Well, my friend, he’s kinda poor he can’t afford some books and some streaming services, so he pirates. He pirate books, audiobook and videos and other stuff. Sometimes he buys books he likes a lot out of loyalty to the author (yeah, I don’t understand it either), he likes to read physical books, but yeah, if he hates the author or just wants to skim through it, he will download the book.

He usually doesn’t like to pirate from small companies or professors who are trying to make a living by selling books, but from millionaires & plenty of mega corps which already have loads of money, he feels like it’s the right move to pirate

Also, have you ever noticed that you have felt that the value of a product has decreased just because you didn’t pay for it, thus you are less interested to read it? i.e., had you paid for the book, you would have more likely read that book.

He says he will buy stuff when his time is more valuable than money, let’s all hope that day is soon.

What are your piracy habits?

  • drcouzelis@lemmy.zip
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    1 year ago

    I don’t have an answer to your exact question but I want to emphasize…

    NOTHING in the history of humankind has ever existed like computer data. A 100% identical copy of videos, pictures, and music can be made almost instantly at what is essentially zero cost to the original holder of the data. Any comparison to “stealing” or to a physical object (a car lol) just falls flat because the situation is just so different.

    Practically speaking, the world we live in, with computers everywhere, cheap storage, and easy fast internet access for so much of the world, has only been around for about two decades, maybe three. NOTHING like this has ever existed before, and businesses, culture, and laws have been very slow to catch up.

    I’m not saying pirating is right or wrong, just that the whole idea is still so new that society hasn’t caught up to it yet.

    • Ganesh Venugopal@lemmy.mlOP
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      1 year ago

      NOTHING in the history of humankind has ever existed like computer data. A 100% identical copy of videos, pictures, and music can be made almost instantly at what is essentially zero cost to the original holder of the data. Any comparison to “stealing” or to a physical object (a car lol) just falls flat because the situation is just so different.

      YES!

      Nice comment, tq!

    • LrdThndr@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      In Babylon Alexandria, docking ships were required to surrender any and all written materials to the library. There, scribes would make a copy of everything that was submitted.

      The originals of the documents were stored in the library and the copies were given back to the ships.

      First instance of intellectual property piracy?

      • DogMuffins@discuss.tchncs.de
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        1 year ago

        First instance of intellectual property piracy?

        Perhaps, but of course there are still significant differences.

        To make these copies you needed a team of highly skilled scribes and their accoutrements, and the ship had to wait in port for several days.

        That is to say, these copies in babylon would have come at a significant cost.

  • TrismegistusMx@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    There is no ethical consumption under capitalism. Even if I pay for a product I love some asshole suit is going to get a bigger cut than the artists who did the work.

    • Hanabie@sh.itjust.works
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      1 year ago

      I’m an indie author, and all my novels ended up on PDFdrive.

      Not that I’d be mad about it. If someone pirates my books and likes them, maybe they’ll support me in the future.

      Just saying, I’m not wearing suits. I’m working full-time and write when I have off and got the time and energy.

      For us Indies, getting eyeballs on our books is next to impossible anyways, so I already gave up on the idea that writing will ever be more than an expensive hobby.

      • ASeriesOfPoorChoices@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Yep! Often the math is “the people who pirated probably wouldn’t have bought your product if they couldn’t pirate it, so you didn’t lose anything. But you did gain a reader, who can now recommend it to others, and / or make future purchases themselves”. Generally speaking, pirating isn’t bad to the bottom line (not saying it’s good).

        It hurts brick and mortar stores, but then, so do libraries. (Hah)

      • Susaga@ttrpg.network
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        1 year ago

        When I was in university, I watched a movie online using alternative means that I had been kind of interested in, but never went to see. I then watched it again. Then I went out and bought a DVD.

        A little after that, I watched a lets play of a game that basically gave the entire experience in a single watch. I liked the game enough that I bought it immediately and just let it sit on my steam library without an install, just so the creator would receive their dues.

        A year or so ago, I got a game through a charity bundle and wound up playing hundreds of hours of it. Since the creators got no money from my purchase, I bought merch, and waited for DLC to come out for me to buy instantly, just so they’d get something from me.

        Recently, a AAA studio let go a bunch of creators while their game was wrapping up, essentially punishing them for a job well done. The creators will get nothing if I buy the game they made, but the studio that screwed them over will get everything. Just like I always have, I will give as much as they deserve to receive.

  • comfisofa@lemmy.ml
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    1 year ago

    You know how writers get paid fuck all for the movies they write? You know how animators are paid criminally low wages for the anime they produce? At the end of the day for most media it’s the companies that get all the money, not the artists. Therefore, fuck them, I am pirating your content not contributing to your profit margins.

  • 👁️👄👁️@lemm.ee
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    1 year ago

    I only pirate TVs/Movies. Streaming is in such a shitty state that I don’t want to figure out what service is on what, and I’m certainly not going to subscribe for just one thing to watch. I feel no remorse.

    • BaconIsAVeg@lemmy.ml
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      1 year ago

      This, the difficulty of simply paying for the things you want. I used to pirate music back in the IRC/pre-Napster days, and then iTunes came out. “I can just click a button and the song is on my computer, high quality, no fuss?” That was the end of music pirating for me.

      I have Amazon Prime and I’ve tried Netflix in the past. The amount of time I spent sorting through their shit movies to find something worth watching was abysmal, not to mention no way to filter out the huge influx of low-budget non-English content.

  • Stuka@lemmy.ml
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    1 year ago

    Give me a reasonably priced, accessible way to enjoy the content and I will happily pay for it.

    Streaming has become untenable and now it’s neither affordable nor convenient to watch what I want to watch. And with how frequently shows and movies bounce around platforms, who knows if the show I want to watch this weekend will be still available on one if the many platforms I’ve been paying for.

    I’m just done with it.

      • CleoTheWizard@beehaw.org
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        1 year ago

        Oh let’s be real here, this is what capitalism does. It chooses the worst possible option for entertainment because it’s what makes the most money. What makes the most money is not making you happy, but getting you to stay subscribed.

        Let me tell you the real secret. You know what it costs to rent a movie online? And stream it? And then never watch it again? Yeah now justify that against streaming services.

        I’ll tell you right now, go get Plex. If you don’t already use a media server, start. Because chances are that you don’t actually watch 90% of what’s on those services. So that $15 a month for content you don’t own could easily be $20 a month on content that you do actually own. Not to mention there’s no ads involved and you can stream as many devices as you want from anywhere. Get friends to pitch in and it’s even better.

        The ONLY argument for this is convenience of all the shows at your fingertips. Except now that’s not the case and they’re on different services, screw it, either pirate the media or buy it used on disc.

  • PowerCrazy@lemmy.ml
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    1 year ago

    I pirate stuff that is older then 7 years. If I want to see it, or play it earlier than that, I pay for it.