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Originally Posted by vinaur
No, downloading is not stealing. It's just taking whatever is offered to you. If someone would offer you a laptop, you would probably take it without even asking if it was stolen. It's the same with music.
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If downloading = taking what's offered to you, then uploading = offering what you have to others? Sounds innocent to me. Except, wait, you're still in possession of stolen property. You could say that technically there's no stealing, since person number one made a copy of the data and freely gave it to other people. But you're obscuring the point with semantics. Downloading music (or any other data) off of the internet without either paying for it or getting the author's permission is illegal.
Maybe I just don't understand your argument, but it seems to me that if you are freely offered an illegal substance, it's still illegal.