Bandwidth theft is a little different than pirating music. It's an ongoing burden that the host of that material is actually paying for each time it is used.

But, as other have pointed out, you're dead wrong about the source of music on the majority of players. Your point may become true at a later date with all the recent sales, but the vast majority of posters on this BBS fill their players with their own music.

I used to do a bit of reading and posting on the Audiograbber BBS as well and the majority of people purchasing the program were interested in ripping their own music for their own private (fair) use.

I just saw one auction where the guy is advertising the fact that he os pre-loading all his empegs with 10000 songs! And he goes to to say stuff like "that's a $500 value!" - needless to say, I fired off a message to eBay about that one guy right away. That is clearly illegal and *so* against eBay policies.

Besides, it gives a leg up to others trying to sell their empegs.

And, why should one have to script their page to prevent bandwidth theft? That's a burden I will definitely undertake for some web projects, but not something I feel like I should have to do all the time. I don't mind the casual link to some of my stuff in a message board for instance, especially if it's of an honest nature. But someone linking any of my material on eBay to generate profit for themselves, or on their own site, to portray it as their work is where I draw the line.

Bruno