Corporations make decision that are predatory and then complain when people avoid them. For example, there has been much talk about "bad" passengers on airplanes. But there is little discussion about the increasingly inhumane people must endure to fly. Somehow the corporations expect people to endure over crowding, exasperating loading conditions, angry and surly "attendants", delays, bad food and more. Then when some passenger loses it, the problem is never the conditions, it is the passenger.
The same is true for digital content. Amazon "sells" you movies (as do others like Apple), but do you "own" the movie? No. Amazon can just tell you it is no longer available. You cannot "sell" the movie you "bought" to some other person. But you bought it right? People in general are of good will. But if you treat them as prey at some point they recognize these corporations are simply predators. In my opinion there is a very strong case to be made that people who decide not to be victims are of better character than these predatory corporations.
[edit: removed the line "May their travels ever be delayed." because it was not clear I meant predatory corporations]
BLKNSLVR 1 hours ago [-]
There's a 'concentration' (of people / power) effect by the creation of a business or company or corporation that makes said entity more appealing to cater to by government than individuals; centralisation is more efficient than decentralisation.
There's also the fact that, historically at least, business entities were created to serve a public need, and therefore these business entities should be encouraged to grow their service to greater satisfy the need.
Government still acts as if this is the case despite that many business entities are the grotesque offspring of that old idea, having evolved through perverse incentives into todays unrecognisable mutants of 'responsibility to shareholders' that are hideous to look upon.
petertodd 3 hours ago [-]
If I could actually buy movies and TV shows for download I would; I buy all my music as sites like bleep.com allow you to easily buy mp3s, probably thousands of dollars over the years. I've tried buying shows a handful of times before. But I travel a lot and they're geolocked - WTF can't I watch my fully paid for episodes of Rick and Morty on youtube wherever I happen to be?
Since studios have made purchasing impossible, I don't, and I don't give them any money via streaming services either.
There is one exception I can think of: https://www.teamstarkid.com/ They've made their (awesome!) musicals available for purchase, with a true video download. So they've gotten a well-deserved $50 from me.
mazambazz 45 minutes ago [-]
I believe if businesses want to stop piracy, they need to start making superior products and platforms. If we put away cost completely for a service, allowing it to be any exorbitant amount, the final question is: Is this a better experience than I could have gotten for free?
It makes zero economical sense why you would pay for an inferior experience, such as being geo-locked. Netflix apparently throttles your bitrate/resolution if you're not watching from a smart TV. Sony can revoke at will media that you "bought".
Steam is a great example of what to do. Could I have pirated all my games? Absolutely, but having them on Steam--crucially--makes life easier. I get automatic updates, social integration, achievements, steam cloud saves, remote play, centralized screenshots, easy linux support via proton, etc.
I have no interest in having to buying something that might want me to pay extra premium on top just for a 4K version, or a streaming service that cycles films in and out that leaves me unable to watch a great title I saw 2 years ago. The biggest sin of all is not letting you download titles. F** me I guess if I want to download & watch a movie offline while sitting in transit. F** me if I want to download a title on WiFi to watch later when I'm out and about as to not use cellular data.
loufe 2 hours ago [-]
I really enjoy Graphic Audio's audiobooks (full voice cast, music, SFX, high quality production). Their titles can all be bought outright, which is great as I spend a lot of time on a plane or away from a cell signal or internet capable of streaming even audio. It's a great approach, but I'm sure there are not a ton of folks who end up buying episodes, it's an expensive way to approach media, certainly.
theandrewbailey 4 days ago [-]
If buying isn't owning, piracy isn't stealing, so...
6SixTy 1 hours ago [-]
For creative works, there's always a license behind it post the invention of copyright. It wasn't as obvious in the past now that DRM and digital/streaming only has given studios/publishers/etc the ability to cancel your access at their discretion. Though complicating matters is that there's increasingly nothing worth spending money on in the first place anymore.
squarefoot 2 hours ago [-]
When someone tells me that downloading a song or a movie is like stealing, I usually encourage them to download a new car.
JumpCrisscross 2 hours ago [-]
> When someone tells me that downloading a song or a movie is like stealing, I usually encourage them to download a new car
Now do social security benefits. Or hell, money in a bank account.
JumpCrisscross 3 hours ago [-]
> If buying isn't owning, piracy isn't stealing, so...
This is a bad argument for piracy. (There are good ones.) Plenty of things that can't be bought and sold without restriction can be stolen.
WastedCucumber 2 hours ago [-]
It's not only about restictions on buying and selling, it's also about restictions on using (where, for how long, can it be inherited) which are dictated by the vendor.
JumpCrisscross 2 hours ago [-]
> it's also about restictions on using (where, for how long, can it be inherited) which are dictated by the vendor
Sure. Again, this is true for a wide variety of things. Many of which we commonly consider to be stealable.
WastedCucumber 2 hours ago [-]
Such as?
thechao 1 hours ago [-]
I've always thought there was a clever hack to get out of deed restrictions through the use of adverse possession.
howard941 1 hours ago [-]
Won't work, recorded deed restrictions run with the land.
exe34 2 hours ago [-]
he didn't say stealing isn't piracy, in which case your point would stand - he says piracy isn't stealing. piracy could be a lot of things, but stealing isn't one of them.
So are cars, it’s still a sale and actual ownership.
bdangubic 57 minutes ago [-]
in some states (e.g. Virginia) you don’t get to own a car. you have to pay for the right to own a car each year in October via 4+% tax on your car’s current value. ‘merica at its finest :)
JumpCrisscross 2 hours ago [-]
> it’s still a sale and actual ownership
What makes it actual versus pretend ownership? Remember, ownership is a social construct.
EMIRELADERO 1 hours ago [-]
> Remember, ownership is a social construct.
But the argument about you not really "owning" stuff even when the button says "buy" is a legal one.
JumpCrisscross 1 hours ago [-]
> the argument about you not really "owning" stuff even when the button says "buy" is a legal one
Ownership is a stack of rights. It's a social construct--you can't lab test for ownership. It's meaningless to say what "really" owning means without specifying which of those rights you view to be essential in this situation.
JumpCrisscross 2 hours ago [-]
> Such as?
Tickets to a live performance. Health information. Public benefits. Tax refunds. Rental cars.
Retric 2 hours ago [-]
You just listed things that are regularly resold.
JumpCrisscross 2 hours ago [-]
> You just listed things that are regularly resold
Yes? I said "things that can't be bought and sold without restriction."
Are you saying it's not pirating if there's a resellable DVD available?
Retric 2 hours ago [-]
Stealing a physical DVD has meaning. Making a copy of a purely intangible set of data doesn’t deprive someone of that data.
JumpCrisscross 2 hours ago [-]
> Making a copy of a purely intangible set of data doesn’t deprive someone of that data
You’re making an argument on the non-rivalry of digital content. This is one of the good arguments I referenced.
Digital content is currently a club good, like broadcast television. (Excludable.) You’re arguing for treating it like a public good, like a park. (Not excludable.)
Ownership being a social construct makes statements like stealing X has meaning somewhat useless, particularly when it comes to rules.
cess11 2 hours ago [-]
Plutonium.
Retric 2 hours ago [-]
Plutonium does get sold, look up certified reference materials.
boomboomsubban 3 hours ago [-]
Saying "piracy supports organized crime" as a scare tactic is a new one to me, and doesn't seem like a very effective campaign. What would be their motivation, shitty ad revenue?
kibwen 3 hours ago [-]
Know what supports organized crime? The copyright-supported media titans that closed ranks to cover up the career-spanning crimes of all the Weinsteins, Cosbys, Diddys, and Saviles of the world.
thih9 2 hours ago [-]
Interestingly, Diddy shares a cell (dormitory-style room) with SBF; small world.
> [Diddy] was arrested and indicted in the Southern District of New York in September 2024 on charges of racketeering, sex trafficking by force, and transportation for purposes of prostitution. He is awaiting trial in federal custody at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn. His cellmate is Sam Bankman-Fried, who is serving a 25-year sentence.
Not to mention their cover ups and distractions from far larger crimes - decades of cheerleading the 'war on terror', stirring up Islamophobia, ignoring Israeli atrocities, spreading climate change FUD, etc etc.
Saville was mind-meltingly evil, but in terms of the damage done, even he pales in comparison to Cheney, W, Obama, Netanyahu, Biden, Murdoch, etc.
Many people won't like these facts, and will reject them with prejudice. And that's largely because of corporate media :/
So yeah, the hypocrisy really stings when they try to blame online piracy for the state of the world. It's staggering weaponized hypocrisy.
johnnyanmac 2 hours ago [-]
well, the bleeding heart "you make indies unable to operate" didn't work. So you gotta move to fear, no matter how bad the argument. Everyone responds to fear when done right.
telgareith 3 hours ago [-]
Private trackers might he considered organized crime.
some_random 2 hours ago [-]
I was guessing stuff like counterfeit DVDs, which also doesn't really have much to do with torrenting
ramon156 3 hours ago [-]
I never understood why it's all collected under the term piracy. Do we just classify illegally acquiring as piracy?
johnnyanmac 2 hours ago [-]
illegally acquiring? Yes, technically. Otherwise it wouldn't be illegal.
dotcoma 3 hours ago [-]
What’s wrong with the other half ?
jowea 47 minutes ago [-]
I'm surprised it's not higher. Are the results unusual for an Western country?
baud147258 2 hours ago [-]
other just think pirating is an acceptable way to stick it to the Man.
mikeocool 3 hours ago [-]
I used to download torrents of tv shows less because it was cheap, and more because it was way more convenient than watching them through legal means — I could download them and then watch them when/wherever I wanted.
For me, the content providers have now basically solved for that with streaming services, I find that way more convenient than dealing with torrents.
It’s definitely not cheap, I’m paying for at least five streaming services right now, but it’s fast and easy and for me that’s worth it.
carlhjerpe 2 hours ago [-]
Torrents UX isn't uTorrent anymore, there are Netflix like UX solutions to piracy 2024. Feel free to pay, I'm happy to freeload off faceless megacorps profit margins.
I pay for YouTube Premium and Spotify premium, I'd probably pay for Netflix if I didn't need D+, Showtime, Viaplay etc... To access all I want to watch.
corporation, no. the small people, yes. You can take a lot of losses when you have a billion dollars in the bank. Not so much when you got maybe 1000 (on a good day).
fldskfjdslkfj 3 hours ago [-]
Vikings gonna viking.
johnnyanmac 2 hours ago [-]
The alternative is that "not playing media you can't buy" is also an acceptable way to save money. There's so much free media out there these days that you could spend your life ethically consuming media without ever spending a dime.
I'm no snitch, so do what you need to do. But I feel this mentality of it being "acceptable" only further devalues art. And the endgoal isn't some utopia where we all make art for free. Just look at the mobile industry for this race to the bottom. Tons of "free" mobile games, after all..
Workaccount2 3 hours ago [-]
Watching people square this mentality with training LLM's on art has been fascinating, and really highlights that people are by and large just in it for themselves.
Newlaptop 2 hours ago [-]
Copyright has always allowed for educational usage.
Writers read other author's books. Artists study other painters and sculptors. Actors and directors watch other movies. Musicians learn to play other artists songs before they ever start composing their own.
The big media copyright cartel has tried to steal that right from the public good by pretending that they're entitled to even more payments for training usage, but thankfully it's clear that no regular people agree with them.
stavros 3 hours ago [-]
Why would it be hard to square the mentality of "pirating art to watch is acceptable" with the mentality of "pirating art to train LLMs on is acceptable"?
CaptainFever 2 hours ago [-]
It depends. If your premise for "pirating art to watch is acceptable" is "information should be free to be replicated and reused", then it is also obvious that "pirating art to train LLMs on is acceptable".
What premise that can infer "pirating art to watch is acceptable" can also simultaneously infer "pirating art to train LLMs on is not acceptable"? "Information should be free to be replicated and reused as long as you're not making a profit"? This would rule out OpenAI, but Stable Diffusion would be acceptable (it's a true non-profit).
What other premises could there be? "One should be able to watch all information, but not replicate it"? But you can't pirate without replicating the information. "You shouldn't repost stuff without consent"? But this rules out piracy.
"Information should be free to be replicated and reused as long as it comes from a big corporation"? But piracy from indie games is a thing, too. And how do you define "big"? Also, is training stuff solely on Getty, Shutterstock etc okay, then? What about books3? "But even though publishers own the rights to the book, individual authors wrote it." But the same is true for piracy from big corporations. People worked on it.
This is why it's so hard to square it, because I cannot see any rational moral foundation that simultaneously condones piracy (possibly indie games too) while condemning Stable Diffusion and the hobbyist AI ecosystem. The only other explanation is that it is irrational, or as the GP put it, "that people are by and large just in it for themselves". Piracy for me but not for thee.
drpossum 2 hours ago [-]
No one you're complaining about would care if people were training LLMs on pirated material for their own private use.
yieldcrv 3 hours ago [-]
GenAI content isn’t afforded copyright protection so that feels like a coincidental good tradeoff
I’ve made money from genAI content but i don’t care if someone copied it, it’s a risk I took, they don’t have the network and community I do which is the value.
blackeyeblitzar 2 hours ago [-]
I am not sure. I think piracy does deprive others of revenue. The only reason it feels acceptable is because it concerns information instead of something physical. The gray area for me is how ownership isn’t real even when you legally purchase something. For example, when Amazon deleted copies of digital books from customers’ Kindles.
mschuster91 2 hours ago [-]
Surprise, that's what you get for ... half a dozen worth of streaming services these days with none sharing their catalogue?
It's not that hard. Spotify and Apple Music both have all the music one can ever want, why the fuck didn't the movie/TV industry consolidate on Netflix... greedy morons.
lofaszvanitt 3 hours ago [-]
Get together with your friends and watch stuff.
johnnyanmac 2 hours ago [-]
Friends, in this economy? Surely you jest.
There was a brief post COVID period where we hung out. It got a lot harder to contact them when almost all of us got laid off in different companies. I still do reach out (I was laid off too. I think I was the first in my circle), but it quickly became COVID hard again.
downrightmike 2 hours ago [-]
No wage. Only buy!
matsemann 2 hours ago [-]
As a Norwegian just above 30, I guess I'm a bit outside. But my impression is that most people don't pirate movies or music to the same extent we did when I was younger. What's being pirated now is often live sports.
Watching Premier League costs about $75 a month. Why? Do the multi-millionaire soccer players really need that much? What happens with the sport when a whole generation of new fans can't afford to watch?
I also wanted to watch the Alpine World Cup today, but due to weird licensing issues with winter sports from Austria it's not on any channel I can buy.
akomtu 2 hours ago [-]
Imagine if someone bought a royal permission to "own" the image of Mt. Everest, hired a bunch of gangsters and tried to chase and beat up everyone who dared to look at the mountain without paying a fee? That's the modern copyright holders, the wannabe aristocracy of the digital world.
4 days ago [-]
Rendered at 23:52:21 GMT+0000 (Coordinated Universal Time) with Vercel.
The same is true for digital content. Amazon "sells" you movies (as do others like Apple), but do you "own" the movie? No. Amazon can just tell you it is no longer available. You cannot "sell" the movie you "bought" to some other person. But you bought it right? People in general are of good will. But if you treat them as prey at some point they recognize these corporations are simply predators. In my opinion there is a very strong case to be made that people who decide not to be victims are of better character than these predatory corporations.
[edit: removed the line "May their travels ever be delayed." because it was not clear I meant predatory corporations]
There's also the fact that, historically at least, business entities were created to serve a public need, and therefore these business entities should be encouraged to grow their service to greater satisfy the need.
Government still acts as if this is the case despite that many business entities are the grotesque offspring of that old idea, having evolved through perverse incentives into todays unrecognisable mutants of 'responsibility to shareholders' that are hideous to look upon.
Since studios have made purchasing impossible, I don't, and I don't give them any money via streaming services either.
There is one exception I can think of: https://www.teamstarkid.com/ They've made their (awesome!) musicals available for purchase, with a true video download. So they've gotten a well-deserved $50 from me.
It makes zero economical sense why you would pay for an inferior experience, such as being geo-locked. Netflix apparently throttles your bitrate/resolution if you're not watching from a smart TV. Sony can revoke at will media that you "bought".
Steam is a great example of what to do. Could I have pirated all my games? Absolutely, but having them on Steam--crucially--makes life easier. I get automatic updates, social integration, achievements, steam cloud saves, remote play, centralized screenshots, easy linux support via proton, etc.
I have no interest in having to buying something that might want me to pay extra premium on top just for a 4K version, or a streaming service that cycles films in and out that leaves me unable to watch a great title I saw 2 years ago. The biggest sin of all is not letting you download titles. F** me I guess if I want to download & watch a movie offline while sitting in transit. F** me if I want to download a title on WiFi to watch later when I'm out and about as to not use cellular data.
Now do social security benefits. Or hell, money in a bank account.
This is a bad argument for piracy. (There are good ones.) Plenty of things that can't be bought and sold without restriction can be stolen.
Sure. Again, this is true for a wide variety of things. Many of which we commonly consider to be stealable.
https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/usa-bodi...
What makes it actual versus pretend ownership? Remember, ownership is a social construct.
But the argument about you not really "owning" stuff even when the button says "buy" is a legal one.
Ownership is a stack of rights. It's a social construct--you can't lab test for ownership. It's meaningless to say what "really" owning means without specifying which of those rights you view to be essential in this situation.
Tickets to a live performance. Health information. Public benefits. Tax refunds. Rental cars.
Yes? I said "things that can't be bought and sold without restriction."
Are you saying it's not pirating if there's a resellable DVD available?
You’re making an argument on the non-rivalry of digital content. This is one of the good arguments I referenced.
Digital content is currently a club good, like broadcast television. (Excludable.) You’re arguing for treating it like a public good, like a park. (Not excludable.)
Ownership being a social construct makes statements like stealing X has meaning somewhat useless, particularly when it comes to rules.
> [Diddy] was arrested and indicted in the Southern District of New York in September 2024 on charges of racketeering, sex trafficking by force, and transportation for purposes of prostitution. He is awaiting trial in federal custody at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn. His cellmate is Sam Bankman-Fried, who is serving a 25-year sentence.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sean_Combs
Saville was mind-meltingly evil, but in terms of the damage done, even he pales in comparison to Cheney, W, Obama, Netanyahu, Biden, Murdoch, etc.
Many people won't like these facts, and will reject them with prejudice. And that's largely because of corporate media :/
So yeah, the hypocrisy really stings when they try to blame online piracy for the state of the world. It's staggering weaponized hypocrisy.
For me, the content providers have now basically solved for that with streaming services, I find that way more convenient than dealing with torrents.
It’s definitely not cheap, I’m paying for at least five streaming services right now, but it’s fast and easy and for me that’s worth it.
I pay for YouTube Premium and Spotify premium, I'd probably pay for Netflix if I didn't need D+, Showtime, Viaplay etc... To access all I want to watch.
I'm no snitch, so do what you need to do. But I feel this mentality of it being "acceptable" only further devalues art. And the endgoal isn't some utopia where we all make art for free. Just look at the mobile industry for this race to the bottom. Tons of "free" mobile games, after all..
Writers read other author's books. Artists study other painters and sculptors. Actors and directors watch other movies. Musicians learn to play other artists songs before they ever start composing their own.
The big media copyright cartel has tried to steal that right from the public good by pretending that they're entitled to even more payments for training usage, but thankfully it's clear that no regular people agree with them.
What premise that can infer "pirating art to watch is acceptable" can also simultaneously infer "pirating art to train LLMs on is not acceptable"? "Information should be free to be replicated and reused as long as you're not making a profit"? This would rule out OpenAI, but Stable Diffusion would be acceptable (it's a true non-profit).
What other premises could there be? "One should be able to watch all information, but not replicate it"? But you can't pirate without replicating the information. "You shouldn't repost stuff without consent"? But this rules out piracy.
"Information should be free to be replicated and reused as long as it comes from a big corporation"? But piracy from indie games is a thing, too. And how do you define "big"? Also, is training stuff solely on Getty, Shutterstock etc okay, then? What about books3? "But even though publishers own the rights to the book, individual authors wrote it." But the same is true for piracy from big corporations. People worked on it.
This is why it's so hard to square it, because I cannot see any rational moral foundation that simultaneously condones piracy (possibly indie games too) while condemning Stable Diffusion and the hobbyist AI ecosystem. The only other explanation is that it is irrational, or as the GP put it, "that people are by and large just in it for themselves". Piracy for me but not for thee.
I’ve made money from genAI content but i don’t care if someone copied it, it’s a risk I took, they don’t have the network and community I do which is the value.
It's not that hard. Spotify and Apple Music both have all the music one can ever want, why the fuck didn't the movie/TV industry consolidate on Netflix... greedy morons.
There was a brief post COVID period where we hung out. It got a lot harder to contact them when almost all of us got laid off in different companies. I still do reach out (I was laid off too. I think I was the first in my circle), but it quickly became COVID hard again.
Watching Premier League costs about $75 a month. Why? Do the multi-millionaire soccer players really need that much? What happens with the sport when a whole generation of new fans can't afford to watch?
I also wanted to watch the Alpine World Cup today, but due to weird licensing issues with winter sports from Austria it's not on any channel I can buy.