Defining Property
The thing that always worries me when I see software people talking about songs not being property is then what does that make software?<p>I see the act of creating software and creating a song or a movie as being very analogous.<p>It takes a lot of work on the front end to create the master copy, but then that master copy can be digitally reproduced at no marginal cost.<p>Movies and songs grew up in an old style situation where distributors and producers put up the money and in exchange for the risk take a lot of the back end.<p>Software came later, and so we have, for instance, the open source movement.  There's not a lot of open source movies.<p>If we don't respect songs as property, but we do think of our own software creations as property, is that not hypocrisy?<p>I can hate the RIAA and MPAA and all their evil actions, and still think of these products as property... many movies cost a hundred million dollars to make.<p>I think it might be more productive to point out that the RIAA and MPAA are doing bad things... than to try and throw out the idea that easily reproducible goods can be property.