Your Own Argument

My argument in the case MGMs. Groakster is that if a person decides to download material from another user or multiple users the guilty party for infringing on copyright laws is the end user who is doing the downloading. Just because a person or company creates a way or makes the material available to download does not make them guilty of anything. People need to take responsibility for their own actions and if they want to take a risk and download something they know is copyright protected thats their chance. If they get caught, well, they are in my own words "Fucked". (I know this is not a valid quote but wanted to quote myself)

"Big Brother in the form of an increasingly powerful government and in an increasingly powerful private sector will pile the records high with reasons why privacy should give way to national security, to law and order, to efficiency of operation, to scientific advancement and the like." Justice William O. Douglas

I do think there is a responsibility that the provider of such material should have to disclose that the material about to be downloaded is copyrighted. Some sort of quick pop up window would be sufficient. Something that the up-loader has to click a box agreeing that they know what they are about to do is illegal.

This is a fine line that we are riding on, people are losing their ability to make decisions for themselves to the government and little freedoms of creativity are being lost everyday. Does this decision mean that if I write a fictional book or make a movie describing in detail how to murder or rape someone and a person takes this information I created, commits murder or rape I am guilty too? Yes, an extreme example but the same concept. Personal responsibility for ones-self is disappearing with court decisions such as this. Seems like just because something is made available by another if you a ignorant enough to use it to break the law only the law breaker should be guilty of the crime. Common sense to me but I guess lawyers and criminals need someone else to blame to in order to make money and stay out of jail.

"The 4th Amendment and the personal rights it secures have a long history.  At the very core stands the right of a man to retreat into his own home  and there be free from unreasonable governmental intrusion." 

Potter Stewart  Source:Bartkus v. Illinois, 5 March 1961