Poll: I want to have a different type of discussion on piracy.

[b3nn3tt]

I don't understand in any way why that would be morally acceptable. If someone wants to donate that much money to charity, that's fine, but they shouldn't be pirating games at the same time.

The person in question is not saving money on games. They are simply not spending money on games, and pirating them instead. A better method would be to wait until a few months after a new game has been released, buy it at that price and then give the difference to charity. Or, just don't buy the game and give the money to charity, which is what I chose from the poll.

At the time of me writing this, there are two people who voted that pirating games and giving money to charity was morally superior to buying the games, and that disgusts me.

Basically, you either give money to charity or buy games (or both if you can afford it, but for the purposes of this question it's an either/or). You absolutely cannot give money to charity and then pirate a game.

EDIT: I am anti-piracy by the way.

 

[iblis666]

$10 thats more than i usually spend on a whole game

 

[TheDarklite]

Well, good and bad here are relative. Good for the industry, or good for humanity? Good by itself is way too vague. As for "right vs. wrong" - You could look at this as a case of "Robin Hood" or you could see it as someone else deciding how you will spend your money. What if your job decided that instead of pay you, they would just donate that same money to a charity for cancer patients?

If you plan to give up X amount of dollars based on the games you want to play, why don't you donate it to the "developers who made this game for you and need to feed, house, and clothe their kids fund"?

I would have to vote bad personally. The act of charity doesn't justify theft.

^This, exactly this. The Dev's worked their asses off on the game/s in question so that they could pay the bills and feed their family. If they want to donate money to charity then that is their choice, not ours.

 

[The Pinray]

I think we've all established how silly this question is. Just don't buy games. Save up and donate. OR just get a better job so you can do both, Mr. Hypothetical!

 

[Phoenixmgs_v1legacy]

Your hypothetical situation is extremely morally wrong. Using deontology, you ask yourself what would happened if everyone did it. If everyone did what you are saying then publishers/developers would go bankrupt in no time flat (or stop releasing any future games that are basically finished) so there'd be no games to pirate and the money people "donated" to cure cancer would not nearly be enough to actually cure cancer. Both gamers and cancer patients lose in this situation.

 

[F4LL3N]

I think we've all established how silly this question is. Just don't buy games. Save up and donate. OR just get a better job so you can do both, Mr. Hypothetical!

It's not that silly. It gives a pretty good perspective on people's stance towards the matter. It's different than the typical self-justification thread, I think. As charity is normally considered to be a good thing.

Charity doesn't justify theft. Interesting. What if you broke into a drug dealers house and stole their money and donated it? The house was empty and they didn't have kids/family to support. That's a question to the people who've already answered.

 

[b3nn3tt]

Charity doesn't justify theft. Interesting. What if you broke into a drug dealers house and stole their money and donated it? The house was empty and they didn't have kids/family to support. That's a question to the people who've already answered.

You get arrested for theft. You're trying to justify something illegal by claiming that it's actually for a good reason, and that argument doesn't work.

 

[Tibike77]

This person wants to donate to a good cause, and the best (let's also say the only way) is to use the money that would normally go towards video games. We're also assuming this person isn't just using this as an excuse not to pay for games. The only form of entertainment this person enjoys is video games. Therefore he/she obviously doesn't want to give them up. But at the same time still wants to donate.

That hypothetical person is pretty... odd (to use the mildest possible qualifier).
One wrong and one right doesn't translate into neutrality on the karma scale anyway. It's not even really a scale.

You can get your "gaming" on quite nicely without ever spending a single dime and yet still not breaking any laws, so that hypothetical person doesn't just like gaming, he likes SPECIFIC types of gaming, for which everybody else pays money (or, well, downloads it breaking the law, or loans it from somebody else, or whatever).

Personally, I have very little moral qualms personally with software piracy, also, from a technical and financial standpoint, buying used or a number of other legal activities you can engage in to play a game also don't bring any money to the game developers anyway, but I still don't see any need for, nor do I believe it would even be remotely a seriously effective incentive to have portions of the earnings go to charity.

 

[JustOrdinary]

So, hypothetically if I were to to claim that I'm now going to donate all my grocery money to charity and just shoplift my essentials, that would suddenly be okay, right?


The ends don't justify the means at all in either your case or mine. You're not obligated to buy video games at all if you don't have any money left over. Hell, giving the money to charity was a choice in itself. And it was that choice, that act of self-sacrifice, that made donating the money a good act in itself.

Otherwise all you're doing is robbing one person and giving it someone else. Robin hood was a bit more magnanimous.

 

[The Pinray]

Charity doesn't justify theft. Interesting. What if you broke into a drug dealers house and stole their money and donated it? The house was empty and they didn't have kids/family to support. That's a question to the people who've already answered.

You get arrested for theft. You're trying to justify something illegal by claiming that it's actually for a good reason, and that argument doesn't work.

Agreed. I'm not Robin Hood. The law says don't steal, so I'm not stealing. Situational ethics are very bad to mess with, in my personal opinion. I wouldn't do it. Sure, he doesn't deserve that money, but there are other channels you can go through. Nothing justifies thievery.

 

[SenseOfTumour]

I think they'd be better off knocking $10 from the retail price, and we'll decide what to do with the ten bucks.

However, I do believe that cheaper games lead to less piracy. I also can't help but think we'd take slightly less pretty scenery and the like, in exchange for not have $20 million budgets for games. I understand GTA 5 and the like need it, but I think many games could be trimmed down some to lower the risk inherent in a release.

I just tend to wait now until games become cheap enough to warrant spending my limited luxuries budget on them. I can't be paying £50 for a new title, but when it hits £15 for the GOTY edition with all the DLC included, count me in! Just Cause 2 for £5? Thanks very much.

Sure there's people who pirate everything, including the humble indie bundles, but then some people don't have a credit card, tho I do think more people need to know about those pay as you go cards, they're kinda a rip off in terms of charges, but still, it's an option.

Stephen Fry made a very good point I think, while not being pro piracy, that many people who are downloading illegally are kids and young people who just don't have the cash to be buying a dozen games, movies and cds each month, but when they evolve into a working adult, they'll, in the vast majority of cases, become a fan of things and want to own them, paying far more back into the industry than they ever 'stole', and that's a far better option than them not getting into things in the first place because they can't afford it.

I know me and virtually all my friends had many old cassettes full of ZX Spectrum and Commodore 64 games as schoolkids, and now we're all owning PCs or consoles and piles of purchased games, or at least, shelves groaning with DVDs.

I'm sure we did damage the gaming industry to an extent at the time, but we're all helping it now, and those who are downloading PC isos while they're at school, I can only hope will be out buying PS5 or Xbox 1080 games in 10 years time.

 

[mezorin]

The guy is hardly being saintly here, because theft is theft, and there's nothing stopping him from simply donating the money and going without the games. Even if he could sneak into Blizzard Activision's money bin and take money straight out of there and give to the poor, ethically it is not right even if it does go to the hungry. However, convincing Blizzard Activision to donate say a third of their profits that year to Iraq/Afghanistan war vets would be a morally justified move though as they willingly decide to donate in that case, without having to be stolen from.


As for the Robin Hood analogy, Robin Hood is a hero because Prince John (as per the legend) was generally a bastard who stole money from the poor and left them starving, so Robin Hood was merely getting back at an oppressive monarch in a legitimate act of rebellion. Given that Blizzard Activision isn't forcibly stealing your stuff and raping your wife (15 dollars a map DLC is bullcrap, but come on perspective here people...) you don't have the Robin Hood defense here. Just don't buy their stuff, and stop pirating, is that really so hard?

 

[F4LL3N]

Okay, okay. Calm down. I just wanted to see the responses.

That subject mentioned above might actually be a good topic to discuss if someone else wants to make a thread about it. Something along the lines of, "is it actually better for the game industry if kids/younger people who literally can't get many games pirate them. As a vast majority will probably one day become 'hardcore' gamers, eventually putting money back into the industry. Whereas, if they never pirate as a child, their passion wouldn't be the same when they start earning an income".

 

[BloatedGuppy]

How about we mug you, and then give some of your money to charity? Your loved ones too. Just reach right into granny's purse, and give it to charity. It's realistically for a good cause, right? It's not like you were doing anything with it. Sure, you WORKED for the money, but blah blah blah, whatever. I want something for free, and those charities aren't going to donate to themselves. It's charity!

 

[SillyBear]

World doesn't work like that. You can't act like a **** and fuck someone and then in a round about way help someone else because of it. You still aren't justified to be a dick in the first place.

 

[ModReap]

First thing I thought of after reading the "proposal" : Hey, I'll go rob a bank and give the money to charity! Does giving stolen money make it better? No.

 

[krazykidd]

I care about games, I don't care about bored, sick children/starving Africans/the homeless as much.

So in my opinion, it's bad.

THIS ^^

This is awsome, this is the kind of thing i would think , but wouldn't dare say, koodos to you sir. Although i think the Starving africans is a bit much, there's starving asians, Europeens and americans :/ why is it that africans are seen in such poor light .

 

[burningdragoon]

Here's a question for this hypothetical person: are they going to contemplate if they have enough money to donate every time the want to pirate a game? Not that a perfect 1-1 relationship between how much money they donate how much they would have spent on non-pirated versions of every game, but it'd be interesting to see how someone tries to justify what games they are pirating to donate money and which games they are pirated because they just want to play it without spending the money on it.