Piracy, simply put.

[DestinyCall]

Software piracy is often equated with stealing. This always rubbed me the wrong way, because nothing is "stolen" when someone pirates a game. Piracy is actually more like counterfeiting or forgery. A software pirate is making or distributing illicit copies of the game. It isn't theft, but it IS wrong - it's a kind of fraud. The pirate is creating a knock-off of the original item that indirectly decreases the value of the original work.

People tend to use the mental shorthand of "stealing" because it is a simpler concept for the layperson to grasp and easier to provoke an emotional response. But it isn't the most accurate description of the crime and I feel like it leads to confusion and people trying to justify their piracy as "victimless theft".

theft [θɛft]
n
1. (Law) Criminal law the dishonest taking of property belonging to another person with the intention of depriving the owner permanently of its possession

coun·ter·feit (kountr-ft)
v. coun·ter·feit·ed, coun·ter·feit·ing, coun·ter·feits
1. To make a copy of, usually with the intent to defraud; forge: counterfeits money.
2. To make fraudulent copies of something valuable.
adj.
1. Made in imitation of what is genuine with the intent to defraud: a counterfeit dollar bill.
2. Simulated; feigned: a counterfeit illness.
n.
A fraudulent imitation or facsimile.

 

[SonOfVoorhees]

Piracy's not stealing, because nothing is taken.

So funny that comment. Lets say you create a picture and want to sell it for £10 each. Instead of buying it 50 people photocopy it. Is that stealing? By your reasoning its not stealing as the original picture wasnt taken and you wouldn't even be angry at the people that did it even though you have just lost £500 in sales.

 

[rob_simple]

Is anybody else getting sick of these threads? The logic of pirating is so flawed I honestly can't understand people that genuinely think they're in the right.

The general consensus of you people seems to be 'I'm not prepared to pay these prices; so I'll steal' which is pretty much the mantra of every single thief on the planet who steals for gain rather than necessity.

You don't need video games, so all that bullshit about not being able to pay rent because you started buying them means nothing. I have to pay rent just like you, so I buy a new game maybe every three or four months. This is what I like to call priorities.

All this self-serving Robin Hood bullshit is starting to wear really thin. If you pirate all your media (and I make this distinction because I do actually think piracy is justified in some cases,) you are stealing, and you don't need to feel bad about it, you just have to accept it as fact. Not necessarily law, just fact.

 

[rob_simple]

Is anybody else getting sick of these threads? The logic of pirating is so flawed I honestly can't understand people that genuinely think they're in the right.

The general consensus of you people seems to be 'I'm not prepared to pay these prices; so I'll steal' which is pretty much the mantra of every single thief on the planet who steals for gain rather than necessity.

You don't need video games, so all that bullshit about not being able to pay rent because you started buying them means nothing. I have to pay rent just like you, so I buy a new game maybe every three or four months. This is what I like to call priorities.

All this self-serving Robin Hood bullshit is starting to wear really thin. If you pirate all your media (and I make this distinction because I do actually think piracy is justified in some cases,) you are stealing, and you don't need to feel bad about it, you just have to accept it as fact. Not necessarily law, just fact.

I'm getting sick of people posting in these threads bringing up "theft" and "stealing" when we already have a proper term.

Cool story bro, way to add to the debate.

 

[weker]

Cool story bro, way to add to the debate.

A bit ironic yourself there , best avoid conflicting otherwise you could both wind up in trouble. I am still surprised this thread hasn't been closed and has been left to run, with the OP admitting pirating and such, and not to mention the small amount of posters in this thread so far.

 

[Viridian]

Cool story bro, way to add to the debate.

A bit ironic yourself there , best avoid conflicting otherwise you could both wind up in trouble. I am still surprised this thread hasn't been closed and has been left to run, with the OP admitting pirating and such, and not to mention the small amount of posters in this thread so far.

Ninja'd. This thread has devolved into semantics, and it's hard to devolve from a thread on piracy.

 

[Burs]

By me. If I'm spending all my income, I'm not holding back.

Still unjust to take advantage of the bus.

Why? How? I'd really like to understand what makes you think this. It's fascinating.
The bus is empty. Nobody is helped by me getting off. It helps me to stay on.

Walking Might make you a little more humble and make you realise that Its not the game developers job to give entertainment for charity.
Would you walk into a pub, and drink a glass of champagne that was reserved for a stranger's party?
Anyway walking's good for you.

You apparently try to justify it to yourself. But go on and just be happy with tricking yourself.

I really am not. I could give a flying f--- what people on escapist think about me personally. And I don't feel bad.

Then please Tell us why you bothered posting this if you dont care what people think!

 

[Antari]

The arguement of piracy is actually quite pointless. No matter how any of you feel about it, it will never go away. Because in order for it to go away you have to change two things. Human nature and the nature of Computers. If you want to try and stop the ocean with your hands you can be my guest. But don't expect me not to laugh.

 

[MelasZepheos_v1legacy]

It was the implication that copying the data was akin to stealing which I was objecting to. It's copyright infringement. I think it's a grey area, I don't think you can outright say that it's 100% wrong or right. I know plenty of people who pirate games, but who also spend a fortune on games, many of which they would not buy if it was not possible to pirate. Someone posted a video from an author who said that when he posted one of his books online for free he saw a 300% rise in sales the next month and he attributed this to people sharing books with each other and that's how many people get introduced to new authors who then become fans and buy their work. I don't see that as a bad thing at all.

There's one crucial diference I see in your example, and it's where I think the debate loses a lot of steam.

The author put his book up voluntarily free for people to read, accepting that there could have been a significant loss instead of gain. He got lucky and a whole load of people who were essentially good at heart read the book free and either bought it or recommended to their friends that they should buy it. I would also like to know if the book is still available for free download, or whether he took it down once it had served its purpose.

A pirate is taking a copy illegally (argue over the moral right all you want, most societies define the activity as illegal) that the developer/publisher did not offer to them for free in an advertising gambit. I also think, and forgive me for what is about to be a gross generalisation, that the history does not support the viewpoint that people will follow the example of this author's book.

Take the Humble Indie Bundle. Available for any price, as long as some money was paid for it. And it was still pirated by millions of gamers. And here's where the generalisation comes in, I believe this is because gamers are becoming more and more entitled. Unlike the rest of the public, who may watch the occasional episode of QI on YouTube at work, pirating games is more and more becoming a way of life for gamers who don't want to pay retail. If this wasn't the case, piracy statistics would be going down or at the least growing as the consumer base grows. Instead there is an exponential rise year on year, suggesting that more gamers are pirating more often.

Obviously this is also becoming more common among the film industry as well, but the gaming industry is where you see it hit the hardest. Also clearly there are the occasional 'good' pirates who pirated because they didn't have the money and then when they did immediately went out and bought the game, or pirated because they were treating it like a demo and bought the real game when they found that they liked it but they are in a minority.

I do think there are shades of grey, but I don't think the issue is as grey as most pirates would like to believe. Watching streamed videos of a television show you wholly support, but it isn't syndicated in your country and the DVDs are not available is one thing, assuming that when the DVDs become available you buy them and stop pirating immediately. Buying a game you have or will have the means to get in a few months just because you feel you are somehow 'allowed/entitled/whatever' to own it? That's something entirely different.

If push came to shove I would class only a few situation where piracy is even close to acceptable:

Spoiler

1. An old game, TV Shows or Movie no longer available on any format save for downloaded copy. Something like the Star Wars Holiday Special.
2. The above mentioned show not available in your country but will be available and you buy it the second it is available
3. Possibly, and this is a big possibly that I'm not sure of my own views on, you previously owned a copy of the game/movie/show, but the copy you own was damaged or lost or otherwise made unavailable to you, so you pirate instead of spending money on a replacement. Personally I buy a replacement and accept the cost as a hazard of materials which break, but I can see an argument here for having spent the money on the intellectual property beforehand.

Those three scenarios are pretty much the only time I would consider piracy to be close to morally acceptable.

 

[Exocet]

So, according to you, a pirate that buys more games than someone who doesn't pirate ever, but still pirates a game every month or so is a lazy freeloaders?

There is no way to see this as a black or white topic, it can only be seen as a case by case topic.

sarcasm, meet Exocet.

Considering how narrow minded people on this forum can be, your comment not being sarcasm what a distinct possibility. Add to that sacarsm not passing well trough written form, and there you have it, my mistake.

 

[BiscuitTrouser]

Some say you shouldn't download stuff you can't or don't want to afford. Why? Who's that helping? Who's getting paid in Karma points?

People don't get critizised for waiting a year until the retail price drops to $10.

Me downloading a CD doesn't diminish the record company's ability to sell it to somebody else.

Basically it boils down to you thinking youre better than me. Or other people. That in some way artist just OWE you work and you are entitled to enjoy it. And entitled to do so for free. While i have to pay to fund the artist that produces the work you enjoy. You are a leech. You take from a system and give nothing, and you depend on others to fund that system so you can continue to sink your entitled hooks into it and enjoy it from the payment of others. Basically you think you deserve artists work for free and other people to pay for it so they have an incentive to keep working to produce more things for you to leech. Its pretty basic.

Sure its not stealing, is it spitting in the artists face and telling everyone else you think they need to work for nice things while you dont? Yes.

The next CD needs to be funded by someone and it sure as hell ISNT you. But youll enjoy it anyway because youre just better than regular people. You deserve it. Just like the parasitic larvae in the caterpiller enjoy its nutrients without helping to gather them.

The best is "i wasnt going to buy it anyway". So because I like something and YOU dont you deserve it for free. Uhuh. Imagine walking into a burger joint. Someone says, I HATE THESE BURGERS. And they give him a burger for free. Since he wasnt going to buy one anyway, he hates them and the burgers cost pittence to make they might as well give it away. Youre hungry and you want a burger and when you ask "I want one for free?" The manager glares at you and says "but you actually WANT it, that means you gotta pay, people who dont want things deserve them more than you". Everything in that scene is wrong. And so are you.

 

[RatRace123]

Yeah, this has been discussed and discussed over and over again. It always ends in a flame war too, so I won't be going in depth.

Apart from me saying, I disagree with your thinking, good sir.

 

[Yopaz]

Piracy simply put: you enjoy a product, you're just not willing to pay for it. You spend time justifying it to yourself and others while it's clear that you don't really care about the developer and how the developer gets screwed over by the copyright holder. You don't care about anything but the fact that you can get free entertainment. You make flawed analogies to protect yourself while claiming you don't care. Pirating is OK, acting like a hero because you know how to use torrents only make you seem like an ass.

 

[Signa]

1. Access to video, audio, textual and interactive media and software is a priveledge, not a right.

Access to culture is a priviledge, huh? Says who?

But I guess these are just the wrong forums for this discussion.
There's a poll about a dude with a crowbar being shot 10 times, 4 shots while he was already down, and 60% of the people said "totally justified".

This is a nice crowd here.

Ok, you just ruined your whole argument as far as I'm concerned. I couldn't find many logical flaws in your OP, but if you think that thug didn't deserve to be shot, then you are just completely misinformed about how the world works.