Let's cast aside that misunderstanding, and continue on. Now, if "piracy would become so common" that authors wouldn't be able to make a living, then surely authors that explicitly allow sharing would fall into economic ruin, and would fail to make a living from their books.However, contrary to this statement, Cory Doctorow is a fine example of the contrary being true. Mr. Doctorow made a living off of the books he has written-- notably, "Little Brother" and "Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom." Both of these books are released under CC-BY-NC-SA licenses, meaning that non-commercial redistribution of these books is legal, which means than anyone may legally "pirate" these books. In fact, Mr. Doctorow thinks that people being able to share his books has positively effected purchases.On Con's response to "Current copyright law also allows the copyright holder an unjust control over the viewer, reader, or listener of their work":I would like to focus on two quotes from Con's response. The first being:"For instance, a Jewish writer may feel harmed if his work is copied and used by Neo-Nazis."OK, in this hypothetical world where "piracy" is legal (as described in the start of the debate as "non-commercial and unauthorized redistribution of creative works"), let's say a Neo-Nazi copies something written by a Jewish writer. Now, what can the Neo-Nazi do, other than criticize the work? I am not arguing for anything except for sharing being legal-- the only thing the Neo-Nazi could do is share the work with other Neo-Nazis. That's it. This was a very bad and nonsensical example of the "potential harm" of sharing.I would now like to focus on the second quote of interest:"I usually am fine with them being copied, except for one time when I showed a story I wrote to a friend before I was going to submit it to a creative writing contest. Had my friend shared it, the people he shared it with could have plagiarized it and submitted it in the creative writing contest before I did, which would have caused me harm."I whole-heartedly agree with Con for this scenario. If their friend claimed to be the author of the story, that would have caused them harm. I do not advocate for plagarism at all. I only advocate for non-commercial redistribution. An appropriate license for your story would have been the Creative Commons BY-NC-ND-SA, which would have made it illegal for your friend to claim to have been the original author.Now, on to Con's conclusion:"To the people in the entertainment industry, being able to make money from their work is not leisure, it is their livelihood."It is very possible to make money while "piracy" is allowed. Again, Cory Doctorow and Randall Monroe are fine examples."According to the RIAA's analysis, piracy already costs 71,060 US jobs, and even more jobs would be lost if it became more common. "The RIAA's estimates are fundamentally flawed, due to the inherent bias and baseless assumptions on the RIAA's behalf. I address this earlier my Round 2."In order to evaluate this issue, we should consider the potential effects of a world where there are no intellectual property laws."Con does not seem to understand what the core of this debate is. Several times now I have stressed that this is about weaking copyright law to make non-commercial redistribution of cultural works legal. This debate is not about ridding of copyright law. Despite me stressing this, it seems Con is still under this misunderstanding.