this post was submitted on 30 Jul 2023
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Piracy: ꜱᴀɪʟ ᴛʜᴇ ʜɪɢʜ ꜱᴇᴀꜱ

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Ko-fi Liberapay

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Hi guys, first of all, I fully support Piracy. But Im writing a piece on my blog about what I might considere as "Ethical Piracy" and I would like to hear your concepts of it.

Basically my line is if I have the capacity of paying for something and is more convinient that pirating, ill pay. It happens to me a lot when I wanna watch a movie with my boyfriend. I like original audio, but he likes dub, so instead of scrapping through the web looking for a dub, I just select the language on the streaming platform. That is convinient to me.

In what situations do you think is not OK to pirate something? And where is 100 justified and everybody should sail the seas instead?

I would like to hear you.

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 years ago (1 children)

All piracy is ethical since all information should be free.

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 years ago

For me anything Nintendo is fair game, I also dont bat an eye at any movie or show piracy.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 years ago

A lot of folk bring up (correctly, imo) indie creators and end up mentioning Stardew Valley as an example - especially within the first couple years of its release. SV as an example has fell off, as it's had it's years to rake in cash.

But I absolutely pirated SV for YEARS, multiple times. I was in a place where I was utterly broke, could not always afford food, and only had internet because of assistance programs. My laptop couldn't run much, not even minecraft at that point. It could, however, run Stardew Valley. So I re-downloaded it multiple times over the handful of hand-me-down hard drives that I used in a laptop that kept frying hard drives. (eyeroll)

I did eventually get to a place financially where I could afford to buy SV, so I did. Then it went on sale on console so I bought it again, knowing I'd never play it (console without the aiming mod is awful), but it helped pay it back how much play time I'd enjoyed back when I couldn't afford the game.

That, to me, is ethical.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 years ago

Whenever EA or Ubisoft releases a half assed game with stellar marketing

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 years ago

i have downloaded tens of thousands of dollars of audio recording software. i always told myself that, if i were to ever make money from my efforts and usage thereof, i would be happy to pay the author.

i never made any money. but i hope the right people got paid by those that did.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

I believe online piracy is the uploading part, not the downloading. I think uploading has a much more narrow use case, but if everyone stopped we wouldn't be able to download.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 years ago

Pirating content with the intent to buy it after trying it out using the pirated version (e.G indie games)

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

I purchased Zelda BotW when it was 6ish months old. Didn't like it, didn't finish it.

I'm working on getting it now on the steam deck because it's critically acclaimed and I'd like to understand what other people like so much about it. It's also my young nephew's favorite game. Totally legal emulation if I were actually dumping my own firmware.

When I pirate Tears of the Kingdom afterward, I'll have several different reasons;

The switch is underpowered. I'm done buying games for a device that can't keep up with modern game development. I'm not some performance purist either, I'd just like 60 frames at 1080. Zelda still looks good at that res. Also the hardware just kinda sucks. The joycon issues remain unaddressed and and the facebutton mapping should at least be mappable on a system level if they insist on being backwards.

Nintendo has pathetic online gameplay support, and a history now of gutting their digital stores. If I'm going to lose access to my switch purchases in the same time frame that the cartridges give out, I'm not paying. The walled garden they've created as a children's toy company doesn't serve me at 30.

If they'd throw these games on steam or epic with some industry-standard sales on occasion I'd just buy them outright.

If nintendo sold a box closer to a PS4/5 in power I could call my emulation unethical, but they don't. Their game runs better as an illegitimate product and that's on them.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I can't really trust that a game is worth the price tag anymore. So I treat piracy as a extended demo. If I feel the fun to price ratio is solid I'll buy the game.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 years ago (2 children)

I think the system of Steam letting you try out a game for 2 hours/2 weeks is pretty fair. You can return it without further reasons.

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[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 years ago

I stopped going to cinema when the Hollywood movie cartel started messing with freedom on the internet, and I don't feel any remorse pirating Hollywood movies.

When I started earning enough to have disposable income, I made sure to buy ebooks and audiobooks, as well as supporting my favourite musicians on Bandcamp or by buying merch.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago

There was a television show from another country that I wanted to watch. It wasn't available to stream in my country from the source, and wasn't available on any other streaming platforms. I even tried making an account, but they wouldn't accept my credit card because of the billing address.

Pirating that would be justified; the argument isn't just that, if I can't buy it then I should be allowed to take it, but that if I can take it without causing financial stress on the artists, then it's OK. They are refusing my money, so pirating it wouldn't deprive them of a sale.

I also strongly agree with what others have said, that my ethics require me to purchase something once.

Where I get fuzzy is on the right for producers (studios and distributors) to make profit. Money going to artists is clear to me; and production studios need to fund projects, some if which will fail. But the existing, purely profits-driven, risk-averse, homogenizing movie production industry... I'm not sure I agree that they deserve the lion's share of the profits.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Downloading a copy of media or software is just a copy. You can make infinite copies, and you're not taking anything away from the creator for copying it.

Thus all piracy is ethical.

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago (4 children)

I'd like to ask myself the opposite, when is it unethical to pirate? Because it's just data, and how many copies there are of it shouldn't change anything. If I want to support a developer I'd 'buy the product', regardless of already having it or not, and I would never in my life buy a product (Not a service, just the data) just because I cannot get it otherwise. I believe it's pretty much the same for most people that knows how to download pirated content.

But I believe that early leaks are strongly unethical, as you end up interfering in the creative and production process before it's ready. Furthermore, a lot of people whom usually won't pirate will jump at the possibility of doing so just for the hype of getting the product NOW, and maybe will not feel the necessity of buying later. I cannot think any case in which a leak is ethical or even beneficial for anyone, and I'm surprised that I've never seen much push against it by pirates.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Nintendo games getting leaked helps emulator developers to iron out issues before most people start playing. Most recent example is tears of the kingdom.

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