Mark Waid on Downloading Comics: Sharing or Stealing?

Mark Waid, Comic Book Creator and Editor-In-Chief of Boom Studios, recently used his Keynote Address at this years Harvey Awards to discsuss comics in the digital future. This speech, which promtped an apparent "heated exchange" with comics legend Sergio Aragones, offered a balanced look at the issue of copyright, digital comics, and the sharing versus stealing debate.
         He states:
"Like it or not, downloading is here. Torrents and filesharing are here. That's not going away. I'm not here to attack it or defend it--I'm not going to change anyone's mind either way, and everyone in America at this point has anecdotal evidence "proving" how it hurts or helps the medium--but I am here to say it isn’t going away--and fear of it, fear of filesharing, fear of illegal downloading, fear of how the internet changes publishing in the 21st century, that’s a legitimate fear, because we’re all worried about putting food on the table and leaving a legacy for our children, but we’re using our energy on something we can’t stop, because filesharing is not going away."
           The speech, which can be read here, is a frank and open-eyed look at how the comic book industry needs to deal with issues of piracy and torrents. Rather then waste time with angry recrimination or futile and resource wasting efforts to combat it, he is looking at ways to use these file-sharing sites to benefit his company and the medium.