
Piracy - You can't have your cake and eat it - willdamas
http://broadmuse.com/piracy
======
alextingle
The author has a fundamental misunderstanding of what laws mean, and how they
change.

In England, it is illegal to eat mince pies on Christmas day? Why? Because
centuries ago England was governed by a despotic, fundamentalist Christian
regime that did not approve of Christmas celebrations.

Should I then refrain from eating the mince pie? No. I and millions of my
fellow countrymen eat mince pies, and most are completely unaware of the
existence of Cromwell's mean spirited law.

Why is this crime tolerated by the authorities? Because they do not go about
like Robocop, enforcing laws as though they are some kind of computer program.
Instead they understand that laws are a crude human attempt to model _current_
social norms. Those social norms change over time and often the written laws
don't keep up with the pace of that change.

The Internet has made copyright law outdated. Social norms are in the process
of adjusting to the new situation. It's perfectly rational and _normal_ for
activists to hasten that process by defying the law, and encouraging others to
do likewise. Obviously, the copyright lobby will react by trying to strengthen
the laws, and step up enforcement. That's fair enough too.

Which side will win? Well opinions vary, but to suggest that breaking the law
is in itself an immoral and irredeemable act, is naive.

~~~
VMG
What happens if everybody eats mince pie on Christmas? Life goes on as usual.

What happens if nobody pays for a copy of Windows 8? There won't be a Windows
9.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_rider_problem>

~~~
DrHankPym
You say that like it's a problem.

Look at it this way: Does Ubuntu or OS X suffer from being pirated? Not
really. Windows needs to figure this out for themselves.

~~~
comicjk
We certainly don't want all OSs confined to closed hardware like OS X.

Ubuntu (and open source in general) works because of inverse-free-riders,
"free helpers" we might call them. That seems to be a sustainable model, but
it likely won't work for annoying grunt programming - note the poor driver
support in many Linux distros. For some tasks, someone needs to be paid.

~~~
treeform
A big couse in pour drivers support is that companies dont publish specs to
their devices. If there was only one dominant free OS like linux, companies
that make hardwire would want their devices to work with it and so will write
drivers or at least publish full spec.

------
mikeash
I don't really understand these posts that simply declare that the correct
choice is not to use their stuff, that piracy is wrong, and it's not your
choice.

I happen to _agree_ with the overall conclusion that one should seek
alternatives in these cases, but this is just an argument by shouting. It's
foolish to simply declare, "it's not your choice". Clearly, people think it
_is_ their choice. If you want to convince them, you had better back it up
with reasoning. The right to control is simply not an obvious, mostly-
universally-held right like the right not to be murdered or the right to
physical property.

The copyright debate is getting awfully stale. I wish the participants would
come up with something new to say instead of just constantly declaring that
piracy is not allowed on one side and that piracy doesn't hurt anybody on the
other side.

~~~
roguecoder
People don't understand how Ethics works.

On the anti-piracy side there are two groups: The first are artists who
believe, without any evidence, that they can make more money when copyright is
enforced. The second are people start out assuming that the right to control
information is a moral right. They then derive the ethical implication that
people shouldn't pirate.

On the pro-file sharing side there are two groups. The first are libertarian-
inclined utilitarians, which require people to prove actual harm before
something should be outlawed or have tried to start a tech company and been
threatened with a patent lawsuit. Every piece of evidence not created by the
middle-man industry I've ever seen has supported their position. The second
are people who oppose the idea of "intellectual property", starting from moral
principles such as freedom of expression, utility maximization or historic
precedent.

There is no need to come up with anything new to say: the conclusion one comes
to depends on what principles one uses to derive ethical implications.
Intellectual property is morally wrong, declares one side. Intellectual
property is a moral imperative, declares the other. It is impossible for
either to convince the other, since neither is basing their arguments on a
rational basis where facts or evidence might play a role.

Anyone who might be convinced doesn't care, probably because they are just
ignoring stupid laws anyway.

~~~
matteodepalo
I totally agree. However I think we should include a third group in the pro-
file sharing side: people who don't have the money to pay for content or just
wont because they're cheap. The problem is that the anti-piracy side mostly
sees this group instead of the other ones and that's why, imho, they claim
that pirating is like stealing and that it causes the same damage.

~~~
FreeFull
If they don't have any money to pay, how is anyone losing any money when they
download? This shouldn't hurt anyone in any way.

~~~
matteodepalo
Of course if you have nothing you can buy nothing so the producer would get no
harm, but this is rarely the case. I was a bit vague on this point but let me
be more clear. "Don't have any money" doesn't mean having 0$ in your bank
account, at least in this argument; it means that you are not willing to use
the money you have to buy some things because in your opinion you have little
money (compared to what you want to buy), so you decide to spend it for things
you care about and can't get for free. Now, imagine a scenario where you can't
get those things for free. In this scenario, you distribute your money
differently in order to be able to buy the products you need. I can assure you
there there are many people I know that have the money buy they tell me they
don't have it to buy certain products, so they pirate it. They are being
cheap. If they couldn't get those things for free they would pay for them.
This kind of people cause harm to the producers. Talking about a real example:
in my country (Italy) many people have breakfast at bars with 2-3 euros and
nobody will question this price. At the same time these people don't want to
pay for a 99 cents song that will entertain them for days. This is something
wrong and I see why producers want to change this kind of behavior. The
problem is they are "doing it wrong" by enforcing (or trying to enforce) laws
that protect things that just can't be protected anymore.

------
yangez
This article is interesting to read and think about from a theoretical
perspective. Practically, though, it is completely and utterly useless.

Fact 1: Pirating is possible and fairly easy across the board.

Fact 2: Some content creators try to limit access to maintain "exclusivity" or
to keep margins high. These guys get destroyed by piracy.

Fact 3: Other services strive to make it as easy as possible to get their
products legally - Steam, iTunes, the Louis CK experiment. Their stuff is
pirated a lot less and they generate a bunch of goodwill on the side.

These are facts, and no appeal to morality is going to change that. You can't
just tell someone to suck it up and say it's not their "decision". Of course
it's their decision - everyone decides whether or not to pirate! It is
ABSOLUTELY their decision. The way to curb piracy is not to appeal to people's
morality and tell people they SHOULD or SHOULDN'T do something. It's never
going to work.

Curb piracy by making it easier, safer, and more reliable to purchase legally
rather than pirate. Articles like this do nothing but reinforce the author's
sense of moral superiority.

~~~
chaz
World of Goo launched on Steam and still saw 90% piracy.

[http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2008/12/my-software-is-
bein...](http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2008/12/my-software-is-being-
pirated.html)

~~~
krig
This is the kind of thing that boggles my mind. World of Goo was a huge
success! How the piracy rate fits into the relative success or failure of
World of Goo is not at all clear. I don't see how anyone can believe that
there's a possible reality where World of Goo would be just as successful as
it was with a 0% piracy rate, and where information exchange is free. You
can't have both! If World of Goo had made a pittance and its developers had
died in poverty, maybe there would have been an argument to make there. But as
it is, that piracy figure is just a number that has no tangible connection to
the number of possible sales in a world where piracy is either morally
abhorrent to everyone, or technically impossible. And that world is something
for dystopian science fiction to explore, not one that I would ever wish to
experience.

~~~
chaz
I'm not saying that they missed out on 90% of their revenue (though it's fair
to say they lost out on some revenue). Rather, they did everything right: a
fun game that anyone can play, great press, broad distribution through
multiple channels, and no DRM. And yet a huge audience still saw it fit to
pirate their game.

It'll be interesting to watch the evolution of game distribution. Xbox and iOS
are massively growing platforms that also bring built-in DRM that's
significantly harder to circumvent.

~~~
lena
Your point is valid, but it is still worth noting that a huge audience also
did buy their game. They just sold their millionth game on the App Store
alone. <http://2dboy.com/2012/01/09/one-million-downloads/>

~~~
chaz
Yes, and the price is dramatically lower as well: $2.99. I paid $19.99 on
Steam three years ago. I'd be curious if they could do it all over again
today, if they would do iOS first.

------
wazoox
I solved this problem the "hard" way a long time ago. I don't use windows, at
all, but GNU/Linux (Yeah, I'm _this_ sort of guy, too).

And you know what, as time goes by it's actually less and less of an actual
problem; heck, I was even able to buy games for my box this year, thank you
Humble Bundle! OK, this isn't free software, but at least you don't feel like
you've been anally raped with barbed wire.

And music? Well, I still buy CDs, mostly; the time when CDs came with DRM
apparently faded away, so I don't even need to screen for this anymore (yes,
I've actively boycotted some artists because of this for a while). From time
to time, for music I don't actually care about, I buy mp3s from Amazon.

I don't write this to emphasize my moral superiority but to emphasize that it
isn't that hard. You don't agree with their policy? _don't buy the frigging
stuff_.

~~~
sequoia
I agree with you but I'm voting down. There's no need to use violent rape
analogies when talking about someone requiring you to activate over the phone.
Turn it down a notch please.

~~~
wazoox
> _when talking about someone requiring you to activate over the phone._

What about software that phones home and require some physical gizmo like a CD
or dongle to use, after you've already spent a nice sum of money to acquire
it? You're simply treated not like an amiable customer, but a thief, while
actual thieves simply use it.

~~~
sequoia
> _What about software that phones home and require some physical gizmo like a
> CD or dongle to use, after you've already spent a nice sum of money to
> acquire it?_

I still don't think this warrants comparison to rape.

------
Apreche
The only problem I have with this article is this line:

"since when does that suddenly mean that you can decide that you are no longer
going to pay for products that both legally and morally you are obliged to pay
for, yet still use them?"

Legally obliged to pay for? Yes.

Morally? No. I have no moral problem with piracy. Do unto others as you would
have them do unto you. Those are the foundations of my morality. I would love
it if people pirated things I made. That's my morality.

~~~
epo
You have no idea what you are talking about, I'm guessing this is because you
have never created anything worthwhile on which your livelihood depended. I'm
sure you'd be quick to whine if your employer (assuming you are old enough to
work) could decide whether or not you should be paid for your work after you
had done it. I hope you congratulate the next person to steal from you with a
cheery "well done, that's my morality too".

~~~
goblin89
If you are creating something on which your livelihood depends, do so ‘under a
promise of financial reward’. It would be foolish to do otherwise, isn't it?

But if you choose to publicly distribute your work—accept inevitable risks.
Don't like that—go get a real job. You can do contract work writing music, or
doing illustration / design.

~~~
seabee
More generally, if you want to be paid then do work under a contract. There
are many cases where you will willingly accept promise of financial reward -
look no further than Y Combinator - but you're a fool if you don't accept the
risks or pretend you should be immune to the illegal actions (rather than
seeking compensation after the fact, anyway).

Even in something like retail, your product can be stolen and there's no
guarantee you'll get recompense. Yet laws regarding shoplifting have remained
rather constant and non-draconian in all that time. The problem with the
internet is that it's all too easy to get something without paying for it, but
people all-too-often forget that the benefit of the internet is that _nobody
can deprive you of your goods_ (bandwidth notwithstanding).

Yeah, piracy sucks, but look at what other sectors of the economy have to deal
with. Risk's everywhere; deal with it.

------
andreyvit
On morality: given how widespread the piracy is, we probably shouldn't assert
that the moral side of the things is obvious here.

Regarding the law, that's one way to look at that. Another way is that the
role of copyright is about to change, and disobeying the law en masse might be
one way to help that change.

(Disclaimer: I'm not much of a pirate myself, I have a US iTunes Store account
despite living in Russia just to be able to buy music legally. Also I'm
earning money by writing software. But being able to copyright music and
software is not a given, it's just how things work today, and as the world
changes, this concept will also evolve.)

~~~
blottsie
The morality question isn't necessarily obvious, but the pervasiveness of a
particular activity has nothing to do with its morality. Was slavery more
morally correct when the majority approved of it, or at least looked the other
way? Absolutely not.

~~~
kmm
Actually, it was. You can't judge the morality of practices from the past from
your present point of view. You shouldn't be convicted that your morality is
absolute and will always be the only correct one.

Not to mention that software piracy is on a completely other level than
slavery.

~~~
blottsie
> You can't judge the morality of practices from the past from your present
> point of view.

Cultural relativism is certainly a valid school of ethical thought — one with
which I happen to disagree. On matters like piracy, which is certainly less
detrimental to society than slavery was, the consequences for believing what
is popular and what is right are relatively low. But to suggest that you can
apply this principle across the board, in all situations, is, in my view,
absurd.

You're suggesting there that we cannot judge anything that has happened in the
past because our views on the matter are now different. But that means we
cannot judge ANYTHING that has happened EVER because, by definition, now is
different from then.

> You shouldn't be convicted that your morality is absolute and will always be
> the only correct one.

I'm not. I'm just not convinced that, because a certain activity is
widespread, it is therefore morally correct.

~~~
kmm
I'm sorry, I should have been clearer.

What I try to say is that you can't judge both piracy and slavery from your
present point of view. I feel that because in the past slavery was commonly
accepted, that it was morally justified then. In the same way, given the huge
proliferation of piracy, I feel that copyright infringement is somewhat
morally justified now. This view might change and in the same way, the
morality of piracy might change too. I would take the common views of society
as the definition of what is morally justified and what isn't. It is possible
you see this in another way and that is fine (and not absurd).

Also, this change in zeitgeist is continuous, not as discrete as you overstate
it is. We are perfectly justified to judge what has happened yesterday.
Judging what happened during World War II is murkier and judging what happened
when slavery was still extant is an almost meaningless activity.

------
TheCapn
I don't understand pirates that think downloading the content is a form of
protest.

If you want to make a change and win then you have to think like your
opponent. This is how the greedy suits think:

"Our product has sold X copies, but Y people downloaded it. That means there
are X+Y people interested in my product! We must make it so X+Y people buy it
and 0 download it!"

NO! Stop! Bad pirates! By downloading the product you're telling the company
you want their offerings but are too lazy or greedy or whatever. Vote with
your wallet and avoid the product! That way when the suit looks at his charts
he can figure out why no one wanted the product in the first place. If his
inbox is chock full of "drop the DRM" then maybe he'll consider it.

You are not making a stance by stealing it. You're reaffirming their decision
to put on DRM and pass anti-piracy laws. You're giving them the excuse to
invade your rights/privacy. Stop it.

~~~
sophacles
Stop with the disingenuous false dilemmas. A perfectly valid message is "we
want what you offer on better terms". The actions strongly broadcast that
message, perhaps better than just having an offering that doesn't sell.

If everyone keeps playing this stupid "there can be only 2 positions in any
argument" game, we end up with posts like this - completely ignorant of a
multitude of other options. Stop it and consider that this may not be binary.

~~~
TheCapn
My point isn't so much about how we go about things but more of a plea to have
people work on their opponent's terms in order to win.

Each side on the issue is drawing their line in the sand but that line is too
far from one another to ever reach a form of compromise or conclusion. There's
this large valley between what the piracy community wants and what the
industry is willing to give. Which side is willing to crack first? While
pirates get their jollies there's still too much of a community of people that
are paying for the products that keep industries afloat. Are we going to try
and convert enough consumers to finally "hurt" the industry? Will that even be
enough once the government tacks a law onto consumer products that goes
towards the industry companies?

What about the "legal" approach. Is boycotting going to work? Is telling the
companies the exact message you wrote going to change anything? Actions
definitely speak louder than words but is pirating something going to send
that message or will it send the message "we want what you offer"?

I agree with your statement that its not binary. Nothing is black and white in
this situations. But the people vocally advocating piracy are doing no better
where they say "my way or the highway".

I maybe shouldn't offer up too much opinion on the matter because there's
evidence on both sides of the matter that show both progress and regression.
On one hand we're seeing more services like netflix offering things on terms
"pirates" want: convenient, accessible and quality. But on the other end we're
seeing things like worse DRM and new bills. Have we really made progress or
not?

------
jxcole
Ok. I hope I'm not going against the rules of HN discourse here but I'd like
to go out on a limb and say any article in which the author doesn't bother
capitalizing the first word in his sentences is not an article I'm going to
bother to read. One of the few things I miss about the world before the
internet is a proper adherence to grammar. If he were ESL, I would be more
forgiving, but this post just smacks of lazy writing.

~~~
ianstormtaylor
It's obviously a deliberate choice, there are no capital letters on his entire
site. I don't know much about the OP but in the design world the style isn't
that alien.

It originated in the 20s and 30s in the Bauhaus, Herbert Bayer
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herbert_Bayer> was one of the more prominent
supporters, designing typefaces that contained no uppercase letterforms at
all. He even experimented with designing entirely new alphabets that were
phonetically based.

Jan Tschichold was another Bauhaus guy experimenting in the same realm. From
Wikipedia: "Between 1926 and 1929, he designed a “universal alphabet” to clean
up the few multigraphs and non-phonetic spellings in the German language. ...
The alphabet was presented in one typeface, which was sans-serif and without
capital letters."

It's interesting that it was born out of choices made to German, where they
have many more capital letters in each sentence than we do in English.
Regardless, it's clearly a stylistic choice, and one that the OP might even
have to work harder to maintain, if he is accustomed to writing in sentence
case.

There's that old saying that you must first learn the rules and then you can
break them. That is exactly what is going on here, and the OP isn't unique in
this. Throughout my time at design school many of my teachers, who had been
educated by Bauhaus instructors, would email in only lowercase—they adopted
the style. And others have adopted it from them (here's one of my design
school friends' site: <http://traceychan.net/> where she has).

I quite like the style myself.

~~~
Nick_C
That's fine for typeset print where other aids to scanning are used, such as a
double space between sentences. HTML, though, removes the double space. Which
means you have to consciously read every single word rather than scan and
parse it in bulk.

To a fast reader, without visual cues it is a jumbled mess. I gave up after
forcing myself to read three sentences.

------
ap22213
I think that many people seem to believe that property is some intrinsic
thing. But, in fact, property is a socially construed thing and a granted
privilege. Furthermore, property means many things, and there are many
different kinds. Each kind should be treated differently.

Most of the confusion of 'piracy' (such a strong word, btw) stems from people
misusing concepts related to physical objects and translating them equally to
ephemeral things like 'intellectual-property' and 'digital-property'. The
later things should be treated differently (in this person's opinion).

'Stealing' is a bad word. It's an age-old word that causes physical reaction
in many. We learn very early on not to 'steal'. But, downloading a digitally
compressed song is not the same thing as taking a toy from another kid.

At some point, power has shifted from owning physical objects to these new
sorts of things that aren't physical. We need new laws and new social norms.
We need fair reasonable treatment, for these things.

Sadly, the power-holders are writing the laws that grant themselves the most
privileges. Instead, the society should write the laws that beget the best
society.

------
kingkilr
Not that I disagree with a word of this article, but he's accepting the
premise of those two articles: that the distribution mechanisms are a worse UX
than pirating. My response:

Are you high? Once upon a time I pirated content, he's an approximate recap of
what my expierience looked like:

* Search pirate bay

* Look at 2000 results, none of which look right.

* Ok, found one.

* Crap it's French with Arabic subtitles.

* Ok this one looks good.

* Shit, no seeders.

* Ok, this one has seeders and is english.

* Go get a bagel because it's going to take an hour to download.

Here's the UX of Netflix, rdio, or hulu:

* Search.

* Press play.

In my time using Netflix, rdio, hulu, and last.fm for my media needs there has
been _one title_ I couldn't find.

EDIT: I'll be clear, my comments on these services apply exclusively to the
US, I know nothing about the status of these services elsewhere.

~~~
mikeocool
Agreed that the UX of existing sites have much better UX than the pirating
options. However a much more common experience on Netflix is:

* Search

* Whoops, this movie isn't available on streaming.

On Hulu:

* Search

* Only the last four episodes are available.

The content distributors are strangling themselves because they're trying to
protect their existing means of distribution and refuse to adopt new ones that
people actually want to use and pay for.

~~~
tsantero
> The content distributors are strangling themselves because they're trying to
> protect their existing means of distribution and refuse to adopt new ones
> that people actually want to use and pay for.

In 2008 Starz and Netflix entered into an agreement where Netflix would be
able to license and distribute Starz media for $30 million. Said contract
expired, Netflix offers $300 million to renew, and Starz rejects the offer
under the premise that their content is worth more.

Now Starz, like HBO (eg. HBO Go), is planning to roll out their own streaming
service--which I would say is both an attempt to protect their means of
distribution as well as an effort to adopt to new models.

As an aside, I tried to use HBO Go a few weeks ago...and was prompted to enter
the details of my cable tv service in order to gain access. I didn't have the
time/patience to proceed and decided to read instead.

All I can say is if every content distribution company expects users to pay a
separate fee, etc, for streaming content they're SOL. Evidence of Netflix,
Hulu, iTunes and the like show that people prefer one-stop shopping.

Edit: typo

------
diiq
Civil disobedience, the most puissant form of protest, is breaking a law you
believe to be unjust, and suffering the consequences if necessary.

If you break a law you believe to be unjust _and_ expect to suffer no
consequences, that's silly, but not immoral.

If you break a law you believe is just, _then_ you're kinda evil.

~~~
Czarnian
Refusing to move to the back of the bus. Sitting down in the middle of the
street to block the movement of troops from point a to point b. Walking from
Montgomery to Selma. Downloading the Inbetweeners.

One of these things is not civil disobedience. In fact, trying to cast piracy
as a form of civil disobedience is insulting to the people who actually got
arrested, beaten by police, attacked by dogs, had the firehose turned on them,
were tear-gassed, run over, and suffered any number of real consequences as
they publicly defied laws and a society that were unquestionably wrong.

To cast content piracy as civil disobedience, one must accept that the act of
murder is an act of civil disobedience because the murderer believes the law
against it is unjust.

~~~
diiq
I do.

------
stasm
My thoughts exactly. You can't force a privately-owned company to sell you the
product the way you want it to be sold. It's their right to make money the way
they see fit, and if they decide it's okay for them to lose some of the
clientele over DRM, it's their choice.

Piracy in the name of protesting against DRM is borderline hypocrisy. As
others already said, morality is subjective, but here are two other ways I'd
personally support :

\- don't use the product,

\- pay for the license, pirate the product, get it touch with the company to
explain your problem to them.

------
Iv
I agree on software : alternative exists and the real way to say "fuck off" is
to use the corresponding free software alternative or to develop it. This is
true to the extent where Microsoft plays the rules of competition and IT
correctly. If a government or a provider gives me a document in a format that
Microsoft does not publish, they are effectively trying to make competition
impossible and I feel entitled to pirate their software.

On music, I could not disagree more : there is a lack of a solution to pay
artists directly. 90% of the artists I know today, I know from friends or web
radio. I would like to repay them directly. I have no way of doing that. The
alternative is just not there. Some artists accept direct donations but majors
try to prevent that. This anti-competitive behavior makes it totally OK in my
opinion to pirate music.

Oh, and don't tell me I am rationalising. I stopped being part of this game
several years ago. I don't buy music, I don't download tunes (unless it is
authorised by the band like Partition 36). I decided this whole show was
stupid when I got my first DRMed CD and that I didn't want to fight on it or
break any law. Nowadays the situation is such that this conflict can't be
ignored anymore. "Piracy" is used as a pretext to put forward net filtering,
restrictive laws, and tools of censorship.

I don't give a fuck about music and musicians. I can do without. I respect
them and they deserve a pay, but the current system is completely FUBAR and
its insanity is creeping in other domains. It should be stopped before it is
too late.

------
acg
If copyright were just to protect the investment of a company in development
of an artist or product I'd broadly agree with this argument.

Where copyright seems objectionable to me, is where the initial cost of
development was non-existent or large profits have been made for years. For
example:

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Happy_Birthday_to_You#Royalty_a...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Happy_Birthday_to_You#Royalty_amounts_sought)

For some copyright to last 95 years seems more like profiteering than
protection of the creative industries considering creation is often based on
the work of others.

I don't condone piracy, but I think piracy would be far less socially
acceptable if: \- the creator can be seen to benefit from their work \-
copyright better resembled its original intent of protecting investment in the
creation of something new and not staking ownership over the work of others.

~~~
jiggy2011
Playing "happy birthday to you" in public might be a legit act of civil
disobedience .

Pirating last weeks blockbuster isn't.

~~~
bitmonk
That's an opinion. Stating opinion as fact is a worthless contribution, in
fact a detriment, to healthy discussion.

I wouldn't argue that there's moral high ground here, I'd simply put it this
way:

    
    
      Anyone who thinks there is a better way to keep people from pirating music than to make the legal means of acquisition simple, affordable, and to not play games with release dates, is a fucking idiot.

~~~
jiggy2011
What's your point? I should prefix every sentence with "I think", people here
are smart enough to put things in context.

Legal means of acquiring music is pretty simple. Legal DRM Free MP3 downloads
are built into my music player and I'm a _linux_ user.

------
kmm
The law is nothing but a piece of paper. I'm glad it exists, as it provides a
framework that protects me from harm and allows me to life my live, but I feel
no moral obligation at all to follow it.

This style of argumentation is starting to tire me. Obviously, this author
thinks piracy is morally wrong. Other people have no such moral qualms about
piracy. Both points of view are fine!

But implicitly or explicitly using morality as an argument for or against
piracy is a bad style of argumentation and is almost an ad hominem. If I were
to say that I am for piracy and someone told me that this was morally wrong, I
would pay no attention to this person. But if he were to say that he
personally feels piracy is morally wrong AND if he were to give me an argument
as to why he feels that way, I would listen to this argument and at least
think about it.

~~~
mattgreenrocks
Except moral relativism is not any more defensible. Suppose the creator of a
work asks you to pay for it, but a pirate chooses not to. Why shouldn't we
call the pirate an asshole? They've disrespected the terms of use set by the
author, as well as the author themselves.

It's that simple.

~~~
Karunamon
I'm perfectly okay with the "Pirates are assholes" stance. I am an asshole. I
admit this.

What I'm not okay with is when industry groups distort facts by trying to get
one crime confused as a completely separate crime.

Make no mistake.. both are crimes, but the attempt is to bring the loaded
meanings of one term to a completely different word.

It's factually incorrect, and it needs to stop.

It's that simple.

~~~
mattgreenrocks
+1 to you, and this is correct. The industry doesn't get called out by
Congress when it claims billions of dollars of lost revenue by people who
wouldn't have paid either way.

Of course, I've come to believe that intellectual honesty is a cognitive
luxury for most people; especially politicians.

------
joshontheweb
Fact: People will pirate your software if you make it a pain to pay for it.

Fact: People will pay for your software if you make it easy to pay for.

Windows has proven this with their DRM.

Apple has proven this with their app stores and itunes.

In a slightly unrelated note:

This is why I wish there was an app store for web apps. The web needs easy way
to sell access to web apps like in the app store. If all I had to do was click
'purchase' and enter my password to get access to web apps like turntable.fm
for a reasonable price, I would gladly pay. This would open up a whole new
revenue model for web apps. There is a whole class of web apps that are trying
to rely on ads now but don't have the millions of visitors a month to make
that feasible. A web app store could provide a place for these lower traffic
but still very useful and relevant products. I envy mobile developers since
they have this avenue as an option. Anyone else feel this way?

------
tintin
Someone mentioned 3D printers in another post and got downvoted for it. But
think about it.

You invested a lot of time into creating an object everybody likes. People can
get it in a online shop and it will be send to there address.

Now a clever guy scans the object with a 3D scanner and is putting the model
online. Everybody can now downloading the model on The Pirate Bay and print it
at home. And they all say: "fuck that online store, it is way too much hassle
and costs too much".

It's a difficult discussion. Therefore I think it's way to easy to just call
making a copy not stealing.

Edit: the post by randomdata: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3479581>

------
insickness
One can say that record labels brought the piracy problem on themselves by
looking to create barriers to content while pirates worked to create access to
content.

However, it's erroneous for an individual to argue that he has a _right_ to
pirate because the industry created barriers to their own content. It's
counterproductive to the anti-censorship movement.

Instead, we should focus on the fact that the music industry has been anti-
effective and is now using censorship to compensate for their reluctance to
change.

~~~
tux1968
You're right, and it's just as erroneous for an individual to argue that he
has a _right_ to payment every time someone shares a new copy of his creation.

Competing interests will often be in conflict, and that's what we're seeing in
this debate. You can safely translate "a right to piracy" to "no moral
obligation to respect copyright". Once the moral argument is dismissed, all
that remains is pragmatic conflict resolution.

One side could be destroyed, a compromise could be found, or a protracted
conflict could ensue. In any case, moral arguments from either side are mostly
useless.

------
rplst8
_"if you want to protest the crappy way these companies treat their customers,
don't buy their stuff. but you can't have your cake and eat it. protest by not
using or having it at all. they have something you want; even if you don't
agree with their methods, it is still theirs to decide what to do with. all
you are doing is supporting the industry in their drive to stamp out pirates;
instead, support legal ways of obtaining this content through spotify and
others. "_

The one fault I see with this argument (mainly related to music) is this:
There is no way to simply boycott the the recording companies' products
without boycotting the artists as well. Recording companies have a monopoly on
the artists they cover. While US contract law supports this arrangement, the
model is broken in today's world of digital distribution.

~~~
michael_dorfman
_Recording companies have a monopoly on the artists they cover._

And that's the artist's choice. The artist could choose to distribute their
work in some other fashion. So, if you want the artist's product, you have to
buy it via the means chosen by that artist.

------
martinkallstrom
Author Paolo Coelho operated a blog called Pirate Coelho where he published
torrents to all his books. He still does this because it makes him rich. For
example, in Russia nobody bought his books, sales were up to 15 000 books in
two years. So he leaked the russian translations via BitTorrent. Soon, he saw
that people started talking about them. Some time later, he saw the sales
increasing. A lot. In one year sales of his physical books crossed 1 million
in Russia. Source is himself.

Now, his publishers have finally realized the connection, so he doesn't need
the anonymous pirate blog anymore. Instead, he links to the torrents from his
own offical blog. He is also an avid SOPA protester:
<http://paulocoelhoblog.com/>

~~~
res0nat0r
That is his right to do so. It is also the right of other authors to be
against free bittorrenting of their books because they believe it hurts their
pocketbook. The key is the creator of the material makes this decision, not
the consumer.

~~~
martinkallstrom
Actually, he did this illegally. His publisher had the copyright to all
translations, not himself. So he routinely asked "to see them" and then
routinely leaked them on The Pirate Bay. Again, this is according to himself.

~~~
res0nat0r
Notice how this was the content creators choice to put his works online for
free. Since he didn't own the works it is still technically wrong, but it is
also wrong for Joe Blow consumer to decide to put up copies online of content
from creators without their permission.

Why do I keep getting downvoted for stating a fact? It _is_ against the law to
put online content you don't own copyright to. Not sure why this is incorrect.

------
cracell
Why is it ok for copyright holders to have a monopoly over the distribution of
their content?

If we go to the core of copyright law the original intention as I understand
it was to encourage creation of stuff and my assumption is that the point of
having such created is to have it distributed in an easily accessible manner.
Yet we have no issue under the law with companies only selling to one
distributor or just crippling it with DRM. Why?

Why don't we expect companies to make their content accessible to everyone and
not just a in the ways they choose. I completely understand this when it comes
to small resource limited companies. But I'm not talking about them, I'm
talking about the huge companies that feel they should be able to pick and
choose who gets their content. Don't get me wrong I am not arguing that I
should get their content for free. But I should be able to get it from various
sources at a comparable price.

In what way do exclusivity agreements help us? They give large businesses huge
advantage over small businesses. How can someone compete with Hulu when the
content owners won't license their content to anyone else at a comparable
rate? (Yes I know Hulu is owned by the content creators but isn't that a
conflict of interest when you only let your own properties distribute it over
the web?)

I'm not sure what the answer is. But I don't see how allowing companies to
have a monopoly over the distribution of their content helps individuals or
businesses in the long term.

------
zobzu
"it is not your decision"

I disagree. It is. Free will is something you still cannot remove. Sorry.

Even doing the most horrible things are still _your_ decision. There might be
consequences, but that's another story.

------
mrdingle
There is nothing immoral about copying data. It is a bummer that you worked so
hard and didn't make the money that you thought you were going to but no one
owes you that money and It's selfish to think distribution is going to work
the way you want it to.

From henceforth and until the sun explodes, there will be massive amounts of
piracy.

Thats it. Seriously. Factor it into your business plan. Think about it before
you write your next song. If you still don't have a creative urge, then good,
do something else. If that software isn't economically viable then good, do
something else. But I guarantee you people will continue to make wheel barrows
full of money regardless. And there will be music, and movies, and poetry and
software. And there will be more of it than ever before.

This is actually a huge blessing in disguise. You no longer need to pay
someone to distribute your creations, you no longer need marketing to reach
your fans, you no longer need middle men. And best of all, you no longer have
to worry about piracy. Because it is now fact.

So stop pretending like copyright law isn't fucked up. Stop pretending like
you can have the same business model you did 5 years ago. Stop pretending like
music, or movies, or software are going to cease to exist and make some
fucking money.

Welcome to 2012.

------
eslachance
My only issue here is "but don't decide to take the law into your own
hands...it's not your decision."

It's unfortunate that people feel that laws are simply things that are imposed
on us by above and are outside our power. You don't simply bend over for the
law to screw you over. Laws are there to be changed, they are there to be
improved and prevented so that we can all benefit from them in the right way.

But hey, if you want to bend over, be my guest.

~~~
roguecoder
Exactly. Jury nullification is a long-standing (and some argue necessary) part
of democratic systems of justice. Basically, if laws are stupid and imposed on
us by powerful people, juries should just refuse to enforce them.

It is too bad this has fallen by the wayside. In general I think "it's the
law" is a terrible reason to do anything: all it really does is shift the cost
curves. Businesses routinely break the law when the fine is less than the
money they make, but if regular people do the same thing suddenly it's
Eeeevil.

------
tgrass
McArdle at the Atlantic explores this more in depth:

[http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/01/how-
much...](http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/01/how-much-does-
file-sharing-resemble-stealing-and-does-it-matter/251277/)

[http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/01/is-
trade...](http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/01/is-trademark-
infringement-fraud/251358/)

------
guard-of-terra
It's an interesting debate.

But may I eat your cake and still have mine? For example, I go to cinema to
see local movies and watch local tv series on legal services, but torrent
american/english films and tv series (the main reason is that there's no way I
can get them legally and in time - american services refuse me as a customer).
Same with books.

This way I have my cake and I ate yours, and it's not obvious to me how it's
not a win for me.

------
twelvechairs
About as poor a post on piracy as the rest of them - not dealing with half the
issues. You could have just posted this in one of the previous threads.

------
jiggy2011
I don't know about the morals of this but I do know that if we hadn't pirated
as gratuitously for the last 10 years we wouldn't have DRM or Walled Gardens
to the extent we do today.

I think the content industries will decide we can't be trusted with our toys
anymore and move them all to the cloud where we can peek at them for a monthly
fee.

~~~
larrik
I disagree.

In my experience as a consultant and graphic designer (actually fronting for
my wife, I'm not really a designer), everyone who isn't a young internet-savvy
type just _freaks out_ at the idea that people might "steal" stuff of their
website. They constantly ask if there is way to let users/visitors see PDFs or
other parts of their website without people being able to download them.

I, of course, tell them that downloading is actually an unavoidable
requirement to the user seeing anything at all, etc. Some simply don't post as
much as they would have.

My point is that DRM would likely always be the first idea a content owner
thinks of when they consider putting something on any digital medium.

(Also consider that DRM existed long before the internet, in the earliest
software and games. It just wasn't as fancy.)

------
grandinj
We granted a limited legal monopoly to certain parties in order to encourage
the growth of certain industries.

Over time, that bargain has been severely corrupted by those industries.

Piracy is the consequence.

I'm sure that with time, and a more balanced approach to the granting of such
monopolies, piracy will become less and less of a problem.

------
danielsoneg
I think it's worth bringing up a factor mentioned here a while ago - Piracy
serves as a useful market signal. The fact that people are pirating content
means there's demand - if they're pirating it, but nobody's paying for it,
that means the rights holders are creating a product people want, but the
price & delivery mechanism aren't right yet. That's an awful lot better
information than just that people aren't buying something - and I'd argue it's
one of the signals that got the record industry to actually start taking DRM-
free music sales seriously.

Obviously it's not a great signal on price - piracy's always going to have the
lowest price - but knowing there's demand means you can start to adjust your
strategy to try to capture some genuinely lost sales.

~~~
nlawalker
Price and delivery mechanism are an important part of the product. In fact,
with digital piracy, they're arguably more important than the content: there's
always demand for free stuff that can be stored indefinitely without any loss
in quality or functionality, doesn't take up any physical space and doesn't
require any effort to obtain. See the hundreds of posts on Reddit with
screenshots of Steam sale aftermaths and the admission that they'll never be
able to play most of it.

Free is magic. It's place on the supply/demand curve is far away from "one
cent."

That said, I think that in general you are right. We just need more publishers
to get brave and try experimenting with pennies-on-the-dollar sales and other
stuff.

------
guscost
I don't watch Boardwalk Empire because HBO won't sell it to me online. I'm
sure as hell not buying cable, and I'm also not going to bother spending the
time finding and watching some crappy rip online when there are other things
to do.

Stick that in your pipe and smoke it.

------
dlikhten
The answer to the author is two fold:

1) laws are made to be challeneged, especially if society does not approve.
See alextingle's response.

2) If I make a widget in a widget factory. You can get widgets from me or from
Frank down the block. Getting it from Frank is illegal. However to use the
widget (that you love) you must stick a pipe in your ass. Frank gives it to
you at a bargain price and no pipe in ass requirements. The only way to tell
me "its not ok to overcharge me and force me to stick pipes in my ass, even if
I love the product" is to buy it from Frank. Otherwise you buy it from me,
live with the ass-pipe and pray for change.

------
alper
Just this is enough justification:
[http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_EbhbPbkypPY/S4lILqwD3GI/AAAAAAAABs...](http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_EbhbPbkypPY/S4lILqwD3GI/AAAAAAAABsw/XXPtZ28lEu0/s400/dvd-
piracy.jpg)

------
pippy
Will has a good point, but I disagree on a fundamental level.

There's three _massive_ core problems with the current media model:

1) Modern media has failed to adapt. When I reinstalled windows I used a
pirated version. The key on the side of my case was awkward to read. Games
industry nailed it: look at Steam. 2) Entertainment is a waste of time and
people know that - if someone can't download a movie they're not going to run
out and buy it. They're going to watch cats fall down on youtube. 3) When
companies no longer prioritize their own products people lose respect for
them.

This SOPA/PIPA drama is simply making #3 worse

------
jrockway
I disagree with this. Pirating makes the problem apparent to the MPAA; people
want their products, but the existing distribution channels are not working.
If people didn't pirate the MPAA's products, then the MPAA would conclude that
nobody wanted their products anymore. That wouldn't result in positive change
for people that like movies but want to play them under Linux, for example.

Piracy proves that DRM only hurts the people willing to pay money for the
product. It has no effect on piracy whatsoever. In fact, DRM may be _causing_
piracy.

------
mhb
Is Trademark Infringement Fraud?:

[http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/01/is-
trade...](http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/01/is-trademark-
infringement-fraud/251358/)

------
sixbrx
I think the big drivers of music consumption must still depend on traditional
media and corporations in a big way. Otherwise we'd have tech specialists
hooking up directly with musicians and together they would have delivered the
death blow to the traditional music distributors already.

I think what's missing is the combination of talent-search + promotion. Most
users just won't be proactive about searching through a bunch of no-name bands
to find some music worth listening to.

------
skylervm
Someone needs to be paid to be able to continue producing the things you
enjoy. Otherwise they stop getting made. So before I get any further, I think
artists, developers, etc. need to be compensated for their work. It should be
illegal to copy someone else's digital goods and sell them for a profit (ie.
copying a cd whether you paid for the original or not and reselling it). That
doesn't mean I think copyright holders need to be compensated in the same way
they have in the past. We're in the midst of trying to figure out how exactly
to do that. Louis CK's movie, Radiohead's In Rainbows, Kickstarter... they're
all examples of people trying to figure out how this all works moving forward.
Some of it works, some of it doesn't. Eventually, we'll figure out a system
that does.

We're going through a cultural shift in the way we obtain information. We
forget that buying and individually owning books, movies, music, etc. is a
relatively new thing and wasn't always the norm. But because there are entire
industries built around these things, organizations like the RIAA and the MPAA
have an obvious interest in keeping things they way they are.

People should be allowed to share as they want without repercussion. Some
people will pay for things, others won't and some can't even if they wanted
to. That's never going to change no matter how many laws are passed trying to
stop it. People shouldn't be denied access to materials just because they
didn't or can't pay for them.

Libraries are essentially what the internet has become except on a much
smaller scale. One person / institution / organization buys all the books,
cds, movies, etc. and lends them to others for free. Some will argue the
differences is there are a limited number of copies that can be lent out at
any one time. And while that's true, it's irrelevant. Just because that's the
way things have been doesn't mean that's the way they need to be. As more
libraries expand their digital content, the lines between our views on
libraries, piracy and the sharing of information will become increasingly
blurred.

We're living in a time when people have access to information like never
before. People are being exposed to music, books and films they never would
have before. We're learning things we never would have been able to 10 years
ago. Walls and barriers to learning and education are being torn down. Those
are all good things that we should be celebrating, not trying to destroy.

------
rejectedstone
It is easier to steal a Twinkie than it is to wait in line and have to pay for
it, and then wait for your change. Then you have all those damn coins in your
pocket...

~~~
shintoist
Maybe if you had to sign terms and conditions, you were unable to share it
with friends, resell it and sometimes, sometimes you don't even get to eat it,
because the wrapper wont recognize your hand!

------
tikhonj
The problem with this article is that he does not provide a compelling
argument. Or, more accurately, he does not provide an argument _at all_ : he
just repeats that unauthorized copying is wrong.

As far as I can tell, he took "piracy is wrong" as an axiom. Which would be
fine, except the article is _arguing_ that "piracy" is wrong. Arguing that an
axiom--or something you're basically treating as an axiom--is true is trivial
and tautological.

------
jmduke
I completely agree (and its hypocritical of me, because I pirate too much for
my own good, but due to financial reasons rather than 'moral' ones.) Pirating
Windows still helps Microsoft, because its another computer not using a
competing OS.

That being said, I think it is a salient point that a pristine distribution
system will curb the effects of privacy; Valve's Steam distribution venue is a
great example of this.

------
jriddycuz
Yes, you actually can decide that you're not going to pay content
distributors. If you regard IP as an illegitimate idea, then you can act on
that.

------
lhnz
> don't decide to take the law into your own hands...it's not your decision.

If it's not my decision that means I should not be held responsible for what I
do.

------
akg
> if there is no legal way for you to enjoy it, unfortunate though it is,
> tough. write to them. email them. call them to protest. but don't decide to
> take the law into your own hands...it's not your decision.

To that point, I would like to add another option: create an alternative.
Things that are seemingly broken are opportunities for creating something
better.

------
evolve2k
SUSPECT AUTHENTICITY This site consists of only this article and almost
nothing personally remarkable about who the author is. It is also the users
very first post to HN on an account created the day after the blackout. Anyone
else find this suspicious?

willdamas do you have any affiliations you might like to declare?

------
noonespecial
I'm still not sure why so many people care if its "right" or "wrong" to pirate
stuff like this. It gets pirated. Making the product easier to buy would mean
it gets pirated less, not more. Companies don't seem to get it. This fact is
interesting.

The pirate is a datapoint, not a moral lesson.

------
rodly
Property has the contingency of being owned. If it is not owned by anyone then
it can be declared public property or non-usable estate.

I will never understand why people seem to view digital content as different
from physical content. The only difference is it lacks a sense of tangibility.
You can only consume it with your eyes and "touch it" with your input devices.
I believe as humans we tend to err on the selfish side far too often. If you
found a $100 bill on the street you would quickly pick it up and walk away. If
you found a $100 bill on the bank floor would you follow the same discourse?
Of course you wouldn't. You might rationalize it is the right thing do to or
you fear reprisal for taking it. The barrier to entry on any endeavor is the
most substantial factor on whether you will commit. Meaning, people would
steal and kill at a tremendous frequency if we didn't put consequences in
place for such actions.

Pirates (us, me, you) are simply children getting away with theft, in the
infancy of the internet.

------
chrisbennet
You are never going to convince anyone of something that they can't allow
themselves to think. If you're stealing you will use all kinds of convoluted
logic to pretend that you aren't.

The real value of the post is that it lets some of know that not everyone was
raised by wolves.

------
etherael
Piracy isn't as desirable as a straight boycott of the parties that are
currently trying to break the Internet, but at least pirates aren't feeding
the beast. Those companies deserve complete destruction for what they have
done

~~~
lachyg
What have they 'done'?

~~~
etherael
They have tried to destroy the internet, remember yesterday? As long as they
exist they will keep on trying and as an existential threat to the internet I
can't see how anyone can excuse continued support for them in any way. Better
a boycott, but failing that piracy is still more ethical than feeding the
beast.

~~~
lachyg
There is nothing ethical about pirating.

~~~
etherael
There is even less ethical about financially supporting companies that tried
to buy laws that would destroy the net as we know it.

~~~
kingkilr
So you're claiming that anyone who buys a DVD or a CD is acting unethical?
Support that.

~~~
etherael
Not if the item was produced by a a party other than the parties pushing for
SOPA and its ilk. I think piracy is generally bad, I just think financing
groups that want to destroy the internet is worse. Think of it as a
transmogrification of the MPAA mandated warnings at the beginning of movies
telling you that if you buy from pirates you're supporting drugs / terrorism /
human smuggling / pick your poison.

If you buy from SOPA supporters, you're supporting the death of the internet.

------
davorb
I do not feel that I am morally obliged to pay and I believe that the laws
should be changed. We have IP rules when it comes to a musical composition and
architecture. Why not in other areas such as hairstyles or recipes?

~~~
v0cab
Right. I'm a language teacher and I don't get paid when a student gets a job
and uses something I taught him.

I also don't get paid if that student becomes a language teacher and reuses
lesson ideas he got from me.

------
fastviper
Hm.. this article is mental slavery.

Also it misses the point that some laws are passed being backed up by well-
paid lies. So breaking the law can no longer be any moral issue.

Example: * speed limits * never-ending copyright * exporting cryptography

~~~
wazoox
People looks for excuses, and I suppose conflating different things like speed
limits, copyright and cryptography is some way to nullify their possible
importance. These are not on the same level:

* speeding and more generally, driving misbehaviour are directly responsible for deaths.

* Pirating software and music never killed anyone, but is about maximizing profits for some corporations.

* limiting cryptography is about government control, and is almost only a political matter.

Law can change the way people behave, notwithstanding their agreement :

Speed limits have been enforced much more severely in France in the past few
years and guess what, people are speeding much less now. I, myself, changed
too: I used to drive at 180 kph quite casually, and I don't anymore. In the
same time, road casualties fell significantly, though of course this is for a
large part because cars are much safer than they used to be (thank you to
Euro-NCAP). Almost everybody complains about the speed limits, the radars
everywhere, higher fines, but it's hard to deny that the policy was efficient,
and that it's good.

Now copyright is an entirely different matter. Copyright is only about
maximizing profits; extremely tight and severely enforced copyright, or the
absence of it, wouldn't change our lives that much, anyway.

~~~
learc83
In the United States speed limits are not enforced for safety. They are
instead a revenue stream for local government.

Relative speed kills, and if police were really concerned about safety they
would prevent people from driving too slowly for traffic conditions as well as
too fast.

I'll give you a similar example from recent news. Over the last few years,
many towns have installed red light cameras. However, many local governments
have discovered that red light cameras work _too_ well.

After people got used to them, they stopped running red lights, and the
revenue from citations dried up.

Guess what happened? Towns started removing red light cameras even though they
enforced safer driving.

~~~
wazoox
Sounds a bit too good (in the usual anti-government, libertarian style) to be
true. Any reference?

~~~
learc83
Just a quick Google search, but here's an article about Fort Lauderdale
removing their cameras.

[http://www.browardcountyduilawyers.com/broward-county-
dui/fo...](http://www.browardcountyduilawyers.com/broward-county-dui/fort-
lauderdale-not-making-money-considers-pulling-red-light-cameras/)

It's also not really a libertarian no government issue, because red light
cameras are basically privatizing traffic enforcement.

It's no secret that companies sell these systems by promoting them as revenue
generators.

Furthermore, there are plenty of other ways to decrease red light violations.
The most effective is to increase the duration of the yellow light.

According to this report "Straight through violations drop 92 percent after
yellow lights are extended by one second in Loma Linda, California."

<http://www.thenewspaper.com/news/30/3055.asp>

Here's some more info on increase yellow light duration.

[http://blog.motorists.org/6-cities-that-were-caught-
shorteni...](http://blog.motorists.org/6-cities-that-were-caught-shortening-
yellow-light-times-for-profit/)

The reason that more cities don't do this is because it leads to a massive
drop in revenue. In fact here is an article on 6 cities that were caught
shortening yellow light duration to increase revenue.

[http://blog.motorists.org/6-cities-that-were-caught-
shorteni...](http://blog.motorists.org/6-cities-that-were-caught-shortening-
yellow-light-times-for-profit/)

------
shintoist
And here I thought civil disobedience was a proud American tradition.

------
nchuhoai
Shameless plug on the same topic:

<http://hackerne.ws/item?id=3485295>

You can have your opinion on laws, but not the right to defy them

------
Raphael
You can pirate all you want and justify it as disobeying unjust laws. Let's
see if the government throws everyone in jail for copying data.

------
awfabian2
We, the human race, made up _property_. And we made up _intellectual
property_. So if you want to argue to me about morality and legality, save it.
Those aren't arguments, those are superstitions and/or conventions.

Tell me why a convention should be observed. If content creators don't get
paid, perhaps less content will get generated. Perhaps there will be legal
consequences like getting sued by the MPAA or RIAA.

But, again, give me actual reasons, not superstition and/or convention.

------
etfb
Quite right. That earlier rant about the moral superiority of piracy was just
embarrassing. Nobody who produces anything of value needs to be told that they
should be giving it away for free. They can choose to give it away, but being
required to do so is another matter entirely.

If everybody who believes that copyright is completely unnecessary were to die
today, the total amount of useful, worthwhile art produced by the world would
not decrease.

------
pessimizer
Stealing a cake is definitely theft, then.

------
realschool
The author makes a good point, everyone wants to blame someone else and not
take responsibility.

------
ernesth
You can't keep a movie on your hard drive and watch it too? Are you sure?

------
micah63
"Do unto others as you would have them do unto you" - Jesus

------
norswap
You can't have dots and no capital letters.

------
angersock
Gah. Wish I could downvote articles for being useless.

Can we stop submitting these things? This article, without even touching on
annoying design and style choices, is bad. It contributes nothing to the
discussion of copyright. It is four paragraphs long, and devoid of useful
thought.

~

It's short enough, let's tear through it:

 _"over on hacker news, there are two articles in which the authors are
justifying their decisions to pirate music and windows because their
respective industries don't make it as easy to get hold of their content as
the pirate bay does. as the first author argues "because you are not offering
a good service" he is going to pirate his music and films from now on and "the
time has come for you to fuck off", the second writes "i am not buying any
more software" until microsoft "address the service problem that is causing
piracy". "_

Okay, so, first paragraph is sloppy quoting of the articles mentioned this
week at HN. The hackjob of quoting misses the flavor of the original articles,
and skips some nuances. That would be fine--but it took the author an entire
paragraph to sum up what could've been said in one line: "Here and here are
two articles causing discussion about piracy on Hacker News." Done. Finished.
Had they done that, I could've gotten through their miserable little post that
much faster.

 _" sorry what? yes, drm is broken. yes, copyright doesn't work very well.
yes, pirating is easier. since when does that suddenly mean that you can
decide that you are no longer going to pay for products that both legally and
morally you are obliged to pay for, yet still use them? i am steering clear of
the word 'steal' because many will argue that it is not 'stealing' under the
strict definition of the word; the content creator still has the song,
software etc. "_

The author says, in effect, "suck it up, stop pirating."

The author does so with some hilarious painful-to-read phrasing. I'm not
asking for art, mind you, in all posts--I just prefer that the written word
(especially when submitted to HN!) have something behind it more than
mallspeak.

In addition to being worded like a petulant teenager angry about missing the
last ship to the Pirate Bay, the author claims that there is a moral
obligation to pay for material, but doesn't explain what that obligation is or
from what it derives.

The author doesn't so much assail the idea of piracy as show a sort of slow-
witted wonder that you can get copies of things without buying them. Drooling
into the keyboard and blinking, it slowly dawns on the imbecile that people
can do this. The author comes _dangerously_ close to diverging onto a useful
thought about the nature of stealing and how it applies to copyright
infringement, but then manages at the last minute to pull ignorance from the
jaws of victory and flits off to the next paragraph.

 _" if you want to protest the crappy way these companies treat their
customers, don't buy their stuff. but you can't have your cake and eat it.
protest by not using or having it at all. they have something you want; even
if you don't agree with their methods, it is still theirs to decide what to do
with. all you are doing is supporting the industry in their drive to stamp out
pirates; instead, support legal ways of obtaining this content through spotify
and others. "_

The author makes several assertions again here: companies treat their
customers badly, piracy isn't effective, piracy somehow supports the industry,
companies can decide what they can do with their IP unconditionally, etc.

This is talking-point vomit, a pile of mealy-mouthed and poorly-articulated
sayings lacking backing or explanation. This contributes nothing to the
conversation, and serves only to underscore the intellectual laziness of the
author.

These claims are all very interesting and exciting to debate, mind you, but
that requires an attention span and maturity that the author seems to simply
not have.

 _" if there is no legal way for you to enjoy it, unfortunate though it is,
tough. write to them. email them. call them to protest. but don't decide to
take the law into your own hands...it's not your decision. "_

At last, sweet release!

The author has finished the article with a stunted attempt at encouraging
protest, and yet again manages to miss a wonderful opportunity to consider the
role of piracy as peaceful protest. The author also makes some baseless
assertions without provided reasoning in regards to "taking the law into your
own hands" and its desirability--again, an interesting philosophical starting
point lost on the moron penning the paragraph.

~

Look, I'm not going to launch into crazy copyright and anti-copyright
discussion here, but for fuck's sake can we start posting articles on this
topic that try to display critical thought?

This is insulting.

------
nerdfiles
Are we paying for a Premium or are we paying for the thing we actually want?

They're taking things into their own hands by installed junk- and malware on
my product.

They're assuming I'm a thief before I've even walked through the door. Why
should I pay for the time they wasted to deal with people who do purportedly
"break the law."

Moreover, it's not like with the music or software industries, these people
lock themselves inside ivory towers and come out with a genius idea. Granted,
there are genius ideas worth protecting, but those ideas protect themselves by
their own internal integrity and passion of the thinker/creator/etc. Copyright
law gives creators an artificial sense of entitlement, and the idea that their
content is privileged somehow. That's the _default_ for a majority of the
products we buy. And it simply isn't obviously true. There's too much clutter
in the market as it stands for people to argument from absolutism like with in
this article.

A majority of this copyright discussion has an unrealistic assumption about
_the state of things as they are now_. There's no transparency in these
products. No sincerity.

------
naughtysriram
kill the patenting system and everything comes back to normal...

------
JulianMorrison
The law is just a thing I follow to avoid inconvenience, when necessary. It's
completely distinct from my morality. And, my morality simply does not see
copying as stealing, pirating, thermonuclear mass-murder, or whatever blood
curdling words you use to label it. It remains copying, and is fine.

~~~
lachyg
Why don't you see it as immoral or stealing? These companies spend millions on
these movies, countless people work on them and depend on them for their wages
(not just the actors, but the support crew, the caterers, the make up artists,
the lighting crew, editing, post production, script writers, casting agents,
location scouts, etc etc). They then charge people a small price for the right
to view their work (either in the form of a subscription to Netflix, a movie
ticket, an iTunes sale, or a DVD). Yet you think it's moral and fine to have
this without paying the authors?

~~~
JulianMorrison
Because basically, I don't think that the trouble they go to creates an
obligation in me in regard of my network, my hard drive, my screen.

~~~
hnal943
What a convenient morality you have. "I get to have what I want and have no
obligation to anyone else." To bad it doesn't scale.

~~~
v0cab
(I agree with JulianMorrison.)

Why doesn't it scale?

~~~
DanEdge
Because people who don't pirate stuff are subsidising those who do and if
nobody paid for anything, new stuff wouldn't get made (or at least it wouldn't
be available from those people who relied on the income from sales to make a
living).

~~~
v0cab
> people who don't pirate stuff are subsidising those who do

Well, the pirates aren't asking the buyers to subsidise them.

> new stuff wouldn't get made

Fine by me.

