EPTOn June 23 2011 21:31 ShAsTa wrote:
It is not theft. It's copyright infringement.
It is not theft. It's copyright infringement.
Then please change the title of this thread, or end the discussion
Piracy is it theft? A deeper look - Page 3
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Deleted User 124618
1142 Posts
Then please change the title of this thread, or end the discussion | ||
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HerroPreaseTN
Norway71 Posts
The only thing which makes me ambivalent is that without piracy the market would probably not have offers such as Spotify and the likes, so in a sense piracy forces the market to please the customer - which I think is a good thing. Nevertheless, even if I do it myself I'm not going to be so delusional as to call it anything but theft. | ||
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Slaytilost
Netherlands968 Posts
On June 23 2011 21:27 Greentellon wrote: How about creating a copy of someone else's property? If your real world property analog applies to software too, wouldn't making copies be legal, because I can craft my own copy of neighbors wooden chair? You can indeed go to a store, buy some wood and recreate the chair. I dont see how that is theft, i didnt take anything from Ikea. It could be considered plagiarism though. | ||
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Vaelone
Finland4400 Posts
Personally I usually wait till the prices come down, last game I bought as full price was SC2. Consoles are even worse in this case, it's utter BS to expect people pay 70€ for 8 hours single player experience. I don't really understand where the prices for video games come from seeing how much more expensive they are than going to cinema/buying DVD. I do understand that video games provide more content for the cost but surely the production values on big Hollywood movies are higher than your average video game? | ||
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Tristan
Canada566 Posts
So what exactly has the piracy trend done to the entertainment industry really? 1. Made the worth of intellectual property virtually zero 2. Made the cost of distribution virtually zero The change of piracy did reshape and is still reshaping entertainment, but not exactly destroying it. This is a market economy, if people want music it will still be made. So to make the change make more sense let's break down how most movies and games and albums are made: 1. The cost to create a piece comes tot he creators in the form of an advance from the record label or studio to cover the cost of studio time and such 2. Artists usually do not see a dime of sales on their products until it has paid for itself. In movies this happens when the movie breaks even, most of the time in music this never happens and the artists usually ends up owing money to their label. 3. The label's role is essentially to put up the money for the asset and covers the cost of distribution (printing millions of CDs isnt free) The advent of online piracy like I mentioned earlier has made the cost of distribution virtually nothing, meaning that one major role of labels is gone. With the internet as it is, artists no longer need a label to get their product to the ears of the masses. What a few people in the industry are thinking (those who don't work for a label anyway) is that this shift will be both the death of the record label and the album as we know it. What we are likely to see as the future of musicians anyway is a change from albums to songs since the overhead of a record or CD is gone now, artists will just release a new song every few months as they write them. Then, after marketing online and giving their music away, the artists will make their money they way they have historically always have, touring and selling merchandise. This is happening to a certain extent in other fields. Depending on how it works, Kevin Smith is marketing his own movie that comes out in November by self promotion and no straight up advertising like commercials. Movies seem safer in a way as people still will pay for movie tickets int heaters, but things like DvD sales might be a thing of the past with only only online mediums like netflix or pirated films being the result. i.e. people will write off DVD sales as a source of cash (I don't recall it being a big source anyway). So companies like Paramount or Alliance will still exist for movies as movies will always require a much higher overhead than say an album and so these companies will exist more like movie investors and overall movies will be made a little cheaper (distribution costs not production costs) Games are actually different, they have not been shrinking in sales. Most games are designed with anti-piracy measures that are pretty solid (Battle.net) or are console exclusive and actually Video Games at least in 2007 when I took the class were the fastest growing field in the entertainment industry. I honestly don't know about other software. | ||
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ooni
Australia1498 Posts
Look guys, when you "buy" a software, YOU DO NOT OWN ANYTHING FROM THE SOFTWARE. The owners of the software is and always will be (unless stated otherwise) the people who produced the product. What you are doing is not theft, it's piracy. Basically, people are buying the right <LICENCE> to use the software (thus you must abide their ToS, you do not own anything, you are using a mere license). So by pirating, you are falsely using a product you do not have a licence for. It's not yours, there is no ownership thus not a theft. What you are doing is, by analogy, trying to go on amusement ride without a ticket. At no point you own the amusement ride and the person who owns the amusement ride won't lose anything or much however you can see how this is morally wrong and number of issues that may arise from large number of people doing so. Now an amusement ride could be $10~20 but what we have here is $50~70 price tag. What's the conclusion, you may ask? It is not theft as there is no ownership of some sort. Is it as bad as theft? -> Almost but not as bad as theft, but pretty damn close. | ||
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Madoga
Netherlands471 Posts
- You have to keep your cd in your drive - Ridiculous drm systems - Digital sales sucks compared to torrents (besides steam maybe) - Poor support So all in all, there is no adventage of buying over pirating. If companies made buying more atractive by addings game books posters and what not, maybe people would start buying again. I think that companies shouldn't put all their money in preventing piracy. They should put that money into adding value to the product for example by adding online services, addings special goodies and so on. | ||
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Jakkerr
Netherlands2549 Posts
But yeh.. I do it myself too only for singleplayer games like Assasins creed and stuff. I know it's wrong but I really don't care too much about it, it's not like I would have bought any of the games I downloaded if downloading wasn't an option lol | ||
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Zealotdriver
United States1557 Posts
Accept the ease of copying because it will never go away. Find a new way to make money. | ||
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DDyarados
United States10 Posts
"Thoose Sinners that fail to resist this tempetion immediately flog themself fiften times with catclaws attached(Yiikess) and swear to never do this deed again it was just this once" In this case you are acting like people who don't hack are masochists or something incredibly extreme as if that helps prove your point that people who pirate stuff are the real good guys. Instead of debating the character of people who pirate or who don't, please focus more on the actual act of piracy instead of writing distracting exaggerations. On towards answering the question of Piracy being theft. First, the law doesn't matter because morals come before laws, and are "generally" (arguable  ) the basis from which laws are formed.Do I consider it immoral to take something from someone and act like I didn't steal something from them? Yes. OP is suggesting that piracy actually takes nothing away from businesses, because all piraters are incapable of buying "expensive" games and would not have normally bought the game anyways. First, I contend that if there was no way to pirate games, some (not all) people who usually would pirate in most situations will pay for games that they wish to possess. More importantly however, and where your argument fails, is the issue where they share it with their friends. Yes, you can again assume the lofty position that NO ONE CAN AFFORD ANY VIDEO GAME EVER AT ANY POINT IN HISTORY but you don't know if these friends can afford the game or not. Maybe they were planning to buy the game, but then their friends pirated the game for them so they didn't need to. Those are customers that you took away from a business by stealing the company's product. Assume you aren't posting this from Communist China, we have this thing called property rights which basically means if you make something, it's yours and you have the right to do with it what you want. This means a product that a company makes is the company's, and it is not YOURS to do with what you want. If six people come in to your house and start eating food at the table that you bought in the house that you own and then try and convince you that everything's nice and fair because sharing is caring, it is still your house and your table before it is their house and their table, so you have the right to kick these strangers out. Also, protip: If something is too expensive, how bought you either A. don't buy it, or B. work hard and save enough money to buy it. Herp derp. | ||
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HornyHerring
Papua New Guinea1059 Posts
On June 23 2011 20:58 StarcraftXTZM wrote: You seem not to know what is intellectual property, now do you? You don't have to steal a game box from the shop in order to steal it. Making illegal copies is violating the copyright and EULA. Buying/downloading/getting an illegal copy of a game isjust aquiring it in an illegal way without paying for it. That is a theft.Pirating/Piracy in internet language? First things first what is Pirating/Piracy in internet language? Well it refers to the act of sharing copyrightted material meant for profit, But we will take the use of the word "Material" Lightly. Now usualy this is Games/Music/Video examples The Witcher 2/Glee second season soundtracks(Spot on)/ Thor in camcorder. Piracy is considered Theft/Stealing in the eyes of the law! which we will also take Lightly in this case. What could led men to commit such an atrocious act you may ask? to share/Partake the fruits of someone elses labour without even paying him as much as a mouse fart! For some it started sharing Disks back in 1992 for others in 2002 one thing is for sure tho if you havent been playing games for 10+ years this discussion is not for you. What if your 20-30 something studiying and you wanna play all the latest games that comes out more frequently then your wallet can afford? do you leave the hot plate of warm DeliCious Crysis 2 gameplay or do you make Four Clicks and get it for "Free" Thoose Sinners that fail to resist this tempetion immediately flog themself fiften times with catclaws attached(Yiikess) and swear to never do this deed again it was just this once. Just like you said when you were a kid and mastrubated for the first time. This is were to problems starts you have just "Stolen" a game from a gaming company dimishing their profits! or? But what if you would never buy it because you couldent afford it to begin with? Well you just took their Copyrighted material, But wait material ? did you physically take something from them i guess not that makes it all okay! but wait what if you could afford but were saving your money for that Starcraft 2 game where you would play the multiplayer! Potential customers exit and enter So what did the Gaming companies lose from your horrid conspicious defilment of their copyrighted "Material" They Lose and gain potential consumers the few that would buy the game if it wasent for "Free" and gain the few that wouldent even buy it but in their moment of Righteousness decided to purchace the game (For Multiplayer or support it varies) The Piracy mentality more commen then we think? to understand the process behind making money of a game we must understand that we are feeble minded creatures that buy the hype one way or another with few things to anchor us down to reality one of theese things are sources of game reviews such as Gamespot PCgamer IGN. And The absolute ultimate game Review is to play the game for yourself. The state of the gaming industry Making a game is easier then ever making a "AAA" More expensive then ever gaming is growing and it dont show any sign of stopping. So you will find dishwasher companies investing money into making games but what do they know of making games you wonder?"Pause" .Exacly, Nothing! so what do we get when we infuse the gaming industry with exceding amounts of money with infestors "Cough soz" Investors demanding return on their money? You get shallow proven games MMO/FPS that all looks and feels the same in the same/Similiar settings! The Samurai and Ronin What is the Bane of Shallow money infushed games which only interest is making profit? you guessed it Reviewers and Pirates anything that can turn potential customers(Victims) away from the dark alley alley were they strip you of both cash and hope. Reviewers and Pirating is a shackle for the gaming industry that holds them from crashing like in 1983 . what i wont tell you tho is which one is the Samurai and which is the Ronin. The Witchhunt We like to hunt pirates and blame them for everything that happends thats wrong and say their supporting the gaming industry but this is only half a truth if anything they hurt the money suckling and grubbing part of the industry which is the most conceviable viewpoint many people are distorted to see. and in turn Strenghen/Empower the gamer with real choice of what he can play and not so what many people dont know is that their allowing the status quo to detoriate the gaming industry and weaken their own possition as consumer of the game! Conclusion Piracy is theft by every legal term of the word. But when i disect "Sharing Copyrighted material" i ignore copyrigheted search for a physical refrence to material find none... and are left with Sharing. And Sharing folks is caring. And there is many things i cheerish more then monetary currency and its the currency of time which we all have a limited amount of and im not gonna spend it playing something i dont enjoy Pricetag or not. Henrik Pedersen The Zeitgeist Movement contactinfo:DeliCiousTZM@Gmail.com | ||
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Phayze
Canada2029 Posts
But imo there needs to be a shift in the way mainstream media (tv and movies) are presented to viewers. People are wanting to watch their favorite tv shows or movies when ever they have the time too. Hence, there is alot of piracy of movies and now tv shows. Something has to be done about copyright infringement, but I feel the entire system has to be reworked for that to happen --- and media has progressed the same way it is now for half a century. Charging $30 for a blu-ray of a movie you're going to watch once is ridiculous, same with charging $20 for an album with 5 new songs and 10 from the previous album. | ||
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Keitzer
United States2509 Posts
On June 23 2011 21:12 Qzy wrote: You would never download a car you wouldn't download a bear! ![[image loading]](http://media.moronail.net/images/stories/dg_pictures/1007/73E38B66DC23-1.png) | ||
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Deleted User 101379
4849 Posts
On June 23 2011 21:34 Vaelone wrote: Only games I've ever pirated were for SNES emulator, not sure if thats even considered pirating seeing that it's been years since those games were actually sold somewhere... Personally I usually wait till the prices come down, last game I bought as full price was SC2. Consoles are even worse in this case, it's utter BS to expect people pay 70€ for 8 hours single player experience. I don't really understand where the prices for video games come from seeing how much more expensive they are than going to cinema/buying DVD. I do understand that video games provide more content for the cost but surely the production values on big Hollywood movies are higher than your average video game? Console Games are the worst offenders with Prices. I don't know if it changed by now, but seeing Playstation 1 games for the same price they had at release even 3 years later would have made me angry if the only console i owned wouldn't have been the SNES. The price difference between games and movies can be defended by assuming that the customer base for movies is a lot higher and movies have a lot more product placement (Ad revenue). I still think games are too expensive and would be bought more and pirated less if they would be cheaper. | ||
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Enki
United States2548 Posts
I played Mass Effect last year, ended up pirating it because I heard about the horrible DRM it comes with. It was ok. Then I heard about Mass Effect 2, and how they not only improved upon the first one alot but they also got rid of the DRM bullshit from the first one. Ended up buying it. There was also Super Meat Boy as well. Ended up not buying it because the keyboard controls are shitty. Ended up pirating it and using a third-party software so I could play it on the PC using my PS3 controller. Checked out their website where the two guys who developed it answer questions and shit on their blog and they were a bunch of fucking douches, so I am glad I never gave them my money ~_~ That and I have a bunch of emulators/ROMS on my computer, but most of the systems I have emulators for I used to own myself, as well as the games. For old-school systems, emulators are simply more convenient. If you buy any of those systems nowadays anyways, you will be giving your money to some used game retailer or some shit, it won't even be going to it's parent company, no loss for them. Don't really care myself if some people think it is stealing or not, I don't see myself stopping it anytime soon, simply too convenient for me nowadays. | ||
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couches
618 Posts
*Posted from my quad core whatever $2000 computer with expensive razer accessories.* yea... You can afford to pay for internet every month you can afford entertainment media. | ||
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Roflhaxx
Korea (South)1244 Posts
On June 23 2011 21:06 mdb wrote: What. Thats makes no sense. Piracy is not "when someone takes your car, but you still have the car, so you haven't lost anything" lol. Piracy is when you have 2 milions cars, and someone steals on of the cars, and he doesnt give you the money for it and you still have ~ 2 milions cars, but you lost the profit ot the stolen car. imo not really, it is excactly like he said. Actually even a better analogy would be to say that you take a picture of a car then print it out and drive it. Did you steal anything? No. Did anyone lose anything at all? No. The car company however did not earn the money that you wouldve spent IF you had decided that you wanted to buy the car. | ||
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Stratos_speAr
United States6959 Posts
On June 23 2011 21:08 Centorian wrote: Piracy is theft. The car analogy is bad. A better one: You are selling games. Someone who was potentially going to buy your game steals it instead. After this starts happening more often then you sell it suddenly you aren't making money and go out of business. No more games. Don't be a fuck head. pay for your shit. This is a bad analogy as well. You have no basis to say the pirate was going to buy the game in the first place. That said, it's still piracy, not theft, and piracy is a crime. You're taking something without paying for it all. Pretty simple concept. It doesn't matter what kind of bullshit excuses you come up with, you are taking someone's intellectual property without first paying for it. There's definitely room to argue about the overall morality of piracy and if it hurts or helps sales of a game, but the fact remains that you are taking something you didn't pay for. You can indeed go to a store, buy some wood and recreate the chair. I dont see how that is theft, i didnt take anything from Ikea. It could be considered plagiarism though. That would take resources, whereas pirating takes absolutely none. The better analogy would be if you bought SC2 and then went home and copied it by manually programming and creating the entire game yourself using it as an example. | ||
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Deleted User 101379
4849 Posts
On June 23 2011 21:44 Roflhaxx wrote: not really, it is excactly like he said. Actually even a better analogy would be to say that you take a picture of a car then print it out and drive it. Did you steal anything? No. Did anyone lose anything at all? No. The car company however did not earn the money that you wouldve spent IF you had decided that you wanted to buy the car. The correct analogy is: A games company is spending a lot of money on developing a game. You download the game and don't give them money. The programmers starve and die the next winter because they didn't have money to pay rent. | ||
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inimenesc
Estonia374 Posts
On June 23 2011 21:12 Qzy wrote: You would never download a car I would if i could... But i buy the games i love, sc2+all its expansions for example  , i have few more original games, but i mostly play ET(freeware i think) and sc2. So all legit here. | ||
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