re: Why is it ok to steal media?

While I do agree with that Oatmeal (if you don't offer your content legally, people will steal it -- "you can't stop the signal"), I do think there is a real troubling problem with consumers. We've been trained by IT companies like Google and Apple that content is supposed to be free, or close to it. For companies that will sue the ever-living shite out of anyone who encroached on their IP, they have no problem with encouraging consumers to steal the IP of "content producers", or as I like to call them, "the people who actually write this shite."

The IT companies have destroyed musicians. It is now almost literally impossible to make a living at being a musician in our current economic structure. Spotify nets musicians next to nothing. iTunes is slightly better, but the streaming sites get around standard usage rates. As much as the record companies screwed over artists over the years, it is nothing compared to what IT companies have done t them. People pretty much don't expect artists to get paid for their creations.

It's wrong. Everyone gets rich but the person who actually makes the stuff. Eventually, this means they'll stop making this stuff. We are trying to morally justify not paying people who actually create things.