What do you think about piracy? - I'd see no problem with it depending on the source.

[Pissmaster]

I'll pirate games until they get a good price drop. Game piracy can be kind of a bitch and now they're like a hundred gigabytes a pop and I can't just burn them bitches onto DVDs anymore and don't wanna end up with a ton of external HDDs just full of pirated games. But there are like, almost no games whatsoever that are worth $60, so, piracy it is and maybe I'll buy it when it hits the $20 mark.

TV shows, movies, and music all get pirated 100% of the time because lmao fuck those industries, and hard copies aren't much of a thing anymore so I get an overall better product if I just pirate rather than buy through iTunes or whatever. I don't think you can even watch any movies or TV shows you buy from there on Android or any game consoles, or smart TVs for that matter. Why do that when I can just have a Plex server on my desktop?

I don't pirate books, as I prefer the feel of holding one in my hands. The only games I pirate are stuff like gameboy advance games, since Nintendo have still not made any kind of Switch emulator to be able to play a lot of their older games (and the batteries in GBA games seem to die over time and I am not sure how to replace mine). Movies, TV shows and anime I download/watch on free streaming sites purely because I do not have the disposable income to pay for something and find out its terrible (that and the increase in so many different streaming sites is just becoming too much to pay for, I already pay for three of them). I will buy merch/DVDs/Blu rays etc if I do like the media I pirated, so I give money back eventually in some shape or form.

the back has one small philips screwdriver, just pop that bitch open and go on ebay and just search for "gba sp battery" and voila

piracy has always been so natural to me that I've never really "thought" about it
my parents had stacks of reel-to-reel tapes of music so the idea of "just make a copy and keep the copy" has literally been around me all my life, then the internet came along and made it a lot easier

Piracy really wasn't thought of as anything until the RIAA started kicking up a fuss about Napster. Older efforts like "Don't Copy That Floppy" were always seen as jokes, but it's not like any kind of media was ever killed off for good due to piracy. Hell, taping shit off of the TV and radio and keeping it indefinitely was something absolutely everyone did for ages, and even Minidisc was designed to copy from your CDs so you could have them in a much more portable format.

then came the internet and now we have legions of faggots who genuinely believe you'll get thrown in pound-me-in-the-ass prison if you so much as download a single MP3 or a ROM of Donkey Kong Jr. Math for the NES

 

[Samson Pumpkin Jr.]

I'll pirate games until they get a good price drop. Game piracy can be kind of a bitch and now they're like a hundred gigabytes a pop and I can't just burn them bitches onto DVDs anymore and don't wanna end up with a ton of external HDDs just full of pirated games. But there are like, almost no games whatsoever that are worth $60, so, piracy it is and maybe I'll buy it when it hits the $20 mark.

Don't pirate games then, the market needs to know what the demand is if you are to get products which you want. All these games which cost $60 are essentially worthless because they're overpriced (not worthless as in the content that's in them is worthless but that they're worthless to the market) but pirating them is justified if that's you're only option, however that's not you're only option as smaller game studios who are putting out fine games would be happy to take your money. Once you show to the market that there's a demand for these games at that lower price then these larger studios will shift to producing what you want or making games of a higher quality so it deserves the $80 price tag.
Of course not every game can be made by indie studios, I would never expect Yacht Club to make an alternative to Breath of the wild, but there must be an order of priority when buying games, always choose to buy games from an indie studio before choosing to pirate.

 

[Pissmaster]

Don't pirate games then, the market needs to know what the demand is if you are to get products which you want. All these games which cost $60 are essentially worthless because they're overpriced (not worthless as in the content that's in them is worthless but that they're worthless to the market) but pirating them is justified if that's you're only option, however that's not you're only option as smaller game studios who are putting out fine games would be happy to take your money. Once you show to the market that there's a demand for these games at that lower price then these larger studios will shift to producing what you want or making games of a higher quality so it deserves the $80 price tag.
Of course not every game can be made by indie studios, I would never expect Yacht Club to make an alternative to Breath of the wild, but there must be an order of priority when buying games, always choose to buy games from an indie studio before choosing to pirate.

Buying things you don't actually consider to carry the value for the money they cost just because you're hoping your purchase helps shift the market your way is a total cuck move. Don't waste your cash just because a bunch of whiny faggots on GameFAQs told you to.

But, hey, if you want to buy extra copies of games you wanna support and send me free Steam keys, I'll happily take them. I'm going to play those games without a dime leaving my wallet one way or another, but I'd prefer Steam copies.

And I especially pirate games from any studio that's ever spouted out socialist bullshit, because what better way to prove how their system works than through piracy? If one person bought the game, I'm technically sharing it with them, so therefore, it's our game.

 

[heyitsmike]

It's wrong. The mental gymnastics needed to justify why it's not are insane. Taking someone else's work without the compensation they demand is stealing, plain and simple.

The fact that the pirater wouldn't have bought the good anyway so the creator doesn't lose any money in the real sense misses the point. The pirater is still getting to enjoy goods they're not entitled to. So it's a distinction without a difference.

Nor is it convincing that some random study says piracy increases sales by exposing the creator to a bigger audience or that many people will ultimately buy it legally because they were able to try it first. Even if that's the case, it's not for the pirater to make that business decision for the creator.

So yeah, it's wrong no matter how it's justified.

 

[Emperor Julian]

I'll steal from the Rat as it's end must be encouraged otherwise it's wrong.

 

[Samson Pumpkin Jr.]

Buying things you don't actually consider to carry the value for the money they cost just because you're hoping your purchase helps shift the market your way is a total cuck move. Don't waste your cash just because a bunch of whiny faggots on GameFAQs told you to.

But, hey, if you want to buy extra copies of games you wanna support and send me free Steam keys, I'll happily take them. I'm going to play those games without a dime leaving my wallet one way or another, but I'd prefer Steam copies.

And I especially pirate games from any studio that's ever spouted out socialist bullshit, because what better way to prove how their system works than through piracy? If one person bought the game, I'm technically sharing it with them, so therefore, it's our game.

I have never said to buy games that you don't actually think is worth the money, what I have said permits pirating IF there is no reasonable alternative. Like I said; Yacht Club is never going to make a BOTW alternative and any attempts to do so would be a slobbering mess, so if you think that BOTW isn't worth the money then pirate it. What I'm saying is that you should look to the indie market first if you want a game from a specific genre, what you find may surprise you.
And for multiple reasons aside from "proving their ideology wrong" I do agree that you should pirate games from socialist developers. One of the most pressing is that we live in an era where politics and the free market are getting closer and closer so by buying from a socialist developer you are directly supporting the socialist cause in general

 

[Jewelsmakerguy]

Piracy really wasn't thought of as anything until the RIAA started kicking up a fuss about Napster. Older efforts like "Don't Copy That Floppy" were always seen as jokes, but it's not like any kind of media was ever killed off for good due to piracy. Hell, taping shit off of the TV and radio and keeping it indefinitely was something absolutely everyone did for ages, and even Minidisc was designed to copy from your CDs so you could have them in a much more portable format.

then came the internet and now we have legions of faggots who genuinely believe you'll get thrown in pound-me-in-the-ass prison if you so much as download a single MP3 or a ROM of Donkey Kong Jr. Math for the NES

Hell, wasn't taping shit off of TV considered a selling point during the early days of VHS? I mean if RCA and the other manufacturers are literally telling you "Here, you can record an entire football game with our machines!", then there was clearly no issue for it unless you played it out in public.

 

[Watermelanin]

Piracy is bad when it reduces the incentive for people to produce their art.
Tbh, I don't think people are generally dissuaded from buying a game/video/etc. when a pirated version is available. If someone's looking for a pirated copy of a thing, they generally would never pay for it in the first place. Those that would pay for it would generally just buy the thing and not waste time looking for a free (often lower quality and potentially malware infested) version. I think most pirates would rather go without the media than pay for it.
Still: I don't think it should be legal. I think it should be more like jaywalking. It's fine as long as you aren't causing any clear and present problems by doing it. If a major platform like facebook or youtube is hosting pirated work, there's a good chance people would seek that as an alternative to buying the product. That is where problems start. The people making these works often put as much (if not more) man-hours into their product than a 9-to-5 job. They need to be compensated if they're going to keep producing. If their work is shit and that's why nobody wants to buy it, that's just the free market doing its thing. If they lose revenue because people are pirating their work instead of supporting it, then we lose a valuable producer of art to thieves.

The point here is that the act should stay illegal, but should only be prosecuted in egregious cases.

 

[AcidityLiquidity]

Fully support piracy.
The souless mega-corp pushing the games these days have enough brainwashed paypigs dropping $60 for the basegame, $30 for the season pass, and who knows how much more for the lootboxes.

Why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free while everyone else pays for the farm?

 

[Pissmaster]

Hell, wasn't taping shit off of TV considered a selling point during the early days of VHS? I mean if RCA and the other manufacturers are literally telling you "Here, you can record an entire football game with our machines!", then there was clearly no issue for it unless you played it out in public.

Yeah, same with cassette tapes, minidiscs, CD-Rs, you name it. Moral panic over piracy is a very recent thing. You only ever really see faggots acting like pirating NES games is worse than the holocaust because of Nintendo's incredibly protective business practices, despite other companies like Sega outright encouraging romhacking. Fun fact, they outright give you the raw ROMs to work with on the PC version of Sega Genesis Classics, they're in the game folder under "uncompressed ROMs". Some of them are obviously pulled from internet rom collections, like Gunstar Heroes having the name "Gunstar Heroes U.bin" and Ecco Jr. is "eccojr.smd".

Atari Vault's roms are located under Steam\steamapps\common\Atari Vault\AtariVault_Data\StreamingAssets\FOCAL_Emulator. There's something to be said about id software and others just outright putting the source code to their games out there, so everyone can make source ports of Doom and such. Only Nintendo seems to be fucking insane about keeping their ancient games under wraps and demonizing playing them in any way whatsoever that they don't explicitly approve of. And then they do wildly baffling shit like not allowing you to play NES games on their newer systems with Y & B as B & A, but instead having you use X & A instead.

Fully support piracy.
The souless mega-corp pushing the games these days have enough brainwashed paypigs dropping $60 for the basegame, $30 for the season pass, and who knows how much more for the lootboxes.

Why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free while everyone else pays for the farm?

That's really why freemium is the way to go in the mobile market. It's more profitable to let 1% of your players subsidize everyone else by spending crazy loads of cash so they can get the waifus with the biggest titties, than it is to charge everyone a flat entry fee.

 

[Dom Cruise]

I have mixed thoughts.

If something is out of print and not readily available on a digital marketplace or a reasonably priced disc/copy/whatever then it's totally fine.

If it's not then I'm a lot more hesitant, but I'm not perfect, I've pirated anime for years simply because it's expensive and I only have so much cash to go around, however given the changes to the western anime industry I think it's imperative for every fan to pirate anime, I have zero moral quandary about it now.

I also think ROMs are a grey area where it's ok to pirate, it's a little silly to spend actual money on old NES games or whatever these days, although I did buy a Super Nintendo Mini because I wanted the bonus of the controllers, but I have no problem with putting extra ROMs on it, they're never going to re-release everything from the old days of gaming officially so ROMs are totally fine.

So rare, obscure, out of print stuff, anime and ROMs is ok to pirate.

And it's ok to pirate a bit if you really do need to save some cash, but you shouldn't go over board with it, you should try to obtain something legally if you can, pirating everything just because doesn't sit right with me.

 

[Wonderful Id]

If you want me to buy something, sell it to me.

 

[Dutch Courage]

I'm a big opponent of the way copyright is enforced in music, it completely cripples sample based artists from reaching their potential and it's fucked that we'd only ever have a group like the Avalanches (3500+ samples in one record) come out of Australia on account of how copyright law functioned there at the time of recording.

Sampling the record crackling before the song even starts is - legally - an act of piracy. That sound belongs to the record company, because it's on their record. Don't even get me started on Paul McCartney, who's been making a fucking fortune off of buying up rights to thousands of songs solely to license the recordings.

That's awful. That's not why copyright was created. That's not perpetuating creativity. That's also the law of the land. Make your choice.

Why single out McCartney? I'm not a fan, but he has done nothing wrong. He began investing in publishing in the 1970's, long before sampling was a thing. Music publishing is (or was, thanks to piracy) a very solid investment (so solid that when McCartney told his former pal Michael Jackson that he should do the same, Jackson bought the Beatles' catalog)

While I agree that sampling ought to fall under "fair use" or something if it is minimal, I see no moral wrong in charging for the use of recorded material if it is used as a basis for a whole new song.

As for 'piracy', I don't necessarily consider it a crime, and I have used Pirate Bay and its progeny myself many times. The average downloader/pirate actually spends more money on music annually than those who don't illegally download, according to a legit study. But I don't delude myself into believing I am entitled to someone's intellectual property and the creator is not entitled to reimbursement. Among other things, it has killed music as a viable avenue of pursuit for most musicians.

I think streaming is a way to save the business, but the payment per stream is so paltry, you can have your song streamed five million times and get a check for about fifty bucks. Something seems wrong in that equation, and it is the record companies who are to blame. They cut their manufacturing costs practically to nothing, but also boosted their cut of the profits, leaving the musician out in the cold.

 

[ToroidalBoat]

It's disturbing how cult-like the devotion to "intellectual property" can be in the modern world. I've seen people (on deviantART of course) argue that fair use is bad. And of course, the "woke" think intangible culture itself should always be property ("cultural appropriation" and "indigenous intellectual property"). I think it may be best if people stop having the idea that one can own ideas themselves, and "steal" by copying alone. Real "plagiarism" (from a word meaning "abducting") should be thought of as lying or dishonesty, not some kind of "theft".

That said, we're stuck with copyright - no thanks to Di$ney lobbyists extending it far beyond a lifetime. So the way things are set up, I personally think at the moment that it's best not to illegally copy, when doing so actually "replaces a sale".

 

[BadBoyCentury]

I see piracy not as problem between rightholders (and their property) and pirates (gaining access to it), but as problem between rightholders and the environment (internet, generally speaking) they chose to distribute their work through.
If there is an easy and/or free way for me to access paywalled content, then it's the rightholder's fault that their property isn't adequately protected from any kind of copying/sharing.

 

[haurchefant]

Piracy is not immoral or moral, it just is. Pirate if you want, buy stuff if you want. Anyone trying to attach moralfagging to piracy is a queer.

 

[Stoneheart]

Piracy's a crime and crime doesn't pay
And we go home poor at the end of the day
But I'd rather live my life in rags
Than be taped to a desk with a wife as a hag
We live each day like there's nothing to lose
But a man has needs and the need is booze
They say all the best things in life are free
So give all your beer and your rum to me!

 

[Imposteroak]

If you are gonna pirate shit then just do so and shut up about it. If you want to debate with strangers on the internet to defend your piracy then you are retarded. You don't need a moral justification to pirate shit when there are plenty of practical ones. Like "I'm a neet and spent all my tugboat on tendies."

 

[DeadwastePrime]

why should i have to justify myself for pirating several thousands of dollars worth of books, movies, games, and software? dont tell me how to live my life.

 

[The 3rd Hooligan]

People who say it makes creators less money are wrong. Most people pirate because they wouldnt buy it otherwise. Money or not being able to buy due to diffrent reasons.

Heck some people who wouldnt buy do so after pirating.