A basic principle of economics is elasticity of demand, which means that people will buy more of something if it's cheaper and less of something if it's more ex

A basic principle of economics is elasticity of demand, which means that people will buy more of something if it's cheaper and less of something if it's more expensive. Piracy "loss" estimates from publishing cartels pretend that elasticity of demand does not exist and assume that anyone who would copy an intangible good at a price of $0 would pay whatever price the publishing cartel demanded if the $0 option was not available. While this may be true in the very narrow case of monopoly software products used by businesses in their line of trade, it's absolutely not true for commodity consumer goods. Very, very few people who have collected a few thousand movies (etc), at a price of $0, would have anywhere as large a collection if they were forced to pay cartel prices for each title. At the absolute best, the cartel belief that they are entitled to full profits from every copy made is in complete ignorance of several hundred years of economic theory. At worst, it's a lie. Anti-piracy enforcement is not about profit. It's about being vindictive for its own sake.