UK views towards Piracy

[Frank]

I did benefit from what my parents did, but when i went infront of a judge to ask for my green card, he was presented with the full story. He judged that i should get my green card. Now you can hold that against me or not. Irregardless my point on piracy is still correct. If you cant afford (or dont want) to buy it, you dont have a right to pirate it.

epic

Different country, different laws. Your point isn't universal. Downloading media is perfectly legal in most of Europe. No judge will hold that against you around here. But some patriotic "American" like you might anyway.

You do realise, that there are countries, like India for example, where people have a totally different view of things, don't you? But you probably see that view (and those people?) as inferior.

But then again, I do realise you don't care about it very much, but see it as a good way to raise the temperature of the debate. In other words, it's just trolling.

 

[epicstruggle]

I did benefit from what my parents did, but when i went infront of a judge to ask for my green card, he was presented with the full story. He judged that i should get my green card. Now you can hold that against me or not. Irregardless my point on piracy is still correct. If you cant afford (or dont want) to buy it, you dont have a right to pirate it.

epic

Different country, different laws. Your point isn't universal. Downloading media is perfectly legal in most of Europe. No judge will hold that against you around here. But some patriotic "American" like you might anyway.

You do realise, that there are countries, like India for example, where people have a totally different view of things, don't you? But you probably see that view (and those people?) as inferior.

But then again, I do realise you don't care about it very much, but see it as a good way to raise the temperature of the debate. In other words, it's just trolling.

Looks like your post is a perfect example of trolling.

epic

 

[digitalwanderer]

it's just trolling.

I was pretty disapointed to wake up to see another half-way decent thread ruined by Epic again.

 

[Monty]

you shouldnt put all illegal immigrants into one boat, as long as they pay taxes and dont leech from the country there is completely nothing wrong with that. its the ones who stick around with no job, dont pay taxes and get job benefits and use the nhs when they dont even deserve it - there the ones who should get thrown out.

now onto piracy, p2p networks allow people to get things they would have never normally ever heard off which in the end are pretty good. such as for me, there is a group called hybrid - in this case i downloaded 1 album and because it was so good i bought 2 others, to me, they made more profit by me downloading their album than they would have done by me not doing so.

this is the same for movies, games and other stuff, if the companies produce good stuff then most p2p users will end up buying it anyway, if its crap, then why should we, the people have to pay to find out the thing is crap.

 

[RussSchultz]

it's just trolling.

I was pretty disapointed to wake up to see another half-way decent thread ruined by Epic again.

Poo on that. The ruination was all the "you illigal alien hypocrit" to sidestep the central topic that piracy is theft.

 

[Acert93]

I'm still waiting for someone hwo BOUGHT Photoshop or 3DSMax for home use. Just an example, insert any app which costs a few grands.

:Raises Hand:

I actually have PS, the Macromedia suite, and other tools for website development (a hobby I am now trying to make money at). I do not make much money, but I feel obligated to pay the hard working individuals who create software to reward them for the use of their product. Anything less is not fair. And this is not a cheap proposition: the two together is like $1,600.00. I could not get a student discount because I knew that I would attempt to make money using the products. $1,600 is about my take home from my previous job and a lot more than I make now. It is also more than an entire months worth of bills.

But you know what? It is the right thing to do.

I know a lot of software developers (lived in the Seattle area) and I have known a lot to lose their jobs. While not everyone who pirates software would have bought it, a significant portion would. Yet I am left paying THEIR bill because these companies are required to charge more to honest clients. Basically I pay for other people's free handout and it is wrong.

But the alternative is worse. When I see guys like ERP, DeanoC, and the other devs and hear about how HARD and LONG they work, they really deserve to be compensated for their time. It is a business and it is their livelyhood. It is the least I can do.

Sadly, the rampant piracy in the PC industry, imo, is one of the reasons we have huge publishers like EA. The small guys have no chance on their own.

In the end piracy is a belief that people should have something that they did not work for. It is rooted in selfishness. People absolve themselves of guilt by referencing a bad movie, game, song, etc... as an excuse to take the hard work that others are selling and entertain themselves for free.

As a creator of content, I have a right to say who can, and cannot, use it. I can give it away for free, I can sell it for little, or I can charge an arm and a leg for it. It is mine to do as I please. If someone is not happy about that they should choose a different product. I do create digital learning content and when people steal that it hurts my family. I spent hundreds upon hundreds of hours to create it and make a viable product. An language audio series is not different from a mucisian creating a song or a potter making a jar. Different formats, but still hard work. And when people use it without permission the creator suffers.

I know these views will recieve venomous responses of how stupid I am and "foul" and to those individuals nothing will change your mind, so please enjoy the media others worked hard to create so they could feed their families. Enjoying it is the least you can do.

In the end electronic media like movies, games, and music is not a necessity. It is not food, water, clothing, etc... You do not need it to live. I do without a lot of things because I cannot afford them. A lot of media I would like, media other hard working individuals create, is one of them. I cannot afford it but I respect their right to distribute it how they wish. And being without does not harm me in the least.

 

[_xxx_]

i personally think we should boycott the music/movie/video game industry until many of the problems are fixe, but without stealing from them.

If people keep stealing from them we will end up with drm riddled computer systems. And them everyone loses.

You don't really get it how that works, I think. People like you and me boycott the industry, that's ok so far.

But the industry ALWAYS, without a single exception blames the lack of sales on the piratery, regardless of the fact that it mostly even isn't the case. So the next thing that happens is rising prices, new and often troublesome copy protection schemes, even DRM then. and so on and so on.

So regardless of anything, the record and movie industry has us screwed.

And that's why many people just want to screw them back. And rightfully so.

 

[silence]

@acert

since i do my living creating digital content, making websites, i perfectlly aware of what you are saying. i also wouldnt like someone coming and taking project that we worked hard for 6 or 12 months and making it public, for competition to look at and cut us down.

problem with piracy has more layers then just stealing from authors....

first of then being that MPAA and RIAA or their counterparts are acctual leeches here, its not artists they have in mind when sueing 8 year olds, but their fat asses, cause before internet there was no way you could deliver content so fast to so many people. they arent ready for change and they wont change.... cause if you take a better look at iTunes or some other similar products, you can see that delivering digital content over internet is possible and people dont mind FAIR price for it....

but with RIAA in bed with publishers (special kind of evil) instead of artists, people simply say "fuck them". do some checking on how much of acctual price you pay for CD in the store ends up where... artists dont get much, there is whole bunch of leeches to feed on those sales....

just look at Valve and Vivendi and their fight over Steam.....

what does acctually Vivendi have to do with selling Half Life 2?
yes, they payed some cash to Valve, but i am sure they made lots of maths before signing the contract. then they went with creating hype and getting people to buy.....

P2P networks will evolve, one day prolly most of it will legit, these are early days with likes of RIAA and MPAA making lots of noise cause they DONT want P2P to evolve into systems for delivering digital content directly between artist/creator and buyer.....

why?.... cause they are becoming obsolete.... useless.... so they fight with DCMA, trying to get DRM and everything else that will force you to stick to their current business model...
one that was created decades ago.

problem has 2 sides.... and idiots like some in this topic cant understand that issue of piracy is much more complex then just "they are all thieves, BURN THEM" idiocy. i am certain that if RIAA and MPAA could they would prolly shut down whole internet....

and guess what?.... i dont think their sales would go much higher....

 

[RussSchultz]

Oh, so you make your money from media content providing, and you still don't pay for your tools?

 

[silence]

Oh, so you make your money from media content providing, and you still don't pay for your tools?

i have legal copies of Macromedia tools, Corel, my OS, NOD32. bought any payed. NOD32 is perfect example...i was using free AVG, but i wasnt happy with it, so i tried couple of trial AV programs and NOD32 was the winner...i ordered it and payed it same day....

where i can, i use Open Source software.... like OpenOffice for example... simply cause i think M$ Office is way overpriced and for what i need OpenOffice is more then enough....

any more questions?

i also dont have any illegal games installed on my computer.... nor do i have instalation files.... as i said, i did DL few games lately, but found them all to be everything but what i expected (after reading reviews) so i uninstalled them and removed downloaded files.
i told you.... when i DL game i see it as demo, if i like what i see in real product i will buy it, but i wont fall for handpicked 10-15 mins of gameplay that official demos are....

best example was Star Wars : Republic Commando, which was kinda fun to play in demo, but when i tried full version it didnt last longer then 2 hours before being uninstalled. IMO, it was crap.
personally i like tactical shooters and from reviews it got (i also read those) it was supposed to be just the game for me.....but it wasnt.

maybe you can afford to give 50$ for game you will play less then 2 hours then throw away..... i really cant....

 

[Acert93]

first of then being that MPAA and RIAA or their counterparts are acctual leeches here, its not artists they have in mind when sueing 8 year olds, but their fat asses, cause before internet there was no way you could deliver content so fast to so many people. they arent ready for change and they wont change.... cause if you take a better look at iTunes or some other similar products, you can see that delivering digital content over internet is possible and people dont mind FAIR price for it....

I definately was not defending the likes of RIAA when I posted! I believe the issues surrounding the publishing industry, specifically music, is criminal. I have a few friends who are musicians and hearing the horror stories makes me sick.

Publishers, marketers, agents, and so forth have a place in the industry. But it is severly out of balance and it is consumers and the artists who are most affected.

I look forward to the day where media can be distributed directly from the artists/creators to the end user. The internet has that potential. All in one portals that allow the artists to self market and to get word of mouth through a totally different system. I look forward to that day because I really do want to see content creators rewarded for their work.

just look at Valve and Vivendi and their fight over Steam.....

what does acctually Vivendi have to do with selling Half Life 2?
yes, they payed some cash to Valve, but i am sure they made lots of maths before signing the contract. then they went with creating hype and getting people to buy.....

Agree here also. I am a big fan of Steam. Yes it had some hiccups (more positives IMO, but that is another debate) but what it symbolizes is very important--especially for content creators. It is the first small step of the guys who actually make this stuff making a bulk of the profit for their work. Not some stiff in a business suit in NY doing the number crunching trying to find a good time to release the game (either too early or too late) so that it pads the quarterly profits just right.

The gaming industry is obviously more progressive than movies and music because it is software and the internet is built around software. If it were not far the massive size of games I think Steam like services would be more popular.

The irony with the Valve/VUG deal was the VUG actually did not put money forward for the development of HL2. VUG's job was to market and manufacture the game and provide the game through traditional retail avenues. Sadly the legal issues appeared to impact VUG's efforts in that the marketing effort was very weak IMO.

While publishers do take large risks with some titles (HL2 not being one of them... games like D3 and HL2 sell on their name alone), overall I find the process too politcal and very outdated.

And that out dated process saw the future last fall. When developers can begin collecting $40 on a $50 game instead of $7-$10 that means more developer profits. That mean more developers stay in business, more remain independant, developers will be willing to try new things (because even 25% of sales is what they make now), and so forth.

I believe eletronic distribution of games will, in the long run, give the game industry a new lease on life. And as a consumer that excites me. As for the publishers, they either need to get with the times or they will find themselves obsolete. Developers will always need publishers, but the day is coming when they wont need them as much as they do now.

Kind of reminds me of the early 90's and getting a neat little shareware demo called "Doom 3" on some floppies. I know I distributed my HL2 *.gfc files to a couple of friends who bought HL2. Get steam, copy the files, buy HL2, and they were live. Reminded me of the good old days! And we were all happy knowing that most of the the money we spent was going directly to the guys who made the product.

Now that is cool.

 

[silence]

great post acert.... i agree totally....
thumbs up

 

[Ty]

Just so my stand is clear. There are 3 camps to this whole debate, those who are thieves (and those who support them), those on the side of riaa/mpaa (and the authors, musicians, programmers), and them my camp. My camp is very small. i personally think we should boycott the music/movie/video game industry until many of the problems are fixe, but without stealing from them.

Uh, ok. But the RIAA is not a party to this discussion so I don't know why you brought them up. /shrug.

If people keep stealing from them we will end up with drm riddled computer systems. And them everyone loses.

The practical side of me says that some people will always be pirating and therefore the industries will always be instituting anti-piracy measures. In fact, even if piracy went down to zero, they'd still work on this believing that their prior measures were the cause of the extinction of said piracy.

Well, i dont feel like im preaching. Im just trying to stand up for the people who have their income stolen from.

I did benefit from what my parents did, but when i went infront of a judge to ask for my green card, he was presented with the full story. He judged that i should get my green card. Now you can hold that against me or not. Irregardless my point on piracy is still correct. If you cant afford (or dont want) to buy it, you dont have a right to pirate it.

epic

Again, I agree with your point (though I can also see the otherside's point), wrong is wrong & right is right. But I can also see that it could be considered a victimless crime and thus less heinous than say, profiting from it by selling illegal warez. Agreed?

My point to you in the previous post was simply that your family commited a victimless crime and therefore you might have more in common in this regard than you think.

Lastly, simply because a judge excuses your history does not mean you did not break the law, you were simply "excused" of it. This is a far cry from following the law in the first place. For instance, if someone committed murder but was found not guilty by the jury does not mean that the defendent is truly innocent, merely that he was found innocent.

 

[nutball]

If people keep stealing from them we will end up with drm riddled computer systems. And them everyone loses.

It's not a given that DRM will become pervasive.

People routinely drive faster than the speed limit, or shoot red lights, how close in practice do you think we are to having every car fitted with mandatory speed limiters and other electronic Big Brother black-boxes? Regardless of how good an idea it might be (poor driving is after all a matter of life and death, unlike piracy), the reaction of drivers to having such devices foisted upon them is so negative that it would be political suicide to make them mandatory.

Fundamentally the choice about acceptance DRM lies with the purchasers of the electronic equipment and the purchasers of the "content", not the manufacturers.

 

[epicstruggle]

ty, i disagree with your views because i think this is not a victimless crime. The victims are the anonymous programmers, the musicians, the actors (and all those behind the camera), these people have a part of the revenue they count on stolen/denied by those who pirate what they produce.

nutball, i hope your right, but from what ive read amd, intel, ati, nvidia, ms and others are all part of the trusted computing group. On a side note, more and more cars are being built with "black boxes" installed that record the last few seconds of a car ride/accident.

epic

 

[Ty]

ty, i disagree with your views because i think this is not a victimless crime. The victims are the anonymous programmers, the musicians, the actors (and all those behind the camera), these people have a part of the revenue they count on stolen/denied by those who pirate what they produce.

Well the argument is that these were products that were never going to be bought by said pirater in the first place.

Much like the argument that your folks "stole" jobs from American citizens. Likely those jobs were not going to be filled in the first place.

 

[Druga Runda]

ty, i disagree with your views because i think this is not a victimless crime. The victims are the anonymous programmers, the musicians, the actors (and all those behind the camera), these people have a part of the revenue they count on stolen/denied by those who pirate what they produce.


epic

that is totally untrue.

What needs to happen is a redistribution of jobs and market reallignment, like whenever a new technology was created.

The old mill owners could have said that they "lost jobs" because of industrial revolution but surely the same revolution created even more jobs and better living standards than before. The same with new technology now.

The ones who would suffer are the distributors and all various middle men. However they hold the power and they are using it to justify their existance trough laws.

If P2P was "private use" as ever artists would make the same amount of money or more as their popularity would increase. Surely some industry manufactured ones would be out of luck but they would be replaced by genuine artists who make music (for example) no matter what, the public thirst for them would be there anyhow, and what would stop them making even better marketing deals, creating concerts and make millions? Absolutely nothing, it is only thet the market wouldn't be controlled by select few which is a historical situation to which we arrived through development of 20 century.

The only problem is that these people are now protecting themselves and their lucrative business models from obsoletion trough lawmaking. They call sharing theft , but it is nothing else than sharing. We consumers did originally buy their producsts, and chose to share them with our friends/or even better people we do not know. We are giving away what we purchased, investing time/money to make a copy and we give it away for free to others, or in other words we share.

This is a social concept and the one which trough history was deemed as a good quality, and it really IS. However we are made to think otherwise of course these days through marketing campaigns.

What happened is that sharing due to technology has become very inexpensive, it still costs (bandwidth, time to find what you need, etc) but the cost to "make an exact replica" of the digital good is now very small, actually negligible, but it is still there. So what is being shared is not "stolen" - ie taken away from somebody so he cannot have something he owned, it is being - replicated for use of both the owner and the one who got the exact replica. If the one getting the replica is happy so be it.

The issue here is the definiton of ownership and utilization of new technologies that make some of old structures obsolete, "reality" will hopefully prevail one day, but it will take a long time until that happens as the "obsolete industry" has a lot of money and power with they are wasting to make their existance "necessary" pretty much like any stage in the history of technological development. It only gets more elaborate now, market restriction trough lawmaking. Only when they destroy themselves (which indeed they actively do) there will be no pressure on the legislature, new realities will be accepted, and business will move on as usual.

Every single digital good creator can make money simply from the fact that their product it being "massively used" whether trough popularity, trough advertising space, tieing in with "real" products, services. The model would jsut get more sophisticated and even more "goods" would be produced/created in such a market, however the old power structure is struggling with those new concepts.

 

[epicstruggle]

ty, i disagree with your views because i think this is not a victimless crime. The victims are the anonymous programmers, the musicians, the actors (and all those behind the camera), these people have a part of the revenue they count on stolen/denied by those who pirate what they produce.

Well the argument is that these were products that were never going to be bought by said pirater in the first place.

lets say broadband in england reaches 100%. I guarantee you that the amount of money spent on legal games/music/movies will plumet. I dont believe the argument you present above. Maybe not all those who pirate will purchase legal copies but many certainly will.

Much like the argument that your folks "stole" jobs from American citizens. Likely those jobs were not going to be filled in the first place.

I answered something similar from silence earlier. I have no problem if you or others believe this. And it is a valid issue of whether or not illegal immigrants (or legal for that matter) do take jobs from those who are already citizens of this country. But i find it a poor counter to the points I bring to this thread. Im convinced that if someone else had stated my view points that this issue would not come up.

There is no (IMHO) justification to pirating/stealing content such as music,programs, movies it is not essential to living.

epic

 

[Ty]

lets say broadband in england reaches 100%. I guarantee you that the amount of money spent on legal games/music/movies will plumet. I dont believe the argument you present above. Maybe not all those who pirate will purchase legal copies but many certainly will.

I agree with you completely wrt to the italicized point. However, those here claim just that; that they would not have bought the legal copies in the first place. Are they lying only to justify their behavior? Maybe. /shrug

Latest study here in the states (Harvard) show that there is little to no impact in music sales from P2P file sharing.

<snip>

Im convinced that if someone else had stated my view points that this issue would not come up.

Possibly but that does not mean the counter argument waged against you is any less valid.

There is no (IMHO) justification to pirating/stealing content such as music,programs, movies it is not essential to living.

epic

You are definately correct that they are not essential, and yet we as humans perform unessential actions all the time. In your case, getting a job was essential so you could live. But coming here illegally wasn't. I do not say this as a personal attack but merely to relate the two actions to each other. /shrug


***Edited to fix quote error***

 

[silence]

There is no (IMHO) justification to pirating/stealing content such as music,programs, movies it is not essential to living.

epic

and since sneaking into US was essential to you.... thats different.
and another question.... your family was lucky/hardworking/mixture of both, so they did create some jobs.... but if they werent?....
illegal immigration, no matter how you defend your own case is nothing more then "job piracy"... fact that some illegal immigrants manage to make the best out of it, doesnt change the FACT they broke the law in order to sneak into another country to "pirate some jobs" from natives.....

Every single digital good creator can make money simply from the fact that their product it being "massively used" whether trough popularity, trough advertising space, tieing in with "real" products, services. The model would jsut get more sophisticated and even more "goods" would be produced/created in such a market, however the old power structure is struggling with those new concepts.

yes, imagine how would RIAA or MPAA make money if they tried to go into search engine business. take Google as best example of how technology is changing the world.

RIAA and MPAA (and their counterparts around the world) are simply becoming obsolete. they are the "middle man" that makes money on other people's work, talent and effort.
only leeches here are them, not people that share music online.

Lets have a good example....Doom 3 was on BT just hours after being released in US and europeans simply swarmed all P2P networks to get their hands of most expected game of the year... how did ID react?
cool, cause in the end.... all those pirating didnt hurt sales at all.....
how many people bought the game after DLing it and finishing it?


P2P are just next step in evolution of distribution of digital content, problem for likes of RIAA and MPAA is that with broadband in more and more homes and distribution systems getting better (Steam for example) there will be no need for them to exist at all.....
i wonder how much does their CEO's make for....doing nothing....

does MPAA or RIAA make music?... no
do they write scripts for movies?... no

what the fuck they acctually do?.... spend countless millions of dollars lobbying that piracy is some sort of doomsday for economy.....