> How does such an obvious fallacy command such purchase among smart people? Swift is talking about "music" as an original work. Patel responds with an irrelevant point about digital copies of music. Obviously these are two different things!
Yes, they are two different things.
The problem is that artists (and record labels) want to get paid for the non-scarce thing: the copies, and not for the actually scarce thing: the artists time and effort. This is why people don't see pirating music as stealing, while at the same time they are more than willing to pay a small fortune for a concert ticket.
The solution then would be to find a way to charge not for the copies, but for the time effort that the artist put into the production of the music.
Yes, they are two different things.
The problem is that artists (and record labels) want to get paid for the non-scarce thing: the copies, and not for the actually scarce thing: the artists time and effort. This is why people don't see pirating music as stealing, while at the same time they are more than willing to pay a small fortune for a concert ticket.
The solution then would be to find a way to charge not for the copies, but for the time effort that the artist put into the production of the music.