Theft or fandom?

You know that downloading television shows has become commonplace when there’s a two page article about it in your local newspaper.

Just to clarify - that’s the local paper that gets delivered to your house free of charge. Not an actual daily newspaper.

I couldn’t help noticing the article over breakfast this morning as it featured a photo of a small stack on TV show DVDs. And I owned pretty much all of them.

It was so nice to read something in the mainstream media about downloading that wasn’t hysterical or hyperbolic.

In fact I found myself nodding along as I read.

Bizarrely it seems many of the shows that are popular in Australia, like Desperate Housewives and House, are also amongst the most downloaded.

Why?

Because people want to see episodes as soon as they can. They don’t want to wait. In fact they can’t.

They are not downloading to steal. They are not downloading to burn discs and sell them at flea markets.

These people are true fans of a show.

So why are they constantly tarred with the brush of theft and piracy?