I don't think so, Headless. The argument doesn't start from "it's easy to get for free" and progress to "it should be legal to get it for free". Rather, the argument begins with the proposition that there's no moral prohibition on copying intangible items. Nor is there any net utility from protecting the works that are most vigorously protected under copyright today. The fact that IP is easy to get for free is irrelevant. Lots of small goods are easy to shoplift (for free) but should not be priced at 0. I'm sure zahc is against shoplifting.
If zahc was against shoplifting, then he wouldn't steal music, because they are basically the same thing. Filching tangible property is morally the same as filching intangible property.
When you buy a CD or iTunes file, you aren't paying hard money for a shiny disc or any old random string of bytes, you're paying for the ability to play a certain piece of music. If this wasn't the case, then any CD would be as good as any other, it wouldn't matter to the purchasers which CD they got, nor which music it contained, nor whether it contained any music at all. And any random collection of bytes would be as good as any other, or none at all.
Clearly the music contained on the CD or encoded in the mp3 file has value in itself. Even the music thieves recognize this fact by virtue of stealing the music. If the music wasn't valuable, they wouldn't steal it. They'd be just as content with any old blank CD or any random string of bytes, but they aren't, they want the CD or byte stream that contains good, valuable music.
So, is it right and just to take someone else's valuable property and use it without their consent? Not if you believe that theft is wrong.
Strangely, I see no serious discussion in this thread about how copyright as it exists today is designed to further that goal. A Brittany Spears album does not fall under the umbrella of science or useful arts. Music, along with photographs, is performance art or fine art. They have sneaked under the copyright umbrella over the years, but without constitutional authorization that I can see.
It's a long stretch to say that photography and music recordings aren't useful arts. The fact that music and photographs have commercial value indicates that they are useful in some capacity. The obvious usefulness is in providing personal entertainment, and this particular use is in high demand as evidenced by the great many people willing to steal it and the great sums of money to bicker over.
Likewise, you're struggling to claim that the authors of music or photographs or movies shouldn't receive the exclusive right to their writings. Do you agree that there is very little reason for someone to invest time, money, and personal labor into producing intellectual property of any sort if he doesn't have the legal and practical ability to sell that property once he creates it? Do we really need to have a discussion of why property rights are fundamental to advancing the production of valuable property?
The best way to promote these useful arts it to allow authors to profit from their writings.
Now, the question becomes just what is meant by "for limited Times". No specific time is quantified, therefore, as long as the particular timespan we use is reasonable there's no way to claim that we're violating the constitution.
So just how long is reasonable? Seems to me that so long as a particular writing retains commercial value, and so long as the owner is putting it to productive use, then it should belong to the owner. Back when people usually only lived 40 odd years a 14+14 year span was sufficient to ensure that the writing was secure for the entire career of the author. Unless he made his invention before reaching adulthood, he had a reasonable expectation of being able to profit form his work until he died. Now that authors are living longer, and especially now that long-lived corporations are authors and owners, it makes good sense to extend the timespan much farther out. 100 years doesn't seem unreasonable, given that many products created and owned by corporations are still in primary use (Mickey Mouse is a prime example).
Not only must authors be able to profit from their works, their profits must be secure for a sufficient timespan to justify the labors involved in producing the writings. Given the increasingly extreme amounts of time and money invested into the production of music and especially movies these days, it seems entirely sensible that their authors be able to profit from them for an increasingly long amount of time.
