6 ms·

Most pirates say they'd pay for legal downloads

12 points by froo 16y ago

sharan 16y ago
There is some level of Bradley Effect to take in to account here. As http://madepublishing.com/wp/2010/04/psychology_of_free/ http://madepublishing.com/wp/2010/04/psychology_of_free/ pointed out a few days back on HN, it's very unlikely that people will make the effort of thinking about the transaction and pulling out their wallets for a micropayment when a free, and equally good option is available another click away.
- noss 16y ago
  I was not familiar with http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bradley_effect http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bradley_effect so I had to look it up.
- covercash 16y ago
  when a free, and equally good option is available another click away Which is why a better looking, faster downloading, reasonably priced option would probably convert a good chunk of the pirates. People are willing to pay if they see value in it.
- daniel02216 16y ago
  That's why there should be a subscription option so the barrier of a micropayment disappears. I'd pay a subscription fee for (for example) unlimited TV shows and movies from iTunes, but I don't buy shows on iTunes because they cost $2 a piece (and they're DRMed, but that's a different matter).
roel_v 16y ago
I'm more interested in a study on stated vs observed behaviour re: paying for downloads. It's one thing to say that you'd pay, it's another to actually do so.
- barrkel 16y ago
  Don't forget that people already pay for their internet connection; this is existence proof they are willing to pay for access to this media (not that it goes to the producers). I sometimes wonder if it wouldn't be better to simply tax internet subscription revenue, and divide up the proceeds according to download statistics.
  - Pheter 16y ago
    Sure, paying for an internet connection means that they are willing to pay for access to media, but that could be because there is no alternative. If there was a way to 'pirate' an internet connection then what's to say they wouldn't do that too? And taxing internet subscription revenue is a terrible idea. Many people who pay for an internet connection do not pirate media, and in fact don't rarely purchase media whether physical or digital. Taxing these people for something that they don't want is unfair. Piracy is something that will always be around but the way to tackle it, imho, is to make obtaining it legally a more attractive option. Steam is a step in the right direction; if you pay for a game then you get a number of benefits that you otherwise wouldn't have if you pirated it.
    - barrkel 16y ago
      I believe taxing subscription revenue would be more economically efficient than almost any micropayments architecture conceivable. I also don't think it's necessarily unfair on the whole; for example, consumer accounts with download caps may be taxed differently depending on the size of the cap. It's hard for most consumers to get near their bandwidth caps without consuming large amounts of media. And if there are other uses, e.g. remote work over VPNs, specific contracts with remote locations, etc., such traffic could be exempted from the taxable cap. One thing I'm pretty sure of: trying to sell information (i.e. bits) along the same lines as historical tokens (DVDs, CDs etc.) is doomed to failure. Steam comes with several major drawbacks: you need to be online regularly to log in, you have to put up with a client on every machine, forced advertising, higher prices than the shrinkwrapped box (the case here in the UK), etc. It's also a single point of failure in a business sense - size or past profitability is no guarantee against overreach or future bankruptcy, and the more eggs you have in the Steam basket, the more you have to lose when (and it will eventually) it goes away. Re pirating internet access: that's inherently different, because (most) information is a non-rivalrous good, while access to a network pipe is rivalrous.
jessor 16y ago
Not to say that I'm a pirate cough, but I do think there's a lot of money to make from the usual media pirate. For instance, I find myself buying from bandcamp a lot lately and if there were a good platform to watch my favorite series DRM-free I'd gladly pay. I like to think that others would, too. (I don't live in the US). Personally I think DRM is one of the biggest cause of the "problems" the industry is having.
yason 16y ago
While downloading pirated movies is easier and faster than renting a DVD, downloading pirated movies could be easier and faster, too. It takes a lot of time to find a good torrent and it can take a lot of time to download it, unless it's hot. This means media companies could make the experience much better. I would gladly pay 2€ per movie if I could legally download it from the legal torrent listings of the movie company's video rental site instead of trying out several Pirate Bay hits in parallel. The resulting video would be a simple .avi file that you can view on any player without any DRM involved. If I can't finish the movie right away, I could do that next week. (I already do the same with rental DVDs.) Thanks to torrents, they wouldn't even have to pay much for the upload bandwidth. Some people would keep the copies, some people would even distribute the copies. But this is nothing new, it happens already. However, I wouldn't keep a copy for too long because I don't want to waste time and effort in storing copies of movies that I can redownload for another 2€. It's my guess that most people would fall into this category. It's all about how easy the access to the movies is. If legal access is easier than illegal access, then there may be a thousand Pirate Bays and people will still use the legal source.

12 points by froo 16y ago

There is some level of Bradley Effect to take in to account here. As http://madepublishing.com/wp/2010/04/psychology_of_free/ http://madepublishing.com/wp/2010/04/psychology_of_free/ pointed out a few days back on HN, it's very unlikely that people will make the effort of thinking about the transaction and pulling out their wallets for a micropayment when a free, and equally good option is available another click away.

noss 16y ago
I was not familiar with http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bradley_effect http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bradley_effect so I had to look it up.
covercash 16y ago
when a free, and equally good option is available another click away Which is why a better looking, faster downloading, reasonably priced option would probably convert a good chunk of the pirates. People are willing to pay if they see value in it.
daniel02216 16y ago
That's why there should be a subscription option so the barrier of a micropayment disappears. I'd pay a subscription fee for (for example) unlimited TV shows and movies from iTunes, but I don't buy shows on iTunes because they cost $2 a piece (and they're DRMed, but that's a different matter).

roel_v 16y ago

I'm more interested in a study on stated vs observed behaviour re: paying for downloads. It's one thing to say that you'd pay, it's another to actually do so.

barrkel 16y ago
Don't forget that people already pay for their internet connection; this is existence proof they are willing to pay for access to this media (not that it goes to the producers). I sometimes wonder if it wouldn't be better to simply tax internet subscription revenue, and divide up the proceeds according to download statistics.
- Pheter 16y ago
  Sure, paying for an internet connection means that they are willing to pay for access to media, but that could be because there is no alternative. If there was a way to 'pirate' an internet connection then what's to say they wouldn't do that too? And taxing internet subscription revenue is a terrible idea. Many people who pay for an internet connection do not pirate media, and in fact don't rarely purchase media whether physical or digital. Taxing these people for something that they don't want is unfair. Piracy is something that will always be around but the way to tackle it, imho, is to make obtaining it legally a more attractive option. Steam is a step in the right direction; if you pay for a game then you get a number of benefits that you otherwise wouldn't have if you pirated it.
  - barrkel 16y ago
    I believe taxing subscription revenue would be more economically efficient than almost any micropayments architecture conceivable. I also don't think it's necessarily unfair on the whole; for example, consumer accounts with download caps may be taxed differently depending on the size of the cap. It's hard for most consumers to get near their bandwidth caps without consuming large amounts of media. And if there are other uses, e.g. remote work over VPNs, specific contracts with remote locations, etc., such traffic could be exempted from the taxable cap. One thing I'm pretty sure of: trying to sell information (i.e. bits) along the same lines as historical tokens (DVDs, CDs etc.) is doomed to failure. Steam comes with several major drawbacks: you need to be online regularly to log in, you have to put up with a client on every machine, forced advertising, higher prices than the shrinkwrapped box (the case here in the UK), etc. It's also a single point of failure in a business sense - size or past profitability is no guarantee against overreach or future bankruptcy, and the more eggs you have in the Steam basket, the more you have to lose when (and it will eventually) it goes away. Re pirating internet access: that's inherently different, because (most) information is a non-rivalrous good, while access to a network pipe is rivalrous.

jessor 16y ago

Not to say that I'm a pirate cough, but I do think there's a lot of money to make from the usual media pirate. For instance, I find myself buying from bandcamp a lot lately and if there were a good platform to watch my favorite series DRM-free I'd gladly pay. I like to think that others would, too. (I don't live in the US). Personally I think DRM is one of the biggest cause of the "problems" the industry is having.

yason 16y ago

While downloading pirated movies is easier and faster than renting a DVD, downloading pirated movies could be easier and faster, too. It takes a lot of time to find a good torrent and it can take a lot of time to download it, unless it's hot. This means media companies could make the experience much better. I would gladly pay 2€ per movie if I could legally download it from the legal torrent listings of the movie company's video rental site instead of trying out several Pirate Bay hits in parallel. The resulting video would be a simple .avi file that you can view on any player without any DRM involved. If I can't finish the movie right away, I could do that next week. (I already do the same with rental DVDs.) Thanks to torrents, they wouldn't even have to pay much for the upload bandwidth. Some people would keep the copies, some people would even distribute the copies. But this is nothing new, it happens already. However, I wouldn't keep a copy for too long because I don't want to waste time and effort in storing copies of movies that I can redownload for another 2€. It's my guess that most people would fall into this category. It's all about how easy the access to the movies is. If legal access is easier than illegal access, then there may be a thousand Pirate Bays and people will still use the legal source.