Poll: What's wrong with piracy

[MiriaJiyuu]

I pirate a lot of things, but I never pirate games. Games make their money directly from copies sold. A developer only makes money after they break even, thinking your actions don't hurt an industry is just stupid because it does. Also, don't pull that, it's just $60 crap, its 60 times however many people think that, and that's a lot more than you think.

 

[TokenRupee]

Well it is stealing, so I'd say it's wrong in a moral sense. Then again, if someone were to pirate a CoD game or another AAA game that was a re-hash of last year's, I probably wouldn't bat an eye to it. I think a lot of piracy could possibly be alleviated if studios would just release a demo of the finished version of their game so people can get a taste of it. Even the first level or thirty minutes would be good.

 

[Radeonx]

I pretty much agree with you.
I mean, piracy is the lost of a potential sale, but all of the top pirated games are still selling massively well and are still making a fuckload of money for the creators of the game.
It isn't good, but I don't think it is as bad as a lot of people here make it out to be.

But if they bought the game instead of pirating, immagine thier proffits then!

No matter how you slice it, pirate a game and companies loose money. That's usually why people don't like it.

No, they don't.
They lose the potential to gain money, which isn't actual money. Everyone who doesn't pirate a game didn't buy the game instead.

 

[Furioso]

I don't even know how it could be argued that piracy is morally right, it's stealing, and it isn't exactly a loaf of bread you're going to feed to your family, it's a luxury item, that you're stealing, so of course it's wrong

 

[ACman]

Answered yes to the poll.

But I would argue that copyright law as it stand is also immoral. Life of the author plus 70 years or 150 years for corporate ownership is too long.

.

 

[Blood Brain Barrier]

I would have thought the difference is clear - before the concept of intellectual property existed, we could not treat piracy as interfering with another's property rights, because of that lack of physical form. The idea of theft needs to be confined to physical goods to keep the objective of the law focused on the property holder - who is, after all, the one who suffers. If we're considering taking intangibles to be 'theft' to focus shifts to the 'thief', so the law loses all of its context and serves no one. And we all end up totally confused.


All I'm saying is that the concept of piracy is different from the concept of theft, and so must be treated in a different way from theft if we want to tackle the problem seriously. Making widespread assertions like "piracy is theft" helps no one, and solves nothing.

Are you suggesting that piracy be treated more lightly than theft? And if so, why is that? When it comes down to it, the theft of a physical copy of a game and the piracy of a digital copy is essentially the same thing; the only difference is the tangible packaging and game disc, which is nothing more than a vehicle for delivering what both individuals (the one who steals a physical copy and the one that pirates a digital copy) is after.

To suggest that the law should remain static in its treatment of theft as being a matter wholly resigned to physical property seems inherently backward, since, in this day and age, the possession of digital property is socially ubiquitous.

Who is suggesting that? Let's see: We have copyright laws, and we have theivery laws. What is your problem with that? Why do you want to apply one to the other? Do you also want to apply copyright law to physical theft? When your car gets stolen, do you exclaim "copyright infringement! copyright infringement!" ?? It doesn't make sense, yet that is what we are doing when we try to claim piracy is stealing.

 

[Blood Brain Barrier]

I pretty much agree with you.
I mean, piracy is the lost of a potential sale, but all of the top pirated games are still selling massively well and are still making a fuckload of money for the creators of the game.
It isn't good, but I don't think it is as bad as a lot of people here make it out to be.

But if they bought the game instead of pirating, immagine thier proffits then!

No matter how you slice it, pirate a game and companies loose money. That's usually why people don't like it.

No, they don't.
They lose the potential to gain money, which isn't actual money. Everyone who doesn't pirate a game didn't buy the game instead.

What about this situation: A 14 year old boy with no money or job pirates Skyrim. He invites over his friend, who does have money and a job, to play the game. His friend, who never heard of the game, is so impressed that he goes out and buys Skyrim straight away.

Is this not a situation where the Bethesda benefits from piracy where they would not have without it? It's essentially advertising without cost for them. And if you compare the same sitaution with stealing a physical item, that same benefit would not apply.

 

[ks1234]

What's morally (or otherwise) wrong with piracy??? HOW ABOUT FUCKING EVERYTHING! I fucking hate pirates because it ruins the industry and forces developers to keep producing garbage BECAUSE THEY CANNOT FUCKING AFFORD TO PUT MORE TIME/MONEY INTO DEVELOPING GAMES BC IT WILL HAVE THE SHIT PIRATED OUT OF IT.
Also, it makes more devs. develop console games because they are harder to pirate and my beloved PC games get NOTHING but shit ports.

 

[SonicKoala]

Who is suggesting that? Let's see: We have copyright laws, and we have theivery laws. What is your problem with that? Why do you want to apply one to the other? Do you also want to apply copyright law to physical theft? When your car gets stolen, do you exclaim "copyright infringement! copyright infringement!" ?? It doesn't make sense, yet that is what we are doing when we try to claim piracy is stealing.

I suppose I just don't understand what detriment treating piracy as theft would render, since I fail to see any functional difference between piracy and physical theft. Why do we have to treat them differently (since the difference between the two is superficial, at best), and why do you believe that would be beneficial? I'm aware that you mentioned before how treating them differently makes sense within a legal context, and I suppose I agree with that (to the extent that categorizing them differently results in a more efficient legal system), but are there other reasons?

 

[Arcane Azmadi]

You know what pisses me off? When companies deliberately release their games without any DRM because they don't believe in "punishing the consumer for the acts of the pirates" and their games are subsequently MASSIVELY pirated, basically punishing them for their faith in the playerbase. Demigod, for example, was a massive failure for Gas Powered Games and really hurt the company. I played it and thought it was a pretty damn good game, so I can mainly ascribe its failure to 1 overriding problem- on launch day it had a piracy rate of 93%! Seriously, there were so many pirates that they overloaded and crashed the multiplayer servers (not good for an almost entirely multiplayer-focussed game). Oh sure, people will tell you the game failed because the support was bad or that it was badly balanced, but that's a load of crap- of course the support was bad, the company was hemmoraging money from developing it and it not selling, so they dropped it like a hot potato. I blame the pirates completely for ruining what was in my opinion a very good game, and Gas Powered Games were hurt so badly that they had to had to partner with SquareEnix to produce Supreme Commander 2 (which turned out to be another big failure as a result, dumbed down far too much) and their next big project, Kings and Castles is on indefinite hiatus. Don't give ME any crap about piracy "not doing any real harm".

And then there's people who insist on pirating games that are being offered for free in exchange for voluntary charitable donations where you simply "pay what you think the game is worth". Fuck you, pirates. Fuck you.

 

[TheDrunkNinja]

Sigh. Wrong.

I don't know if you know this, but 550k+ sales for any game on the PC these days is ridiculously high.

A lot of major games now are made on consoles and then ported onto the PC. Ubisoft recently stated that they need only 50k sales on PC for it to be worth it.

All those numbers show is that consoles are significantly more popular then the PC these days. Which of course has been a well known fact for years now.

EDIT: I keep seeing people saying stuff about Steam and suggesting you can't pirate something on it. Steam games have been some of first ways that pirates have been cracking games lately. Everything can be cracked people, EVERYTHING.

Pff, now that's just complete and utter console superiority talking. The Elder Scrolls series has never had an installment that was made as a port to the PC.

Maybe you don't see it that way, but that isn't the issue. Piracy has and is still taking from the deserved sales of PC games. Is this really the thread where we should be bickering about console vs. PC gaming? Come on, man, don't give me that attitude, at least not over something as stupid as console vs. PC.

You do of course realize the PC figure is only retail sales and doesn't factor in digital sales. Unless Steam wants to release it's figures we have no real way of knowing exactly how many actual PC copies were sold. Furthermore, PC is the one platform currently where digital sales have overtaken retail sales so in reality the PC could very well be as much as double or more than the number of boxed copies sold.

Also the current number of retail sales at this point in time is estimated around 730,000 NOT counting digital sales. So again it's very very likely that the PC is actually ahead of the PS3 and probably just a hair behind the Xbox 360 when you factor in digital sales.

Looking at those numbers it seems that Skyrim is doing just fine on PC. It's hardly a surprise that a AAA title is going to sell best on a console like the 360 but still it's still very likely handily broken a million total sales for PC in it's first three weeks and that's pretty damn impressive. If anything I'd argue that the Skyrim is doing BETTER on PCs than any of the four previous Elder Scrolls titles have to date.

That's much more reassuring.

My figure was actually based upon the week sales numbers in the US of when Skyrim came out, which (I thought) must have included Steam sales.

Here's the source:
http://www.vgchartz.com/charts/weekly.php?reg=USA&date=40860

Really, why wouldn't someone release these numbers with the Steam sales? That makes everything completely inaccurate and misleading.

 

[Scabadus]

Is Piracy wrong? Yes. Is Piracy as much of a problem as a lot of people claim? No.

I'd quite like a Ferarri but I'm never going to buy one, going down to the local car store and jacking one is still stealing. It's not a lost sale, because I'm never going to buy one, it's not going to end the company, but it's still stealing the thing. Likewise my hopping onto a torrent site and downloading a game, fillm, music, etc is still stealing it (and no, stop, don't tell me that they're free to produce while a car costs materials. The companies behind the media paid artists - and a hell of a lot of other professions too - to create that data and my stealing it would still be a loss of return on that investment).

As for whether the game was made for charity or not, what does that even mean? What, it's evil to steal something made for charity but not by a corporation? Somehow theft is ok if you're simultaneously "sticking it to the man"? You ask who cares if Skyrim gets pirated, well you know what: I care. I honestly do. I found Skyrim to be an amazingly fun game that's totally worth the £40 I paid for it and I really do think it's unfair if some pirate downloads it for free. Not because (ok, not ONY because) of the simple jelously that they didn't pay for the same enjoyment I'm getting, but because I think it's unfair that a team can put so much work and so much love into a game and people don't pay them a fair price for it.

If you don't agree with a company's policies then either vote with your wallet and don't buy their stuff, or just admit that what your doing is wrong and steal it, don't try to justify your crime by turning yourself into a crusader for good against the evil corporations.

 

[Doctor Glocktor]

Pirates fuck over consumers indirectly.

Like, really really badly.

 

[SonicKoala]

Because there's a fundamental difference between me stealing your car, and me copying your DVD while leaving it completely whole. The car was stolen, I infringed on your right to private property. The DVD was copied, your copy of the DVD doesn't magically disappear because I copied it.

By copying the DVD, you infringed on the owner's right to intellectual property. You are still taking something you aren't entitled to.

 

[Blood Brain Barrier]

Who is suggesting that? Let's see: We have copyright laws, and we have theivery laws. What is your problem with that? Why do you want to apply one to the other? Do you also want to apply copyright law to physical theft? When your car gets stolen, do you exclaim "copyright infringement! copyright infringement!" ?? It doesn't make sense, yet that is what we are doing when we try to claim piracy is stealing.

I suppose I just don't understand what detriment treating piracy as theft would render, since I fail to see any functional difference between piracy and physical theft. Why do we have to treat them differently (since the difference between the two is superficial, at best), and why do you believe that would be beneficial? I'm aware that you mentioned before how treating them differently makes sense within a legal context, and I suppose I agree with that (to the extent that categorizing them differently results in a more efficient legal system), but are there other reasons?

Because there's a fundamental difference between me stealing your car, and me copying your DVD while leaving it completely whole. The car was stolen, I infringed on your right to private property. The DVD was copied, your copy of the DVD doesn't magically disappear because I copied it.

I should have put it this way much earlier on. Thanks Zetion.

 

[Blood Brain Barrier]

Because there's a fundamental difference between me stealing your car, and me copying your DVD while leaving it completely whole. The car was stolen, I infringed on your right to private property. The DVD was copied, your copy of the DVD doesn't magically disappear because I copied it.

By copying the DVD, you infringed on the owner's right to intellectual property. You are still taking something you aren't entitled to.

It might be useful to look at the original crime of larceny, which was later replaced by theft:

"Larceny: The unlawful taking and removing of another's personal property with the intent of permanently depriving the owner. The wrongful acquisition of the personal property of another person."

What, in your example, are you taking and removing with the intent of permanently depriving?