Aaron Swartz: “Libraries and video stores (neither of which pay per rental) hurt sales too. Is it unethical to use them?”
The library angle is interesting. If one applies the current logic of the RIAA stance to libraries then if libraries were to lend digital information, this would be indistinguishable from filesharing and therefore illegal.
Most rational people think that libraries are a good thing, yet they cannot logically exist in a world of digital content governed by traditional attitudes to content distribution.
As more information becomes available in digital form then a library can clearly offer better services such as online delivery. A library becomes a more exciting and valuable community resource.
So is it really conceivable that as media like CDs go the way of 8 tracks that libraries will be forced with a choice to become repositories of information stored on obsolete media, or exist underground as filesharing Speakeasies in an era of digital prohibition?