Piracy poll

What's your stance on digital piracy, in general?

  • I have or currently download pirated music, movies, and/or games.

    Votes: 24 70.6%

  • I don't directly support piracy, but I see no harm in it.

    Votes: 2 5.9%

  • Either way, I don't really care.

    Votes: 5 14.7%

  • I'm against piracy, but I don't actively condemn it.

    Votes: 3 8.8%

  • I fully disagree with the practice of piracy, and legal action should be taken against pirates.

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Total voters
    34
InVerse said:
I probably have over 10,000 retro ROMs, but I bet I've actually played a large chunk of them at least once or twice. Mostly, I have them for when I get bored and go searching for a new hacking project, or so that I already have them on hand when someone else releases a hack that sounds interesting.

Now, as for music... I have a habit of downloading entire discographies at a time, so I do have quite a bit of music that I've never listened to. I have several albums recommended by people that I haven't got around to listening to yet, I've got albums by bands who's other albums I liked that I haven't listened to yet and I've got random shit who's title's just sounded interesting but I don't know anything about it that I haven't listened to yet. But while back, I built a playlist in Songbird that contains all of the albums I haven't listened to yet, so I'm trying to clear at least one or two albums off of it each weekend.
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I'm in the same position as far as the roms are concerned, but music I only dl when it's something older and harder to find. I'm not a big fan of most of the music out nowadays...the most recent CD I purchased was Will Smith's Lost And Found.
 
The 9th Sage said:
That's what I'm talking about. I won't judge, but with the Wii's USB Loader for example...am I really the only one who uses it only because it's convenient (well, and for improved load times in some titles)? :erm:
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Not the same thing, but I modded my PSP specifically so I could play my PS1 titles on it. Although, it didn't take long for me to put things, such as S/NES ROMs, which I didn't own, on it.

As for me, I got in trouble for downloading movies once, and haven't done it since, but I noticed that when I was "pirating" movies, I spent 100-300 dollars a month on movies (same with music) and now I might spend 20 bucks a month on movies. Part of that is because Blockbuster Online started sucking really bad after I got caught, but mostly it was because of how I downloaded movies. Maybe once in awhile, I'd download a movie because I was bored and too lazy to go to Blockbuster or someplace that sells DVDs, but usually I'd download something I couldn't find, then go rent or buy the sequel, or a movie starring the same actor, or directed by the same guy, and so on. So the lack of piracy cut my spending habits by over 90%. And, really, the stats on illegal downloading shows pretty similar numbers. The most conservative view shows that there's no net losses from illegal downloading, and some studies show that piracy causes net gains in sales.

Either way, the business model has fundamentally changed and the RIAA is dying. I bet there's no "major labels" within 20 years. And not because of piracy, but because modern tech advances render them effectively useless. Thanks Nine Inch Nails and Radiohead!
 
The thing is this wouldn't happen if the media and customer experience was better. Install a game or Operating system 5 times and you no longer own it even though you payed out the nose to get it. Thats a lode of bull!

Who's to say you even owned it in the first place. In my humble opinion DRM is stealing, You bought it they took it. Now you own a shiny cup holder. Meaning the publisher wins your money for nothing and allot of the time the creator only sees but 1% of that cash anyway, So I say Keelhaul em!
 
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DRM doesn't equal stealing (unless you mean it stealing customer's rights at times) but yeah, I don't like DRM either. Actually, I only mention this because strangely I still like the service Steam. In that case, I can at least back up what I've bought and downloaded easily, and I tend to get really awesome deals on there (I would never pay $40 for a downloaded game though even if it is new).

It kind of makes me wonder what you all think of things like Steam and the Wii Shop Channel (PSN, XBLA, whatever) since they are DRM'd, technically.
 
I've had bad experiences with DRM / Steam.
On steam my account was completely removed for some reason with about $200 worth of games (keys are no longer valid) and no refund, and they never give me a state answer as to why and as far as I know I did not violate any of the terms. EA Games... enough said there.

So my attempt at explaining as to why I find drm to be stealing (Which was my opinion and based on personal experience and does not express the views of CBS) and my general mood toads it. But I also like steam for its convenience when its working anyways. I got carried away with my last post, this subject gets me excited. :regret:

I have no thoughts on Wii shopping channel, psn, xbla, etc. Due to having no experience with them of any kind. I guess my rant was about steam really.
 
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I can't recall any really bad experiences I've had with DRM, but I still pour scorn over the concept because it seems plainly obvious to me that experiencing such an problem is a matter of when rather than if with the current system.
 
I Think that Piracy can be bad but not always. I believe that company s have the right to charge for a product they have produced and if you want to download it for free just because you don't want to pay for it for whatever reason you are wrong. the company has the right to seek protection and retribution against you. That being said, I believe that if that retribution harms innocent user's or the punishment doesn't match the true scope and intent of the crime than the companys are wrong.

I think one area where the company is wrong is with regard to many record labels suing for massive amounts of money for what is apparently a small number of downloaded songs that where gotten for personal listening pleasure.

This I believe isn't about protecting there product but more about making money and strong arming people as there products continue to decline and are not as lucrative anymore.

One area where the pirates where wrong was with regard to the pirate bay. the guys that run that outfit got what they deserved for propping up piracy with no real legitimate defensible position for doing so and there arrogant insulting attitude only hurt themselves and others who download protected content for reasonable legitimate purposes. there needs to be a middle ground where companys and the people have a mutual respect for one another and there positions.

I for one am not innocent I have pirated for both the right reasons and the wrong ones as well.

some examples of the right reason to pirate are, to get a new copy of a game you already own but doesn't work because of a scratched disk or because you don't want to have to put the cd in the drive and be treated like a potential criminal every time I try and run a game I already own.

Downloading games that will never conceivably make a company money anymore is a gray area as far as piracy is concerned. While technically wrong if it harms no one I don't see the problem. Emulation falls into this category.

Another gray area is if you can honestly say that you wouldn't have gotten what you pirated had it not been free. In that case there is no real lost sale and there for no harm. The problem is, how many of you can honestly say that?

The wrong reasons are just to steal because you want something and would have bought it if not for it being available to pirate. Or, to make available for others to pirate. This doesn't include being on a P2P network if you weren't the first to upload it and your intent was to download not to distribute. it was the software's intent to distribute. you just simply wanted what you are downloading.

This is a complicated issue with many angles. ultimately I don't know who is more right or wrong but if I had to guess I would say 80 to 90 percent of piracy falls under bad piracy and for that there is no excuse and you are simply hurting the existence and affordability of the very things you seek to pirate.

We don't have to agree on this subject but lets at least be honest about it. I myself am guilty of bad piracy and seek to be a better person. I pledge to try and be respectful of legitimate copyright so-long as copyright holders are respectful of me. I hope you will as well.

The Internet is powerful and as wielders of this power we should be responsible with it.
 
i am with the lead singer of NiN. we are gonna get it either way, so whjy bother trying to make us buy it, just let us take it.
Even the group Evanescence agrees, if you can't buy it download it.
 
The way I see it, if it's something I like I want to buy it to support that artist, or that anime series, or whatever. For example...I have tons and tons of Bleach fansubs (and intend to keep on watching the fansub). I also have most of the Bleach box sets that have been released though.
 
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