Maybe astroturfing, but most likely just people trying to be morally superior to one another.
Yeah all the ethics behind it are arbitrary.
Unless someone what’s to grandstand themselves for internet points it’s pointless. A majority of people know to buy something if they like it and it’s not going to change the mind of people who weren’t going to buy it from the beginning.
Pirate some things, pay for some things. It doesn’t have to be absolute.
Only a Sith deals in absolutes.
I like having physical and digital media, and usually digital media is locked to a site that and a lot of my blu rays to burn them would take more effort than I realized so I like to obtain both
Its the feds! They are in here trying to guilt us because they know no other way to make us stop. May the redcoats end up in Davey Jones Locker!
*you’re
I stand corrected. Thanks
no problem, dude, I gotchu
*got you
When it’s intentionally spelled as such as a slang meme response, corrections don’t apply.
I mean, I was just being funny. Guess I should have included the /jk
oh ok, yeah, that would have helped
Piracy isn’t a “movement” it’s a means to an end.
To consider it anything more that “get shit for free or delisted/abandoned” is cringe.
It does feel like a lot of people trying to justify their piracy are just looking for excuses for something that they personally feel is wrong, but they want to do anyway… but I do think that free access to data and information is something that people can legitimately care about. Libraries are a good socially acceptable example of this (and they definitely fall under the “get shit for free” movement!), and it’s not entirely crazy or cringe for people to want more libraries in life and fewer walled gardens.
Give me an opportunity to pay to access the content easily for a reasonable price. It’s all I ask.
I used to have a huge pirated music collection, and now I have no pirated music at all because it became convenient and reasonably priced to listen to the music I want the way I want to listen to it.
For quite awhile I had no pirated TV or Movies because the content I wanted to watch was available on Netflix and HBO Go. Now I have a lot of content pirated because I’m not going to pay $10-$25 monthly to pay for a streaming service for every show I want to watch. And another $10-$25 monthly for every show my kids want to watch.
To be clear, I am not claiming any moral high ground. That shit is out there for free and unless these companies can find a way back to reasonably-priced streaming I am going to continue taking it because I have a limited budget and TV/Movies are only worth a certain amount of money to me.
Absolutely! It’s also frustrating that you can’t just buy a digital copy of a movie or something for a relatively cheap price? I just want the digital equivalent of bargain bin DVDs and libraries. I don’t want to pay $20/mo to not own anything?
Oh when it comes to digital preservation it’s all good we need that as it’s often the only way to access a ton of media.
Just don’t tell me you’re fighting capitalism cuz that computer and Internet connection says otherwise 😂 also if you’re boycotting something like Ubisoft or Disney, like don’t even pirate their stuff, what are you doing?
It definitely seems more idealistic when it’s academic papers instead of Marvel movies, haha. Still, I guess it feels like the only way to get the upper hand for some people, so I can kind of understand the catharsis. I think for most people it’s just “get shit free”, some people feel like it’s a small act of rebellion, some people want an excuse to feel better about it, and some people probably are actually more idealistic about it.
I think there are legitimate questions for society in relation to piracy, though. Copying and transmitting data is essentially free in the modern era, and I feel like we still haven’t really figured out what that should mean. The issue of ownership is getting really weird in the digital age too… Like you used to be able to lend and resell things, and libraries with physical media were a simpler concept… but these things are tricky and cause problems when copying and sharing is so effective. I think there’s arguments to be had that this a pretty fundamental shift and that we should potentially reconsider how media and other things work economically.
I forgot about academic papers. That shit should be on Wikipedia or Archive. Literal knowledge shouldn’t be copyright-able. Shout out to the data hoarders on that one.
EXACTLY. Academic publishing is actually kind of insane. It’s not like buying the paper even funds the research, it just goes to the publisher… and sure, you could argue that they do a service by basically being a muster point for peer review… but it just feels SO WRONG to put research (especially public funded research) behind a paywall.
The case for movies and games is absolutely a more contentious issue, but there are some similar arguments for the current system being a little dated (especially with respect to copyright law and how long it takes before works enter the public domain). All things being equal (e.g., assuming the creators can still make a living) the more people who have access the better! Of course it’s far less important that you can watch the latest movies or whatever (vs somebody accessing a research paper about a disease they have or something), but it’s still a bit of a shame to restrict access, and it feels like your ability to own copies of media is being eroded over time… And maybe that is worth caring about a little bit?
Ugh, self-righteous pirates are the fucking worst. My brother in Christ, you’re pirating Assassins’ Creed 14. Just fucking say you’re stealing it. You don’t need to sugar-coat it.
Right? It’s cool! I won’t judge.
I don’t mind paying for things when the value proposition is there. Just in entertainment, the prices get skewed way outside value.
Here’s a supporting example; my son wants to see Blue Beetle. I checked it out, and the rental is $20 - for a streamed “right to view” which means there is zero marginal cost for them to produce, track, or retrieve it. Even with recent inflation, you can get a restaurant meal for that.
I ain’t cheap, I just don’t like my money going to billionaires who give us nothing in return. I pay for email, I don’t pay to watch a Marvel film.
I don’t think it’s that hard.
You…pay for email???
You have to pay to get a real domain
Aye, as @forensic_potato said. And they have really good free options too, that are actually improved upon feature wise (only usage is limited)
Gonna pay once I can actually afford it.
A lot of us pay for privacy focused email because we don’t want Google or MS steal our data
Proton!
The fuck if I’m gonna let Google train an AI off my emails.
Some people are about piracy, others are about ownership and fighting back against neo digital feudalism
When you purchase digital goods you’re downloading capitalism.
Isn’t it generally pointing out what was actually worth paying for?
Cracking groups have always said they do it for the challenge and if u like the game you should go buy it. Crackers and warez ftp groups have never dissuaded anyone from paying for the stuff they crack and release.
Well, I’m browsing all, so I see the posts here from time to time. And generally speaking, I pay for games and books and pirate everything else, so if the discussion is about games, I’m gonna mention I buy them (if relevant, of course, I’m not going around telling people I actually buy games).
Because in the words of GabeN, piracy (in a 1st world country at least) is a service problem and not a pricing problem. Many things are worth paying for, especially when you are supporting smaller creators, artists and indie game devs. But when heavy-handed DRM’s and corporate shovelware and services that actively remove content I pay for makes it a shit experience. I’m gonna just torrent that shit, fuck 'em
Amen
But when heavy-handed DRM’s and corporate shovelware and services that actively remove content I pay for makes it a shit experience. I’m gonna just torrent that shit
The annoying hurdles are what get me. I’ve cracked a lot of the games that I own because I hate forced updates, going through an additional client, or being asked to sign in for another service that I won’t use.
I once had a valid office key… But since I reset my computer to often the amount of “free activations” was used up… There where so many hoops to jump through to re-activate it that it was easier to get a cracked key to activate my office version… That’s just sick
That kind of related: when mostly single use software works off of a subscription model versus just being available for purchase.
Jep I hate the, “you don’t own anything anymore” mentality… There are some valid reasons to actually provide a subscription, but most of the times it should just be a one time payment
Sometimes it’s just about ease of access. I’m happy to pay for games but it’s often harder to track down legal copies of retro or delisted games than it is to find a torrent.
And a number of the files you find on torrent sites were uploaded by someone who bought the content legally. Torrenting is just peer-to-peer file sharing, someone has to acquire the first copy somehow
