is it wrong to download music and movies illegally?  

All theft is wrong, isn't it? It's easy to persuade yourself it doesn't matter when you can't see the victim. People who steal, whether it's a tin of peas from a supermarket or a movie off the internet, make everything much more expensive for the rest of us. The loss in earnings doesn't come out of the music or film companies - they just put their prices up to cover the cost of the theft. Having said that, paying out a big fine for illegally downloading just eight songs is totally excessive. I don't think the fine could possibly be that much but even if it was one-thousandth of that amount, it's still a lot of money.

Well, that's the law. The severity of that punishment is only a result of the severity of the problem---the problem with piracy. Piracy is a global problem. You will understand this if you will put yourself on the shoes of those developer of the new music technology. If you are a businessman, how would you feel if, you have invested millions of dollars and efforts in developing new technologies, only to find out later you are losing expected profits due to uncontrolled piracy? There is a saying that goes, "Our freedom ends at the point where the freedom of others begin". :)

I have 2 view points on this

In essence yes its illegal to download cracked copies of movies or music etc etc, and she was quite rightly prosecuted the level of the fine is none of our business as that will of been set by the court but I guess if you don't want to risk a huge fine then don't do the crime lol.

Though I think downloading say a cracked game is fine aslong as its just to evaluate it then delete it and buy the original I have a work colleague who d/loads music and I borrowed one of his illegal copy loved the album and went out and bought the original.

If its used in this way it will force developers to actually make decent albums or movies not just a few good songs and a load of rubbish one, which can only be good for the industry.

But how many will actually use it in this way.

what do you mean download. in internet? i dont think its illegal to download in internet since theres a lot of free site whre you can download music or video. unless you do the hacking to download music, in itunes store theres really payment before you can download it but why go there if thees for free. you can even burn the music you download to empty cd or dvd. i guess pirated is illegal, like selling pirated copy of muvie.

well... i guess we could say she got the down payment for all the songs she downloaded illegally in her entire life.. but i wouldn't say so since i am no better..

yes, downloading music and movies illegally is a punishable offense. The punishment should be severe one to leave impact on society not to commit the same crime again.

hi! depending on the copyright laws- YES, it is illegal, because we must pay for products like movies and songs, which have copyright, and if we download them without paying their owners we can be judge and go to jail. but there are really not many people who pay for this stuff. I have never bought an original CD/DVD with some movie or songs, i just download them free from the net

Is it wrong to download them illegally?

Well, it IS illegal, so...

Criminal penalties have nothing at all to do with fairness...they are punitive measures, designed to stop others from committing the same crime.

Well, technically it is wrong. Technically there are a lot of things that are wrong, that people do but are still done. And there are a lot of laws that are quite frankly absurd, that people just roll their eyes. I think with the case of downloading music, it really depends on your perspective on the situation.

I will say that the music industry has no one but themselves to blame for things like music being downloaded. Its improved but there is a far more problem. There are far fewer people, especially these days, that will by a CD for just one good song and a bunch of subpar filler. Especially at whatever music costs these days.

I'll leave everyone with this thought. I am listening to songs on the radio right now. Why should I buy something that I can listen on the radio for free? Should we ban music from playing on radio stations as well? Just something to consider.