Views on piracy. Honesty please

On 2010-03-26 12:13, Spindrift wrote:

You can't sentence someone for murder if the supposed victim is alive and well.

Several surveys noted the opposite trend, the more people pirate the more they purchase as well.

If everyone who wanted to get started making music had to fork out €100's on a DAW and some plugins they might not have gotten in to it in the first place.

And if you cannot afford both a legit copy of windows as well as a donation to the small struggling developer making that plug you cannot live without, I would say the morally correct thing to do is to use a pirated version of windows.

On 2010-03-26 17:42, Maine Coon wrote:

True. Like I said – moral issues are very different from legal. And you what you said is just a matter of scale – not a principle.

If you walk into your neighbor’s garden and pick a couple of kilos of tomatoes – you are still a thief, even if your neighbor never notices the difference. If you look outside your window and start laughing and mocking a guy in a wheelchair on the street – you are still a callous jerk, even if that guy can not see or hear you.

This may be true for software, I don’t know. It is certainly not true for music. Physical sales of music decrease dramatically every year. Online download sales grow – but not nearly fast enough to compensate for that decrease. So, in fact, illegal music downloads are killing the music industry. And, unfortunately, it affects primarily little known artists and niche markets – like psy trance. This is the reason why nowadays hardly anybody can make money being just a producer and not doing any live gigs.

It’s like borrowing an encyclopedia of astronomy from your library. Once you decided that you love astronomy and will constantly refer to this particular book – you go to a book store and buy it; you don’t sneak the library copy to your office and Xerox the whole thing. Although, I have seen people do that too.

I used to think the same way. Now I am more inclined to think that it’s better to have a legit copy of Ubuntu than a cracked copy of Windows. Just like it’s better to get music which is freely given by artists or labels than to fish out obscure Rapidshare links. You can support both the Ubuntu team and Ektoplazm when you can afford it. Yet you are not doing anything morally wrong by using their gifts – since they are freely giving them to you. On the other hand, even though Bill Gates never noticed your piracy, it does not change the fact that you stole from him. See the difference?

On 2010-03-26 00:12, Maine Coon wrote:
My point is: most people can figure out what is right and what is wrong by themselves, if they listen carefully to their heart. It is simple but it is also very difficult, thanks to the massive brainwash we receive since we are born. Most people are trapped in one of 2 modes of thinking/feeling about piracy:

First one relies on an outside authority:
“God (my Mom, the Supreme Court) said it’s wrong to download pirated stuff – so I will not do it. And those who do this kind of immoral (naughty, illegal) stuff should go to hell (their room, prison)”.

The other one relies on “independent reason”:
“If I can find a rationalization that sounds plausible enough (like “it’s OK to steal from Microsoft – they are too rich anyway”), I will just do it”.

I say that neither approach is right. Both are traps. What is right depends on your intentions. If your intention is to choose something you would like to buy – piracy is fine. If you are just getting for free something you should pay for – it’s theft, does not matter how good your rationalizations sound.

Just my $0.02 ...

P.S. I don’t mean that you have to buy everything you like. Getting stuff for free is great – as long as the rightful owner gives it to you. Long live Ektoplazm!

On 2010-03-26 12:13, Spindrift wrote:
You can't sentence someone for murder if the supposed victim is alive and well.
There is a massive amount of very high quality software available. Maybe in theory it could be even more and higher quality, but it's hardly a market that is dying.

On 2010-03-27 18:18, braininavat wrote:

Of course there is great stuff available but piracy has literally killed innovation.
What great new software has been announced since december? Basically nothing came out at NAMM this year...
Messe ends today...not even a blip. To think of this happening even 5 years ago would be laughable. When you steal things that people worked really hard for you get what you pay for which is nothing...because people stop working when they aren't getting paid. What a novel concept....
Its not a question of morality, its a question of self interest. You are harming yourself along with the entire industry when you pirate something. The problem its such slight damage on your part that everyone does it, you don't notice it until everything has rotted from the inside and one day you wake up and realize something very beautiful has died.
"the work of maggots is not measured in decibels"
Welcome to that day.
Instead of NI showing off the reaktor 7.5 update at Messe this week, they can't even get 6 off the ground and instead are sampling drum kits because its cheap.
Hell, I'm at the point in life with the background and cash that if it wasn't for piracy I would have a company going right now to try to blow any psytrance vst synth completely away. There is just no way its worth my time and money to bother with because of piracy.
The destiny of a maggot is to eat shit later in life when they have "matured", too bad its too late at that point for something else.
I'm in no way saying I'm innocent in all this either...far far from it. Its just the sad realization of what we have all done to this beautiful thing.

On 2010-03-27 18:18, braininavat wrote:
Of course there is great stuff available but piracy has literally killed innovation.

On 2010-03-28 10:08, *eLliSDee* wrote:
developers,
don't sweat it. the moment i profit from using your software I'll buy your product. it;s a promise

On 2010-03-27 19:24, Spindrift wrote:

I can think of countless synths and modular system I would love to spend money on right now, and Reaktor is very far down on my list compared to a few years ago.

On 2010-03-28 15:39, mubali wrote:

I think this specifically was the point that brainavat was trying to make. Sure Reaktor is far down on the list now, but a few years ago it was ace. Why?? because people were willing to invest money into developing this particular software. Because this isn't making any $$ for them, why should the waste the time?

and you know who is not feeling this piracy pain? Clavia, Access, Waldorf....

On 2010-03-26 22:33, Spindrift wrote:

Of course any assessment of a markets health will be a matter of scale.

Quote:

If you walk into your neighbor’s garden and pick a couple of kilos of tomatoes – you are still a thief, even if your neighbor never notices the difference. If you look outside your window and start laughing and mocking a guy in a wheelchair on the street – you are still a callous jerk, even if that guy can not see or hear you.

If you actually take someone's property they have lost it regardless of if they notice it or not, and you cannot know if they will notice it or not.
If you copy someone's property you have not created a loss for that person, so it's not an issue of noticing or not. There is simply no loss to be noticed.

Windows is fast, stable and compatible with the most software.

And in what sense is piracy stealing?
Legally? No, it isn't. It's copyright infringement.
Morally? Hardly. There is a big difference between potentially less profit and a direct loss of assets, hence most people see piracy as a lot less serious offence than stealing.
I guess most people calling copyright infringement for stealing actually are capable at understanding the differences between the terms, but choose ignore that for some reason. In my eyes it only makes for a really dumb argument.