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On February 21 2012 22:32 Tal wrote:
I'm torn on this, but it still feels to me like both sides aren't making some of the arguments that they could
An argument against piracy:
Someone offers you something, asking you to pay. You decide not to pay, but still take it. It's a tricky position to make a moral stand on...
If you don't want the product, or think there is something wrong with it, then you shouldn't buy it. It's rare nowadays to be tricked into buying something you completely hate. Games have demos, songs have youtube, and everything has endless reviews and comments to give you a pretty damn good idea of what the experience is like. And even if the experience is not quite what you imagined, then that doesn't mean you shouldn't pay anything. If you go to see a band/football team or go to eat at a restaurant, and things aren't up to scratch, that doesn't absolve you of paying.
A common argument is that the product isn't worth the price being charged for it. Assuming we accept that this gives you the right to take it without paying and to make such judgments, surely this doesn't also mean it's worth nothing? If you download an album/game/film and think it's sub-par, that doesn't mean it's worthless. Donate something to the maker.
An argument for
Particularly in areas such as education, there is a benefit to essentially saying 'fuck copyright lets give millions of people the tools to better themselves and see what happens.' I'd like to think that ideally there should be a core of up-to-date, very high quality texts/works/recordings that anyone can use to advance their knowledge in any field to an expert level, without paying (or by paying a very small fee). Within a generation the effect would be stunning.
The entertainment argument for everything to be free is a little harder to sustain, but I'd be happy to watch Hollywood and the current music industry be forced to dramatically change their model. It's important to note that not everything needs to become completely free to 'beat' piracy- just cheap and convenient. The incredible success of iphone apps, cheap steam games, and free to play games with micro-transactions shows this, and feels like a better future.
One can also argue that something can have no value whatsoever or even negative value. The hollywood marketing machine wants to make us believe the movies they are selling are good. What if I buy a movie and it ends up sucking? What value did it have for me? I wasted 2 hours of my life. That's negative value, do I get anything back for it? Nope, ofcourse not. But why not? You are arguing that all the content they make has SOME value and that you should pay for it if you want to see it because of that value. Well if the value turns out to be negative, why don't they have to pay me back? They lied to me with their marketing schemes, what gives them that right? If you count all the hours I watched series and movies in my life and add them up you probably get a whole lot of lost potential.
If people make crap, they aren't automaticly entitled to money if other people look at it. Simple as that, that's why I think it should be legal to share. There are tons of other ways they can make money. Hell, even a crap movie can make money. All they have to do is hand it out for free and add in some commercials, get some sponsors and have a system where people can donate to the creators of that specific movie/song/whatever. Oh and maybe if they want to make money they should stop making crap and start producing shit everyone wants to see... commercial income goes through the roof.
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On February 21 2012 22:47 Talin wrote:Show nested quote +On February 21 2012 22:32 Tal wrote:
I'm torn on this, but it still feels to me like both sides aren't making some of the arguments that they could
An argument against piracy:
Someone offers you something, asking you to pay. You decide not to pay, but still take it. It's a tricky position to make a moral stand on...
If you don't want the product, or think there is something wrong with it, then you shouldn't buy it. It's rare nowadays to be tricked into buying something you completely hate. Games have demos, songs have youtube, and everything has endless reviews and comments to give you a pretty damn good idea of what the experience is like. And even if the experience is not quite what you imagined, then that doesn't mean you shouldn't pay anything. If you go to see a band/football team or go to eat at a restaurant, and things aren't up to scratch, that doesn't absolve you of paying.
A common argument is that the product isn't worth the price being charged for it. Assuming we accept that this gives you the right to take it without paying and to make such judgments, surely this doesn't also mean it's worth nothing? If you download an album/game/film and think it's sub-par, that doesn't mean it's worthless. Donate something to the maker.
The thing with "moral stands" though is that they don't really matter. Many of the common practices in advertising are difficult to make a moral stand on. Plenty (if not the majority) of perfectly legal business practices are difficult to make a moral stand on. What it really comes down to is fighting fire with fire. Having a different way to obtain the product gives you a degree of control and influence over what happens to the business that sells the product. It doesn't even have to be about product not being worth the money. It could be something entirely different such as - for example - you don't want to pay because the company exploits and abuses their workers in Chinese factories (or works with companies that do), or you don't want to pay because the company lobbies for laws that are ethically questionable or you object to them, or because they endorse a political option you heavily disagree with, or because they're involved in corruption cases, or because of a number of exploitative business practices they do. It's just a level of control you as an individual have, and it's a bad idea to give that control up or not utilize it. If everyone had the ability to exert this level of control and everyone used it, businesses would be forced to be a lot more honest and actually worry about the ethical implications of every move they make. They would need to make sure people actually like them and appreciate what they do and how they do it in order to actually sell anything.
Fighting fire with fire by exercising your individual power against the big corporations is a damn good argument for piracy, well put. In fact I think you could even see it as moral.
I think there is a line somewhere though - maybe when you're dealing with small businesses who need the money to continue, or who are actually being moral.
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On February 21 2012 23:52 Tennoji wrote:Show nested quote +On February 21 2012 22:32 Tal wrote:
I'm torn on this, but it still feels to me like both sides aren't making some of the arguments that they could
An argument against piracy:
Someone offers you something, asking you to pay. You decide not to pay, but still take it. It's a tricky position to make a moral stand on...
If you don't want the product, or think there is something wrong with it, then you shouldn't buy it. It's rare nowadays to be tricked into buying something you completely hate. Games have demos, songs have youtube, and everything has endless reviews and comments to give you a pretty damn good idea of what the experience is like. And even if the experience is not quite what you imagined, then that doesn't mean you shouldn't pay anything. If you go to see a band/football team or go to eat at a restaurant, and things aren't up to scratch, that doesn't absolve you of paying.
A common argument is that the product isn't worth the price being charged for it. Assuming we accept that this gives you the right to take it without paying and to make such judgments, surely this doesn't also mean it's worth nothing? If you download an album/game/film and think it's sub-par, that doesn't mean it's worthless. Donate something to the maker.
An argument for
Particularly in areas such as education, there is a benefit to essentially saying 'fuck copyright lets give millions of people the tools to better themselves and see what happens.' I'd like to think that ideally there should be a core of up-to-date, very high quality texts/works/recordings that anyone can use to advance their knowledge in any field to an expert level, without paying (or by paying a very small fee). Within a generation the effect would be stunning.
The entertainment argument for everything to be free is a little harder to sustain, but I'd be happy to watch Hollywood and the current music industry be forced to dramatically change their model. It's important to note that not everything needs to become completely free to 'beat' piracy- just cheap and convenient. The incredible success of iphone apps, cheap steam games, and free to play games with micro-transactions shows this, and feels like a better future.
One can also argue that something can have no value whatsoever or even negative value. The hollywood marketing machine wants to make us believe the movies they are selling are good. What if I buy a movie and it ends up sucking? What value did it have for me? I wasted 2 hours of my life. That's negative value, do I get anything back for it? Nope, ofcourse not. But why not? You are arguing that all the content they make has SOME value and that you should pay for it if you want to see it because of that value. Well if the value turns out to be negative, why don't they have to pay me back? They lied to me with their marketing schemes, what gives them that right? If you count all the hours I watched series and movies in my life and add them up you probably get a whole lot of lost potential. If people make crap, they aren't automaticly entitled to money if other people look at it. Simple as that, that's why I think it should be legal to share. There are tons of other ways they can make money. Hell, even a crap movie can make money. All they have to do is hand it out for free and add in some commercials, get some sponsors and have a system where people can donate to the creators of that specific movie/song/whatever. Oh and maybe if they want to make money they should stop making crap and start producing shit everyone wants to see... commercial income goes through the roof.
I think that's stretching it a bit. If you think it has negative value just stop watching it. Also how often have you honestly been tricked by trailers? I can't remember the last time I saw a terrible film because the trailer looked excellent.
In the case of something being truly awful, of course you don't need to pay. But what if you just think it's ok? Isn't that worth something?
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On February 21 2012 14:37 ArtofRuin wrote:
If I am unwilling to pay any amount of money for an album, then when I download it for free I am not stealing. There is no lost profit. As well, The Pirate Bay is also a fantastic hub for freeware and indie bands, Katawa Shoujo (a free visual novel) being a fine example.
That's actually complete garbage. Saying that you wouldn't have paid for it anyway if you couldn't get away with illegally copying/ pirating/ removing it from the owner's hands doesn't justify stealing something. You still have all the knowledge that comes from having the work without needing to pay for it- it's not fair to those who actually paid for it, and it's not fair to the company who made the product.
That being said, OP: internet piracy will never completely be stopped, in the same way that hacking or breaking the law in general can never completely cease to exist. There will always be ways to cheat the system. That's a fact of life. People will take risks because of possible rewards. That doesn't justify anything necessarily, but it's a cruel reality.
The people who play by the rules can only hope that the worst offenders get caught, most people understand laws, and that companies won't screw us all over by making content so crappy or overpriced that we're enticed to pirate it instead of pay for it. None of that tends to be realistic though, and that's unfortunate.
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On February 21 2012 23:57 Tal wrote:Show nested quote +On February 21 2012 23:52 Tennoji wrote:On February 21 2012 22:32 Tal wrote:
I'm torn on this, but it still feels to me like both sides aren't making some of the arguments that they could
An argument against piracy:
Someone offers you something, asking you to pay. You decide not to pay, but still take it. It's a tricky position to make a moral stand on...
If you don't want the product, or think there is something wrong with it, then you shouldn't buy it. It's rare nowadays to be tricked into buying something you completely hate. Games have demos, songs have youtube, and everything has endless reviews and comments to give you a pretty damn good idea of what the experience is like. And even if the experience is not quite what you imagined, then that doesn't mean you shouldn't pay anything. If you go to see a band/football team or go to eat at a restaurant, and things aren't up to scratch, that doesn't absolve you of paying.
A common argument is that the product isn't worth the price being charged for it. Assuming we accept that this gives you the right to take it without paying and to make such judgments, surely this doesn't also mean it's worth nothing? If you download an album/game/film and think it's sub-par, that doesn't mean it's worthless. Donate something to the maker.
An argument for
Particularly in areas such as education, there is a benefit to essentially saying 'fuck copyright lets give millions of people the tools to better themselves and see what happens.' I'd like to think that ideally there should be a core of up-to-date, very high quality texts/works/recordings that anyone can use to advance their knowledge in any field to an expert level, without paying (or by paying a very small fee). Within a generation the effect would be stunning.
The entertainment argument for everything to be free is a little harder to sustain, but I'd be happy to watch Hollywood and the current music industry be forced to dramatically change their model. It's important to note that not everything needs to become completely free to 'beat' piracy- just cheap and convenient. The incredible success of iphone apps, cheap steam games, and free to play games with micro-transactions shows this, and feels like a better future.
One can also argue that something can have no value whatsoever or even negative value. The hollywood marketing machine wants to make us believe the movies they are selling are good. What if I buy a movie and it ends up sucking? What value did it have for me? I wasted 2 hours of my life. That's negative value, do I get anything back for it? Nope, ofcourse not. But why not? You are arguing that all the content they make has SOME value and that you should pay for it if you want to see it because of that value. Well if the value turns out to be negative, why don't they have to pay me back? They lied to me with their marketing schemes, what gives them that right? If you count all the hours I watched series and movies in my life and add them up you probably get a whole lot of lost potential. If people make crap, they aren't automaticly entitled to money if other people look at it. Simple as that, that's why I think it should be legal to share. There are tons of other ways they can make money. Hell, even a crap movie can make money. All they have to do is hand it out for free and add in some commercials, get some sponsors and have a system where people can donate to the creators of that specific movie/song/whatever. Oh and maybe if they want to make money they should stop making crap and start producing shit everyone wants to see... commercial income goes through the roof. I think that's stretching it a bit. If you think it has negative value just stop watching it. Also how often have you honestly been tricked by trailers? I can't remember the last time I saw a terrible film because the trailer looked excellent. In the case of something being truly awful, of course you don't need to pay. But what if you just think it's ok? Isn't that worth something?
It does not realy matter if I let them trick me or not, the only thing that matters is that it happens. (millions of people watch hundreds of movies, it is statistically bound to happen) The law is not just for me, their business model is not just for me, my arguments do not have to be based on just me.
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On February 21 2012 22:11 ooni wrote:Show nested quote +On February 21 2012 17:53 Nightfall.589 wrote:On February 21 2012 17:42 Azzur wrote:On February 21 2012 17:34 Hail Eris wrote:On February 21 2012 17:10 Azzur wrote:
Some of the arguments in this thread are quite ridiculous - you have people here claiming that "stealing" is ok because it's not loss sales, or that the artists themselves don't mind because it's publicity or that it makes no difference, etc. Like it or not, it's stealing and people arguing otherwise are merely justifying themselves with excuses. FFS, stop with the "stealing". Stealing and copyright infringement are not the same thing. Theft is deprivation of property. Let's consult wikipedia: Copyright holders frequently refer to copyright infringement as "theft." In copyright law, infringement does not refer to actual theft, but an instance where a person exercises one of the exclusive rights of the copyright holder without authorization.[6] Courts have distinguished between copyright infringement and theft, holding, for instance, in the United States Supreme Court case Dowling v. United States (1985) that bootleg phonorecords did not constitute stolen property and that "interference with copyright does not easily equate with theft, conversion, or fraud. The Copyright Act even employs a separate term of art to define one who misappropriates a copyright... 'an infringer of the copyright.'" In the case of copyright infringement the province guaranteed to the copyright holder by copyright law is invaded, i.e. exclusive rights, but no control, physical or otherwise, is taken over the copyright, nor is the copyright holder wholly deprived of using the copyrighted work or exercising the exclusive rights held. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_infringement#.22Theft.22So, anti-legislation people should argue along these lines - rationalising your stealing is frankly very stupid. Like it or not, piracy is a problem and I think that good solutions (rather than censorship) should be developed to combat it. Some people might suggest that rethinking copyright law is a good solution. I'm not going to be involved in semantics - copyright infringement is a crime, full stop. Sematics are important. Both may be crimes, but there is a difference between jaywalking and murder. Much like there is between theft and copyright infringement. So pirating in essence is using some item without permission. Stealing is taking an item without permission.
Stealing is taking an item without permission, to the loss of the owner.
If I were to look at your car... And an identical car would appear in my garage, I don't think I'd be guilty of Grand Theft Auto. Regardless of the owner's opinions on the matter.
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If you're in favor of the governments, you just don't understand what's going on, and what other solutions are...
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No one is arguing that we should be allowed to steal things. The thing is that people are getting more severe punishments for sharing files, than people who murder/kill/rape. And simply trying to ban it is the wrong way to approach it.
People are getting punished because hollywood wants to make more money. It always is, and always will be about the money.
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If you download a movie, watch it, then delete it again, how is that any different from having a friend buy the movie, then 20 friends borrow it, watch it and give it back.
Just because you download it it doesn't mean you would've bought it if you could've downloaded it. Technically, if you don't pay for it you shouldn't be able to watch it, so technically you shouldn't be allowed to borrow movies from friends either.
If they want to make money and reduce piracy, they should reduce prices(perfectly possible, lower prices=more sales=higher income overall) and actually make shit that's worth buying, and stop treating the customer who paid for your product like shit(DRM etc).
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What makes me sick is that companies that get affected by piracy refuse to change but demand that the world around is changed to suit them. And the sad thing is that it's working because of lobbying.
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It is only considered "stealing" because the government defines it as such, and go out of their way to specifically restrict the supply of a good. Bypassing an artificial government created supply deficit is not my definition of "stealing." Particularly when my behavior does not "hurt" any other person.
And just to clarify, my definition of "hurting" someone does not include paying less for their product than they would LIKE to receive. According to that definition, all of you must also say that minimum wage laws are "hurting" and "stealing" from employers. Actually, according to that definition, the market is hurting every seller of every good in the world.
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On February 21 2012 17:20 Cheeseypoofs wrote:Show nested quote +On February 21 2012 15:07 Jormundr wrote:On February 21 2012 14:41 firehand101 wrote:On February 21 2012 14:37 ArtofRuin wrote:
If I am unwilling to pay any amount of money for an album, then when I download it for free I am not stealing. There is no lost profit. As well, The Pirate Bay is also a fantastic hub for freeware and indie bands, Katawa Shoujo (a free visual novel) being a fine example. Are you serious? THAT IS NOT STEALING?!? seriously, if you had no intention of buying it, then you should not get it for free! fml, life doesnt work like that. An artist doesnt pour his/her soul into a CD, just so someone like you can listen to it for the hell of it Mixing engineer, visual artist here Please shut the fuck up about what I and the people I work with want. I am tired of hearing this line of bullshit in every copyright related thread I go into. This is record company propaganda. NOTHING MORE. There is possibly 1% of artists who could negatively be affected by sharing(read: exposure) of their material. These artists aren't affected anyway because they generally get marginal proceeds from their albums, with the lions share going to their label. And piracy isn't some new concept. Any breathing sack of flesh can realize that the RIAA and MPAA have been heralding the end of life as we know it since popular radio, since the 8 track, since the cassette, the VHS, CDs, DVDs, MP3s, Usenet, DC++, Kazaa, Limewire, Napster, Torrents, and currently FTP sites. Guess what Nothing has changed in the past 50 years. Your parents recording a popular TV show on the good ole vhs is just as illegal as it is to download a song today. The only difference is that people like you buy into this hilarious propaganda about truckers and recording engineers being terribly affected by piracy. We're not. And James Hetfield and Richard Branson aren't being affected either. The entire goal of the lifelong campaigns of the RIAA and the MPAA seek to "keep the fear" in the people. Because without that fear they would lose about a total of 10% of their market. Which is significant in that they couldn't keep their current management salaries and stay profitable. Man, you're buying into propaganda from the other side while accusing others of listening to Hollywood's. Most of the money that you claim goes into these management salaries goes into the the millions of jobs created in the production aspect of the television, cinema, and music industries. And something you choose to ignore in your post flaming the MPAA and RIAA is that though they are always worried, this is the internet. It becomes infinitely easier to steal at a large scale online. Torrenting and streaming of illegal content is much more widespread than recording an episode on a VHS. That was stealing, but it wasn't an international problem. The main issue with all this legislation is that all the stolen information is broadcast globally. And with all the lost revenue associated with ripped off television and movies, American jobs are lost and given to the man with three massive houses running megaupload.com. Seems like a good deal to me...
Sorry, but don't criticize me about buying into propaganda when spewing it yourself. Millions of jobs?
http://www.bls.gov/oes/current/naics3_512000.htm#27-0000
If you want to include the whole goddamn movie theatre and theme park industries then take the big number at the top (371,450) which coincidentally isn't "millions". And you're wrong about it being more widespread. It's more
convenient. People who can't afford things share them. They share cassettes, they share CDs, they share DVDs and they will share files.
American patent/copyright law is a steaming pile of shit which has slowly been covered in gold plate over the last 70 years.
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On February 22 2012 00:48 JackDino wrote:
If you download a movie, watch it, then delete it again, how is that any different from having a friend buy the movie, then 20 friends borrow it, watch it and give it back.
Just because you download it it doesn't mean you would've bought it if you could've downloaded it. Technically, if you don't pay for it you shouldn't be able to watch it, so technically you shouldn't be allowed to borrow movies from friends either.
If they want to make money and reduce piracy, they should reduce prices(perfectly possible, lower prices=more sales=higher income overall) and actually make shit that's worth buying, and stop treating the customer who paid for your product like shit(DRM etc).
Probably the fact that you've legally purchased a copy of the product? I don't understand how you could not see the difference.
You can let someone borrow something that you've bought, but that's not the same as making unlimited copies and selling them (or even giving them away for free), because you own the copy but not the rights to the actual content.
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You may see yourself as a thief. Others may not.
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On February 21 2012 14:36 Pyskee wrote:Show nested quote +On February 21 2012 14:28 Dr. ROCKZO wrote:
Firstly, it will never be stopped. Secondly, the solution isn't to 'stop it', well, at least not like this. The solution is to adapt the content creation industry to the way the internet works, not blindly refuse to change traditional methods of commerce. Thirdly, I voted for the third option because >:D. I agree with this. Online piracy can't be stopped. Well I guess it theoretically could be somehow. It'll be much easier to just adapt new business models though.
that sounds like work and would require thinking, just pass laws, it's so much easier to prohibit something you don't understand
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Pirates will exist throughout the ages guanteed!
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On February 22 2012 02:10 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:Show nested quote +On February 22 2012 00:48 JackDino wrote:
If you download a movie, watch it, then delete it again, how is that any different from having a friend buy the movie, then 20 friends borrow it, watch it and give it back.
Just because you download it it doesn't mean you would've bought it if you could've downloaded it. Technically, if you don't pay for it you shouldn't be able to watch it, so technically you shouldn't be allowed to borrow movies from friends either.
If they want to make money and reduce piracy, they should reduce prices(perfectly possible, lower prices=more sales=higher income overall) and actually make shit that's worth buying, and stop treating the customer who paid for your product like shit(DRM etc). Probably the fact that you've legally purchased a copy of the product? I don't understand how you could not see the difference. You can let someone borrow something that you've bought, but that's not the same as making unlimited copies and selling them (or even giving them away for free), because you own the copy but not the rights to the actual content.
What's the difference between me buying it, then sharing it over the internet with 20 people or just sharing it with friends.
And before you say that the internet is more than 20, said 20 irl friends can put it on the internet aswell, there's practically no difference.
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On February 22 2012 02:31 JackDino wrote:Show nested quote +On February 22 2012 02:10 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On February 22 2012 00:48 JackDino wrote:
If you download a movie, watch it, then delete it again, how is that any different from having a friend buy the movie, then 20 friends borrow it, watch it and give it back.
Just because you download it it doesn't mean you would've bought it if you could've downloaded it. Technically, if you don't pay for it you shouldn't be able to watch it, so technically you shouldn't be allowed to borrow movies from friends either.
If they want to make money and reduce piracy, they should reduce prices(perfectly possible, lower prices=more sales=higher income overall) and actually make shit that's worth buying, and stop treating the customer who paid for your product like shit(DRM etc). Probably the fact that you've legally purchased a copy of the product? I don't understand how you could not see the difference. You can let someone borrow something that you've bought, but that's not the same as making unlimited copies and selling them (or even giving them away for free), because you own the copy but not the rights to the actual content. What's the difference between me buying it, then sharing it over the internet with 20 people or just sharing it with friends. And before you say that the internet is more than 20, said 20 irl friends can put it on the internet aswell, there's practically no difference.
If you make a copy of copyrighted material it's copyright infringement and is illegal. If you have 1 copy and you share it with people, that is not illegal AFAIK. If you burn DVDs on your computer and hand out copies to your friends that is copyright infringement.
It's called copyright for a reason, everyone. It means that you need permission to copy material. Sharing a single copy is not copying. Filesharing on the internet creates copies so it's illegal.
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If you can steal something why would you pay for it? Kinda the same with cheating/lying ect.
Caring about other people is way overrated.
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On February 22 2012 02:35 SnipedSoul wrote:Show nested quote +On February 22 2012 02:31 JackDino wrote:On February 22 2012 02:10 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On February 22 2012 00:48 JackDino wrote:
If you download a movie, watch it, then delete it again, how is that any different from having a friend buy the movie, then 20 friends borrow it, watch it and give it back.
Just because you download it it doesn't mean you would've bought it if you could've downloaded it. Technically, if you don't pay for it you shouldn't be able to watch it, so technically you shouldn't be allowed to borrow movies from friends either.
If they want to make money and reduce piracy, they should reduce prices(perfectly possible, lower prices=more sales=higher income overall) and actually make shit that's worth buying, and stop treating the customer who paid for your product like shit(DRM etc). Probably the fact that you've legally purchased a copy of the product? I don't understand how you could not see the difference. You can let someone borrow something that you've bought, but that's not the same as making unlimited copies and selling them (or even giving them away for free), because you own the copy but not the rights to the actual content. What's the difference between me buying it, then sharing it over the internet with 20 people or just sharing it with friends. And before you say that the internet is more than 20, said 20 irl friends can put it on the internet aswell, there's practically no difference. If you make a copy of copyrighted material it's copyright infringement and is illegal. If you have 1 copy and you share it with people, that is not illegal AFAIK. If you burn DVDs on your computer and hand out copies to your friends that is copyright infringement. It's called copyright for a reason, everyone. It means that you need permission to copy material. Sharing a single copy is not copying. Filesharing on the internet creates copies so it's illegal.
so if i share a copy and give permission to the other person to make copies of my copy, what's the problem?
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EPT
