Illegal downloading is not theft - its something new

[Zephirius]

A pirate that will use said pirated game for personal use will not win any money out of it. And the company being infringed of their copy rights won't lose any because they didn't had it from the beginning!. No one loses, no one wins. It balances itself out and to all the haters saying that pirates are thieves well, go eat cacti, maybe then you'll think before posting.

Technically they do win money out of it, to be precise, the money they would have paid for the game had they not pirated it.

 

[incal11]

Zephirius , you ough to read the first AND last pages of a thread ; or your just making everyone go round and round .

Start with this page from the top

 

[Northover32]

"You wouldn't steal a BMW would you?"

Damn right i would! if it took about 4 seconds, and i could steal like 20 at a time without being caught! No one can denie that if they wern't gonna get caught they would definately steal a brand new car!

Actually, yes they would deny it. The answer to that question is what separates quality from trash.

but if you read what i said correctly, i didnt say you wouldnt denie stealing the car once caught, as i put it, you wouldnt denie that if you had the oppertunity to take a car without being caught that you wouldnt do it.

good try though, and "The answer to that question is what separates quality from trash."? so since you answered it wrong without even understanding the question makes you trash then? just using your words.

 

[Northover32]

If the celebrities that are ultimately losing money from downloading music (for example) can bend the law as to, for example, escape jail time? why can we not bend the law, for example, to get free music?

 

[goodman528]

The moment you brought the law into this, you've just invalidated all of your arguments. The law is an arbitary line in the ground, on one side is "pass Go", on the other side it "Go to jail". Ever heard of SS officer Klaus Barbi? He was sentenced to life for "Crimes against humanity"; but let's remember when he commited his "crimes", he was not breaking any laws at all, he had french legality on his side. How do you define a criminal? If the media and those with a lot of money and power says: you are a crimal, then you are a criminal; if they say: you are not a ciminal, then you are not a criminal.

What's the difference between filesharing and stealing?

Love music, Love filesharing, Hate piracy.

Here's my summary:

There are 2 different kinds of value:
1) Money. This is what you get for you labor, which you use to exchange for similar goods and services
2) Inspirational value. This is what you get when you see a good painting, or sit and listen to good music. This can not be expressed in monetary terms.

Musicians produce music because they love music, not because they want to make money from music. [read: they should not expect to get money in exchange for their music] However good musicians can easily make a comfortable living from concerts, advertising, interviews, merchandise, etc, without ever selling a single recording.

The difference between filsharing and piracy is:
Filesharing is downloading the music to listen to the music, it generates a lot of inspirational value, but never any monetary value.
Piracy is downloading music to make money from it, it generates no inspirational value, and a lot of monetary value.

Notice how money is a zero sum game, but inspirational value is not. Therefore stealing is only useful in describing something of monetary value, it is meaningless in the context of inspirational value, because you can never steal a particular feeling I just had 24 hours ago. How much money is my .jpg file of the Mona Lisa worth?

 

[perfectimo]

No;
an idea can really be stolen if the one who taken it then claims unfairly it's his own idea.
The idea which lead to the creation of a game has already been used ,
who would claim to be the maker of Halo after pirating it ?
Also a plane needs more fuel if it carries more weight , however small , and fuel is tangible.

I'll try but in my defence I was pointing out the hypocrisy in incal11's post.


Here's an interesting point. You can call it whatever you want and try to justify it however many ways you want but until it is legal to take somebody else's property without their permission then you are breaking the law.

The real hypocrites are the one who started insulting me at every turn ; and I could have used a lot more verbal violence .

You see the word in black and white if you think the law is forever almighty , and your blind acceptance makes you a sheep .
That's not name calling , it's a constatation; at least I'm not insulting your intelligence , but your ability of making use of it.


I feel like talking to a wall; I'm not trying to change the way the world works...
but it will change , it will HAVE to change along with our current conception of property and some laws , like it changed before you were born.

Maybe this thread is just a few years too early.

Okay I feel like this has happened before but could tell me how insulting you is hypocritical?

I don't blindly accept the law but I abide by them, I didn't say they were acceptable.

You are a dumb person but that's not name calling. Isn't my ability to use my intelligence in fact part of my intelligence? If not please tell me what it is called since you seem to think you are more intelligent than me.

 

[perfectimo]

I wish people would stop saying illegal=wrong. The law isn't infallible.

Sorry for double but just read this.

Not everything illegal is "wrong" but it is branded legally and socially wrong in most cases.

 

[Jimmyjames]

I just found this... Mindy Kaling (from the office) makes the most convincing argument FOR illegal downloading I've heard. It's right in the beginning.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qcOdNc_seyM

None of anyone else's argument here has made more sense that this.

Oh, before anyone tries to trounce me on this.... it's an attempt to lighten up the topic. Take it only as such, please.

 

[incal11]

Okay I feel like this has happened before but could tell me how insulting you is hypocritical?

I don't blindly accept the law but I abide by them, I didn't say they were acceptable.

You are a dumb person but that's not name calling. Isn't my ability to use my intelligence in fact part of my intelligence? If not please tell me what it is called since you seem to think you are more intelligent than me.

You are being the very definition of hypocritical with this post.

Despite the telling look of your avatar I've been trying not to categorize you;
do you even realise that YOU think you are smarter than everyone ?

The fact that you feel the need to tell how idiotic I am each time should be a hint.

 

[Nimbus]

I wish people would stop saying illegal=wrong. The law isn't infallible.

Sorry for double but just read this.

Not everything illegal is "wrong" but it is branded legally and socially wrong in most cases.

Legally wrong... isn't that, like, the definition of illegal?
And socially? Not here.

 

[Logan Westbrook]

You don't get to pick and chose which laws you obey and if you think a law is unjust, the correct response is not to break it, but to try and get it changed.

I agree with this statement as far as copyright infringement is concerned, but not in general.

There are circumstances when the law is very poorly thought-out and not likely to change soon.

Sometimes, it's trivial laws covering trivial shit. I know the DMCA makes pretty much any form of DRM circumvention illegal. Fuck that! I'm not waiting ten years for the legislature to get off it's ass just so I can back up a bit of media or make some DRM-infected game work with my CD drive.

Sometimes, it's trivial laws covering non-trivial shit. If I lived in a state with sodomy laws that covered something I like to do, I would certainly break them.

-- Alex

You raise a good point there actually. If I may amend my statement, you can pick and choose which laws you follow, but you have to accept that you may be committing a crime.

 

[Asehujiko]

Look at it this way then had you not acquired the game through "piracy" you would have had tto of bought it from a store. That is why this is theft. There is no way around it.

Or, more likely, not bought it at all. In that case, the only thing they gain or loose is word of mouth and wether that's good or bad is up to the developers.

Tell me, how is downloading World of Goo in europe or asia detracting anything from the developers directly?

I don't know exactly what that has to do with location but it will take from the developer as a direct after affect because if you and whoever else out there is torrenting his products then the company will look at his sale and realise he didn't make as much as usual. In fact he had made about 20% less in sales and so the next project he wants to work on the company gives him less money and then you and your friends torrent and you think the game is worse than his last outing but you still plan on stealing his next game. This goes on and well his pay starts to decrease and the game are just crap and then you all go out and ***** and moan about the how crap his games are now but in the end it was you lot that caused it.

Thank you for reading this if you did and I hope you see the error in your ways.

What has location to do with this? Well here's what location has to do with this: The game isn't available outside the usa. How can they loose 20% of their sales if they weren't seling it anyway? Error in my ways? I'd say there's an error in your ability to research.

 

[Alex_P]

I didn't comment on this before but it's really jumping out at me now:

You're just a subjectivist, and probably a dishonest man.

It never ceases to amuse me the lengths to which collectivists thrive on the sanction of the victim.

The tendency to to relabel everyone and everything with insular terms from one's own ideology triggers my cult-dar.

-- Alex

 

[Nilix]

In short, downloading can reduce profits, in some cases increase them by spreading knowledge of a product, and in some cases make no change in sales at all. It is not theft and should not be referred to as such. You may as well say that if you walk into a book store, sit down and read a book, then put it back on the shelf and leave that you stole from the store. Maybe call it `potential/possible loss of sales`, or `reduction in maximum possible revenue`, but not theft, and its nothing like stealing a car or any physical object.

 

[jasoncyrus]

Absolute, perfect win.

Esecially since Library do dvds and cds too x)