BeIR/webis-touche2020 huggingface dataset:
Because the artist made the song, it is their property, in this case “intellectual property”. Prope...

Because the artist made the song, it is their property, in this case “intellectual property”. Property means that the owner/artist has the right to ask something from you in exchange for you gaining access to the music. This may be money. It may also be the requirement that you clearly recognize the artist’s moral right to always be mentioned as the creator of that song. This is called the “free exchange of value”, and this is the most fundamental relationship in our free market economy.\ Whatever the artist chooses as payment through a legal transaction, it is his/her basic right to ask this of you. The only way to make sure that he/she can actually exercise that right is by making sure you only take music from the artist through a legal transaction, i.e. with their permission. Only then can we be sure that the desired free exchange of value has taken place. \
Apart from the moral reason, there is also a simple societal reason why it is wrong to download musi...

Apart from the moral reason, there is also a simple societal reason why it is wrong to download music without permission. The reason is that musicians have to eat, too. Suppose you are an up-and-coming young musician thinking about what to do with your future. You can either become a full time musician or take up a job. If you become a fulltime musician, you’ll be doing what you love. But at the same time, everyone will be downloading all your music for free, simply because they can. This means that music won’t be a good, stable source of income for you, and this means you’d rather take up a job. Since you’re not working on your music every day, your talent will be underdeveloped, and the little pieces of music you do write, for example in the weekend, are not as good as they could have been. So, downloading music without permission will lead to fewer good musicians. That’s not only bad for the musicians, but also for us: we’ll have less good music to listen to.
Downloading does not fall under the so-called “private copy exception”. The private copy exception ...

Downloading does not fall under the so-called “private copy exception”. The private copy exception only covered those rare cases when you took the effort to make a copy from a lawful source (perhaps putting a song you owned on CD on to a cassette so you could listen to it in your car). With the internet, the situation changed hugely. Firstly, copying became a lot easier. Secondly, the home copy-exception applies to when you borrow an album from a friend - someone you know. Online, you’re downloading from anyone, anywhere who happens to have the song you want. Thirdly, when you start downloading using peer-to-peer software, you will usually also start uploading at the same time. It’s the nature of p2p-technology that you both distribute and consume. So, you’re not just making a copy for yourself, you will also be distributing the same song, and that distribution is in any case wrong. These changes together mean that the three step-test is not met, so downloading does not fall under the private copy exception and is therefore illegal.
The home-copy exception was only put into law on the condition that there would be a charge, or levy...

The home-copy exception was only put into law on the condition that there would be a charge, or levy, on the devices used for copying (see condition 3 of the three-step test). This levy in turn would be used to compensate artists for the income they missed because someone copied, instead of bought, their album. There is no such levy on the internet or on our computers, which means there is no fair compensation available. Since there is no fair compensation available, it is wrong to allow downloading from illegal sources. \ This also explains why record companies use Digital Rights Management (DRM) to limit copying of audio files. Since there is no levy on every player or carrier, they have to make sure their material does not get unto those platforms. Hence the protection: it might seem unfair but it’s the next best thing after the lack of fair compensation.\
Record companies have been blamed for unfair practices, like DRM, “milking” artists (see opposition ...

Record companies have been blamed for unfair practices, like DRM, “milking” artists (see opposition argument 3), or suing individual downloaders for unfair damages. But record companies also have a very positive role to play: they scout every day for new talent, and offer training and production studios for up-and-coming musicians. Moreover, they provide valuable marketing services, making sure that new artists get heard instead of drowning in the vast sea of information that is the internet. Consider this, how don you even know which song to download? A large part of that is because record companies get the music out there, on to radio stations, all over MySpace, on MTV, so that you get to hear it for the first time. Those are things a musician is not trained to do and very often does not want to do, which is why it is good to have record companies.
Theft is taking something from someone who is the rightful owner without their permission. It doesn...

Theft always involves a thief taking something away for themselves with the result that the original owner can’t use it anymore. For example, if I steal your bike, you can’t use it anymore. And this is exactly why theft is wrong: you had something which you wanted to use, and now you can’t anymore, simply because I took it. \ That’s why downloading music is not theft because it is a form of copying. You download a copy from an original, but the first owner still has the original on his or her computer, and can still enjoy it. In more complicated terms: music files are “non-rival” goods, meaning that my use of the good does not diminish your future use of it.
Because the artist made the song, it is their property, in this case “intellectual property”. Prope...

Realistically speaking, music is not even property - for property to really be property, it needs to be tangible (something physical you can touch). If it is tangible, it is easier to keep you from using it, whereas when it is intangible, I can’t. What if you hear a song on the radio which stays in your head all day long because you liked it so much? In economic terms, we call such a good “non-excludable”. \ Private property is both a rival good (see above), and excludable. The above shows that music is neither, even though we happen to call it “intellectual property”. That means that music can’t be private property, and copying it can’t really be theft in any normal sense of the word (see above)\ In addition, the moral right of the artist to be known as the author of a piece of music is also not broken by downloading. People usually sort the music on mp3-players by musician’s name, which means that we’re always recognizing that a certain artist made a certain song. \
Apart from the moral reason, there is also a simple societal reason why it is wrong to download musi...

It’s true that musicians have to eat, too, but it’s not true that downloading cuts their income. Most of the money spent on music goes to record companies, not to artists. Those record companies have been keeping musicians on a leash for decades, paying them less than they could. They paid them enough to make sure they would remain fulltime musicians, but not so much that they didn’t bother to create new albums. So if downloading music files means record companies miss out on some income, we shouldn’t feel bad about it.
Downloading does not fall under the so-called “private copy exception”. The private copy exception ...

Downloading music without permission is allowed under the “private copy exception”. Practically, the exception meant that you were allowed to copy, but not distribute any music. Downloading music from a torrentsite or newsgroup is essentially the same. People who download music do it purely for their own enjoyment and use. They have no intention to resell the songs and make a profit from it. So, if it was legal to make a copy for personal use before the internet was invented, why then should it suddenly be different afterwards? And when it comes to peer-to-peer software, you can turn off the option to upload automatically. This allows you to only download, but at a slower speed.
The home-copy exception was only put into law on the condition that there would be a charge, or levy...

Even if downloading would lead to less income for musicians, it’s important to realize that most musicians are not in it for the money. They are artists: creative people who do it for the love of their art. They create music because they want other people to listen to it and enjoy it. This means they will keep making music, even when there is little money to be made from it. Even better, with the internet every talented musician now has the means to spread their music all across the world without having to wait for a record deal!
Record companies have been blamed for unfair practices, like DRM, “milking” artists (see opposition ...

Even if downloading is illegal, it still is right from a moral viewpoint. The reason is that by downloading, you’re not hurting the artists, but the record companies. And these record companies have engaged in unfair practices towards consumers for decades. They asked €20 euros for a CD, when a blank CD only costs about 5 cents. They still engage in unfair practices, for example via DRM. DRM stands for Digital Rights Management, and it means that companies limit how and when you can listen to a song. For example, you can buy a song and listen to it on your MP-3 player, but if you want to play it on your laptop, you have to buy the same song again. Moreover, record companies have sued individual consumers for huge fines for downloading just a few songs. Most recently one ordinary woman was fined $1.92 million dollars, which just doesn’t add up to the “damage” these individuals are supposed to have done. That’s unfair, and because it’s unfair, we are justified in download without permission.
It is a mistake to think that when you’re downloading, there isn’t someone else making a huge profit...

Actually, downloading songs could mean more income for musicians. Concerts (plus merchandise like T-shirts) are becoming a bigger source of income. But suppose a new musician comes to town. How am I supposed to know if I want to go to their concert if I don’t know their music? Previously, I wouldn’t have gone since I didn’t want to spend money on first buying their album and then buying the ticket. Now, I can quickly check out their music by downloading some songs to see if I like it, and then go to their concert. I save money on the albums, and will go more to concerts.
One should also wonder why exactly opinion polls are relevant. The only information they generate i...

One should also wonder why exactly opinion polls are relevant. The only information they generate is that “you know what other people think”. But in a democracy, it should not be important for citizens to know what other people think. We expect our citizens to make up their own minds on political topics. Citizens who do decide their opinions on “what the majority thinks”, should know better. The implication of this is that it is wholly legitimate to limit the publication of opinion polls, in order to ensure that voters decide only on the issues and personalities involved in the campaign.
Opinion polls also distort the political decision making process: during elections, polls swing fast...

Opinion polls also distort the political decision making process: during elections, polls swing faster then politicians can adapt their strategies. The result: politicians are following every swing of the polls and engaging in “political marketing” instead of really developing a party philosophy and trying to honestly engage the citizens. Also, in between elections, polls ruin the process: the executive launches policy to try and create a better public opinion in stead of real policy. Symbol politics, in stead of real politics, is the result.
Opinion polls are damaging to good government and democracy. It is easy for politicians to become o...

Opinion polls are a form of expression, as they publicize the opinions of large numbers of citizens. As such they must be protected under the right to free speech. Any attempt to restrict the free exchange of opinion damages democracy, and it sets a bad precedent which may lead to other restrictions of free speech. For example, in India some have proposed banning the publication of horoscopes during an election period.\ And democracy itself is safeguarded by opinion polls for they ensure that electoral fraud and vote-rigging will be obvious to all. It is notable that around the world, those regimes which ban or heavily restrict opinion polling are those which are either undemocratic or where elections are very corrupt. These regimes know that allowing opinion polling would embarrassingly reveal their lack of legitimacy, and could lead to a domestic and international outcry against them.
Opinion polls are the product of research – but as products of research they can also be heavily man...

It might be so that opinion polls can be manipulated, but we should trust our citizens and politicians to be critical using them as basis for decision making. That is actually a reason to publicize them as much as possible: the more opinion polls on one topic, the more possibility for dissent there is. In the competition between partisan opinion polls, the polls with the least scientific reliability will soon lose legitimacy, whereas the most trustworthy polls will gain more attention, since they are more accurate and therefore more newsworthy. An example of this can be seen in the U.S.A.: the polls that Fox News runs are not taken seriously across the entire U.S. public and even widely mocked (see the Colbert Report), whereas polls done by Pew Research receive more widespread recognition.
Even if the research is done with an objective mindset, the research technique or reporting method c...

A well-conducted poll can be very accurate. It is reckoned that a sample of 1,000 people can accurately reflect the views of more than 200 million US adults to within a few percentage points. Polling is a statistical science with an established literature and the publication of ongoing research. And once again: we should trust our citizens and politicians to base their decisions on good information, and also to be able to work out what poll is statistically better then the other. We can also expect our media to compete on bringing the most accurate polls – the more accurate they are, the more newsworthy they are. When systematic errors are found, then polling firms can work hard to correct for these in future surveys – as happened in Britain in the 1990s where a series of polls in 1992 consistently underestimated Conservative support. After all, it is not in their interest to look stupid by calling an election result wrong!
Publishing opinion polls during elections might lead to tactical voting, and if the polls are mistak...

There is nothing wrong with tactical voting. In fact it is a crucial feature of a democracy that citizens are not only able to vote for the government they want, but also for the type of opposition that that government will face. Tactical voting also avoids wasted votes under the First-Past-the-Post system Britain and America both use. To enable tactical voting, opinion polls are necessary. That this may sometimes lead to mistakes, is an unfortunate but necessary byproduct. However, the media themselves can be responsible in the way they portray their polls. After the 1992 U.K. Elections, the BBC introduced a policy of emphasizing the uncertainty and limited reliability of every poll they cover. The only way that media, and the population, can learn about the possible mistakes in polls, is by allowing them to make those mistakes.
One should also wonder why exactly opinion polls are relevant. The only information they generate i...

It is a fundamental right of citizens to vote however they want – and to base their vote on whatever criteria they choose. Some citizens might turn to astrology or tarot-reading to decide their vote, others go for the best looking candidate, and other still might look to opinion polls. Many decide after finding out how their family and fellow workers plan to vote (should we ban conversations about politics for this reason?). However one might personally dislike that, every citizen should be allowed to arrive to their own conclusions, through whatever process they themselves deem relevant.
Opinion polls also distort the political decision making process: during elections, polls swing fast...

Opinion polls are very useful for politicians: they give them very important information on what people think of their performance during elections, allowing them to change tactics if need be. Presumably, their new strategy would be closer to “what the public apparently thinks”. In between elections, opinion polls can serve a similar role, informing politicians of the general public opinion on decisions they make, thus performing an extra check on the executive, next to the parliament.
Opinion polls are damaging to good government and democracy. It is easy for politicians to become o...

Opinion polls are damaging to good government and democracy. It is easy for politicians to become obsessed with the shifting whims of public opinion, and to become fixed on short-term populist measures in an attempt to respond to changing concerns. In this way the media drives the policy agenda, and long-term, consistent policy making suffers accordingly.\ Democracy is also harmed by the publication of opinion polls as citizens can be influenced negatively by them. When, for example, an opinion poll portrays a huge majority for a certain subject, or for a particular party, its opponents might be less vocal since they feel “outnumbered” and so democratic debate is damaged. Undecided voters may rally to a party they see is popular with many of their fellow-citizens (a well-known psychological phenomenon), or may fail to vote as they consider the result is a foregone conclusion. This is exactly why in France opinion polls are forbidden shortly before the election actually takes place.
Opinion polls are the product of research – but as products of research they can also be heavily man...

Opinion polls are the product of research – but as products of research they can also be heavily manipulated by the organization performing or commissioning the poll in question. A bias can be created by selecting a certain target group, asking certain questions or phrasing them in a certain way. The problem with this is that it unfairly influences the democratic process: it generates false information and untrue or exaggerated claims.
Even if the research is done with an objective mindset, the research technique or reporting method c...

Even if the research is done with an objective mindset, the research technique or reporting method can skew the results. For example, opinion polls seldom report the measure of uncertainty of the conclusions, by for example reporting standard deviations from means, sample size, etc. These measures are usually not published because either the public doesn’t care about them or doesn’t know what they mean. Reporting the results of opinion polls without further statistical information leads to more misinformation in the democratic process and that might lead to bad decisions being made. One example of this was the exit polls of the 2004 U.S. Presidential election: many of the election polls predicted a win for Kerry, but didn’t reckon with the fact that Republicans were less likely to respond to an exit poll, as was later found.
Publishing opinion polls during elections might lead to tactical voting, and if the polls are mistak...

Publishing opinion polls during elections might lead to tactical voting, and if the polls are mistaken, this means that the votes are being cast on a wrong basis. One example is the events unfolding in 1992 in the U.K. elections, where all polls predicted a Labour victory – but against all expectations, the Conservatives won. The problem here is that it is wholly possible that many people, ensured of a seeming Labour victory, voted for the Conservatives tactically, to ensure that there would be a balance in the House of Commons. Thus, it is possible that the people of the UK didn’t get the government they actually wanted, but cast mistaken votes based on the misinformation delivered by polls.
There are many reasons why oil and gas exploration should not be allowed in the Antarctic. Firstly,...

There are many reasons why oil and gas exploration should not be allowed in the Antarctic. Firstly, proven and probable reserves of oil and gas are still rising faster than global consumption, so there is no economic need to exploit any hypothetical Antarctic sources. Secondly, as the continent is already suffering as a result of global warming, our priority should be to find renewable alternatives to fossil fuels rather than to continue our dependence upon them. At a practical level, the cost of exploration and production would be completely uneconomic, especially given the hostile climate and the serious iceberg threats to offshore rigs, tankers and pipelines, as well as the very deep continental shelf. There would also be a serious danger of pollution, both from the increased human presence in this fragile environment, and from oil spills.
Antarctica must be protected from mineral exploitation and the 1991 Protocol upheld. There are no k...

Antarctica must be protected from mineral exploitation and the 1991 Protocol upheld. There are no known mineral deposits on the continent, so the argument for exploitation is highly speculative, but it is nonetheless dangerous. Even just exploration would greatly damage the delicate environment, both physically and by greatly increasing the number of people disturbing the landscape and eco-system. Actual mineral extraction, with its spoil heaps, pollution, processing facilities and transport infrastructure would be hugely destructive. Politically, placing an economic value upon Antarctic claims would renew dangers of territorial conflict that have been frozen since the 1961 Treaty, and risk the whole system of international cooperation falling apart.
Fishing is at present allowed under the 1991 Protocol, and has been increasing in recent years as ov...

Fishing is at present allowed under the 1991 Protocol, and has been increasing in recent years as overfishing is exhausting other global fisheries. Although much about the marine eco-system of the southern ocean is still unknown, it is clear that overfishing could quickly damage it, and that any recovery could take decades. At present limits are set according to our current understanding of fish stocks, but there is a great deal of illegal activity by boats from a variety of nations, so the situation is not under control. Even legal fishing can do great damage - thousands of seabirds die each year as a result of longline fishing. Not only should we not relax the Antarctic fishing regime, we should probably seek to tighten it further; the less legal fishing is allowed, the easier it will be to spot unlicensed activity.