3 ms·

Popular things that people want are stolen more often... so what? Correlation is not causation. Piracy is theft, but it's pretty minor shouldn't be a felony an

Popular things that people want are stolen more often... so what? Correlation is not causation. Piracy is theft, but it's pretty minor shouldn't be a felony and the harm is a dollar or two at most for movies and music per user and shouldn't be harshly penalized and thus probably isn't worth the studios or attorneys time to bother with.

FireInsight 3y ago
Piracy is not theft, it does not take away the item from it's "owner" or rightsholder. It's not even using a paid service without paying, because privacy is provided for free or in exchange for ad revenue by different people than who provide the paid services. Really, the only thing digital piracy is is digital piracy; consuming content that it's rightsholder would want you to pay for before accessing.
lazide 3y ago
The issue of course is for the studio, any piracy is sign of a huge problem they need to clamp down on (leaking potential revenue). And easy to blame missed numbers/targets. And they have money, and usually a coherent voice. Where for the audience, any amount of piracy which doesn’t visibly and reliably kill new movies they want to watch is perfectly fine. Even desirable.
LocalH 3y ago
Piracy is not theft. Theft requires the owner be deprived of the thieved property. Piracy does not do that. If a pirate duplicates a work, no lawful owner of a physical copy, nor rights holder, is deprived of that work. The rightsholders still have it. They can still legally duplicate it and sell it. Piracy is copyright infringement, which is a completely separate legal and moral concept. My question to you is - if I could duplicate a physical object you own, with no harm or deprivation suffered by you, should that be a crime?
- lesuorac 3y ago
  Well this is splitting hairs imo. Assault isn't theft either but Piracy and Assault are still both crimes. Somebody who sells say photographs is _harmed_ by you just using your phone to take a picture print it out later without paying them anything. It's their livelihood. However, whether is the crime of piracy worth the current penalties? No. They're excessive and that's what the parent was saying.
  - deleted 3y ago
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- chung8123 3y ago
  Piracy is depriving the content owner the value of their creation. I don't understand how people justify piracy vs just not watching the content. It is clear there is value derived by watching (or you wouldn't consume the content), and you are not paying the owner, you are in fact taking from the owner.
- BariumBlue 3y ago
  There can be harm, as piracy can theoretically reduce demand for the premium non-pirated products Reduced demand leads to reduced income/revenue. If someone did some action that directly definitively reduced your income, bringing you from say 130k to 110k, that would 100% qualify as "harm or deprivation".

FireInsight 3y ago

Piracy is not theft, it does not take away the item from it's "owner" or rightsholder. It's not even using a paid service without paying, because privacy is provided for free or in exchange for ad revenue by different people than who provide the paid services. Really, the only thing digital piracy is is digital piracy; consuming content that it's rightsholder would want you to pay for before accessing.

lazide 3y ago

The issue of course is for the studio, any piracy is sign of a huge problem they need to clamp down on (leaking potential revenue). And easy to blame missed numbers/targets. And they have money, and usually a coherent voice. Where for the audience, any amount of piracy which doesn’t visibly and reliably kill new movies they want to watch is perfectly fine. Even desirable.

LocalH 3y ago

Piracy is not theft. Theft requires the owner be deprived of the thieved property. Piracy does not do that. If a pirate duplicates a work, no lawful owner of a physical copy, nor rights holder, is deprived of that work. The rightsholders still have it. They can still legally duplicate it and sell it. Piracy is copyright infringement, which is a completely separate legal and moral concept. My question to you is - if I could duplicate a physical object you own, with no harm or deprivation suffered by you, should that be a crime?

lesuorac 3y ago
Well this is splitting hairs imo. Assault isn't theft either but Piracy and Assault are still both crimes. Somebody who sells say photographs is _harmed_ by you just using your phone to take a picture print it out later without paying them anything. It's their livelihood. However, whether is the crime of piracy worth the current penalties? No. They're excessive and that's what the parent was saying.
- deleted 3y ago
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chung8123 3y ago
Piracy is depriving the content owner the value of their creation. I don't understand how people justify piracy vs just not watching the content. It is clear there is value derived by watching (or you wouldn't consume the content), and you are not paying the owner, you are in fact taking from the owner.
BariumBlue 3y ago
There can be harm, as piracy can theoretically reduce demand for the premium non-pirated products Reduced demand leads to reduced income/revenue. If someone did some action that directly definitively reduced your income, bringing you from say 130k to 110k, that would 100% qualify as "harm or deprivation".