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I wanted to watch a special by my favourite comedian Stewart Lee. It's only available on BBC iPlayer and most VPNs I have tried don't seem to work with it. Is i

by typon 3y ago

I wanted to watch a special by my favourite comedian Stewart Lee. It's only available on BBC iPlayer and most VPNs I have tried don't seem to work with it. Is it really unethical for me to torrent that special that I literally can't pay for even if I wanted to? Information wants to get out (almost like a gas), and as long as it's suppressed, torrenting will remain relevant.

Avamander 3y ago
It's even more "fun" when it's the same streaming service, but your region is not amongst the blessed ones. One still has to pay the same price for the subscription as those that get a better catalogue, not to mention the differences in purchasing power. I struggle to see how avoiding in some sense unethical business practices is (as) unethical. EUIPO nicely published a study recently that very clearly says that it's primarily a service and economic issue. The amount of available service providers and the amount of piracy heavily correlated.
WendyTheWillow 3y ago
Yes, it is unethical to pirate content you don’t own the rights to. The problem comes from the false belief of entitlement to the media. The common argument that it’s the “only way” to obey certain content forgets the alternative, which is to not consume that content. You aren’t entitled to watch what you want. Obviously this is closer to “littering” than it is to murder, but technically it’s unethical.
- kps 3y ago
  > Obviously this is closer to “littering” than it is to murder Littering leaves behind something that costs money (effort) to deal with. Trespassing is a better analogy: temporarily using something that doesn't belong to you, in a way that is undetectable if no one catches you in the act.
- executesorder66 3y ago
  That's debatable. It's illegal to torrent, but not necessarily unethical. Is it really unethical to make an identical copy of a file? How would you feel if I made an identical copy of your car and drove off with the copy? Furthermore the people involved in making the content put a lot of time and effort into making this work of art. (Whether it is good art is for the perciever to decide) and now the distributor is preventing audiences from viewing/accessing the art for no good reason. Is that ethical? I see torrenting as a case of civil disobedience. Yes it is not legal, but it IS ethical. It is protesting stupid laws and policies. When distributers don't let you legally access content, they should get fucked over, and people should pirate it to send a message: "We would have paid for this, but you didn't want to let us. So fuck you, we will get it for free then. See how much blocking legal access helps you."
- nitwit005 3y ago
  The justification given for copyright law is typically to "promote the arts". In a situation where they refuse to sell the product, that justification is essentially gone. If you violate a law that doesn't benefit anyone, who is harmed?
- beej71 3y ago
  If someone is unwilling to pay for the media under any circumstances, the damage to the "victim" is zero. So it's actually infinitely far better than even littering.
- kilolima 3y ago
  It's unethical if the content owner expects you to pay for bandwidth, computing, and local storage, and then also charge you to make a perfect digital copy that you are entirely paying the costs for.
- keernan 3y ago
  >Yes, it is unethical to pirate content you don’t own the rights to. It is difficult for me to tell from context the definition of "to pirate content" you (and others) are using. Pirating content means: using copyrighted materials to which you hold no rights for the purpose of making money. Most important to the conversation: "pirating content" does not include the act of watching a video; listening to a song; reading something; etc that is online. Just as it is not illegal to listen to a song being played in the park; or to watch a movie being broadcast against the side of a building; or to read a book left on a park bench. If you try to sell any of those things, then that is illegal. But you can listen or watch or read all you want. In the public park or the public internet. If you have something that indicates otherwise, I would be very appreciative if you would provide me the details so I can read it directly. Thank you.
- Dylan16807 3y ago
  That depends on what you think the purpose of copyright is.
- A4ET8a8uTh0 3y ago
  Humans are exceedingly adept at determining fairness and adjust their own actions to match fairness levels[1]. If you pay for something and becomes unavailable, because someone else messed up and effectively lowered the value of your purchase[2], there is a simple argument to be made that maybe lack of ethics on one side is almost negligible when compared to that of a multimillion faceless conglomerate. In other words, it may be unethical, but it is hard for me to argue that it is not warranted. [1]https://www.apa.org/news/podcasts/speaking-of-psychology/fairness https://www.apa.org/news/podcasts/speaking-of-psychology/fai... [2]https://www.polygon.com/2018/4/27/17292836/gta-4-soundtrack-removed-song-list-patch https://www.polygon.com/2018/4/27/17292836/gta-4-soundtrack-...
- graphe 3y ago
  >Yes, it is unethical to pirate content you don’t own the rights to. If I'm not entitled to media, why are they entitled to have no 'piracy' with digital technology? If you decide to spread information, don't be surprised if it spreads.
- hotnfresh 3y ago
  The ethical distance between this and littering is about as large as the one between littering and murder, though. If it’s unethical, it’s somewhere around running a stoplight that’s plainly not registering your presence and hasn’t turned for ten full minutes, with perfect straight mile-long views either way and not a car or person in sight. Not really unethical at all.
  - WendyTheWillow 3y ago
    I like the littering analogy because it's a kind of tragedy-of-the-commons problem. If everyone pirated, clearly there'd be a problem around capitalistic incentives for making intellectual property, similarly to how if everyone littered, there'd be a problem around environmental cleanliness. But I don't think most people would argue that everyone should pirate IP. That's a good follow-up question though; for those who believe pirating is ethical, do you a) believe everyone should pirate, and b) if not, what makes your pirating acceptable but other pirating unacceptable?
    - vonjuice 3y ago
      Littering is actually a terrible analogy. First of all, a place becomes littered, everyone there is affected. Piracy only hypothetically harms a select few who probably make more money you can imagine. Furthermore, in a world where everyone pirates, everyone is still free to give money. You can pirate and buy a steam game or a bandcamp album. They're not mutually exclusive. Here the littering analogy breaks down again. I don't believe "everyone should pirate", I think the model of ownership as archaic, it is trying to uphold an old model of material goods, through power alone, into a technological model. If I make a ceramic cup, and you steal it, I don't have it anymore. I can't drink my tea or look at it and smile. If you made an exact replica of it, if I find out and I'm petty maybe I'll be mad, or maybe I'll fantasize about how you were maybe gonna buy it from me, but I sure can't complain that you took my cup away from me. Being able to reproduce media at virtually no cost is a new concept. As such, it deserves new mindsets, not old models based around material goods. I believe this exposes that the new model should be one of higher trust, where customers use their money as reward, not to obtain. In regards to b) I think it's pretty simple. A steam game currently could take 20% or 2% of minimum wage based solely on where you live. There's emulated games too, what benefit, what real consequence is carried upstream to anyone that deserves it, when I take my time to find a used copy of an old game, buy a used CD reader, and rip the game legally, as opposed to two clicks from a torrent site. Show me the real harm, where in that chain is anything of consequence being done? Is it just about performing the dance that the authorities tell you to do?
- fluoridation 3y ago
  What do you mean when you say that it's "unethical"? I understand that something is "unethical" when it contravenes some code of correct behavior. I'm not sure what code is contravened in the following scenario: * Steve sells secrets for a fee. * I want to buy a secret from Steve but he refuses to sell to me specifically. * Steve sells his secret to Bob. * Bob is willing to tell Steve's secret to me for free, so he does so. It seems to me that in this scenario everyone got what they wanted. Steve got to sell his secret to Bob and not to me, and Bob and I got to learn Steve's secret. I think it would be unethical to force Steve to sell his secret to me if he doesn't want to, but I don't see what's unethical in learning his secret from someone else even if he refuses to sell it to me directly.
  - fragmede 3y ago
    Steve didn't want you to have them. Depending on what they actually are, it could be important. If you're North Korea, and they're the secret to nuclear weapons, Bob is in a lot of trouble with Steve. Or if it's Steve's mom's ashes, and you did something to her that Steve didn't like. Regardless of how you got them, you got them, when Steve didn't want you to have them. You might as well have broken into Steve's house and stolen them yourself. That you had a third party, Bob, to get you those secrets doesn't contravene the fact that Steve didn't want you to have them.
    - fluoridation 3y ago
      Of course, I used the word "secret", but it really is the wrong word. A secret is something you don't tell anyone, because you can't afford the wrong person finding out. The game we play with copyright is pretending that cultural artifacts are secrets, even though culture by definition exists in the transmission from one person to another. If Steve didn't want me to have his secret at all he shouldn't be selling it to Bob or anyone else.
  - WendyTheWillow 3y ago
    It's a fair question, but you are ethically responsible for knowingly obtaining ill-gotten goods, and pirated media violates the original purchaser's agreement with the IP owner. Basically, Bob agreed with Steve that Bob would not give anyone else the secret, and Steve only sold Bob the secret because he made that agreement, but then Bob turned around and gave it to you for free. So Bob lied, and you know Bob lied, and you benefit from Bob lying, so it's unethical. Again, all kinds of modifiers and caveats apply to the severity here. I really have little sympathy for Steve when he's a gazillionaire already, and the marginal value lost isn't meaningful enough to stop Steve from making more secrets, but technically speaking it appears to be an immoral act to pirate.
- _bohm 3y ago
  > technically it’s unethical. For some technical definition of ethicality on which I'm sure we can all agree :)
- AlexandrB 3y ago
  What does it mean to "own rights" to the distribution of information? It's effectively a restriction on everybody else's freedom of speech for the benefit of the rights holder. Whether this is a net benefit to society or not is very situational, so the ethics here are not as clear cut as you imply. > You aren’t entitled to watch what you want. The rights holder is not entitled to stop me from sending certain streams of bits in all circumstances. Edit: While calling IP "property" can be a useful abstraction in some cases, it leads you astray in others. For example, the only way to measure "losses" from piracy is as loss of potential sales since the owner is not deprived of the "property" in the process. But what are the losses when media not available in a given geography is pirated in that geography? There was no "potential revenue" that could be recognized there because the media was not for sale. Thus one could argue that the losses are precisely $0.
  - WendyTheWillow 3y ago
    The rights holder isn't entitled to stop you from doing what you like; you are entitled, however, to agree not to do things in order to obtain information. That's what pirating is based on; you've explicitly agreed not to make available content for others when you agreed to purchase the content. By providing content for pirating, you are breaking your word. Further, by consuming pirated content, you have a reasonable assumption that the person providing you with the pirated content obtained that content through deception, which ropes you in on the culpability of the ethical violation. Nobody's freedom of speech is violated because nobody has been compelled to do or say anything! Rather, you are knowingly benefitting from the deception of others.

by typon 3y ago

Avamander 3y ago

It's even more "fun" when it's the same streaming service, but your region is not amongst the blessed ones. One still has to pay the same price for the subscription as those that get a better catalogue, not to mention the differences in purchasing power. I struggle to see how avoiding in some sense unethical business practices is (as) unethical. EUIPO nicely published a study recently that very clearly says that it's primarily a service and economic issue. The amount of available service providers and the amount of piracy heavily correlated.

WendyTheWillow 3y ago

Yes, it is unethical to pirate content you don’t own the rights to. The problem comes from the false belief of entitlement to the media. The common argument that it’s the “only way” to obey certain content forgets the alternative, which is to not consume that content. You aren’t entitled to watch what you want. Obviously this is closer to “littering” than it is to murder, but technically it’s unethical.

kps 3y ago
> Obviously this is closer to “littering” than it is to murder Littering leaves behind something that costs money (effort) to deal with. Trespassing is a better analogy: temporarily using something that doesn't belong to you, in a way that is undetectable if no one catches you in the act.
executesorder66 3y ago
That's debatable. It's illegal to torrent, but not necessarily unethical. Is it really unethical to make an identical copy of a file? How would you feel if I made an identical copy of your car and drove off with the copy? Furthermore the people involved in making the content put a lot of time and effort into making this work of art. (Whether it is good art is for the perciever to decide) and now the distributor is preventing audiences from viewing/accessing the art for no good reason. Is that ethical? I see torrenting as a case of civil disobedience. Yes it is not legal, but it IS ethical. It is protesting stupid laws and policies. When distributers don't let you legally access content, they should get fucked over, and people should pirate it to send a message: "We would have paid for this, but you didn't want to let us. So fuck you, we will get it for free then. See how much blocking legal access helps you."
nitwit005 3y ago
The justification given for copyright law is typically to "promote the arts". In a situation where they refuse to sell the product, that justification is essentially gone. If you violate a law that doesn't benefit anyone, who is harmed?
beej71 3y ago
If someone is unwilling to pay for the media under any circumstances, the damage to the "victim" is zero. So it's actually infinitely far better than even littering.
kilolima 3y ago
It's unethical if the content owner expects you to pay for bandwidth, computing, and local storage, and then also charge you to make a perfect digital copy that you are entirely paying the costs for.
keernan 3y ago
>Yes, it is unethical to pirate content you don’t own the rights to. It is difficult for me to tell from context the definition of "to pirate content" you (and others) are using. Pirating content means: using copyrighted materials to which you hold no rights for the purpose of making money. Most important to the conversation: "pirating content" does not include the act of watching a video; listening to a song; reading something; etc that is online. Just as it is not illegal to listen to a song being played in the park; or to watch a movie being broadcast against the side of a building; or to read a book left on a park bench. If you try to sell any of those things, then that is illegal. But you can listen or watch or read all you want. In the public park or the public internet. If you have something that indicates otherwise, I would be very appreciative if you would provide me the details so I can read it directly. Thank you.
Dylan16807 3y ago
That depends on what you think the purpose of copyright is.
A4ET8a8uTh0 3y ago
Humans are exceedingly adept at determining fairness and adjust their own actions to match fairness levels[1]. If you pay for something and becomes unavailable, because someone else messed up and effectively lowered the value of your purchase[2], there is a simple argument to be made that maybe lack of ethics on one side is almost negligible when compared to that of a multimillion faceless conglomerate. In other words, it may be unethical, but it is hard for me to argue that it is not warranted. [1]https://www.apa.org/news/podcasts/speaking-of-psychology/fairness https://www.apa.org/news/podcasts/speaking-of-psychology/fai... [2]https://www.polygon.com/2018/4/27/17292836/gta-4-soundtrack-removed-song-list-patch https://www.polygon.com/2018/4/27/17292836/gta-4-soundtrack-...
graphe 3y ago
>Yes, it is unethical to pirate content you don’t own the rights to. If I'm not entitled to media, why are they entitled to have no 'piracy' with digital technology? If you decide to spread information, don't be surprised if it spreads.
hotnfresh 3y ago
The ethical distance between this and littering is about as large as the one between littering and murder, though. If it’s unethical, it’s somewhere around running a stoplight that’s plainly not registering your presence and hasn’t turned for ten full minutes, with perfect straight mile-long views either way and not a car or person in sight. Not really unethical at all.
- WendyTheWillow 3y ago
  I like the littering analogy because it's a kind of tragedy-of-the-commons problem. If everyone pirated, clearly there'd be a problem around capitalistic incentives for making intellectual property, similarly to how if everyone littered, there'd be a problem around environmental cleanliness. But I don't think most people would argue that everyone should pirate IP. That's a good follow-up question though; for those who believe pirating is ethical, do you a) believe everyone should pirate, and b) if not, what makes your pirating acceptable but other pirating unacceptable?
  - vonjuice 3y ago
    Littering is actually a terrible analogy. First of all, a place becomes littered, everyone there is affected. Piracy only hypothetically harms a select few who probably make more money you can imagine. Furthermore, in a world where everyone pirates, everyone is still free to give money. You can pirate and buy a steam game or a bandcamp album. They're not mutually exclusive. Here the littering analogy breaks down again. I don't believe "everyone should pirate", I think the model of ownership as archaic, it is trying to uphold an old model of material goods, through power alone, into a technological model. If I make a ceramic cup, and you steal it, I don't have it anymore. I can't drink my tea or look at it and smile. If you made an exact replica of it, if I find out and I'm petty maybe I'll be mad, or maybe I'll fantasize about how you were maybe gonna buy it from me, but I sure can't complain that you took my cup away from me. Being able to reproduce media at virtually no cost is a new concept. As such, it deserves new mindsets, not old models based around material goods. I believe this exposes that the new model should be one of higher trust, where customers use their money as reward, not to obtain. In regards to b) I think it's pretty simple. A steam game currently could take 20% or 2% of minimum wage based solely on where you live. There's emulated games too, what benefit, what real consequence is carried upstream to anyone that deserves it, when I take my time to find a used copy of an old game, buy a used CD reader, and rip the game legally, as opposed to two clicks from a torrent site. Show me the real harm, where in that chain is anything of consequence being done? Is it just about performing the dance that the authorities tell you to do?
fluoridation 3y ago
What do you mean when you say that it's "unethical"? I understand that something is "unethical" when it contravenes some code of correct behavior. I'm not sure what code is contravened in the following scenario: * Steve sells secrets for a fee. * I want to buy a secret from Steve but he refuses to sell to me specifically. * Steve sells his secret to Bob. * Bob is willing to tell Steve's secret to me for free, so he does so. It seems to me that in this scenario everyone got what they wanted. Steve got to sell his secret to Bob and not to me, and Bob and I got to learn Steve's secret. I think it would be unethical to force Steve to sell his secret to me if he doesn't want to, but I don't see what's unethical in learning his secret from someone else even if he refuses to sell it to me directly.
- fragmede 3y ago
  Steve didn't want you to have them. Depending on what they actually are, it could be important. If you're North Korea, and they're the secret to nuclear weapons, Bob is in a lot of trouble with Steve. Or if it's Steve's mom's ashes, and you did something to her that Steve didn't like. Regardless of how you got them, you got them, when Steve didn't want you to have them. You might as well have broken into Steve's house and stolen them yourself. That you had a third party, Bob, to get you those secrets doesn't contravene the fact that Steve didn't want you to have them.
  - fluoridation 3y ago
    Of course, I used the word "secret", but it really is the wrong word. A secret is something you don't tell anyone, because you can't afford the wrong person finding out. The game we play with copyright is pretending that cultural artifacts are secrets, even though culture by definition exists in the transmission from one person to another. If Steve didn't want me to have his secret at all he shouldn't be selling it to Bob or anyone else.
- WendyTheWillow 3y ago
  It's a fair question, but you are ethically responsible for knowingly obtaining ill-gotten goods, and pirated media violates the original purchaser's agreement with the IP owner. Basically, Bob agreed with Steve that Bob would not give anyone else the secret, and Steve only sold Bob the secret because he made that agreement, but then Bob turned around and gave it to you for free. So Bob lied, and you know Bob lied, and you benefit from Bob lying, so it's unethical. Again, all kinds of modifiers and caveats apply to the severity here. I really have little sympathy for Steve when he's a gazillionaire already, and the marginal value lost isn't meaningful enough to stop Steve from making more secrets, but technically speaking it appears to be an immoral act to pirate.
_bohm 3y ago
> technically it’s unethical. For some technical definition of ethicality on which I'm sure we can all agree :)
AlexandrB 3y ago
What does it mean to "own rights" to the distribution of information? It's effectively a restriction on everybody else's freedom of speech for the benefit of the rights holder. Whether this is a net benefit to society or not is very situational, so the ethics here are not as clear cut as you imply. > You aren’t entitled to watch what you want. The rights holder is not entitled to stop me from sending certain streams of bits in all circumstances. Edit: While calling IP "property" can be a useful abstraction in some cases, it leads you astray in others. For example, the only way to measure "losses" from piracy is as loss of potential sales since the owner is not deprived of the "property" in the process. But what are the losses when media not available in a given geography is pirated in that geography? There was no "potential revenue" that could be recognized there because the media was not for sale. Thus one could argue that the losses are precisely $0.
- WendyTheWillow 3y ago
  The rights holder isn't entitled to stop you from doing what you like; you are entitled, however, to agree not to do things in order to obtain information. That's what pirating is based on; you've explicitly agreed not to make available content for others when you agreed to purchase the content. By providing content for pirating, you are breaking your word. Further, by consuming pirated content, you have a reasonable assumption that the person providing you with the pirated content obtained that content through deception, which ropes you in on the culpability of the ethical violation. Nobody's freedom of speech is violated because nobody has been compelled to do or say anything! Rather, you are knowingly benefitting from the deception of others.