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I was speaking to a friends dad at his last Christmas party. He was talking about downloading movies. I asked if he used a proxy. He said. "Of course I do. I us
by bobsy 14y ago
I was speaking to a friends dad at his last Christmas party. He was talking about downloading movies. I asked if he used a proxy. He said. "Of course I do. I use blah." He then told me how he checked to make sure it was working.. I was genuinely surprised that a casual internet user knew about proxies.
As always such domain bans are ridiculous and do not solve the issue of why people choose to pirate stuff. I now use Spotify. I used to pirate music, downloading thousands of albums. Most were deleted after one play. I brought albums, merchandise and saw live bands that I liked. Bands I would never have discovered without "pirating" the music to begin with.
The article talk's about how piracy is dropping and Spotify use is raising. This isn't to do with TPB being blocked. This is to do with people realizing that music discovery is easier with Spotify than it is via piracy. This is the way it should be.
I am sure less TV shows are being pirated due to the rise of catch up and streaming services. I only download TV shows and the only reason for this is the delay in availability in my country. I don't download movies any more because there is already an abundance of stuff to watch - be it new or old - on streaming services like Netflix. I recently discovered the TV show Jericho. Check it out. It was brilliant.
If anything these ban's are endangering users making them more vulnerable to viruses, keyloggers and becoming a part of a bot net. If someone wants something THEY WILL DOWNLOAD IT. Sites like TPB have great community moderation. Dodgy downloads are flagged. Good ones are up voted. I don't remember the last time I got a bad download.
Compare this to the less known sites which people are being pushed towards. More bad links, less community moderation, bad site owners pushing dodgy downloads. A lot of people who are not expert computer users are becoming more vulnerable.
All this is because the music / film lobbies have convinced the UK Government that Piracy is destroying their revenues. Its not. The Internet combined with the glacial speed in which these industries are moving is. Better content, easier access and fair pricing will crush piracy. Blocking domains moves piracy to another source.
Music streaming services have done more to stop piracy than anything else. If music / film industry spent less on lobbyists and court actions and more on innovating access to their products they would see a far bigger turnaround in profits.
When TPB was banned I said it would kick a ball rolling that wouldn't stop. Here we go. I wonder what is next.
- benev 14y agoA friend's mother is fairly non technical to the point that she gets into a state every time her web-mail provider changes the page layout. However, she uses a VPN to get round geographical restrictions on video streaming services. I think we're reaching the point where ordinary people are starting to understand how the internet works, and how to make it work for them. That's a good thing.
- icebraining 14y agoIn my case, even if I can access Netflix, etc, many people here don't know English well enough to be able to watch a movie. Local volunteers offer free subtitles, done in their own time, but they're only synced to "pirated" copies.
- youngerdryas 14y ago>If anything these ban's are endangering users making them more vulnerable to viruses, keyloggers and becoming a part of a bot net. And hence reluctant to pirate if a legitimate option is available.
- drucken 14y agoYou're assuming non-technical users are aware of this or care. I have seen non-technical users, who for one reason or other do not have access to Bittorrent, install streaming software or pass between them TV streaming sites for the latest episodes so stuffed full of heavy scripting, including XSS, that any hacker would be petrified of touching them even with a condom-clad bargepole! When informed of their vulnerability, they often find reasons to dismiss the risk such as stating they have never had any problems or it is not their PC (family or school computer)...
- bobsy 14y agoThe reason a lot of people pirate stuff is because they lack a legitimate option? Take Game of Thrones. You cannot afford or justify the cost of the TV package. You enjoy the show. Your friends always talk about it the day after it is aired in your country... There is a pressure to watch it and no easy way to do so. Hence piracy. My cousin was desperate to watch a football match. She went into the darkest parts of the Internet and the end result was taking her computer to a repair shop because the things she had installed basically rendered her computer inoperable. Will she stop pirating? Probably not. She can probably better identify files likely to damage her computer. The worrying thing is a lot of spyware and keyloggers etc are transparent. Even malware. You notice a toolbar appears but a lot of people do not care and continue to use their computer.. Someone may become reluctant if they become aware that their computer has been successfully infected by a virus. A lot of things now are far more sinister though. They do not want to be noticed or discovered so there is no lesson to learn until someone empties your bank account. Even when this happens it isn't obvious your computer was the source of the breach. It could have been phishing etc. Piracy is widespread and the police do not even treat it as a misdemeanor. Socially, piracy is completely acceptable. Smoking has become more socially unacceptable... and yet these court judgements make the public more at risk from identity theft, fraud etc etc.. without making piracy any less rife.