Let me get the link for the EFF’s petition to “Stop the RIAA” out of the way before my point meanders too much.
In case you don’t know, the EFF (Electronic Frontier Foundation) is like the ACLU for the digital world. They fight the cause that “the information wants to be free.” I know that saying can sound a little hackneyed, but it represents the ideals that they represent – namely that the Information Age has caused massive changes to our lifestyles, and businesses, government, and individuals must come to terms without infringing upon our rights. The EFF does not argue that music should be free and therefore fileswapping is ok. Instead they make the point that if millions of Americans can be sued by big businesses for downloading music instead of paying the exorbitant prices for CDs when they only want one song, the system itself does not work. When laws like this make so many people criminals, you must examine the laws, not the people.
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