3 ms·

I agree with this. A friend of mine is an avid pirate and is often the first one to recommend to me some new book/TV show/movie, which in quite a few cases has

I agree with this. A friend of mine is an avid pirate and is often the first one to recommend to me some new book/TV show/movie, which in quite a few cases has led to me buying a ticket or a paperback etc. I've also then shared my thoughts about the media I've consumed with others, and they also bought tickets! In my friend group, one dude downloading Into The Spiderverse led to six of us seeing it in theaters. This is obviously anecdotal, but it's always seemed to me that piracy is almost free advertising in some cases (though obviously not universally.)

webmaven 6y ago
> This is obviously anecdotal, but it's always seemed to me that piracy is almost free advertising in some cases (though obviously not universally.) Tim O'Reilly wrote a post in 2002 titled "Piracy is Progressive Taxation"[0]. Basically, the conclusion he came to after analyzing the data is that on average, piracy stimulates demand enough for net gain in sales for publishers, but it isn't distributed evenly: works in the fat head (eg. bestsellers, blockbusters, etc.) see a very small net loss (ie. for the most popular content piracy may displace sales a bit), but for everyone else it is a net gain, and the gain is bigger the less popular the content is. [0] https://www.oreilly.com/content/piracy-is-progressive-taxation-and-other-thoughts-on-the-evolution-of-online-distribution/ https://www.oreilly.com/content/piracy-is-progressive-taxati...
jerrysievert 6y ago
> In my friend group, one dude downloading Into The Spiderverse led to six of us seeing it in theaters. and this is different than "paid influencers" how? oh, well I guess in the former, it's an interested fan, and in the latter it's a known commodity that likely doesn't even like what they're reading/watching.
Mromson 6y ago
This heavily reminds me of when Artists are offered to "get paid in exposure".

webmaven 6y ago

> This is obviously anecdotal, but it's always seemed to me that piracy is almost free advertising in some cases (though obviously not universally.) Tim O'Reilly wrote a post in 2002 titled "Piracy is Progressive Taxation"[0]. Basically, the conclusion he came to after analyzing the data is that on average, piracy stimulates demand enough for net gain in sales for publishers, but it isn't distributed evenly: works in the fat head (eg. bestsellers, blockbusters, etc.) see a very small net loss (ie. for the most popular content piracy may displace sales a bit), but for everyone else it is a net gain, and the gain is bigger the less popular the content is. [0] https://www.oreilly.com/content/piracy-is-progressive-taxation-and-other-thoughts-on-the-evolution-of-online-distribution/ https://www.oreilly.com/content/piracy-is-progressive-taxati...

jerrysievert 6y ago

> In my friend group, one dude downloading Into The Spiderverse led to six of us seeing it in theaters. and this is different than "paid influencers" how? oh, well I guess in the former, it's an interested fan, and in the latter it's a known commodity that likely doesn't even like what they're reading/watching.

Mromson 6y ago

This heavily reminds me of when Artists are offered to "get paid in exposure".