ipl-logo

What Is Digital Piracy Ethical

1776 Words8 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: John rawls theory of distribtive justice

Levi Magnus
For: Ruth Lowe-Walker
Word Count:
25 February 2018

The Ethics of Digital Piracy
Most people would agree that illegally downloading a book online to avoid paying for it is unethical, but what if you have already purchased a physical copy of the book? Does that entitle you to a pirated copy of the book so that you can also read it on your tablet or e-reader? I will argue that even if you have purchased the physical copy of a book, downloading the book illegally for viewing on your digital devices is still unethical. By analyzing this topic through the lens of various philosophers and their theories, I will try to show that there is no way to justify the download as an ethical action. Recently, New York Times ethicist Randy Cohen …show more content…

After all, nobody knows that you downloaded a copy of the book and it doesn’t really affect the company, right? While you might be able to keep your illegal activity a secret, it does, in fact, impact the company in a significant way. First and foremost, you are undermining the owner’s control and interfering with the exercise of their government granted rights. John Rawls’ Theory of Justice, which defines justice as fairness and aims for everyone to have as much freedom as possible, would be violated when you download an unauthorized copy of a book, as you are violating the author’s and/or publisher’s freedom of intellectual property through copyright infringement. Unauthorized downloads also hurt the company economically, even if you purchased the physical copy. One way publishers make money is by controlling the supply of their product on the market so that it never quite meets the demand. This allows them to keep their product at an attractive price. So when people assume that taking one of an infinite supply of digital copies has no effect on a company because it didn’t cost them anything, they are wrong. Each additional copy on the market, whether physical or digital, creates a reduction in the value of all other copies through the economic concept of dilution. With this in mind we can analyze the scenario using John Stuart Mill’s Utilitarianism view of the Greatest Happiness …show more content…

Ethics in a computing culture. Boston, MA Course Technology, Cengage Learning
Carmen, C., Carmen, A., & Javier, R. (2014). Technological and ethical antecedents of e-book piracy and price acceptance: Evidence from the Spanish case. The Electronic Library, 32(4), 542-566. Retrieved from https://doi-org.ezproxy.library.ubc.ca/10.1108/EL-11-2012-0149
Cohen, R. (2010, April 2). The Ethicist E-Book Dodge. The New York Times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/04/magazine/04FOB-ethicist-t.html
Masnick, M. (2010, April 5). NYTimes Ethicist: Not Unethical To Download Unauthorized Copy Of Physical Book You Own. Techdirt. Retrieved from https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100404/2115408870.shtml
Robertson, K., McNeill, L., Green, J., & Roberts, C. (2012). Illegal Downloading, Ethical Concern, and Illegal Behavior. Journal of Business Ethics, 108(2), 215-227. Retrieved from

Show More
Related
277 Words | 2 Pages

C., Fraedrich, J., & Ferrell, L. (2015).Business ethics: Ethical decision making & cases (10th ed.). Mason, OH: Cengage. O 'Sullivan, Arthur; Sheffrin, Steven M. (2003). Economics: Principles in Action. Upper Saddle River, New

Read More
367 Words | 2 Pages

However, in modern day society, we are allowed to let our books sit on a shelf out in the open with being reported. Today we are using books for a lot of our learning in life. There are people today that

Read More
1214 Words | 5 Pages

A book should not ever be banned when it contains a strong message that is not found in other “safe”

Read More
865 Words | 4 Pages

Now three years post covid we can acknowledge how the world has changed drastically as digital technology enhances, raising the ethical question; did digital technology benefit society during Covid-19 or did it do the opposite? Looking into both the positive and negative effects of digital technology during the pandemic, we can ethically determine this digital dilemma.

Read More
768 Words | 4 Pages

1. The biggest point of contention between Appiah and Hardt and Negri is that Appiah’s philosophy is one which primarily concerns itself with ethics and ethical influence on behaviors. Appiah largely makes arguments about what is considered right, or the different ways in which cultures should respond to certain practices. Hardt and Negri, on the other hand present an analysis which is, for the most part, amoral; it makes observations about habits and trends within shifting power in a political and economic analysis, though the analysis is suffused with disdain for the system as they currently see it. Appiah makes historical observations about cultural interaction, honor, and respect which he then extrapolates to the practices of a modern culture

Read More
787 Words | 4 Pages

This invokes Pathos as well because it is making you angry. It makes you want to stand out against book banning so that no one else 's favorite book is banned by a person with power that has a different opinion than

Read More
994 Words | 4 Pages

It is still a crime to use torrent sites to download movies and considered to be an act of piracy. The author also stated that when using

Read More
550 Words | 3 Pages

We do not have to wait for the shipment or even waiting the books to be printed out when they are running out of

Read More
748 Words | 3 Pages

It seems as if the main point of contention here is article VI of the Library Bill of Rights

Read More
793 Words | 4 Pages

The goal of most authors when publishing their book online is exposure. They want as many people to see their book as possible. Ordinarily, this is a good thing, but there are also people out there will turn that exposure into a bad thing. One of the most obvious examples is stealing your content.

Read More
649 Words | 3 Pages

All of them were able to apply and relate to the ethical theories. The ethical theory that was applied and used by the owners of the companies, institutions, etc. that were affected by Aaron Swartz’s actions was the deontological theory. They insisted that even though Aaron had a good purpose for his actions, the cost or consequence was simply too much for the purpose to be able to outweigh it. Aaron’s actions was considered too much in a sense that he downloaded files, documents, etc.

Read More
1056 Words | 5 Pages

Digital Divide and Its Ethics Introduction Digital divide is one of the important iternational issues in information technology. It effects the nations that suffer from it negatively, much more like the saying goes: adding more pain to the injury. Which means that not only is the country having a digital divide facing poorness but also the poorness is increasing due to lack of technology! However, digital divide must be defined well so it becomes easier to understand. Also, the relating ethics to digital divide wil be discussed.

Read More
940 Words | 4 Pages

In order to achieve its goal, Amazon implements some strategy during their planning stage, namely cost leadership strategy and differentiation strategy. 2.1.1.1 Cost leadership Strategy Amazon is implementing cost leadership strategy as its core strategy in serving its customers. The company has enormous number of warehouses and processing capabilities, which provide the company physical economies of scale. (ACCA, 2015)

Read More
1428 Words | 6 Pages

Background on Digital Piracy Digital piracy refers to the general use of digital resources and capabilities (in some cases, hardware and reverse engineering) to illegally copy, hijack digital protection and distribute counterfeited or modified digital commercial products like software, music, films, electronic books, online journals and among others, without the consent to the legal owner. (Higgins, 2008) The evolution of information technology can be attributed for the rise and propagation of digital piracy. (Ramayah, 2009) Software is one of the leading products distributed online. Thus, the software industry is one of the most targeted industry by piracy.

Read More
957 Words | 4 Pages

New technologies that people had never imagined a decade, or even some decades ago, are now expanding and changing all our lives. Taking smartphones as an example, people in old time had never imagined that small, tiny box could enable people to bring smart computer to everywhere. Yet, smartphones are now completely embedded into our lives and changed how we communicate. Technology lets us live simply, more conveniently, and more easily, but at the same time, it creates complex debates and controversies of ethical problems. In this world, where humans cannot live without the benefits of technology, it is impossible to ignore ethical problems.

Read More

More about What Is Digital Piracy Ethical

Related Topics

Open Document