Of course there is an ethical issue. A lot of people consider the downloading, for free, of copy right protected material as theft. I have heard all the arguments by now. I did hear them in the 70’s when cassette recorders became available and very popular. I heard them when CD writers became available and I hear them now when downloading over the Internet is becoming more and more popular.
In my opinion it is theft if you copy anything and sell it. If you copy CD’s for your own use, that is o.k. with me. I have noticed that I, and a lot of people I know as well, still buy the “real thing” if we like it, and I also have noticed that I am getting selective.
I hardly buy anything anymore from the real top performers. I think they simply earn enough as it is. If I come along a new group I like I usually copy a few songs, and I might go out and score their CD if I really like them. I noticed that I must have been doing this for a long time.
I had a look at my CD’s and saw that most of the originals were indeed the earlier work of a certain group. If I had more of them, it were usually copies. I had downloaded some how from the Internet.
But all this free downloading has a downside. A lot of people are having computer problems because they downloaded something from the Internet. The Internet is a jungle and there are a lot of predators around that are searching for their prey. Predators like spy ware / ad ware.
Little programs that you sometimes download as well and that hide on your computer without you knowing it. Some can be very harmful indeed, like the so called key loggers. These programs "remember" every keystroke you make, and send this info to their "owners". This way sensitive info, like passwords or credit card numbers, can get in the hands of the wrong people.
In order to get the best deals you can use price comparison sites which will compare all of the top companies giving you the cheapest result. Not only will this ensure you get the best deal but it makes life easier if you’re in the market looking for things such as home or car insurance. This is because you simply have to fill out one form with your details on and it will use the same for them all, you don’t have to fill a separate form in for each insurer which would take ages. There is a problem with this method though, once you get the results back they can often change as most comparison sites ‘assume’ a lot of the data meaning the price may be false or inaccurate. What will happen is that when you click through to take it out it will ask you further questions which will bump the price up.
By using these kind of sites you will find many special offers from companies that didn’t know even existed as there are new companies being created all of the time, especially on the internet. You have to be careful though and do thorough research of the company to guarantee they can provide what they are claiming and not just out to get your money and never hear from them again.
