Is this morally wrong?

[Larz60+]

Check out:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_infringement

[perfringo]

it is important that we use our moral rules to make ourselves better people, not to make ourselves believe we are better than other people.

Very well put! It is true on so many levels.

[micseydel]

I've got nothing to hide. This is not using bit torrent, only the public internet.

To be clear, this has nothing to do with the legality (or morality as far as I can tell). Both the "public internet" and Bittorrent have legal and illegal uses. If you stream a video from a random website when downloading that video would be illegal with Bittorrent, then it's also illegal to stream it from that random site. There are practical reasons why Bittorrent might make you more likely to be caught but I'm not going to get into it.

When considering morality, I suggest using the "veil of ignorance" thought experiment. Imagine a society where you'll be randomly placed into it, but you don't know where. Are all the roles reasonable, preferences aside? Would you feel bad about being placed into the author's role, and not being compensated for your work? I would, but there might be mitigating factors; if I were poor and the author rich then I would feel far less bad about it, since I would not be depriving them of something I would otherwise have given and they don't really need it.

My personal judgement is: if your'e a poor college student barely getting by, I'm not going to judge you for stealing a PDF. If you have rich parents, I'm probably going to judge you pretty hard for it. If you're someone trying to make a career pivot that will lift you out of poverty, I'm not going to judge you. If you're a software engineer who makes a lot of money but just finds stealing easier, I'm going to judge you.

Lastly, I'm going to soap-box about my personal situation and something tangential... I committed intellectual property theft a lot as a student. Now I'm a software engineer several years into my career and I'm far less likely to steal. There are times I do though. For example, I bought Legend of Korra on Google Play years ago when it was still airing, but my pre-paid-for episodes came out about a day after illegal streams were already available. Did I "steal" to watch it sooner? Hell yes. Do I feel it was immoral? Definitely not. Worse yet, I've wanted to purchase videos that are only available as DVDs. I hate DVDs. I hate having more things. I hate the environmental impact. I hate waiting for shipping. I looove streaming. I'll let you guess what I did.

[pcsailor]

I appreciate everyone's opinion and I am looking for a discussion. Anyone's judgements on me I don't value nor live by. I spent 10 years of my life working for the 1% and have heard and seen some disgusting things. Yet most of these people are considered of high value to society. So my decision making regarding morality I base on the law. After that, I leave my morality up to interpretation in the moment.

We've talked mostly here about high level stuff, generalities. We've talked about the authors, which is fair. Let's bring this down to a recent real world example. If I google Python_Pocket Reference_5thEd filetype:pdf the very first two links are actual PDF's of the book. If I search for this book on Amazon, it's US$80. If I am doing 2-3 books a month whicch each book US$40-$80, that adds up. Where does your morality lie, to an unknown person or to your family, your bills, your 2-year old daughter? I'm confident what those high-society 1%'s would say who are so valued throughout the world. Yet we in the trenches debate these ethics. My morality lies within the law, and that's where I choose to leave it.
There's my 2 cents.
Phil

[Larz60+]

nuff said

[perfringo]

If I search for this book on Amazon, it's US$80. If I am doing 2-3 books a month whicch each book US$40-$80, that adds up.

This book is available in amazon for $14.24, in Kindle format for $6.20.

I (and majority of others in this thread) have not judged you. You asked for opinion and you got it. You probably noticed that several responders admitted of doing things that are morally wrong. You judge yourself. It's your moral compass which says it's right or wrong, not ours. But there is subtle difference between acknowledging that something is morally wrong but doing it anyway out of necessity and acknowledging it as morally right and doing it.

[pcsailor]

Kind of amazing the same book has such a wide scope of a price, with only the cover being the difference.

BTW, I never said anyone here is judging me. That is simply an overall philosophy I live by. I see this as an interesting topic and that's why I bring it up.

Phil

[DeaD_EyE]

I have so many eBooks (illegal and legal), that I'm not able to read them all.
Some of them (legal) eBooks I've read because of my work with dsp.

One of my source for eBooks is PacktPub.
There you can get legal books everyday for free, but you can buy them also.

Usually you don't need books, the internet is a good place to collect knowledge.
My first encounter with Python was 3 days in a closed room without light.
The only source I had, was the Internet and the python repl.

[Gribouillis]

My first encounter with Python was 3 days in a closed room without light.
The only source I had, was the Internet and the python repl.

An event to remember for the rest of your life

[DeaD_EyE]

Oh yes, I don't forget this. But it felt good. I was already very good in shell scripting, but I hated the escaping against shell.

To get the answer about moral, everyone has to ask himself:
"If I write materials for teaching students, do I want to get money for it and how do I feel, if other people steel my work?"

I there is someone who invest time to write a book, it's his decision to take money for this book or not. We have to respect this decision. If there is someone who made it for free, we should spent money to show him, that his work is valuable.