It's to be hoped you never get busted then, because I can just hear the civil court beak laughing his tits off as you summarise your defense, and he's calculating costs to be awarded to the claimant It may never happen, but it would make a great read, if ever it did
As I've said, I wouldn't be this naive and wouldn't expect any kind of legal sympathy. I take legal risks because I feel morally comfortable with my actions.
Can I just explain that I DO understand where you are coming from, and that I even agree to an extent... actually, I would go as for to say that I just agree full stop. There is one problem though: You and I are not the sole recipients of pirated material. This is the one problem with all these pro piracy (and I use that term loosely before you accuse me of calling you a pirate) ideals: They are ALL open to abuse by those who merely wish to obtain the game for free. This for me, renders all such arguments null and void. Piracy is just bad, even if there are good reasons for it... it's still bad. There is simply no justification for advocating game piracy whatsoever, as there are so many other legal alternatives that could work equally as well. No matter how fervently and passionately you explain your standpoint, you are still wrong, and piracy is still something we need to rid ourselves of.
I think the players can be put in the following groups: 1. do not copy, do not buy 2. do not copy, buy 3. copy, do not buy, would not have bought anyway 4. copy, do not buy, would have bought without the copy 5. copy, buy, would have bought without the copy 6. copy, buy, would not have bought without the copy Group 1 is of no interest either way. Group 2 is what most sellers would like to see. Group 3 acts illegally, is what no seller likes to see, but is not a loss. Group 4 acts illegaly, and is a loss to the seller. Group 5 acts illegally, but is a plus to the seller. Would also have been a plus without the infringement. Group 6 acts illegally, but is a plus to the seller that would not have existed without the infringement. The only question that determines if copyright infringement is bad for the industry is: group 4 > group 6? The other groups may be acting illegally or even immorally, but the infringement is of no impact whatsoever on the revenue of the seller. ataraxis84 is in group 6, and although acting illegally his actions are a plus to the seller. As such you can hardly argue he's acting immorally, and if a seller has any kind of business sense he would see this behavior as positive. Sure, group 3-6 is acting illegally, but it's practically impossible to prevent this from happening.
Great... now all we have to do is dissuade others from downloading freely available material from the internet.... which is of course sooooo easy LOL. Maybe you need to rethink?
Going you one further, I even agree with this too, and would welcome and facilitate the downfall of piracy, to the point where it stops my own illegal activities from being possible. It's just that until then, I don't find a moral negative in my actions. I'm careful not to advocate piracy; I don't offer this philosophy up for others to cynically manipulate to justify their own actions. (It wouldn't work anyway, because if you don't actually buy all the games you pirate, this philosophy ceases to function correctly.) I can see why you'd want to brand piracy as universally bad regardless of circumstances, but the fact is that life isn't that simple: there aren't moral absolutes. My own case is, I think, a grey area: the fact that I break the laws of my country means that they couldn't be described as morally good, but the fact that they're mutually beneficial and support the game industry mean they're not morally bad either. I agree that piracy is wrong, but unlike you I wouldn't maintain that it's always definitely wrong no matter what: I think it being morally wrong depends on the circumstances. In my circumstances, it seems to me that it ceases to be wrong. Flexible morality isn't a popular concept, particularly among idealists and moral realists (and Pookey, you sound fairly idealistic about this). But I do think the morality on this subject is flexible. edit - speak of the devil, phulshof's post illustrates quite well just how flexible the issue really is morally. Also, phulshof, it's worth pointing out one massive problem with assessing piracy (your model will make it easier to explain): a lot of people would say they're group 3 when asked, when in reality they're group 4. If piracy didn't exist, I'm sure a lot of these "oh I just wouldn't buy games" types would, in fact, buy games.
There's only a need to do that if the revenue lost from people who've downloaded a copy and then not bought it when they would have done without being able to download is greater than the revenue earned from people who've downloaded and then gone on to buy a copy.
So what about the legalities then? Should they be so flexible that we can excuse people from committing illegal acts, purely due to personal preference?
Really? What about the people NOT in his convenient list? You think that list is exhaustive and covers everyone who downloads pirated games? May I add a category to your list? 7: Those who seek out and download games for free because they simply do not want to pay for them while there is a free alternative and does not care about the legality of their actions. There... fixed for you. [edit] Love the way you ninja edited as you realised your argument was flawed
We already do that. There are plenty of laws of the books that people don't always comply with due to personal preference and a blind eye is turned to it. Just in the realm of copyright infringement it's illegal to copy your own music but people do it anyway and noone is going to realistically argue they should be dragged up in court for it.
How is that not what he put in group 3? Or possibly group 4? Depending on whether or not the people you're talking about would have bought the game in question if they couldn't have downloaded it. No, I edited it because you changed the post which I was originally responding to. So I updated the quote and my response.
Obtaining property (regardless of how it's obtained) that you have no legal right to isn't a little thing, and maybe if more people kept sight of that fact then we wouldn't have so many scrotes wasting oxygen in our country.
You can't have flexible morality in real life I'm afraid... because it will flex both ways and justify bad actions as well as good. The best you can hope for are degrees of culpability. Like Murder, manslaughter, unlawful killing etc. They are all punishments metered out for taking someone's life. They are all wrong, but some have moral ambiguity. You still end up in jail though. Also, again you are using yourself as a benchmark for your ideology. The fact is, while you can obtain illegal games, they will be obtained by those who have no intention of paying for it, EVEN if they then say "Well I wasn't going to buy it anyway". Which is a bit like killing someone, and saying "Well he had cancer anyway".
No, not at all. See above a few posts. I don't expect the legal system to bend to meet these complexities - it never has done and it's not about to start now. But we should be mature enough to admit that the law is not a perfect reflection of morality - it's just the law. We can discuss the theoretical morality of actions without even paying attention to legality; they're separate issues. That's Group 4. The worst one. His list is comprehensive, and the most objective summary of facts so far in this thread, and could even be easily used to shape and strengthen your own arguments around. edit - Pookey, see above, I'm talking pure morality, not legality here. Moral flexibility can and does exist, insofar as morality exists at all. But I agree with both you and stuart that the law can't reflect that flexibility. edit2 - here's betting Krazeh's post, below, gets much more attention in replies than mine, despite being much less coherent and progressive of the issue. One thing this thread has shown me is that people prefer a good old fashion slagging match and a contest of egos to a calm, reasoned discussion.
If these people who have obtained it have no intention of paying for it then what actual damage has been caused? Who has it cost for them to obtain a copy? Who's lost out? Yay for crappy ending analogy which is completely irrelevant and so not at all like what you're claiming it is.
Seriously... this is getting out of hand now. NO one EXPECTS to be able to DEMAND that they sample everything that it's possible to buy in the whole world and use it as a defence, so why for THIS market? Why this indignation that someone has the temerity to offer goods for sale without letting you try them for as long as you like under any conditions you see fit? That would be deemed unreasonable in any other arena, yet for games, it's considered not only reasonable, but EXPECTED! It's stupid. Can I break into a house to "evaluate" it before buying it? No. I can arrange to visit and have a look around instead however, and if I use this opportunity, linked with some common sense and a good survey, I can probably get MORE information and a safer sale than if I merely squatted in it for a month. Just download a damned demo. If there is none... just wrote to the developers and tell them what morons they are for supporting piracy.... then just walk away. Going that extra step and using the developer's lack of demo as a DEFENCE for supporting piracy (which you are doing if you download it) is just ridiculous. LOL.. nope. The same. People claim no harm is done because they are not planning to buy it anyway, so no loss. I can say "He had cancer, so he was dying anyway, so no loss". They're the same, and my analogy just highlights the stupidity of the piracy advocate's logic.
While that rant was terribly nice to read (albeit pretty much a rehash of all your previous posts so a little samey and still with issues if ya ask me) it didn't do anything to answer the question which was how was your new "group 7" not what phulshof had already mentioned in groups 3 and 4? So you think taking someone's life, as long as they have a terminal illness which would kill them sooner or later, is the same as downloading a copy of a piece of software that you have no intention of ever parting with money for? Right.... that sounds like you've really put a lot of thought into your analogies. All your analogy does is highlight your own inability to view this topic rationally imo.
...which are? In all honesty? Not much. The way I worded it however puts in in perspective a little better and makes it apparent that ignoring that section is stupid. While you have one section in that list that intends to download for free and has no intention of paying for it, then no matter how wonderful the other sections may appear should you choose to think so, there is still a very powerful reason for allowing NO ONE to download the entire game for free. No, like all analogies, they make the point better if you exaggerate. My point is that they are BOTH wrong, and NEITHER is an excuse for doing so. I'm not suggesting that I deem game piracy to be as serious a subject as murder, and was hoping it would be obvious that I do not. Apparently, despite being accused of brashness, I'm still being far too subtle in here.
The problem is, you're not offering any reason why this is the case. It's just rhetoric; your claim basically boils down to "people in Groups 5 and 6, who pirate and then buy, are morally wrong for pirating because I say so." There are actually good arguments to support this, but you haven't offered any: you just keep repeating yourself. Do you have a rational reason for believing it to be wrong? We've already ruled out tangible loss, since that type of piracy actually benefits the developers. The only similarity in those two cases is that there's a claim of no harm being done. In every other way they're dissimilar: the patient being killed loses something tangible, his/her life, whereas the developer pirated from by Group 3 loses nothing tangible (at least, if Group 3 are being honest, and wouldn't have bought it anyway). It's an inaccurate analogy. If they were stealing physical copies from shops that were going bankrupt, then it'd be more relevant.
