Hi Ray

While I respect your opinion and your logic does make sense. One person downloading one song illegaly doesn't take money from the performers pocket. The person who illegaly downloads probably wouldn't pay for the song if he couldn't download it illegaly. So there is no loss there. The only loss comes when that person shares that file with millions of others who might have bought the cd (might really breaks things down) So in the end an artist can still make as much money as his/her fans are willing to pay. Although really all that is beside the point. The person downloading music illegaly is commiting a crime I do agree what I don't agree with is the punishment. You want to punish these people? Make them do community service and make sure it's hard work! If someone download 10 songs and you charge them 100.000 dollars are they really learning any lesson? Not in my opinion except don't mess with big business. In the end those who cheat the system are hiding behind huge walls of network security. Those getting caught are the ones who don't even really know what they are doing. Again I do not excuse their behavior however make the punishment fit the crime for crying out loud! If you have 10,000 illegaly downloaded songs and your sharing them all then heck yes I'd be the first to throw the book at you! Download three measily songs (with low bit rates at that) And I'd ask you to wear a stupid sign for a week lol.
Derek

All the worlds a song and all the people Singers

http://www.soundclick.com/bands/pageartist.cfm?bandID=740346