PC Gaming Is Dying

[Ivo]

The best part of a conversation about software piracy is how freaking creative software thieves are in their coming up with bullshit defenses for their actions. Who else can take an such an inane sense of entitlement and make it out to be something so innocent and noble?

Shame on you if that is a jab at me. Maybe you did not notice that I was arguing that even when it is only old games, pirating is not a victimless crime (maybe crime isn't the right word here ).

How about you reply to my question to you instead of a flame? I'm genuinely interested. How does a pirate remove the intellectual property of the owner of said intellectual property. I honestly want to know as I can not see that being the case.

Software thieves are those who steal physical media with software. Those who download (or whatever) are pirates.

Ivo.

[Flake]

Shame on you if that is a jab at me. Maybe you did not notice that I was arguing that even when it is only old games, pirating is not a victimless crime (maybe crime isn't the right word here ).

How about you reply to my question to you instead of a flame? I'm genuinely interested. How does a pirate remove the intellectual property of the owner of said intellectual property. I honestly want to know as I can not see that being the case.

It wasn't directed at you. More like software thieves in general.

Oh and crime is definitely the right word to describe piracy.

A pirate removes a companies opportunity to make revenue off of their work. They own their work. It is theirs. THEY get to decide how they want to disseminate and profit from it. When you take a copy of it, you have taken something that is not yours, is protected by law from such uses, and was not intended to be given away freely to you. It was also not intended for someone else who is not a representative of the company to give it away.

Here's a question for you: Why the hell should someone make a piece of software if they cannot expect to be paid for it?

[Erik_Twice]

And it's not the pirate who's bad here,

Hey, want to support a crime? Sure, why not, supporting crimes is okey!

What happens? If I make I'm not entitled to sell own work like everyone else?

[Inazuma]

Oh look. It's another one of these discussions.

Copyright infringement and theft are not the same thing.
Both are illegal.

Copyright infringement is wrong when the person doing it would have legitimately purchased the product otherwise. If he had no desire to purchase the product normally, copyright infringement does no harm, however it is still illegal.

Laws are a good guideline for determining if something is bad or not, but you need to keep an open mind and consider both sides when deciding if a particular case is is actually wrong.

The problem is that we don't know for sure if people are lying when they say they wouldn't have bought something normally. Many people are dishonest, which in turn causes the honest people to be treated like criminals.

I am one of the honest pirates and it always annoys me when people don't believe me.

[Limewater]

If he had no desire to purchase the product normally, copyright infringement does no harm, however it is still illegal.

Of course, you're the one who gets to determine if a "harm" has been committed, right? Not the people you're "not harming."

[Inazuma]

If he had no desire to purchase the product normally, copyright infringement does no harm, however it is still illegal.

Of course, you're the one who gets to determine if a "harm" has been committed, right? Not the people you're "not harming."

"Harm", meaning it prevented someone from making money they would have gotten from selling their product normally. If this happened, it is wrong.

Don't try to put words in my mouth like before. My point is that copyright infringement is fine if there is no harm done. If you describe a situation where harm was done, I will agree with you that it is wrong, so let's not waste our time arguing about this again.

[Limewater]

"Harm", meaning it prevented someone from making money they would have gotten from selling their product normally. If this happened, it is wrong.

So there are no possible harms of piracy other than lost revenue?

[Inazuma]

"Harm", meaning it prevented someone from making money they would have gotten from selling their product normally. If this happened, it is wrong.

So there are no possible harms of piracy other than lost revenue?

I can't think of anything else, but feel free to mention something.

[Limewater]

So there are no possible harms of piracy other than lost revenue?

I can't think of anything else, but feel free to mention something.

"Last week, in the first installment of Loyola University New Orleans' Father Carter Lecture Series, Thomas Dolby Robertson, best known for his early 1980s hit She Blinded Me With Science, and Grateful Dead lyricist John Perry Barlow debated music piracy.

"Robertson said he feels violated by illegal downloading.

"'I don't think I've lost a huge amount of money but I feel violated nonetheless.'"

This is just one example, but clearly a lot of (not all) content creators are experiencing negative emotions as a result of having their copyrights violated. Does this not count as a harm?

[Inazuma]

So there are no possible harms of piracy other than lost revenue?

I can't think of anything else, but feel free to mention something.

"Last week, in the first installment of Loyola University New Orleans' Father Carter Lecture Series, Thomas Dolby Robertson, best known for his early 1980s hit She Blinded Me With Science, and Grateful Dead lyricist John Perry Barlow debated music piracy.

Robertson said he feels violated by illegal downloading."

This is just one example, but clearly a lot of (not all) content creators are experiencing negative emotions as a result of having their copyrights violated. Does this not count as a harm?

Take a step back, and ask "Why are they upset?". People don't just get upset at something for no reason, you know.