Editing Copynorms (section)

{{No footnotes|date=December 2021}}
As used by copyright theorists, the term '''copynorm'''  (or more frequently '''copynorms''') is used to refer to a [[Norm (sociology)|normalized social standard]] regarding the [[Ethics|ethical]] issue of duplicating [[copyright]]ed material.  

Questions about the ethics of copying came to public attention as a result of [[peer-to-peer file sharing]] systems, such as [[Napster]], [[Gnutella]], [[KaZaA]], [[BitTorrent (protocol)|BitTorrent]] and [[Direct Connect (protocol)|Direct Connect]].  Survey research indicates that most users of filesharing systems do not believe that it is wrong to download [[MP3]] files of copyrighted [[music]], even though such downloading may be unlawful.{{Citation needed|date=October 2007}} 

These questions are important to legal theory, because the ability of copyright law to control the copying of digital material may depend more on voluntary compliance than on hypothetical criminal or civil actions against individuals.