Again: just because the Internet makes a tort insanely easy to commit does not make it any less of a tort.<p>The cognitive dissonance here is between the casual ease (and apparent innocuousness) of file sharing vs. the actual reality of unauthorized distribution.<p>It doesn't seem like it should be possible for some poor soul to wind up incurring 60k of damages just for clicking a button to trade "free" music. But it is. Just about every government in western civilization has considered this issue, and from what I can see, the verdict has been unanimous. "Easy for a lower-middle class mom to wind up in hock to the RIAA for five figures? Not the RIAA's problem. Don't trade copyrighted music."