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>>> sharing of information But what TPB mainly distributed, was not information, it was products. And they are not essential products, you can live just fine w

by gedrap 12y ago

>>> sharing of information But what TPB mainly distributed, was not information, it was products. And they are not essential products, you can live just fine without TV series or movies. People don't die because they can't play their favourite video game. It's like saying designer clothes should be free. Information should be shared without profit, yeah, that's what wikipedia is doing fine. But video games are not information, so are TV shows, movies, etc. They are products which cost money to produce. It doesn't make economical sense to give it away for free hoping to get money from ads or whatever. Mobile games do that, and mostly they are unplayable without purchasing credits, etc. Even then, the quality is often very poor. You can point to open source, but people producing open source software are minority of all engineers. What you are saying might be morally 'right' but unfortunately being morally right doesn't pay the rent, bills and food.

higherpurpose 12y ago
> It's like saying designer clothes should be free. I wonder if it's not more like "designer cloths shouldn't be copyrighted" - which is actually true in the fashion world. And because of that tens if not hundreds of millions of people can get "cheap cloths" that look good.
- gedrap 12y ago
  Well, yes, but you can't download clothes using torrents ;) Similar idea would be that ideas of movies and video games should not be copyrighted. IANAL, but there are many many similar movies and video games and don't think there are any copyright infringements unless you create a video game with almost identical name, etc.
  - pbhjpbhj 12y ago
    >there are many many similar movies and video games and don't think there are any copyright infringements // That's because they're copying the ideas and not the implementation, copyright protects implementations ("works") and not the ideas behind them (at least that's the intention). Similar names would be trademark law rather than copyright FWIW.
jimktrains2 12y ago
> But what TPB mainly distributed, was not information, it was products. It did no such thing. It provided a searchable list of user-generated content. It was no different than hacker news or reddit. It was used in a fashion that facilitated "crimes", but so are computers, Internet, and cash in general.
- sigzero 12y ago
  No, it was a lot different from Reddit or HN. Please stop trying to support the "pirating is okay". It's not. It's theft. You do not need or have to see those shows. You want to watch them and you fulfill that want by pirating. That pirating may cause purchases later is a horrible argument for theft.
  - the8472 12y ago
    >It's theft. Stop repeating that. It isn't. Even the courts agree on this one. And TPB did not engage in it either way.
    - Donzo 12y ago
      Just because no one was strong armed for a loaf of bread does not mean that a theft did not occur. No one may have been deprived of physical property, but we do not live an entirely physical world. Piracy deprives content creators of opportunity: the opportunity to distribute their products in the way that they see fit. Perhaps this means that they give all of their work away for free through the channels of their choosing. Perhaps they sell it. Perhaps they don't sell it to people who live in certain regions. As a content creator, shouldn't I have the opportunity to give away my products (or sell them) in a way that I see fit?
      - the8472 12y ago
        Well, sure, you can sell it or give it away for free, that's up to you. But once you give it to someone you give someone a blob of information. Which is identical to the one you still have. That chunk of information is not intrinsically tied to you anymore. So you can easily control initial distribution. But to restrict further distribution you have to restrict actions of others. You have to limit their freedoms to do with that new copy of information. Is there a good reason to limit their freedoms? Maybe. But it doesn't occur to me as a natural right. Once you handed over a copy to someone else each of you control an identical set of information. You severed your ties. So if you want the rights of others restricted then - in my opinion - the burden of constructing a case why they should be is on you.
pparkkin 12y ago
Fair enough. I can see how someone would not think they are information. In this case we can use the word "culture" instead of "information", and the original point still stands. And I am sure we can all agree that TV and movies are culture.
tomp 12y ago
Your argument is implicitly based on an assumption that piracy/sharing reduces income/profits. I'm not so sure this assumption is correct; at least it hasn't been demonstrated as true (AFAIK). A strong argument speaking against it is the fact that there are many examples that say the contrary; Avatar is one of the most pirated movies and also one of the most successful ones, and earned a huge amount of money just on cinema tickets. You have e.g. Zynga, King and Rovio who have earned lots of money on free games. I used to pirate stuff much more when I was younger (a poor student). Now, I often pay for music that I really like, to support the artists! Other music I just watch on YouTube. If I was sure that Netflix would provide a better service than downloading (i.e. good quality, little wait time, superb selection, offline viewing, no geo-restrictions), I would subscribe.
- gedrap 12y ago
  >>> I'm not so sure this assumption is correct; at least it hasn't been demonstrated as true (AFAIK). Might be. But the cost to produce Candy Crush Saga and a AAA title is, well, different. But if you try to find a non-digital analogy, e.g. food, it doesn't make it right for me to steel expensive whisky just because I don't agree with pricing model :) >>> I used to pirate stuff much more when I was younger (a poor student) Agree with this, I perfectly know what you mean. When I was a poor student, I would buy a video game once a year on my b-day and keep playing it for a year or two :) completely objective, but it felt really better than downloading a batch on games. But that's not the point :) This is a different problem (pricing, not intellectual property). HumbleBundle sometimes has games by big publishers for $1, Steam has good weekend sales sometimes (grabbed a few relatively new good games for under $15). I think solution to provide poorer markets can be found in this direction.
- mike_hearn 12y ago
  Your argument is implicitly based on an assumption that piracy/sharing reduces income/profits. I'm not so sure this assumption is correct; at least it hasn't been demonstrated as true (AFAIK). It's absolutely been demonstrated to be true, many many times. Do you think game studios, console makers, movie studios etc put money into DRM because none of them understand their own business? There are lots of people who spoken either on or off the record who say the same things: the moment their copy protection fails, sales fall off a cliff and you can see it in the data. For video games it's even worse. The general figure I see for video game piracy on the PC platform is around 90-95% of players are not paying for it, yet, often they are still consuming resources on e.g. multiplayer servers. Movie studio executives have graphs of sales and you can see the point at which high quality rips were uploaded to the internet. Example: http://www.develop-online.net/news/lgc-2013-sports-interactive-reveals-shocking-impact-of-piracy-on-football-manager-2013/0185951 http://www.develop-online.net/news/lgc-2013-sports-interacti...
mathetic 12y ago
One important difference between giving designer clothes free and your favorite video game free is that that former is a constant sum game while the latter is not. Sharing software products does not prevent anyone else to access it. It does not even cost money for the producer as the distribution is handled by seeders. All in all it's a terrible analogy. EDIT: By all means go ahead and downvote, but don't forget to explain why the analogy doesn't fail.

by gedrap 12y ago

higherpurpose 12y ago

> It's like saying designer clothes should be free. I wonder if it's not more like "designer cloths shouldn't be copyrighted" - which is actually true in the fashion world. And because of that tens if not hundreds of millions of people can get "cheap cloths" that look good.

gedrap 12y ago
Well, yes, but you can't download clothes using torrents ;) Similar idea would be that ideas of movies and video games should not be copyrighted. IANAL, but there are many many similar movies and video games and don't think there are any copyright infringements unless you create a video game with almost identical name, etc.
- pbhjpbhj 12y ago
  >there are many many similar movies and video games and don't think there are any copyright infringements // That's because they're copying the ideas and not the implementation, copyright protects implementations ("works") and not the ideas behind them (at least that's the intention). Similar names would be trademark law rather than copyright FWIW.

jimktrains2 12y ago

> But what TPB mainly distributed, was not information, it was products. It did no such thing. It provided a searchable list of user-generated content. It was no different than hacker news or reddit. It was used in a fashion that facilitated "crimes", but so are computers, Internet, and cash in general.

sigzero 12y ago
No, it was a lot different from Reddit or HN. Please stop trying to support the "pirating is okay". It's not. It's theft. You do not need or have to see those shows. You want to watch them and you fulfill that want by pirating. That pirating may cause purchases later is a horrible argument for theft.
- the8472 12y ago
  >It's theft. Stop repeating that. It isn't. Even the courts agree on this one. And TPB did not engage in it either way.
  - Donzo 12y ago
    Just because no one was strong armed for a loaf of bread does not mean that a theft did not occur. No one may have been deprived of physical property, but we do not live an entirely physical world. Piracy deprives content creators of opportunity: the opportunity to distribute their products in the way that they see fit. Perhaps this means that they give all of their work away for free through the channels of their choosing. Perhaps they sell it. Perhaps they don't sell it to people who live in certain regions. As a content creator, shouldn't I have the opportunity to give away my products (or sell them) in a way that I see fit?
    - the8472 12y ago
      Well, sure, you can sell it or give it away for free, that's up to you. But once you give it to someone you give someone a blob of information. Which is identical to the one you still have. That chunk of information is not intrinsically tied to you anymore. So you can easily control initial distribution. But to restrict further distribution you have to restrict actions of others. You have to limit their freedoms to do with that new copy of information. Is there a good reason to limit their freedoms? Maybe. But it doesn't occur to me as a natural right. Once you handed over a copy to someone else each of you control an identical set of information. You severed your ties. So if you want the rights of others restricted then - in my opinion - the burden of constructing a case why they should be is on you.

pparkkin 12y ago

Fair enough. I can see how someone would not think they are information. In this case we can use the word "culture" instead of "information", and the original point still stands. And I am sure we can all agree that TV and movies are culture.

tomp 12y ago

Your argument is implicitly based on an assumption that piracy/sharing reduces income/profits. I'm not so sure this assumption is correct; at least it hasn't been demonstrated as true (AFAIK). A strong argument speaking against it is the fact that there are many examples that say the contrary; Avatar is one of the most pirated movies and also one of the most successful ones, and earned a huge amount of money just on cinema tickets. You have e.g. Zynga, King and Rovio who have earned lots of money on free games. I used to pirate stuff much more when I was younger (a poor student). Now, I often pay for music that I really like, to support the artists! Other music I just watch on YouTube. If I was sure that Netflix would provide a better service than downloading (i.e. good quality, little wait time, superb selection, offline viewing, no geo-restrictions), I would subscribe.

gedrap 12y ago
>>> I'm not so sure this assumption is correct; at least it hasn't been demonstrated as true (AFAIK). Might be. But the cost to produce Candy Crush Saga and a AAA title is, well, different. But if you try to find a non-digital analogy, e.g. food, it doesn't make it right for me to steel expensive whisky just because I don't agree with pricing model :) >>> I used to pirate stuff much more when I was younger (a poor student) Agree with this, I perfectly know what you mean. When I was a poor student, I would buy a video game once a year on my b-day and keep playing it for a year or two :) completely objective, but it felt really better than downloading a batch on games. But that's not the point :) This is a different problem (pricing, not intellectual property). HumbleBundle sometimes has games by big publishers for $1, Steam has good weekend sales sometimes (grabbed a few relatively new good games for under $15). I think solution to provide poorer markets can be found in this direction.
mike_hearn 12y ago
Your argument is implicitly based on an assumption that piracy/sharing reduces income/profits. I'm not so sure this assumption is correct; at least it hasn't been demonstrated as true (AFAIK). It's absolutely been demonstrated to be true, many many times. Do you think game studios, console makers, movie studios etc put money into DRM because none of them understand their own business? There are lots of people who spoken either on or off the record who say the same things: the moment their copy protection fails, sales fall off a cliff and you can see it in the data. For video games it's even worse. The general figure I see for video game piracy on the PC platform is around 90-95% of players are not paying for it, yet, often they are still consuming resources on e.g. multiplayer servers. Movie studio executives have graphs of sales and you can see the point at which high quality rips were uploaded to the internet. Example: http://www.develop-online.net/news/lgc-2013-sports-interactive-reveals-shocking-impact-of-piracy-on-football-manager-2013/0185951 http://www.develop-online.net/news/lgc-2013-sports-interacti...

mathetic 12y ago

One important difference between giving designer clothes free and your favorite video game free is that that former is a constant sum game while the latter is not. Sharing software products does not prevent anyone else to access it. It does not even cost money for the producer as the distribution is handled by seeders. All in all it's a terrible analogy. EDIT: By all means go ahead and downvote, but don't forget to explain why the analogy doesn't fail.