I don't think the dictionary is a very useful authority, here. Dictionaries are reactionary -- they document what words we use. They don't create words. We do that.
(Patent|Copyright|IP) infringement is an old issue, yes, and perhaps in the established context of one business copying and selling the work of another, it's a near neighbor to theft. But this world of free, crowd-sourced torrents . . . this is a new thing. The laws and dictionaries haven't caught up. We are having the conversations now that will BECOME laws and will UPDATE dictionaries.
Whether you think infringement of this sort is bad or okay, it is a very fair point to say that it is not the same as stealing. It isn't. It is a fundamentally different act, and how bad it is is something we should discuss independently. It would be unfair to import the negative rhetorical weight of the word theft -- an act that can directly impoverish or even imperil someone -- with what we're talking about. And likewise, if we decide infringement isn't so bad, it would be unfair to carry those emotions over to how we feel about physical theft.
I wish we had a catchy term for it. Freeling or "copying" or something. I don't know. I'm not sure exactly how in favor it of I am, either. But I do think it makes a lot of sense to use a separate term to discuss a genuinely new issue, so we can do so in neutral emotional territory and evaluate it on its own merits.
> I don't think the dictionary is a very useful authority, here. Dictionaries are reactionary -- they document what words we use. They don't create words. We do that.
That is a very insightful comment, perhaps obvious in this particular case, but people often argue semantics over dictionary definitions, which is often unrelated to the true issue at hand.
(Patent|Copyright|IP) infringement is an old issue, yes, and perhaps in the established context of one business copying and selling the work of another, it's a near neighbor to theft. But this world of free, crowd-sourced torrents . . . this is a new thing. The laws and dictionaries haven't caught up. We are having the conversations now that will BECOME laws and will UPDATE dictionaries.
Whether you think infringement of this sort is bad or okay, it is a very fair point to say that it is not the same as stealing. It isn't. It is a fundamentally different act, and how bad it is is something we should discuss independently. It would be unfair to import the negative rhetorical weight of the word theft -- an act that can directly impoverish or even imperil someone -- with what we're talking about. And likewise, if we decide infringement isn't so bad, it would be unfair to carry those emotions over to how we feel about physical theft.
I wish we had a catchy term for it. Freeling or "copying" or something. I don't know. I'm not sure exactly how in favor it of I am, either. But I do think it makes a lot of sense to use a separate term to discuss a genuinely new issue, so we can do so in neutral emotional territory and evaluate it on its own merits.