4 ms·

The problem is that piracy destabilizes the price of whatever is being pirated. Digital goods are only worth what people are willing to pay and if everyone kno

by rick888 15y ago

The problem is that piracy destabilizes the price of whatever is being pirated. Digital goods are only worth what people are willing to pay and if everyone knows they can go to thepiratebay and get it ford free, it will be $0. So even though companies know they will never win the piracy fight, it sends a message that it's not okay to download it for free (as opposed to doing nothing).

demallien 15y ago
Except that that's not true - I would cite iTunes as a counter-example - easy (and reasonably-priced) trumps free.
- teamonkey 15y ago
  The pay-for download market has been in decline for the last few years.
  - Fargren 15y ago
    What's your source on that?
- rick888 15y ago
  yet, piracy is still rampant. I just wish the pirates would admit that it has nothing to do with "freedom" and everything to do with being selfish.
  - tomp 15y ago
    Of course they are. Just like the content industry is. Everybody is just being selfish. You are still assuming that all piracy (= unauthorized copying = disrespect of copyright) is wrong. While it is illegal, it doesn't automatically mean that it is also illegitimate. What if someone is too poor to spend money on legal music? Nobody loses anything by him pirating music, and he gains something (entertainment), so overall, the outcome is positive.
eftpotrm 15y ago
No. I don't deny there is a demographic that will always obtain for free what it can but it's a lot below 100%. Witness the documented effect of services like NetFlix on piracy levels or the warnings in software such as PDFCreator or Paint.Net that if you paid money you were conned. For whatever reason, some people will pay for the freely available. Not to mention that, very often, material via sources such as TPB is of lower quality - inexpertly cut off at the start or finish, periodic glitches, whatever. Plus it's hardly got high availability and consistent cataloguing. People will pay for a reliable, quality service.
- rick888 15y ago
  yes. "For whatever reason, some people will pay for the freely available." If piracy wasn't stopped and it was advertised everywhere that in all the search engines that you could get commercial software for free, these numbers would be very close to 100%. "Not to mention that, very often, material via sources such as TPB is of lower quality - inexpertly cut off at the start or finish, periodic glitches, whatever. Plus it's hardly got high availability and consistent cataloguing. People will pay for a reliable, quality service." TPB has a search box. software is a perfect copy, music is usually near perfect, and many times the movies (not always), are ripped right from the studio or DVD.
  - cookiecaper 15y ago
    I disagree strongly. The Pirate Bay is infested with malware, fake torrents, media monitoring companies, and lots of other undesirable stuff. It is difficult to navigate and use. Here's the way that record companies should make money: $20/mo for access to that company's entire catalog, unlimited download, well-organized, high-quality rips, vetted torrents (i.e., uploaded by the company itself, malware free), etc. If you've ever used one of the big private music trackers they make an excellent prototype for a for-pay service that would allow the rights holders to rake in even more money than they currently make. They were eventually able to figure it out with VHS, I don't know why it takes them so long with the internet.
    - 15y ago
danssig 15y ago
If pirating were at least as convenient as buying, then sure. But pirating is a lot of trouble. You have to have custom software that serves no other purpose than this. You may have to hunt for codecs. You have to make sure you're getting the right thing. If it's a foreign film (90% of what I view) you have to dig around for subtitles which are often very poorly written and/or don't sync with the film properly. Pirating is a pain and I think most people would pay something to avoid having to do it. The question is just how much and how convenient it is to do so.
- eru 15y ago
  You can also learn the foreign language in question.
  - danssig 15y ago
    I was arguing that I will pay for convenience and your solution is that I learn Mandarin?
    - eru 15y ago
      You can pay for convenience in some situations, and put in more effort in others.
WorkingDead 15y ago
The price isn't being destabilized. The reproduction cost of digital goods IS zero. The initial creation cost of that first version is quite significant however. Copyright laws are meant to protect that initial investment for a period of time so that huge creation cost plus a reasonable profit can be made. This limited monopoly is the incentive to create. In return for that government granted monopoly period, the copyrighted work then goes into the public domain where market forces and competition determine the new price of the good or service. This is the public's incentive to grant a temporary monopoly. Piracy is running rampant because the laws have been manipulated and skewed in favor of the content generators so their work get all the protections but no longer ever fall into the public domain. The collective public thus no longer have incentive to follow copyright laws and have quite a bit of incentive to violate and disregard them as totally and as quickly as possible.
- rick888 15y ago
  "The price isn't being destabilized. The reproduction cost of digital goods IS zero." It was never about the reproduction, it's about the original and the "value" to the user. If they know they can get it for free, they will download it for free. How is this not destabilizing? Currency is just ink and paper and pretty much costs nothing to reproduce, yet it has a value. "Piracy is running rampant because the laws have been manipulated and skewed in favor of the content generators so their work get all the protections but no longer ever fall into the public domain." Right, because people that are downloading the latest Lady Ga Ga album are doing so because of these laws. Why can't people admit that they are selfish and just don't want to spend their own money because they know they can get it for free? "The collective public thus no longer have incentive to follow copyright laws and have quite a bit of incentive to violate and disregard them as totally and as quickly as possible." Piracy is running rampant because: 1) The Internet is now mainstream and it's very easy to tell mass amounts of people how to download something for free. 2) The risk involved with being caught for pirated materials is almost non-existent. It's funny because when the discussion is about open source and the GNU license, opinions quickly change. Using software against the spirit of the license is "theft" and shouldn't be allowed. Even though it does nothing to harm the original content creator (the original open source work is still there and open, you just don't get the changes). Months ago when there were discussions about the Thesis wordpress theme, there was nearly a witch hunt on HN. This is why it's difficult to take any of these discussions seriously. It's all about politics and has nothing to do with freedom or rights.
rmc 15y ago
DVDs and music cds are still being sold for >0, and it's more than 10 years since Napster. These facts are inconsistent with your theory, so like a good scientist, your theory (that piracy will makes prices = 0) has been disproved

by rick888 15y ago

demallien 15y ago

Except that that's not true - I would cite iTunes as a counter-example - easy (and reasonably-priced) trumps free.

teamonkey 15y ago
The pay-for download market has been in decline for the last few years.
- Fargren 15y ago
  What's your source on that?
rick888 15y ago
yet, piracy is still rampant. I just wish the pirates would admit that it has nothing to do with "freedom" and everything to do with being selfish.
- tomp 15y ago
  Of course they are. Just like the content industry is. Everybody is just being selfish. You are still assuming that all piracy (= unauthorized copying = disrespect of copyright) is wrong. While it is illegal, it doesn't automatically mean that it is also illegitimate. What if someone is too poor to spend money on legal music? Nobody loses anything by him pirating music, and he gains something (entertainment), so overall, the outcome is positive.

eftpotrm 15y ago

No. I don't deny there is a demographic that will always obtain for free what it can but it's a lot below 100%. Witness the documented effect of services like NetFlix on piracy levels or the warnings in software such as PDFCreator or Paint.Net that if you paid money you were conned. For whatever reason, some people will pay for the freely available. Not to mention that, very often, material via sources such as TPB is of lower quality - inexpertly cut off at the start or finish, periodic glitches, whatever. Plus it's hardly got high availability and consistent cataloguing. People will pay for a reliable, quality service.

rick888 15y ago
yes. "For whatever reason, some people will pay for the freely available." If piracy wasn't stopped and it was advertised everywhere that in all the search engines that you could get commercial software for free, these numbers would be very close to 100%. "Not to mention that, very often, material via sources such as TPB is of lower quality - inexpertly cut off at the start or finish, periodic glitches, whatever. Plus it's hardly got high availability and consistent cataloguing. People will pay for a reliable, quality service." TPB has a search box. software is a perfect copy, music is usually near perfect, and many times the movies (not always), are ripped right from the studio or DVD.
- cookiecaper 15y ago
  I disagree strongly. The Pirate Bay is infested with malware, fake torrents, media monitoring companies, and lots of other undesirable stuff. It is difficult to navigate and use. Here's the way that record companies should make money: $20/mo for access to that company's entire catalog, unlimited download, well-organized, high-quality rips, vetted torrents (i.e., uploaded by the company itself, malware free), etc. If you've ever used one of the big private music trackers they make an excellent prototype for a for-pay service that would allow the rights holders to rake in even more money than they currently make. They were eventually able to figure it out with VHS, I don't know why it takes them so long with the internet.
  - 15y ago

danssig 15y ago

If pirating were at least as convenient as buying, then sure. But pirating is a lot of trouble. You have to have custom software that serves no other purpose than this. You may have to hunt for codecs. You have to make sure you're getting the right thing. If it's a foreign film (90% of what I view) you have to dig around for subtitles which are often very poorly written and/or don't sync with the film properly. Pirating is a pain and I think most people would pay something to avoid having to do it. The question is just how much and how convenient it is to do so.

eru 15y ago
You can also learn the foreign language in question.
- danssig 15y ago
  I was arguing that I will pay for convenience and your solution is that I learn Mandarin?
  - eru 15y ago
    You can pay for convenience in some situations, and put in more effort in others.

WorkingDead 15y ago

The price isn't being destabilized. The reproduction cost of digital goods IS zero. The initial creation cost of that first version is quite significant however. Copyright laws are meant to protect that initial investment for a period of time so that huge creation cost plus a reasonable profit can be made. This limited monopoly is the incentive to create. In return for that government granted monopoly period, the copyrighted work then goes into the public domain where market forces and competition determine the new price of the good or service. This is the public's incentive to grant a temporary monopoly. Piracy is running rampant because the laws have been manipulated and skewed in favor of the content generators so their work get all the protections but no longer ever fall into the public domain. The collective public thus no longer have incentive to follow copyright laws and have quite a bit of incentive to violate and disregard them as totally and as quickly as possible.

rick888 15y ago
"The price isn't being destabilized. The reproduction cost of digital goods IS zero." It was never about the reproduction, it's about the original and the "value" to the user. If they know they can get it for free, they will download it for free. How is this not destabilizing? Currency is just ink and paper and pretty much costs nothing to reproduce, yet it has a value. "Piracy is running rampant because the laws have been manipulated and skewed in favor of the content generators so their work get all the protections but no longer ever fall into the public domain." Right, because people that are downloading the latest Lady Ga Ga album are doing so because of these laws. Why can't people admit that they are selfish and just don't want to spend their own money because they know they can get it for free? "The collective public thus no longer have incentive to follow copyright laws and have quite a bit of incentive to violate and disregard them as totally and as quickly as possible." Piracy is running rampant because: 1) The Internet is now mainstream and it's very easy to tell mass amounts of people how to download something for free. 2) The risk involved with being caught for pirated materials is almost non-existent. It's funny because when the discussion is about open source and the GNU license, opinions quickly change. Using software against the spirit of the license is "theft" and shouldn't be allowed. Even though it does nothing to harm the original content creator (the original open source work is still there and open, you just don't get the changes). Months ago when there were discussions about the Thesis wordpress theme, there was nearly a witch hunt on HN. This is why it's difficult to take any of these discussions seriously. It's all about politics and has nothing to do with freedom or rights.

rmc 15y ago

DVDs and music cds are still being sold for >0, and it's more than 10 years since Napster. These facts are inconsistent with your theory, so like a good scientist, your theory (that piracy will makes prices = 0) has been disproved