Modern technology makes it relatively easy to copy a product or information, and some companies derive a substantial portion of their revenue from replicating what other companies have created. Section 504 (c) (provides for increased damages when the civil offense is committed deliberately, that is, when the defendant intends to infringe. Therefore, not only are all criminal offenses the same as criminal theft, since there is a specific intent to infringe, but every deliberate civil offense is also criminal theft, since there is also the same specific intent. A civil offense is an intentional tort such that the defendant must have intended to make the copy, but it is also a strict liability tort such that there is no need to prove an intent to infringe to establish the defendant's liability.
I don't care if the violation is theft or not, but I think it's interesting that there are some good arguments to explain why it is. The criminal offense, on the other hand, requires that the defendant deliberately infringe in order to be guilty, meaning that he not only intended to copy, but also intended to break the law by copying. Most of the time, violations occur when someone takes one of my articles and posts it to their own website, either manually (by copying and pasting the text from my site) or automatically (taking the RSS feed and displaying it on your site in its entirety). I think people often refer to infringement as theft in the colloquial sense of the word, but it is the legal meaning of the term that I will focus on.
Violation cases can result in contingent liabilities, which are reserved quantities in the event of a potential lawsuit. An innocent offender is just as responsible as a willful offender, but the latter faces the possibility of being trapped for more damage than the former. However, it is less clear that the taking that occurs when an offender arrogates the use of other protected work comfortably fits the terms associated with physical removal employed by section 2314. To bring an action for any violation of that particular right committed while he or she is the owner of it. This is true not only because property for purposes of theft statutes is broadly defined to include intangibles, but also because intentional infringement involves the illegal taking or control of another person's personal property with the intention of depriving the victim of his or her property.
