Of course you're entitled to your opinion and there are those that share your position and as there are others who share my position on the matter.

I agree that many on the forum, you and I included, who would not hesitate to help another, but there's a way to ask and a better way to ask, especially when asking for something that cost someone else money, how ever little that cost may be.

As you have mentioned in your message, "sharing" the service is ultimately self-defeating as it may cause the company to raise the prices or restrict the use, so in the end, it just hurts the consumer if the consumer's goal is to save money.

I believe that the consumers goal should be to pay the right and reasonable price for a service, not to pay nothing for something. At some level, we're always both the consumer and the provider, with the exception of the privileged few, we have to earn a living before we can consume and for most of us, to earn a living relies on others consuming.

What goes around, comes around at some point.

As for buying and selling cars, it is quite customary for the seller of the car to provide proof that the car is in good condition, and one of the best modern ways is with a report like those from CarFax.

Before there were services like carfax, the seller is always the one that has to show that the odo wasn't tampered with or rolled back and it's the sellers responsibility not to mis-represent the sale, never the buyers responsibility.

Though the "buyer beware" caution always exists.

As for the magazine analogy posed by Blue Pearl, I don't think it is wrong at all to borrow something you can return but if I decide that the magazine contains an article I really like, I would not hesitate to buy it. If it is offered to me, I might just take it but I wouldn't ask for it to begin with, but again, that's just me.

When it comes to a carfax report, you can't exactly borrow it and return it so like nox1s's comment on my CD analogy, I don't think this analogy is perfect either.

Doing a favor for a friend that I know, sure, totally, wouldn't hesitate but I think there is a difference when you post on an open forum asking "strangers" for something that cost them money, but again that's just my opinion and I'm just expressing it.

I'm actually even more surprised now that we're discovering he's buying a Mini and asking for a free report in a Crossfire forum.

I work in the service industry and like many people in the business, I make my living providing people with reports and knowledge that can very easily be passed from one person to another, so I'm definitely in the camp that says it's bad form to not expect to pay for something that you will derive value from.