I haven't thought about Beck's Diamond Dogs in five years. Yesterday, though, it popped into my head and I could not get it to go away. I was going to buy it from the iTunes Store, but it was only available if I downloaded the entire Moulin Rouge soundtrack. That was pointless since it would be too slow on dial-up, not to mention the stupidity of paying $9.99USD for one song encoded at 128kbps. So, I actually considered stealing it from a P2P network. Today, I did the bad thing, downloading it from a P2P network. To make up for going against my principles, I am going to purchase another one of Beck's songs so that he will (indirectly) receive what he is owed for his work. I know that all of this sounds a bit strange and convoluted, but it was the best thing I could come up with. What do you think?

Can't you get the david bowie version as a single or did you have to have the beck version?

If it was me, I would have went to http://www.shoutcast.com and do a search for beck and then see if the song was being played there, especially if you could not get it out of your head. That way you could still keep your ethics and maybe if you had did that, it would have been out of your system if you had found it on there.

Beck is one guy I can not stand to listen too

I did not know of Shoutcast, and David Bowie gives me the creeps. I do enjoy seeing his wife, though.

I don't dislike or like him. I just wanted to get the song to stop playing in my head.

then you needed to play some Wango Tango by Ted Nugent 4 notches past to loud that would of drownded out that nasty beck

You'd not like most of my music. I tend to enjoy the subdued and the depressing pieces.

you need to listen to my musack , put a woogy in your oogy

There's another angle...

If you went after something legit and came up with nothing, but got it for free later, who can argue? You tried to pay the royalties but it wasn't offered.

Years ago I wanted a copy of the book Visions. I called all over and nothing. It was out of print and no one had one... Except a co-worker I found out. So I photocopied the thing. This was pre-internet Amazon and all of that. But I never lost any sleep.

I thought about it that way, but only briefly. If the song were out of circulation through legitimate channels, I would have no qualms about downloading an illegal copy from a P2P network. However, the song is available. It just isn't available in the individual form that I want. Taking that one song from that CD and not paying for it would be like going to the store and stealing one banana from the bunch just because all you want is one banana.

I've taken one banana up to the register before and bought just that. It would be like being forced to buy the bunch just for one as they give you no alternative. Rather than pay $10 for the one song you want. It is one of the reasons behind the piracy dealing with price of CDs. People didn't want to spend 15-20 for one or two songs they wanted and so turned to the only place where they could get just those one or two songs.

Not trying to legitimize it as it is still wrong to infringe on their copyrights by copying it from someone else and no royalties are being payed. Just not as wrong as if it were available by itself and you pirated it from someone else just because you didn't want to pay for it.

When you don't want to feel "bad" and get it for free, go allofmp3.

I just purchased some other Beck song distributed by the same record label that distributed the Moulin Rouge soundtrack. As soon as it downloads, I will delete it.

The way I look at it is that if you only want one song it's OK because they wouldn't normally sell single songs and make any money off of it anyway. And if you owned it previously then you've already paid them the royalties. I've downloaded lots of music that I used to own and got rid of. Since I paid for it once and the artist was already paid I don't consider it stealing.

Also, if you only intend to listen to it once or twice and get rid of it then they aren't losing any money anyway since you wouldn't have bought it to begin with.

That's the MST3K tape trading ethic. If the episode is available to buy then it's off limits. If not then you can obtain copies for free from others. It even says so in the show credits!

Their only complaint so far is that they are losing money in illegal download business. But if they never intended to make money off of certain things, like individual songs that are not "singles" or demoing an album or downloading an out of print album then they aren't losing anything because they never intended to gain anything in the first place.

That makes sense...

.002 cents it does not make.