Poll: A situation in which piracy is OK? [Read first]

[MelasZepheos_v1legacy]

No. Man up and choose between graphics or modding. Beliving you have some sort of esoteric 'right' to the game is one of these weird entitlement complexes gamers seem to be growing everywhere.

I was thinking about this recently, situations in which piracy might be okay. I was largely thinking in terms of movies, but it works alright for games. It is based on a 'normal' response and a 'pirate's' response.

1. You want to see a movie. It is out on DVD but not showing in any movie theatres. Do you.

A. See if it is available for purchase or renting, either locally on online?
B. Pirate it.

If you answered A, congratulations you aren't an entitled dickhead. Why is it that if you asked most people they would respond that their first instinct would be to buy something, but there's this little determined group who are yelling, 'I bought a DVD Player and an HDTV, that means that I have access to all movies by right of my having bought a DVD Player and HDTV.' Just because you own all the consoles doesn't mean you have some sort of right to own the games that come out for them.

Anyway, corollary

2. The movie isn't available. What do you do now?

A. Decide to leave it, live's too short to waste on trying to dig up one movie they couldn't even be bothered to put on DVD.
B. Pirate it.

This is basically the only situation I really think piracy might be okay. The movie or game or books or zoetrope is not available commercially. I still maintain that your average citizen would just say 'fuck it' and move on but then some accounting has to be made for fans being fans. Without fans there might not have been quite a lot of movies or games even made, and supporting the roots of the games we love today is part of what makes gaming great. People still download emulators to play Pokemon Red and Blue because they remember the games from when they were growing up. Or they find versions of Ultima or 101 Dalmations: Spot's London Adventure because they were an integral part of gaming history and they want to experience the mythology.

It's like Star Wars fans, without whom the Star Wars Holiday Special wouldn't still be available. It's a part of the history and the mythology and without the fans it wouldn't still be alive today.

However, Skyrim or Mass Effect 3 or Modern Warfare whatever number are not part of our history yet, they are part of our present and pirating them for any reason instead of buying them is hurting gaming. And if you really were a fan, then you wouldn't do it. Cry about the state of the industry and big business and one pirated game not making that much impact but there are millions who are willing to pay to support the industry they love. Let's face it, if everyone thought the way that pirates did there wouldn't be an industry left.

 

[evilneko]

I wondered when the food strawman would come up.

 

[Kungfu_Teddybear]

My copy of Oblivion became unreadable on Xbox did I get the next copy for free because I had already bought it once? No.

Legally, you could obtain a backup for your Xbox copy as licenses allow you to do so, as long as its for your own person.

The shop won't let you have it for free, but you can reduce cost a fair amount and it will be legal! How about that! Pretty good eh?

Really? I didn't even know that. That is pretty good but still, pirating a copy of a game on a different system just because you bought it for another does not justify piracy.

 

[Korolev]

Legally? No. Morally? Well, if you are going to pirate, I'm assuming you'll probably use Bittorrent. Just being part of the cloud enhances the transfer rate to other pirates. So, unless you set your upload to Zero, then I wouldn't do it.

 

[ThatLankyBastard]

Personally I pirate things, but only music and occasionally books... With games I don't want to take 60$ out of someones pockets...

...and with the things I pirate, I've made it a personal mission to actually buy everything I pirate if I end up liking it! And if not, I just delete it...

 

[Vausch]

Not in my eyes. Now if you bought it on the PC version and it didn't work and the place you got it won't do anything about it, or if the game has horrible DRM that makes it almost a chore to play, yes you should be able to pirate a working version.

 

[AhumbleKnight]

No its not. Its still illegal, its still morally wrong and you're not entitled to a free copy just because you bought it already. The industry doesn't work like that.

But maybe it should. If you pay for the game on one playform why should you have to pay full price again to play it on another? Some companies already do this. Valve has done it with their mac ports. Legaly, you right. Morally however, there is a lot more grey area than your willing to admit. What you pay for (ethicaly) is the developers hard work in creating something for you to enjoy. They only did that hard work once, so you should only have to pay once. I am aware that there is a lot of work that goes into various ports but the value of that work is a lot less than the value of them creating the entire game once. It's not a black and white world.

 

[V8 Ninja]

Why don't you just buy the game for the PC and see if it works? If not, then just trade the game back in and get a copy of the PS3/360 version. Sure, you would be spending a few more dollars because of trade-back value, but it would only be 3-10 dollars. You don't need to try and morally justify pirating when there are other solutions that aren't that hard.

 

[Gill Kaiser]

Ethically I wouldn't have a problem with this. However, if you buy for a console and pirate for the PC, it weakens the PC gaming industry and strengthens the console industry, which is something I oppose.

 

[AhumbleKnight]

2) modding is wrong unless it is made by the company that owns the game IMO

What about companies that release their game with a toolset so people can mod it? Even if they don't it is not harming the developers. Even if the dev's don't want you modding, it can only strengthen/broaden the fan base. There are a lot of dev's that know this and that is why they have encouraged modding and some have even purchased the mod off the modders and/or given them jobs. It's not a black and white world. Illegal != immoral.

 

[Dogstile]

My copy of Oblivion became unreadable on Xbox did I get the next copy for free because I had already bought it once? No.

Legally, you could obtain a backup for your Xbox copy as licenses allow you to do so, as long as its for your own person.

The shop won't let you have it for free, but you can reduce cost a fair amount and it will be legal! How about that! Pretty good eh?

Really? I didn't even know that. That is pretty good but still, pirating a copy of a game on a different system just because you bought it for another does not justify piracy.

That's why I specified Xbox copy. When you download a PC copy, you download a copy that isn't covered under the "license".

 

[DarthFennec]

So do you not pay for food that don't like, even after eating all of it?

Of course not.

Yet you would watch a movie, and not pay for it, if you don't like it.

Entitled. Just admit it. It's okay. It doesn't mean you are evil incarnate.

Food isn't a service, it has a resource cost, and movies don't have that. They have an initial cost, yeah, but the act of reshowing a movie in a theater doesn't actually cost anything, other than labor and a few film reels.

A better comparison would be if you got someone to come over and fix your plumbing. If he did a shitty job, I think you deserve a refund. Maybe not a full refund considering the resource cost of the pipes installed, but besides that, you should get your money back. And it doesn't matter if it had a high initial cost, it doesn't matter that he spent a lot of money to start his business, get premises, etc, what matters is that the labor you paid him for was not worth the money you paid him, and you should be refunded.

There's a difference between a good and a service, which is the fact that a service cannot be returned. If you buy a dvd player or moldy bread or something and you don't want it then you can return it, but you can't do that with a bad movie experience or if the plumber floods your basement.

I don't know, I guess that technically is me feeling entitled. If someone says `Imma show you this movie it'll entertain you!' I feel entitled to be entertained, just as if someone says `Imma fix your sink' I feel entitled to not have a flooded basement after. When I pay for something, I feel entitled to get what I payed for. And you're right, that doesn't mean I'm evil incarnate. But it also doesn't mean I'm a thief, or that I have no good justification for my actions. I'm just doing what makes sense to me, and my own moral values. Isn't everyone?

 

[maddawg IAJI]

No its not. Its still illegal, its still morally wrong and you're not entitled to a free copy just because you bought it already. The industry doesn't work like that.

But maybe it should. If you pay for the game on one playform why should you have to pay full price again to play it on another? Some companies already do this. Valve has done it with their mac ports. Legaly, you right. Morally however, there is a lot more grey area than your willing to admit. What you pay for (ethicaly) is the developers hard work in creating something for you to enjoy. They only did that hard work once, so you should only have to pay once. I am aware that there is a lot of work that goes into various ports but the value of that work is a lot less than the value of them creating the entire game once. It's not a black and white world.

You're not buying a second copy when you use the Mac Ports. You're still using the copy of the game you bought from Steam. In other words, Valve is giving you the copy you bought from them. If you buy it for a Console, you're not buying it from Valve, you're buying it from Microsoft or Sony or Nintendo or some 3rd party publisher in which Valve doesn't get any of the profits. You're not entitled to a free copy if you didn't buy it from that distributor. There is no grey area, this is still piracy. You would still be denying profits from someone through the use of illegal acts and therefore it would be morally wrong and ethically wrong to do such an act.

 

[DarthFennec]

You theory sinks (pun) unless during your 'bad' movies, the projector goes out and you are unable to finish watching it.

Well there's two services going on, the theater itself and then the guys who made the movie. Interesting that you should mention that though, because I did end up being able to get a refund for Transformers 2, because something was covering the projector for a couple minutes and the sound cut out at another point and then I walked out before it finished, so I'm happy about that I think that was when I started streaming more often, but whatever.

But whatever, you can do what you want, believe what you want, I do see either of us changing our thoughts about piracy. Just don't condone/encourage it here, mods don't like that so much.

Yeah thanks, just figured that out the hard way Not a big deal. It was nice talking to you ^^

 

[Rednog]

Why don't you just buy the game for the PC and see if it works? If not, then just trade the game back in and get a copy of the PS3/360 version. Sure, you would be spending a few more dollars because of trade-back value, but it would only be 3-10 dollars. You don't need to try and morally justify pirating when there are other solutions that aren't that hard.

Uhh, you can't trade in PC games. Once you enter the CD-Key it is locked out from anyone else using it forever.

 

[Olrod]

I'd merely consider it a backup copy of a purchase I already made.

 

[NormalityImpaired]

No, it is still wrong. If modding is such a big deal for you, then buy the PC version and hope your rig can run the game. Save up your money and buy them one at a time.