Trying to explain to a 6th grader that most of that “free” music they are downloading for that new MP3 player is illegal is a conversation one should never have to have, but unfortunately it happens.

To me it’s very simple, very black and white – unless the Artist or record company is giving it away, consider it stealing. What’s unfortunate is the peer to peer (p2p) technology used in products such as Limewire, Morpheus, or Soulseek is excellent, but so much of what you find online is violating copyrights, that it is hard, if not impossible, for that 6th grader (or her parents) to know what is OK to download and what is not.

Personally I choose to buy all of my music, but for every one of me that buys the music, there are 99 others that chose to steal it. And this isn’t just about kids. These are adults; your friends, neighbors, people you’d think were just normal people that would never commit a crime, but when it comes to stealing music they don’t seem to feel that it’s wrong. If it’s “up there” and I can just download it I’m not doing anything wrong.

I also see the other side of this where p2p is a great way to discover new music you may have never heard about from any other source. I’ve heard stories from people that say that they went and bought a CD once they downloaded a band’s music because they thought it was so good. If I was in an unsigned band you better believe that I would be dumping our songs all over the Internet to gain exposure.

People say that the music industry is flawed. I don’t know enough about it to argue either side, but I do know that as much as people complain that the artist gets very little of the money from the sale of music, they are getting even less when you steal it. For many it comes down to a moral dilemma. For me it’s just bad karma, so I’ll keep on purchasing the music I want to listen to.

Let your conscience be your guide.