Why lol?
In what other situation could you takesomeone elses work for nothing and not call it theft?
piracy on pc
- Thread starter RedStarRiot
- Start date
In what other situation could you takesomeone elses work for nothing and not call it theft?
Meh at those figures, I'm sure they made more than enough profit from the game still (wasn't it something like 1.5 million sales within first 48 hours?). It's a popular game so pirate figures usually reflect that too as for justifying piracy because of the £35 price tag that's a little silly and frankly conflicting. We keep moaning about all these "ports" and then when a true PC game with a lot of work put in it and costs us more than the £17.99 pre order people moan about it?
because you are not taking it away and depriving the owner so it is not theft. does it need to be explained in EVERY piracy thread ?
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It's duplication not taking though, hence the legal issues.
otherwise anyone who bought some paint and painted a copy of the Mona Lisa (for personal use not for sale) would have to be arrested for theft.
1) If it was not £35 then not so many people would have had the need to download it.
2) The vast majority of those who did download it would not have bought it anyway even if it was £10.
3) They still made a crap ton of money from it.
2) The vast majority of those who did download it would not have bought it anyway even if it was £10.
3) They still made a crap ton of money from it.
But is there a difference in utility gained from observing the Mona Lisa and playing a game such as this? Or rather perhaps from where it arises?
Certainly a more formal structure when it comes to this level of abstraction is required
. I dont see why it's not made a bigger issue of in governments.
When it's piracy. Have you ever wondered why they have different words to describe them? Hasn't it occurred to you that because they have different words, it means they might also have different definitions?
Piracy/copyright infringement and theft aren't the same thing, the only thing they have in common is the end result of acquiring something for free.
If we use your logic, winning a game or receiving it as a gift is also theft as you're getting some one else's work for nothing. Maybe you should think about the ethics and how games developers treat their customers, Activision especially.
They think second hand games are the same as piracy and are trying their best to make it impossible to buy games second hand without them getting a second lot of monies for the same game.
But is there a difference in utility gained from observing the Mona Lisa and playing a game such as this? Or rather perhaps from where it arises?
Certainly a more formal structure when it comes to this level of abstraction is required
Because it's really a non-issue, and arguably if you believe it should be a bigger issue in governments, then so should the way said developers act with regards to invasive DRM and trying to kill off second hand sales.
Additionally, maybe governments should have more important things to deal with than people copying/downloading movies, games and music.
What I do think is an important issue though is rather than those downloading and copying, those who download/copy and then sell said items, arguably that's so much closer to theft than simply downloading/copying/lending. You know if they get any more control that you won't be able to lend/borrow games without their permission any more too, right?
Ok first of all I'm a musician so piracy bothers me because it affects me directly.
A couple of years ago I was giving a mate a lift, and playing a cd from a band I'd recently recorded with. He said 'That sounds great, can I burn a copy?' he didn't understand why I got cross and I'd guess a number of people on this thread don't.
I'd been paid, as had the rest of the band, the studio, the engineer, the producer etc. By the band leader. He was now out of pocket by many thousand pounds and needed to make that money back and some profit through cd sales. If people copy it for free then this doesn't happen.
If games, music, films etc were freely available to copy and everyone took advantage of this then no-one would make these things as they would never get paid.
As far as I'm concerned people deserve paying for the work they do.
They are freely available and yet people still buy them. Way to massively misunderstand the point though (purposefully?). If individual sales have an impact on you, then chances are no one will be pirating your stuff as very few know about it anyway. It's only really the mainstream that's pirated to any effect. If you're a small time musician and you're getting pirated you realistically should look at that as a good thing, your target audience will open up massively, as I said, music is freely available yet people still spend out on it. The music movie and games industry is constantly growing and doing better than ever.
"Oh poor Activision, they are so hard done to! STOP PIRATING ACTIVISION GAMES! WHAT HAVE THEY EVER DONE TO YOU?!?!
"sure we do, but we just use the correct term (Copyright infringement/Piracy) to describe it.
btw does your music get played on the popular radio stations often ? im guessing not, so isn't letting your mate copy and play it infront of others getting you some good publicity ?
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Individual sales don't affect me as I am paid by the session, but they do affect the people I work for, which affects my employment opportunities.
I'm not trying to say anything about the wider impact on the industry as I dont know enough about it. All I am trying to say is that I personally see copyright infringement as theft wether that is the legal definition or not. Someone has created something to sell, and pirates use it without paying which to me seems wrong.
It's not really my music, as I get paid to play other peoples stuff. Some of it gets airtime, some of it doesn't.
I suppose it's tough to argue that the downloader is him/herself committing a crime. However, could one not argue that the distribution violates intellectual property rights? We as a nation value the ability to control the distribution of our own work. So if I release some sort of program on a website with some free license that gets copied and redistributed without my permission (i.e. if I have expressly said that I dont want it to happen, then the act of downloading and then redistributing has broken the contract entered into by visiting and then proceeding to download the software), then I think most people would agree that I am in the right if I want to force them to stop doing so.
I would argue if there is no better formal legal structure established, then there will simply be more victims. We see cases of people being sued extreme amounts for music downloads, while others simply continue with no penalty at all. That doesnt sound fair. I'm not simply talking about to the artist/publisher. A better system would lead to better contols over judicial methods. Furthermore, it would help to curb the 'DRM' mania that you refer to, caused by companies doing everything they can to protect 100% of their potential profits.
I can understand the objection to lending/borrowing restrictions. Honestly it doesnt really affect me, so it's not a debate i can really comment on.
To see it as theft shows you're only doing so due to an emotional reaction, trying to link it to something to make it worse than it is. Attempted murder is the same as assault when you use that logic, and people do make out like assault is attempted murder for the very same reasons, due to an emotional reaction.
Distribution isn't part of downloading though (torrenting aside). For me to go and download a game, I can do it totally without distributing it to anyone else. Legally wise the act of downloading isn't "illegal" it's the act of uploading (distribution) that people get "done" for.