Can’t believe this is a decade old
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To clarify, making a photocopy of a book under copyright is not the same as taking a copy from the library and not returning it, or shoplifting from the bookstore. I still have bellyaches when people call it “theft”. It’s not theft so much as trespassing on a sold right to make copies.
It’s as much theft as setting up lawn chairs on the roof to watch the game at the next door baseball field is. Or like sneaking into a theater, only I’m not taking a seat from a paying customer.
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And sometimes even if you do. Case in point: one of the most anticipated anime releases of this season, Summer Time Rendering, is only available on Disney+, and only in Japan. It will allegedly be made available worldwide at some point, but no date yet.
My guess is that Disney, having decided for some bizarre reason to expand into anime, now has no idea how to market it.
In any event, my eldest is still furious.
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Relevant Johnny Cash song.
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I still don’t get the justification for downloading music, video, software, games, etc… and not paying as being acceptable because someone wasn’t going to buy the product anyhow. And just because it’s not a microwave or toaster it’s even more okay because it’s not a physical thing.
Theaters, at least in my neck of the woods, usually have empty seats, I never thought that meant the empty seats should be free.
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I recommend you have a look at Cory Doctorow’s writings on the subject of copyright, how it came to be, how we got in this current boondoggle, and ways out of it. This blog entry is a good place to start.
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Not sure what that has to do with justifying sneaking into a movie theater being okay because the seat was empty.
Or downloading games for free because you weren’t going to buy it anyhow.
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Let’s set some ground terms here:
Theft
Hey, you took my thing!
Bootlegging, AKA media piracy
Hey, you made a copy of that thing only I am supposed to make copies of!
Trespassing
Hey, you’re on a thing that belongs to me!
What is missing from this list? Viewing a thing that the owner is charging admission for. Be it descrambling a streamed event, or sneaking a view of the thing where the owner charges admission. Things like viewing a carny sideshow through a tear in the tent, to getting a decoder to watch the scrambled channels, to listening to tapes of your friend’s records.
I’m old enough that I can remember pre-internet bootlegging of concert tapes, of trading “sneaker net” copies of Commodore 64 games—which I played even if I bought it, because the DRM would literally damage the VIC 1541 drive! Piracy in streaming is just another wrinkle in an old fight between those who want to make a mint off of controlling who gets to see/read what, and those who can’t afford it.
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Ah, or the guy at conventions with VHS and later DVD copies of weird, obscure shows. Like the Star Wars Holiday Special, or the Japanese Spider-Man, or the made for TV Captain America movie.
Lots of weird gems in over priced, poor grade copies.
The last con I went to, there was still one guy with a small stash of DVDs. Not sure if it is old stock, or people want a physical copy and here it is.
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I found another interesting piece to supplement Cory’s, which talks about prosecution and sentencing.
tl;dr… These days, most distributors are seeking to punish major copyright infringement, not your Average Joe who’s viewing streaming content.
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This is simple tresspassing and theft. Not piracy. Unless someone is attempting to record the movie, the distributors have no fear of them releasing the content over the internet.
Besides, who really does this at movie theaters anymore when there’s so much less incentive these days to leave the house?
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So says the person with the pirate-themed avatar.
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That’s a labeling problem. Even songs with perfectly fine production quality but still having outright profanity were (are) being attributed to Al simply because some people don’t know any other demented music singers. The Arrogant Worms have run into the same thing on a slightly smaller scale. (After all, how many Canadian funny music groups can there be, right?)
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Right! So that you know that I know what I’m talking about! What people call piracy involves zero looting, pillaging and no commandeering of ships to take their cargo from them!
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I get what you’re saying, obviously if everyone did it we wouldn’t be able to have nice things. But I think you’re focusing on the wrong end of the deal. Rather than the freeloader’s morality, focus on the seller’s injury- point out on the doll exactly how they are damaged by this? They do not lose a sale, and gain word of mouth publicity. Obviously that doesn’t pay the bills for the next game they are developing but it creates fans who, when they have money, will be spending it on this stuff. When I became an adult with a job I eventually bought some computer games. I taped music off the radio like a fiend back in the day, but also spent almost every dime I had on records.
Victimless crimes aren’t actual crimes (IMO) and a copy that doesn’t replace a sale victimizes no one.
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from N©!
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An author I like had over 100,000 copies of one of his books pirated online and sold by others. Those were indeed sales he lost by having someone else make copies of his book. How different is that from 10 people pirating his book to read by themselves? I get that people are frustrated by not being able to afford stuff, but feeling entitled to own it anyway isn’t really the solution. Telling creators that you will enjoy their work only if it’s free? Doesn’t sound all that enlightened to me. Telling creators that they should like the word of mouth publicity and “exposure”? That’s a way to cheat creators out of paying for their work. Not wanting to pay for something is no excuse.
No special insights, I just like comics.
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