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Re: "copying isn't stealing": If a producer prices someone out of the market, he/she is no longer a potential customer. That's a business decision about market

Re: "copying isn't stealing": If a producer prices someone out of the market, he/she is no longer a potential customer. That's a business decision about market size made by the producer - they get higher profits at a higher price point and smaller market. Great! However, producers don't get to complain about piracy by people who aren't in their market. Unless they eventually put the product on sale at some point, a pirate has no impact on the bottom line. In the simple (one-price-forever) case, the producer lost nothing - not even potential profit, because the consumer was already priced out.

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- dangerlibrary 13y ago
  If my $1,000 were to magically, instantly transform into an identical Hermes bag sitting on the counter, I'm not sure how they'd ever even know it happened. Who was harmed? Fashion is a little different, too. There's very little software that operates in a world where exclusivity is an important aspect of pricing - Hermes bags cost $10,000 because people like to signal that they can afford a $10,000 bag. The value is very quickly diluted with greater availability. I can't think of a digital product that operates that way - maybe niche data re-selling? Certainly not TV shows or movies or songs.
  - TeMPOraL 13y ago
    > because people like to signal Yes; signaling seems to be an important part of value for the producers, not only in fashion. It's the same in expensive cars, expensive electronics (think Apple), etc. Not surprisingly, those are the companies that are the loudest about chinese knockoffs. If I were to 3D scan and then replicate the bag with subatomic precision using Star Trek replicator, I don't think anyone would feel that I'm stealing something, but people would still point out that this is not a real Hermes bag (so I got something of lesser worth). And if I took the original and left the copy in the shop, it could be considered theft even though you couldn't tell a difference with a scanning electron microscope. It's funny how society and moral intuitions work; a very interesting topic.
    - logfromblammo 13y ago
      It wouldn't be stealing. It would be trademark infringement. You would have to adjust your replicator to remove any trace of brand identity from your copy. Trademark infringement is a variety of fraud, not a property crime. Your action did not deprive Hermes of its ability to keep or sell its bag, but it did damage its ability to sell the bag for 10 times production cost by diluting and confusing the brand.
rayiner 13y ago
Say an Hermes handbag costs $1,000 to make. This is something you can afford. But it sells for $10,000. You can't afford this, so you'd never be in the market. By your reasoning, it should be okay for you to walk into an Hermes, grab a bag, and leave $1,000 on the counter, and walk out. Hermes shouldn't get to complain, right, because they're in exactly the same financial position they were in before. It has no impact on their bottom line to lose a sale to a customer who wouldn't have bought the product anyway, right?
- selmnoo 13y ago
  The bags are made out of something physical, a depletable resource. And put together by labor that is also finite (there are only so many low-wage Indian and Bengali workers to put these things together). So, while a seductively attractive situation to analogize with, I don't think it's a technically good one all the way through. (though fwiw, I should mention I'm okay with people stealing Hermes or louisvitton bags)
  - rayiner 13y ago
    Leather and labor are both more scarce than electricity, bandwidth, and storage (but all are finite), but that is priced into the cost of replacement. If you refund the producer the cost of replacement, whether it's $1,000 or $0.01, they are still in the same financial position they were before you took the product.
    - selmnoo 13y ago
      I remember having a conversation with you about how uneven access to opportunity is in America among different races, economic classes, etc. - and I recall you saying in a resigned way (something like) "Oh welp, yeah things are bad, but I have a wife and a kid, I'm too tired and old to do anything about that, and I'm not an idealist anymore." I have somewhat the same feelings about piracy... it's not going to stop, it's just the way people get their software. Frankly I hate that this is the way things are, because now we have total pieces of shits like Facebook -- free things, which are not really free -- they're taking our fucking data, and invading our privacy, I hate that, I wish developers of good software made a killing. But there are a lot of poor people right now who're not doing really well... and you know what, if they can spend 2 hours watching a pirated movie to lessen their miseries, I say God bless them. There are bigger things we should be directing our outrage at. When there are no more wars, no more poor people, no more crimes, let's worry about piracy. (And, also, unlike the uneven access to opportunity thing -- at least (generally) the people getting fucked in this case are the already rich ones.)
ptmx 13y ago
What makes you think pirates are priced out of the market? If we're talking about, say, the U.S., your typical pirate doesn't seem to be "priced out of the market" for a variety of other leisure goods, like the electronics that they're using to pirate music and TV shows. The difference is that they don't have a frictionless way of "pirating" electronics, so they are actually forced to choose between paying for the good and abstaining from it. With media, it's easy to rationalize that you wouldn't be giving the producer money anyway, but I'm skeptical of your ability to honestly evaluate that when you have the option to trivially enjoy the good for free.
- dangerlibrary 13y ago
  Excellent point! However, there is an incredible amount of content out there available via free and legal means. That is to say - technology has made the barrier to entry very, very low and so content creation is a really competitive market. The relevant question is not whether, strictly speaking, the pirate can afford the product - I can afford an Hermes bag if I save up for a while - but whether their willingness to pay exceeds the price. I'm priced out of the market based on my willingness to pay, not my ability to pay.
  - ptmx 13y ago
    That's a good clarification, and I agree that willingness to pay is the relevant metric to use when talking about being priced out of the market. The same point applies, though; it's hard to honestly assess your willingness to pay when it takes you 5 clicks and a few minutes of waiting to get exactly what you want for $0. If we were to take a typical pirate and transport them to a hypothetical world where piracy was physically impossible, I think you'd generally find that they're not actually priced out of the market for many of the goods that they currently pirate. They'd likely cut down their consumption in a major way, but I strongly suspect that they'd still be willing to pay for a significant portion of the goods they currently pirate.
    - dangerlibrary 13y ago
      It's really easy to "honestly" assess willingness to pay, actually. If you paid for it, you were willing to pay at least the asked amount. In a "pay what you want" scheme, your willingness to pay is something between infinity and what you wind up paying. If you don't buy a thing, your willingness to pay is something below the price being asked. There's no magic. It's an immediately available revealed-preference system - you either pay or you don't. I won't disagree that the availability of a free, well-functioning, DRM-free, easily available alternative reduces people's willingness to pay for locked-in, degraded, or even available-but-overpriced alternatives. That said, we live in a world where the piracy alternative exists, whether people like it or not. Adjust your business model accordingly. Valve is making a killing selling software via Steam.

deleted 13y ago

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deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
dangerlibrary 13y ago
If my $1,000 were to magically, instantly transform into an identical Hermes bag sitting on the counter, I'm not sure how they'd ever even know it happened. Who was harmed? Fashion is a little different, too. There's very little software that operates in a world where exclusivity is an important aspect of pricing - Hermes bags cost $10,000 because people like to signal that they can afford a $10,000 bag. The value is very quickly diluted with greater availability. I can't think of a digital product that operates that way - maybe niche data re-selling? Certainly not TV shows or movies or songs.
- TeMPOraL 13y ago
  > because people like to signal Yes; signaling seems to be an important part of value for the producers, not only in fashion. It's the same in expensive cars, expensive electronics (think Apple), etc. Not surprisingly, those are the companies that are the loudest about chinese knockoffs. If I were to 3D scan and then replicate the bag with subatomic precision using Star Trek replicator, I don't think anyone would feel that I'm stealing something, but people would still point out that this is not a real Hermes bag (so I got something of lesser worth). And if I took the original and left the copy in the shop, it could be considered theft even though you couldn't tell a difference with a scanning electron microscope. It's funny how society and moral intuitions work; a very interesting topic.
  - logfromblammo 13y ago
    It wouldn't be stealing. It would be trademark infringement. You would have to adjust your replicator to remove any trace of brand identity from your copy. Trademark infringement is a variety of fraud, not a property crime. Your action did not deprive Hermes of its ability to keep or sell its bag, but it did damage its ability to sell the bag for 10 times production cost by diluting and confusing the brand.

rayiner 13y ago

Say an Hermes handbag costs $1,000 to make. This is something you can afford. But it sells for $10,000. You can't afford this, so you'd never be in the market. By your reasoning, it should be okay for you to walk into an Hermes, grab a bag, and leave $1,000 on the counter, and walk out. Hermes shouldn't get to complain, right, because they're in exactly the same financial position they were in before. It has no impact on their bottom line to lose a sale to a customer who wouldn't have bought the product anyway, right?

selmnoo 13y ago
The bags are made out of something physical, a depletable resource. And put together by labor that is also finite (there are only so many low-wage Indian and Bengali workers to put these things together). So, while a seductively attractive situation to analogize with, I don't think it's a technically good one all the way through. (though fwiw, I should mention I'm okay with people stealing Hermes or louisvitton bags)
- rayiner 13y ago
  Leather and labor are both more scarce than electricity, bandwidth, and storage (but all are finite), but that is priced into the cost of replacement. If you refund the producer the cost of replacement, whether it's $1,000 or $0.01, they are still in the same financial position they were before you took the product.
  - selmnoo 13y ago
    I remember having a conversation with you about how uneven access to opportunity is in America among different races, economic classes, etc. - and I recall you saying in a resigned way (something like) "Oh welp, yeah things are bad, but I have a wife and a kid, I'm too tired and old to do anything about that, and I'm not an idealist anymore." I have somewhat the same feelings about piracy... it's not going to stop, it's just the way people get their software. Frankly I hate that this is the way things are, because now we have total pieces of shits like Facebook -- free things, which are not really free -- they're taking our fucking data, and invading our privacy, I hate that, I wish developers of good software made a killing. But there are a lot of poor people right now who're not doing really well... and you know what, if they can spend 2 hours watching a pirated movie to lessen their miseries, I say God bless them. There are bigger things we should be directing our outrage at. When there are no more wars, no more poor people, no more crimes, let's worry about piracy. (And, also, unlike the uneven access to opportunity thing -- at least (generally) the people getting fucked in this case are the already rich ones.)

ptmx 13y ago

What makes you think pirates are priced out of the market? If we're talking about, say, the U.S., your typical pirate doesn't seem to be "priced out of the market" for a variety of other leisure goods, like the electronics that they're using to pirate music and TV shows. The difference is that they don't have a frictionless way of "pirating" electronics, so they are actually forced to choose between paying for the good and abstaining from it. With media, it's easy to rationalize that you wouldn't be giving the producer money anyway, but I'm skeptical of your ability to honestly evaluate that when you have the option to trivially enjoy the good for free.

dangerlibrary 13y ago
Excellent point! However, there is an incredible amount of content out there available via free and legal means. That is to say - technology has made the barrier to entry very, very low and so content creation is a really competitive market. The relevant question is not whether, strictly speaking, the pirate can afford the product - I can afford an Hermes bag if I save up for a while - but whether their willingness to pay exceeds the price. I'm priced out of the market based on my willingness to pay, not my ability to pay.
- ptmx 13y ago
  That's a good clarification, and I agree that willingness to pay is the relevant metric to use when talking about being priced out of the market. The same point applies, though; it's hard to honestly assess your willingness to pay when it takes you 5 clicks and a few minutes of waiting to get exactly what you want for $0. If we were to take a typical pirate and transport them to a hypothetical world where piracy was physically impossible, I think you'd generally find that they're not actually priced out of the market for many of the goods that they currently pirate. They'd likely cut down their consumption in a major way, but I strongly suspect that they'd still be willing to pay for a significant portion of the goods they currently pirate.
  - dangerlibrary 13y ago
    It's really easy to "honestly" assess willingness to pay, actually. If you paid for it, you were willing to pay at least the asked amount. In a "pay what you want" scheme, your willingness to pay is something between infinity and what you wind up paying. If you don't buy a thing, your willingness to pay is something below the price being asked. There's no magic. It's an immediately available revealed-preference system - you either pay or you don't. I won't disagree that the availability of a free, well-functioning, DRM-free, easily available alternative reduces people's willingness to pay for locked-in, degraded, or even available-but-overpriced alternatives. That said, we live in a world where the piracy alternative exists, whether people like it or not. Adjust your business model accordingly. Valve is making a killing selling software via Steam.