The Big File Sharing Debate?

[MikeyTage]

Ok, I want peoples opinion on this. Is the downloading of a copyrighted file technically illegal? I understand that some people would identify this as morally wrong but is it technically a crime? From what I understand, music piracy, in law, is determined by someone distributing music, ie UPloading it to other people or servers or copying a CD and selling it to people. Actually downloading these files is not classed as distributing the music hence not technically piracy. For example, you follow a link from a website and don't know what the files are. You finish the download and they stay on your PC, they do not get copied or shared to anyone else. You may not know what these files are. I think that the ones committing the crimes are uploaders, not the people downloading. Thing is though, if you are using a P2P client such as BitTorrent to download these copyrighted files, you have to upload at the same time which makes you a distributer. But downloading direct from a site such as MegaUpload does not mean that you are sharing with others whilst downloading.
I have a quote from the BBC that shows the BPI is not targetting downloaders but uploaders

"How is the music industry targeting file-sharers?

The British Phonographic Industry is monitoring the most popular
file-sharing tools and is looking for people who are uploading (i.e. actively sharing) music tracks."

So what does this legally mean? Do people commit an actual crime when they solely download or is it more of a moral issue?

NOTE: In no way do I condone the active sharing or downloading of copyrighted material; this question is purely a discussion of the issues.

 

[erick]

In some instances, you are allowed to have a digital copy of something if you legally own it in the first place, ie music.