5 major ISPs roll out the "six strikes" policy regarding illegal downloads.

Who the fuck uses Dish anyways, can't even watch a whole bunch of channels and sporting events. Always being sued.

On the topic of commercials, when the fuck did they start just playing regular old bullshit commercials in theaters? I don't go to the movies a ton, but last time I want my jimmies were so rustled by the 10-15 minutes of pepsi/phone/fandango commercials I thought I was about to hulk out and throw a chair through the screen. And by hulk out, I mean go bitch at the theater about wasting my time.

That shit was like some meta level piracy revenge or something, stealing my goddamn time for something I had already paid way to much to see.

Ronne_sl said:

On the topic of commercials, when the fuck did they start just playing regular old bullshit commercials in theaters? I don't go to the movies a ton, but last time I want my jimmies were so rustled by the 10-15 minutes of pepsi/phone/fandango commercials I thought I was about to hulk out and throw a chair through the screen. And by hulk out, I mean go bitch at the theater about wasting my time.

That shit was like some meta level piracy revenge or something, stealing my goddamn time for something I had already paid way to much to see.

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So it's not just my fucked up memory? I don't go to the cinema much, but as I remember it you used to get a good 10 - 15 minutes of trailers preceded by 5 - 10 minutes of regular advertising. Now it's 20 minutes or so of just straight up ads, with 2 or 3 random trailers thrown in at odd intervals. Oh well fuck it, people will just stop rocking up early for the trailers and spend the extra 20 minutes outside viewing apple.com/trailers on their iphones.

Give people what they want, when they want it, and they'll pay a reasonable price for it. Provide a shitty or misleading product, create arbitrary delays or force them to suffer through advertising so some corporate asshole can increase his profit margin, and people will say fuck it and raise their jolly roger. It's not a particularly challenging concept.

The legality of it is irrelevant imo, morality and legality are two entirely separate beasts.

BrutulTM_sl said:

Consequences dictate
the course of action and it
doesn't matter what's right.
It's only wrong if you get caught.

It's just a fact of life that when taking something rather than paying for it is easier and has no consequences, a certain number of people are going to do it. They will find a way to rationalize the moral issues away, this thread is chock full of examples. As long as I can find a reason to complain about the service, then it's morally acceptable for me to steal it.

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Then why did I buy all the games I've bought on Steam when I could have torrented them instead? I don't have as extensive a Steam library as some, but it's still my first stopoff when I want a game, just the other week I bought Mass Effect 1 & 2 and Bioshock, when I'm sure I could have grabbed them off pirate bay instead.

On the other hand, I torrent my TV shows, because the alternative is waiting until it finally airs on Australian TV, then scheduling my afternoon around watching it, all so some corporate asshole can make a profit out of forcing me to sit through ad breaks? No thanks.

If there was a TV equivalent of Steam which allowed me to pay a small, one time price, to instantly purchase and download ad-free episodes of shows as they first come out and then access them freely afterwards, I'd sign up in a second.

BrutulTM_sl said:

You don't HAVE to watch the show. There is no moral or physical imperative that you see Downton Abbey the day it comes out. You want it in a form that is not considered financially viable for the people who create the content, so you take it and rationalize.

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Not the people who create the content, I want it in a form which isn't considered financially viable by the studios and distribution companies who want to muscle in and leech as much profit as possible for basically acting as glorified middle men, taking money they didn't earn from the creative and production teams who did the real work to make the show.

The ones fighting so hard to shut down digital distribution aren't the ones writing or filming or acting in or otherwise creating the content, but the ones who stand the lose out when the internet allows us to skip the middle man entirely and cut them off from their artificially created profit margin.

Again, if I'm just being greedy and lazy, why do I pay for my games on Steam? because they provide a reasonable experience which actually caters to the consumer. If someone was doing the same thing for TV, I'd pay them too, but they aren't, so I don't.

BrutulTM_sl said:

As long as I can find a reason to complain about the service, then it's morally acceptable for me to steal it.

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Is DVR stealing? If I record a show with my VCR and give the tape away to my neighbor, is that theft?

I don't know why people bother justifying piracy. You're not talking to your mother.

Is it wrong to pirate something? I don't care. If you make it harder to pay for your product than to pirate it, through DRM or other annoying restrictions, fuck you I'm taking it. If you're gonna be a dick and force me to sit through 15 minutes of ads on a DVD I *PAID $20* for without the ability to skip to the menu (I don't know if they still do this), not only will I pirate it, but doing so will bring me joy.

The bottom line is that people respond to incentives. Piracy will continue to exist regardless of the morality involved. So if you ask people to pay for your product instead of pirate it,then punish them for paying(through DRM, ads, etc), they will pirate it. On the other hand, if you give an incentive for following the law, so many more people would pay. I haven't pirated a song since the second I discovered Spotify, and I would probably pay up to $40 a month for it before I decided that pirating would be preferable. Steam also makes it often preferable to pay. Convenient list of my games. Uninstall with 1 click, reinstall with 1 click. WAY easier than searching for each game, applying cracks, etc etc.

Piracy is now a market force. Companies that accept that have success in preventing it. Companies who scream "but it's wrong!" fail. Right vs wrong? Lol at that question.

Oh, and once upon a time there were no ads at all before movies in the theater. Just previews.

BrutulTM_sl said:

Consequences dictate
the course of action and it
doesn't matter what's right.
It's only wrong if you get caught.

It's just a fact of life that when taking something rather than paying for it is easier and has no consequences, a certain number of people are going to do it. They will find a way to rationalize the moral issues away, this thread is chock full of examples. As long as I can find a reason to complain about the service, then it's morally acceptable for me to steal it.

Click to expand...

Is the presumption here that two moral wrongs do not make a right? I.E. Their duopoly vs pirates copying their product? If so then I agree but Steam does show us that when both sides are acting morally that even when there are illegal options a large number of people will choose the legal option.

The problem with morals and law is when one side has more control over laws governing (or effecting) their products then the consumers buying their products then the laws themselves may be inherently immoral. That begs the question "If you follow laws you believe are immoral then are you (im)moral?"

I'll throw this out there just for arguments sake. Studios are complaining that once they broadcast their product into the public they have no control over it, and can't gain additional revenue beyond it's initial release, if that is a financially crippling problem that will bring down the industry, why don't they make their content only available via theaters where they can continue to control access and revenue?

How about gold sellers in WoW? Are they thieves? Is torrenting a textbook theft? Are you stealing from textbook publishers if you buy an international edition for a fraction of the US domestic cost? What if you buy someone's used textbooks outside of the university bookstore system? Is that piracy?

Famm_sl said:

Oh, and once upon a time there were no ads at all before movies in the theater. Just previews.

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A captive audience that can't fast forward through them, it was only a matter of time.

Have the entire current season on demand for channels that offer and I won't have to go download.
Someone recommends a show to me and I try to catch up only for FX to have the last 3 weeks rather then the full season, my choice is either wait 8 months for the dvd or pirate the few episodes i missed and then catch up.
Otherwise my dvr catches it all for me and then i catch up at my own discretion, which tends to be when i can watch a few episodes at once rather than 1 a week.
Damn hurricane sandy messed that up for a few shows, my choices were to either try to follow a story arc with a huge missing piece that the channel didn't let me see, or get it from the internet and be able to enjoy the rest of what i pay for.

BrutulTM_sl said:

It's just a fact of life that when taking something rather than paying for it is easier and has no consequences, a certain number of people are going to do it. They will find a way to rationalize the moral issues away, this thread is chock full of examples. As long as I can find a reason to complain about the service, then it's morally acceptable for me to steal it.

Click to expand...

I think copyright laws in their current form are unjust and feel no remorse breaking them. In fact, I consider it moral to break unjust laws. So I download whatever I like and feel good about it. On the other hand, I also feel that content producers should be able to make money so I buy the stuff I like. If I really like something I buy 1-2 extra copies and give away the extras. I don't pirate music/games since there is no real need with Spotify and Steam.

I think the industry worry way to much about protecting their "rights" instead of making it as convenient as possible for people to buy their stuff. Sure, they might be able to squeeze out more per sale with the current model, but I'm sure it would be possible to greatly increase the volumes if they got with the times. Just look at Steam sales. People buy large amounts of games they would never have considered buying otherwise (and in many cases never even will play) just because they are cheap and easy to buy. If there was a central marketplace where you could buy most content produced at reasonable prices without DRM I'm sure a lot less people would bother to pirate stuff.