[ SECRET POST #2496 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #2496 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 03 pages, 071 secrets from Secret Submission Post #357.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

I understand that people might have better reasons than others for pirating. I'm certainly not on a high horse about the morality of doing it, and I can totally sympathize with people who can't get stuff in their country.

But I hate it when pirates act like they are entitled to the things they steal. Like, okay, everyone downloads and that's not going to stop any time soon, but don't act like you ~deserve~ to have media for free. I mean, I pirate, too, but can't we just accept that it's not a good thing but might at best be a minor bad thing? Whether it's available for you or not for whatever reason, it's still stealing and the scorn we receive isn't any less deserved.

[loracarol]

This is what I was trying to say in my comment, but better. Much better. <3

[(Anonymous)]

Stealing?
Not copying without permission (which isn't legal, but still different from stealing)?

Honestly, this is what annoys me of every discussion about this.

[diet_poison]

This is true. "Stealing" implies taking something so the original owner no longer has it. That's why the word "pirating" exists. It's a different kind of activity.

[dreemyweird]

People call it "stealing" as though it somehow makes the act worse.

What nobody seems to realize is that even if you include pirating in the definition of stealing, they are different - different kinds of stealing, okay, but what does it change? Their opponents can still say something like "I consider this kind of stealing okay, but that one is wrong", and the argument goes down the drain. My own stance is ambiguous, but the illogicality irks me.

[(Anonymous)]

you're not stealing the work, you're stealing the money the person would get from the work

hth

[(Anonymous)]

This falls through if you are in a situation where the work is not being sold in a format you can access.

[(Anonymous)]

Yeah I think that's reasonable enough, I just don't think the "piracy isn't stealing because you're only copying something" argument is really that good

[(Anonymous)]

No one is stealing the money the already own.

If without pirate copies they would get more money or not is debatable, since it depends on whether the people downloading a copy 1) already own it/bought it but have yet to receive it 2) plan to buy it later when they have money 3) plan to buy it later if they like it 4) they would only buy it if it wasn't available for free 5) they won't but it no matter what.

In all those cases, only in 4 the author really loses.

Hell, they could actually selling more thank to pirating and there are several studies that indicate that, as some anons said above.

It's also worth to point that buying something doesn't alway mean the creator(s) get money from that sale, but that's another can of worms.

[(Anonymous)]

only if you would/could have bought it anyway.

hth

[(Anonymous)]

You can't steal what someone does not yet have. At worst you're denying them a sale, which is a whole other ball game--you do that every time you decide to purchase something else or to save your money and not buy anything at all.

Scenario A: I have no money and can't buy the product, and I don't download it either. The seller makes zero profit from me.
Scenario B: I have money, but I spend it on clothes instead of media and do not download the product. The seller makes zero profit from me.
Scenario C: I have money, but I leave it in my bank account for a rainy day and do not download the product. The seller makes zero profit from me.
Scenario D: I have money, but I burn it in my fireplace and do not download the product. The seller makes zero proft from me.
Scenario E: Any of the above, except I do download the product. The seller makes zero profit from me.

If scenarios A-D are fine (or at least not considered a crime against the seller, currency defacement aside,) why is scenario E bad? What is it about getting something for nothing that we see as inherently evil, even if the practical outcome is precisely the same for the "victim" as with multiple other actions that are okay?

[(Anonymous)]

E: you're denying them a sale from something they presumably spent money on creating or buying the rights to expecting a profit in return. The other cases you're doing no such thing.

[(Anonymous)]

Yes, in the other cases I am doing EXACTLY the same thing. Across the board, they were hoping for a sale, and they didn't get a sale. The reason WHY money didn't change hands has no measurable impact whatsoever on their bottom line (unlike actual theft, where the reason matters greatly because they lost not only the sale but also the means to ever make one.) Zero equals zero, whether I wind up with a copy of the thing or not.

Something hoped for or expected is not the same as something that is already in one's possession. If it were, no product or company would ever fail, and everyone who ever bought a lottery ticket would be a millionaire.

[(Anonymous)]

So you're saying that taking a physical copy of a game would be stealing because you're taking a finite resource where as taking a digital copy would not be because it's an infinite one?

[(Anonymous)]

That's one way of expressing it, and I believe that very concept has been proposed and chewed over more than once by much smarter people than me.

[(Anonymous)]

except in pre -internet days there was E looked more like "if I want it, I have to buy it".

Digital copying isn't the same as 'stealing' would be better if you use the borrowing arguments, as in you are borrowing a copy the same was as someone who got one from a library or borrowed from a friend.

Otherwise you are demanding a very narrow focus and definition to prove your point.

DA

[(Anonymous)]

"except in pre -internet days there was E looked more like "if I want it, I have to buy it"."

No, not necessarily. In pre-interet days there already were ways to copy movies, music or whatever. Maybe not as easily but it was there.

[(Anonymous)]

Exactly. It's all entertainment. Entertainment is a privilege, not a right. It's understandable to pirate some things, but for the most part you should at least TRY to support the things you love. Otherwise the things you love aren't gonna last very long without any money to support it.

[(Anonymous)]

Yep, entrainment is a privilege for rich people and the companies have always make sure to keep it that way.

In my country, the only kind of entertainment that most people can pay for is cable and cine. But cable is pretty limited and going to the movies is only cheap if it's a blockbuster, otherwise they ask far more for the tickets and only show the movies in very few theaters in the capital.

Music? LOL Radio stations have been playing the same thing for over a decade and only every now and then they add something new if it REALLY popular in USA.
CDs are expensive and concerts? Cost more that one month of rent, so most people can't effort it.

Books? HAHAHA. It's cheaper to buy brand clothes.
Most libraries only have classics, encyclopedias, dictionaries and text books, so that free option is pretty limited.
Comics and manga are only in specialized shops and can be more expensive than books.

In short: NOT RICH PEOPLE SHOULD ACCEPT NOTHING IS FOR THEM, RIGHT? SO LET'S KEEP EVERYTHING AS EXPENSIVE AS POSSIBLE SO THEY CAN'T BUY ANYTHING!

[(Anonymous)]

Well, now you're running right back into the old debate over whether it IS stealing. I can remember a time when this was very much an open question, and the fact that the entertainment industry has managed to get it declared legally so does not close the debate, it merely puts the authorities on their side of it.

Why exactly is theft wrong in the first place? My answer to that would be "Because it deprives the owner of the item itself (and by extension whatever time, effort and resources they put into creating or obtaining it) and any use or profit they may potentially have gained from it in the future." (You'll note that I do not include in my definition any mention of the owner's feelings on the matter. As far as I'm concerned they're completely irrelevant to the question of theft. Making someone unhappy may not be a nice thing to do, but it is not a crime.)

At any rate, when an item is pirated, it remains in the owner's possession, and they can still use it themselves or sell it to anyone who's willing to pay. And all indications seem to be that they can and do still find people who will pay--possibly, depending on whose figures you believe, more than they would if there was no piracy.

Thus, the piracy argument is ultimately more philosophical than it is economic. The type of person who stands on principle without regard to the practical outcome thinks it's wrong because they feel that nobody should take something without the owner/creator's permission, even if that person has an effectively unlimited supply and is not harmed in any measurable way by the action. To a pragmatist, all that matters is that they benefit and all anyone else suffers for it is principled indignation, which (being pragmatists) they don't consider very important.

ON THE OTHER HAND, none of this necessarily speaks to what anyone does or doesn't "deserve" or is entitled to. That's a whole other ball of wax.

[quantumreality]

The thing that has always bothered me is how effectively the RIAA and hangers-on have managed to essentially criminalize what is a civil tort.

[(Anonymous)]

Honestly, for me? It's sheer laziness. It's actually easier to torrent the TV shows I want to watch and view them at my leisure on my computer than faff about figuring out what my TV-cable schedule is like. I haven't even turned on my TV in a year or more, and I don't even have a digital cable box.