So I was talking to some friends in english class today about piracy, and both of them were saying that it's bad. But I had to disagree with them. Call me out on any ******** here, but here's my idea behind it:
Okay, so people pirate things. BUT is that lost sales? I think for the most part, it isn't. Let's say something cost $1,000 dollars, and just about nobody was willing to pay $1,000 dollars for that application/program/whatever, but instead they pirate it. Is that really a lost sale? I wouldn't say so. They weren't intending on buying the product in the first place, therefore you would've recieved no money for it in the first place.
WITHOUT Piracy:
-Sees something, wants it, but not willing to pay for it, so they don't buy it. You don't get a sale.
WITH Piracy:
-Sees something, wants it, but not willing to pay for it, so they pirate it. You still don't get a sale.
YES, I know piracy is "bad" in the sense that it's stealing something, getting something for free. But when people bring the claim that it's losing sales, it's really not. You're making just as much money without piracy as you are with piracy.
Also, I think piracy could even HELP sales.
WITHOUT Piracy:
-Want to get something. Can't pay for it. Don't get it.
WITH Piracy:
-Want to get something. Can't pay for it. Pirate it. Tell your friends about it/show it to them. Your friend is a good kid who doesn't pirate stuff. Instead he goes out and buys it. You just made 1 more sale with piracy than you did without piracy.
Now I know not all circumstances are like this, but for the most part I don't really see how piracy is SO bad. I think people are just getting enraged about their work being stolen.
Just my thoughts. Point out flaws if you want, or agree/disagree. Tell me what you think.
Yeah I can agree with you on how Piracy isn't really that bad. But of course, there can be situations where people have the money to buy it, but don't want to spend money on the game so they decide to pirate it. If piracy was somehow eliminated then they might have actually bought the game.
However, I don't think piracy is a big issue. And as you said already, piracy can make the game more popular when friends play the game and tell others about it, which is a good thing.
I think it's bad to pirate something, like Photoshop or any of the Adobe programs, and profitting off of it. I also think it's bad to pirate something that you have the money to buy, and intending to buy it then deciding just to pirate it because you don't feel like paying for it.
I'm fine with pirating something to preview it, I do it myself. I listen to a lot of music so a lot of times I end up hearing a song that I like by a band/singer I've never heard of, I don't want to waste $10-$15 for a CD that has one song on it that I like. I'd say about half of the CDs I have I pirated first then bought after deciding I liked it.
I think it's bad to pirate something, like Photoshop or any of the Adobe programs, and profitting off of it. I also think it's bad to pirate something that you have the money to buy, and intending to buy it then deciding just to pirate it because you don't feel like paying for it.
I'm fine with pirating something to preview it, I do it myself. I listen to a lot of music so a lot of times I end up hearing a song that I like by a band/singer I've never heard of, I don't want to waste $10-$15 for a CD that has one song on it that I like. I'd say about half of the CDs I have I pirated first then bought after deciding I liked it.
Yeah, but the actual act of pirating it doesn't even hurt sales, and could potentially even help sales.
Well by pirating you are receiving something for no cost, and the rights holder of that program/album/whatever has lost one potential sale they could have had with no benefit to them. Since you "pirated" that piece of intellectual property we could probably say you wanted it, but you didn't pay for it. Therefore, it's benefiting one side: yours.
The holders of that property likely won't be making up for that one sale any-time soon.
Now, on an individual scale that's sort of bad morally, or at least it depends on who you're asking or what it is. Now if you pirated a JB album, good on you. He doesn't need any more money. ****. If it's an excellent artist who could use the money: you're the **** (besides, if you had bought it then that artist would have the 20-40$ more he/she/they could use to promote themselves and ultimately go up the billboard charts).
Additionally though, on an individual level it's probably not that bad. But if you multiply it then we got issues, because that's a lot of people loosing potential sales. This is also where it gets grey.
Personally, I can't see there being any reliable way to measure the scale of piracy. Are the mega-million dollar media and publishing corporations of the world really loosing money? How are we to estimate the total revenue lost to them? If we're to accurately measure this we need to know how many are doing it. Which is where it gets even fuzzier.
I really don't think you can get an accurate idea of how many people are pirating. The number would likely vary greatly depending on the source. Record companies and the lack are likely going to exaggerate the numbers, and the government too, depending on how far they are in the record company's pants. However, certain internet groups may also place it far too low.
If we had an accurate number, then we'd probably know who the pirates and there would have been more sweeping arrests on them. So it wouldn't be an issue. As having an accurate number relies on knowing which individual where partakes in it.
Most of piracy is not lost sales- it's technically impossible. Perhaps in certain circumstances it can be, such as a person choosing to be spiteful for no real reason, but otherwise it's simply not. Someone who doesn't posses the money or deems the game as not worth their money is just a market force and the sales were never meant to be. If we claim piracy creates lost sales, and that is used as justification for why it's wrong, then why aren't terrible PR teams or negative reviews viewed so badly? If I watch a review of a video game on IGN and I choose to not buy the game, is that a lost sale?
The argument for lost sales is based on the grounds of what cannot or was not going to happen; a logical fallacy.
I don't pirate- I actually have income and purchase my games now, but I personally support piracy because it functions as competition against corporations. As Gabe Newell once espoused that idea- and this is a man who runs ****ing Steam- and then stated that they counter piracy by offering a better service for their customers. Long live piracy, long live freedom, and long live not socially and lawfully condemning people for copying data.
I only pirate music or programs to see if I truly want them or not. My reason behind doing so:
I'm not going to sit in front of a computer to listen to an album just to see if I want it. I'd rather be reading a book or doing some work. What do I do to resolve that? Pirate the album that's on my mind, put it on my iTouch, and go about my business while listening to the album. If I don't like it, well, I get rid of it. If I like it, I buy it when I get the chance.
Same goes for programs. Except I actually have to sit in front of the computer to test it out.
I actually have kept a pirated version of Photoshop for more than a year now. You could say that I'm "stealing it", but I'm not. I'm going to buy Photoshop once I get my own computer (that isn't ****). Besides, I don't think I can get away with making art to sell on a pirated program... I'm required to buy it in the long run for the job I'm pursuing.
I try to do that to keep some sort of dignity.
I did it with Borderlands, tested it out then bought it.
Well by pirating you are receiving something for no cost, and the rights holder of that program/album/whatever has lost one potential sale they could have had with no benefit to them. Since you "pirated" that piece of intellectual property we could probably say you wanted it, but you didn't pay for it. Therefore, it's benefiting one side: yours.
The holders of that property likely won't be making up for that one sale any-time soon.
Now, on an individual scale that's sort of bad morally, or at least it depends on who you're asking or what it is. Now if you pirated a JB album, good on you. He doesn't need any more money. ****. If it's an excellent artist who could use the money: you're the **** (besides, if you had bought it then that artist would have the 20-40$ more he/she/they could use to promote themselves and ultimately go up the billboard charts).
Additionally though, on an individual level it's probably not that bad. But if you multiply it then we got issues, because that's a lot of people loosing potential sales. This is also where it gets grey.
Personally, I can't see there being any reliable way to measure the scale of piracy. Are the mega-million dollar media and publishing corporations of the world really loosing money? How are we to estimate the total revenue lost to them? If we're to accurately measure this we need to know how many are doing it. Which is where it gets even fuzzier.
I really don't think you can get an accurate idea of how many people are pirating. The number would likely vary greatly depending on the source. Record companies and the lack are likely going to exaggerate the numbers, and the government too, depending on how far they are in the record company's pants. However, certain internet groups may also place it far too low.
If we had an accurate number, then we'd probably know who the pirates and there would have been more sweeping arrests on them. So it wouldn't be an issue. As having an accurate number relies on knowing which individual where partakes in it.
...
I don't know what I wrote anymore.
Well, I agree with you on most of that except in your first paragraph.
You said "lost one potential sale"
but in many cases (I know not all, but many) it's not a potential sale. The person who pirated it wasn't going to put up the money to buy it in the first place, there was no potential sale there.
But they obviously wanted it if they pirated it. And a sale could have been made from them if they weren't cheap bastards or the whole of the music industry wasn't a bunch of slimy old gits.
But they obviously wanted it if they pirated it. And a sale could have been made from them if they weren't cheap bastards or the whole of the music industry wasn't a bunch of slimy old gits.
Yeah. But if I want something and am not willing to pay for it, I won't get it anyways.
But they obviously wanted it if they pirated it. And a sale could have been made from them if they weren't cheap bastards or the whole of the music industry wasn't a bunch of slimy old gits.
You can want something but not find the price low enough to guarantee a purchase. Most people will compliment a developer if they can- it's basic mutual cooperation as a group species. As I said, there might be the occasional person who it merely spiteful, but that's more to do with them being an asshole and less to do with piracy being dangerous to any digital industry.
As for the music industry, they reap what they sow.
Piracy has become dubious as a scapegoat, because it provides legitimacy to the claims the RIAA and MPAA are making against their own consumers.
For the longest time, we've been subjected to monopolistic trite at the whims of these very same companies who are turning draconian to save their obsolete business structure. Rather than decent singles being produced at a slow pace for a modest price, we were forced to buy mass-produced music on albums with only one or two songs that we actually liked, produced by producers (Or in the case of 80's/90's Rap, DJ's) who actually cared. Suddenly, $12.99 wasn't enough. To make up for the phony rise of cost of CD's. (a resource controlled entirely by three of the big four, including the worst offender Time-Warner. - Albums skyrocketed to the modest price of $19.99 (CDN, Even $39.99 AUS for select albums.) for albums which contained only one or two good songs. (With the exception of classic albums, which earned the title classic by being worth the cost of every song.)
Now people are slowly reverting back to the old ways. Rather than buying albums, which the RIAA cites entirely as their lost sales - people are buying single tracks, for a fraction of the cost. (They're still having trouble tallying the numbers even now.)
Make no mistake. Digital Copying, (Piracy sounds more maligned doesn't it?) does hurt the profits: of bad musicians who don't deserve their fame. People can download the latest catchy tune by Soulja Boy, get bored of it and not feel bad about spending the equivalent of cheap 2-for-1 pizza. I can cite three genre-defining bands from the 90's(Green Day, Nine Inch Nails, Radiohead) who've made the move to independent digital sales/donation based sales who have managed to make more money off of their independant projects than they ever did while working under the thumb of their respective overlords. (Decent bands get money? Bad musicians disappear! Imagine that!)
I've donated more money to bands in this year alone, than I've spent on music CD's in all of the 90's and early 00's. Guess what? It works. We put money into the pot because we're happy with what they give us. It's like a tip for good service at a resteraunt, the classic American staple.
In truth, this fight isn't against piracy. Piracy is the scapegoat used to rally the ignorant. They've controlled the language for so long, it's become impossible to defend piracy without looking bad. (Even though it's not theft. It's copying, and it's perfectly legal in 3 first world nations. Decriminalized in 8 more!) - In reality, they're fighting to regain and then retain the monopoly they've lorded over us for decades.
The music industry needs to die, so it can be reborn again - without the RIAA and it's corporate backers.
GOOD VPN (pay)
I pirate all the time, with a VPN of course. VPN uses a an ip that isnt yours, so when the big bad copyright company comes to get you, they get led back to the ip of the vpn.
Which means....
You dont get caught
still get free stuff
...?
Profit
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
this is my signature, look how unique it is. it is one of a kind.
A company makes a product okay. That product in some way will cost them money to produce; computer programs, music, tvs, so on. When someone pirates that product for free yes it will harm a company. Not only will you be stealing from them, but you will also be harming the economy (trade). There are more reactions to that action but overall yes it does.
WITH Piracy:
-Want to get something. Can't pay for it. Pirate it. Tell your friends about it/show it to them. Your friend is a good kid who doesn't pirate stuff. Instead he goes out and buys it. You just made 1 more sale with piracy than you did without piracy.
Actually, it's a lot more common than it may seem. For example, when I first saw Minecraft, I pirated it, not because I didn't have enough money, but because I didn't have any way of buying it. My friends saw me playing it, and started playing it too, pirating it as well. Eventually I got a paypal account and bought the game. Showing the benefits of having a paid Minecraft account (SMP) to my friends, I encouraged them to get premium accounts. Now, they all have a premium account. I guess I kind of advertised Minecraft.
Tl;dr: It's a lot more common than you think.
Also, Rememberthese?
Imo it's still bad either way.If you pirate something you're one more person who's using the product but your using it for free.While they aren't losing sales they are missing out on a sale that they would have gotten had you actually bought the product,but since you didn't you're using the product for free and the maker isn't getting compensated.
Say you made and released a new CD. Some people start pirating it, and selling it at a super low price to other people. You're hardly making a sale because your prices are too high, even though you're the one who made it, and you should have the right to earn the money instead. How would you feel?
Piracy may (or may not) be a good thing for sales, but we can't rationalize it away. It has to be someothing that has moral consequences when you do it. If we free ourselves from the burden, Then there's no reason for ANYONE to buy any downloadable item. There have to me moral and sometimes legal consequences to prevent this fate.
Okay, so people pirate things. BUT is that lost sales? I think for the most part, it isn't. Let's say something cost $1,000 dollars, and just about nobody was willing to pay $1,000 dollars for that application/program/whatever, but instead they pirate it. Is that really a lost sale? I wouldn't say so. They weren't intending on buying the product in the first place, therefore you would've recieved no money for it in the first place.
WITHOUT Piracy:
-Sees something, wants it, but not willing to pay for it, so they don't buy it. You don't get a sale.
WITH Piracy:
-Sees something, wants it, but not willing to pay for it, so they pirate it. You still don't get a sale.
YES, I know piracy is "bad" in the sense that it's stealing something, getting something for free. But when people bring the claim that it's losing sales, it's really not. You're making just as much money without piracy as you are with piracy.
Also, I think piracy could even HELP sales.
WITHOUT Piracy:
-Want to get something. Can't pay for it. Don't get it.
WITH Piracy:
-Want to get something. Can't pay for it. Pirate it. Tell your friends about it/show it to them. Your friend is a good kid who doesn't pirate stuff. Instead he goes out and buys it. You just made 1 more sale with piracy than you did without piracy.
Now I know not all circumstances are like this, but for the most part I don't really see how piracy is SO bad. I think people are just getting enraged about their work being stolen.
Just my thoughts. Point out flaws if you want, or agree/disagree. Tell me what you think.
However, I don't think piracy is a big issue. And as you said already, piracy can make the game more popular when friends play the game and tell others about it, which is a good thing.
I'm fine with pirating something to preview it, I do it myself. I listen to a lot of music so a lot of times I end up hearing a song that I like by a band/singer I've never heard of, I don't want to waste $10-$15 for a CD that has one song on it that I like. I'd say about half of the CDs I have I pirated first then bought after deciding I liked it.
Yeah, but the actual act of pirating it doesn't even hurt sales, and could potentially even help sales.
The holders of that property likely won't be making up for that one sale any-time soon.
Now, on an individual scale that's sort of bad morally, or at least it depends on who you're asking or what it is. Now if you pirated a JB album, good on you. He doesn't need any more money. ****. If it's an excellent artist who could use the money: you're the **** (besides, if you had bought it then that artist would have the 20-40$ more he/she/they could use to promote themselves and ultimately go up the billboard charts).
Additionally though, on an individual level it's probably not that bad. But if you multiply it then we got issues, because that's a lot of people loosing potential sales. This is also where it gets grey.
Personally, I can't see there being any reliable way to measure the scale of piracy. Are the mega-million dollar media and publishing corporations of the world really loosing money? How are we to estimate the total revenue lost to them? If we're to accurately measure this we need to know how many are doing it. Which is where it gets even fuzzier.
I really don't think you can get an accurate idea of how many people are pirating. The number would likely vary greatly depending on the source. Record companies and the lack are likely going to exaggerate the numbers, and the government too, depending on how far they are in the record company's pants. However, certain internet groups may also place it far too low.
If we had an accurate number, then we'd probably know who the pirates and there would have been more sweeping arrests on them. So it wouldn't be an issue. As having an accurate number relies on knowing which individual where partakes in it.
...
I don't know what I wrote anymore.
My DeviantArt, so sexy
The argument for lost sales is based on the grounds of what cannot or was not going to happen; a logical fallacy.
I don't pirate- I actually have income and purchase my games now, but I personally support piracy because it functions as competition against corporations. As Gabe Newell once espoused that idea- and this is a man who runs ****ing Steam- and then stated that they counter piracy by offering a better service for their customers. Long live piracy, long live freedom, and long live not socially and lawfully condemning people for copying data.
I try to do that to keep some sort of dignity.
I did it with Borderlands, tested it out then bought it.
Well, I agree with you on most of that except in your first paragraph.
You said "lost one potential sale"
but in many cases (I know not all, but many) it's not a potential sale. The person who pirated it wasn't going to put up the money to buy it in the first place, there was no potential sale there.
My DeviantArt, so sexy
Yeah. But if I want something and am not willing to pay for it, I won't get it anyways.
You can want something but not find the price low enough to guarantee a purchase. Most people will compliment a developer if they can- it's basic mutual cooperation as a group species. As I said, there might be the occasional person who it merely spiteful, but that's more to do with them being an asshole and less to do with piracy being dangerous to any digital industry.
As for the music industry, they reap what they sow.
For the longest time, we've been subjected to monopolistic trite at the whims of these very same companies who are turning draconian to save their obsolete business structure. Rather than decent singles being produced at a slow pace for a modest price, we were forced to buy mass-produced music on albums with only one or two songs that we actually liked, produced by producers (Or in the case of 80's/90's Rap, DJ's) who actually cared. Suddenly, $12.99 wasn't enough. To make up for the phony rise of cost of CD's. (a resource controlled entirely by three of the big four, including the worst offender Time-Warner. - Albums skyrocketed to the modest price of $19.99 (CDN, Even $39.99 AUS for select albums.) for albums which contained only one or two good songs. (With the exception of classic albums, which earned the title classic by being worth the cost of every song.)
Now people are slowly reverting back to the old ways. Rather than buying albums, which the RIAA cites entirely as their lost sales - people are buying single tracks, for a fraction of the cost. (They're still having trouble tallying the numbers even now.)
Make no mistake. Digital Copying, (Piracy sounds more maligned doesn't it?) does hurt the profits: of bad musicians who don't deserve their fame. People can download the latest catchy tune by Soulja Boy, get bored of it and not feel bad about spending the equivalent of cheap 2-for-1 pizza. I can cite three genre-defining bands from the 90's (Green Day, Nine Inch Nails, Radiohead) who've made the move to independent digital sales/donation based sales who have managed to make more money off of their independant projects than they ever did while working under the thumb of their respective overlords. (Decent bands get money? Bad musicians disappear! Imagine that!)
I've donated more money to bands in this year alone, than I've spent on music CD's in all of the 90's and early 00's. Guess what? It works. We put money into the pot because we're happy with what they give us. It's like a tip for good service at a resteraunt, the classic American staple.
In truth, this fight isn't against piracy. Piracy is the scapegoat used to rally the ignorant. They've controlled the language for so long, it's become impossible to defend piracy without looking bad. (Even though it's not theft. It's copying, and it's perfectly legal in 3 first world nations. Decriminalized in 8 more!) - In reality, they're fighting to regain and then retain the monopoly they've lorded over us for decades.
The music industry needs to die, so it can be reborn again - without the RIAA and it's corporate backers.
Moraterra Single Player Survival - Last Updated: September 16, 4:00 PM PST
GOOD VPN (pay)
I pirate all the time, with a VPN of course. VPN uses a an ip that isnt yours, so when the big bad copyright company comes to get you, they get led back to the ip of the vpn.
Which means....
You dont get caught
still get free stuff
...?
Profit
1/1000 chance
Give me a source on that. If you can't, stop shouting things that aren't true.
Actually, it's a lot more common than it may seem. For example, when I first saw Minecraft, I pirated it, not because I didn't have enough money, but because I didn't have any way of buying it. My friends saw me playing it, and started playing it too, pirating it as well. Eventually I got a paypal account and bought the game. Showing the benefits of having a paid Minecraft account (SMP) to my friends, I encouraged them to get premium accounts. Now, they all have a premium account. I guess I kind of advertised Minecraft.
Tl;dr: It's a lot more common than you think.
Also, Remember these?
This is why pirating is illegal.
Without Piracy:
Someone sees something they want. They buy it. (+sale)
With Piracy:
Someone sees something they want. They pirate it. (-sale)
Sometimes the people can afford it, and sometimes they can't. So, piracy is losing sales and increasing sales. It is probably about equal.