even in the case of unobtanium....

context is important...

for example, suppose that Bruce Edgar had a flagship speaker system that took so much time to biuld each set that realistically he had to cap the number of orders that he could accept every year.

Suppose you really wanted those speakers... but you were the 13th in line and only the first twelve could be accomadated.

Since you tried to buy from Bruce but couldn't... does this give you a licence to copy and reverse engineer his design? Now suppose further, that you were an active participant on a speaker forum on the internet... and you knew that demand for the speaker was high and that several other folks on the board might be interested.

Would it be kosher to take the "reverse engineering" that you acquired
(say by studying and copying a lucky friend who did have a pair of these same speakers) and then go on the board and offer Edgar copies of his flagship model produced by an outside unauthorized firm?

the music example is a bit trickier... but not a close analogy to what 's been going on here.

None-the-less... it's a fascinating example. Which has many facets or sides to consider. Here are some thoughts that quickly came to mind...

1) if everybody hotrods their copy (gets it feebie on-line) then that will surely decrease demand for an item that may already have a very limited market potential. So it becomes a self-fulfilling _________ (fill in the blank).

2) is it possible to get LP's, cassettes, reel to reel tapes, or any other previously issued copy of the song or album that interests you?

3) my other test... though it is quite imperfect in some respects.... does someone or some company depend on it economically? Is it economically active?

If the answer is yes... then my first reaction is to honor their ownership interests in whatever it is that we are talking about.... I'd sooner do without it than to pirate their property or rip them off.

In the case... say were the music piece has not had any economic activity for say decades.... that's were I am so less certain myself of what is the right thing to do or not to do.

But the mere absence or unavailability of a design or a product (say Mr. Edgar withdraws his flagship speaker product) still does not trump the fact that he was the designer of that flagship speaker and that he has a right to control (or should have) to control his own property and his own designs.

What if... this is an offshoot... someone had an old Austin Healey bug eye sprite sitting in their backyard. That they had bought the car some years ago... and left it unprotected outside in the elements... suppose also that there was no legal (state issued) title for the car... if I am a AH enthusiast would this give me the right to pirate the car from his back yard to save it... could I argue that I would restore and preserve the car.... thus my interests trump the owners property rights?

some of these are tougher cases... like the music example you gave... but many of these cases really seem to be basic ethics... where we all know right from wrong. Or should.

msl