Asklemmy

You cannot steal what is not physical. Theft implies removing a physical object from somewhere, creating a loss of an item.

Digital information is 1s and 0s, and you just create a copy. You do not remove the original one. There is no theft taking place.

The value of a product does not go down because I didn't pay for it. If anything, if it's a quality product, the value goes up. If I pirate something and enjoy it, chances are I will pay for it when I can afford to. If I pirate something and don't enjoy it, well, I wasn't going to buy the product anyway so there's no loss. Let's say I watch a movie at a friend's house and absolutely hate it. I do not buy the movie. How is that different than pirating it and coming to the same conclusion? I see the movie without paying money.

I will pirate it if it's old (tv series from the 80's, for example) or if I can't get it legally. I live in a country that falls through distribution loopholes moderately often. Like right now, I can't watch the latest season of Lower Decks on prime even though I could the previous ones. Some kind of licensing thing. If it's not resolved soon, I'll be taking to the high seas for it.

I have pirated some opera video recordings. It's the only way I'd see some of them. I don't know how to pirate TV or music, and I'd never pirate music anyway because I care a lot about music.

If its not multiplayer, why care.

I just don't earn enough money to justify paying for movies, games and books, i can use those money to pay my bills and what little left after paying my bills, i save it for future

I pirate metric shitloads of movies and series. I don't pirate music or games (much).

I watch maybe 5-10% of what I download. That's probably true for the games I buy as well.

The reason is part convenience. I probably listen to royalty free 95% music of the time, but for the other occasions Spotify has anything and everything I want to listen to. I can't beat that library.

I game on Linux, the Switch and old retro computers. The old retro computers have all pirated games on them, but for Linux and Switch I buy my stuff on the Nintendo shop and Steam. They have everything and it just works.

The video streaming services of today have also taught me that they will pull licenses. When Netflix had a big library I stuck mostly to that, but today it feels like all the good content has been pulled and they mostly just have Netflix originals. So Hollywood has taught me that If I want to watch something, I shouldn't rely on it being available on my streaming service of choice in the future. I'm not going to subscribe to a dozen streaming services just for the odd chance that I want to watch something particular. I'm going to have my own plex server with everything I might want to watch.

The one show that would make me consider getting a second streaming subscription just to support it is Futurama. But of course, Hulu is not available in my region.. so, yarr.

I pirate the odd bit of music and the ocassional film if I cant find it on streaming services, or if I need music in MP3 format for swimming with, vast bulk of what I pirate is music though. And probably less than 10% of all the media I have is pirated. Make something easily available in the format I need at a reasonable price and I'll happily pay for it

i'm on basic welfare (400 dollars per month to afford everything i need) so yeah, i don't exactly have a choice..

For me it's usually about availability. If someone suggests I try out a cool game that came out in the 80s, there's a pretty good chance piracy is the only way to play it. Sure, you can pay way too much on Ebay to get a physical copy, and I have a fair collection of retro games, but it's not like the money from Ebay sales go back to the original creators.

Same with movies. The version of Star Wars I grew up with, the one without all the digitally added stuff since the late 90s, isn't on Disney+. If Disney announced a nice blu-ray Star Wars collection that featured the copies without Jedi Rocks and the extra aliens in the cantina and whatever, I'd go out and get it. But they haven't, so I stick to the fan-made 'despecialized editions'.

I don't pirate from the little guy. I buy albums on Bandcamp and indie games on Steam all the time. I want the small creators to be able to eat. But I'm also fortunate enough to have a little disposable income. I know some people pirate as much as they can, and while I don't entirely agree with it, I don't know their financial situation (or the availability of these things in their country), so it's not really my place to judge them.

I used to pirate anything. Music, movies, softwares, games...

Since I have a developer job and a stable income, I don't really pirate much stuff anymore, only movies and series, but then the whole piracy thing is not even illegal here where I live.

Maybe softwares, too, if I can't find any free and/or open source alternative of it.

For games and music, I like to pay, if I can. If it's expensive, I wait to some sale.

And also, with pirated stuff, you always end up something doesn't work or missing or you just have to make compromises. Fuck that, I'm too old for that.

One aspect of pirating is appealing to me tho - preservation. Anything you can't go and just buy because of dead services or just time going by needs to be preserved. It applies for hardwares, too. Liberating closed hardware and software is a noble thing in my eyes, and it justifies piracy.

Depends.

Sometimes I just can't find the actual thing by legal means. Go try listening to Bruce Woolley's version of "Video Killed The Radio Star" sometime. I can either try to hunt down a physical copy or I can just pirate it. See also: most video game soundtracks.

Usually though it's more about convenience. If I can just stream something on Spotify, I'll just do that.

If there's a movie I kinda wanna see but I'm not sure if it's going to be good I'll pirate it

Only thing I've pirated was a show with no reasonable means to access it legitimately in my region. Hell, I couldn't even access it via VPN because the services it was on didn't accept my card due to region.

Normally of the mind that if it isn't worth my money it isn't worth my time, but in this case I just wasn't allowed to pay them for it. Hardly my fault when they've gone that far out of their way to block me buying it.

I want to support artists, but I will not pay for shit I've already pay for. I own an N64 and loads of games, I have the roms and will never pay a subscription to play worse versions in restricted conditions.

I will also not pay for the sports channels it is far too much. Where I am there are are like 3-4 different sports packages required to watch one league. Fuck that

I am disabled and earn pennies every month. I'll glady support something I like (I buy a shitton of CDs), but I won't lose any sleep from pirating a movie I wasn't gonna buy or see in the theatres anyway.

After going through many phases of why i should and or want to pirate, i honestly just stopped giving a shit entirely about any of those and i ended with "who gives a shit, fuck em"

those that deserve my money get it directly

If i don't see the value i'm pirating.

Money is tight, don't expect me to pay for a play button that you'll take away the second i can't spare the money. It means there is no value delivered for my money so i don't have a reason to spend my hard earned money.

Especially when the amouny is as significant as 10/15€. Fuck i would've bought a cd for each month i could spare that money.

Yes to movies and shows that aren't available on Netflix, Disney, or Amazon. My kids watch a lot of shows on those, so they're worth it, but I refuse to pay for others.

No to everything else.

Yes. Because I can't afford either.

I generally pirate first and buy later if I want to support a game. I think of it as voting with my wallet.

I pirated BG3, enjoyed it even though it’s generally not the sort of game I play. Decided that I want to see more companies making games of this quality in future, so went ahead and bought it.

Same with FromSoftware games, I always buy those as I want more games like that.

Ultimately, if you never buy anything then you can’t expect companies to make the games you want.

I only pirate when the company makes it extremely hard for me to pay for the product or I would be paying for a worse product than if I pirated.

For example, I watch a lot of hockey. The NHL has an idiotic system where I would need to pay for like 4 different services - including cable TV - to watch every game of my favorite team. They would all be in different places, so I would need to figure out where each game is being broadcast, then go to that service. Depending on the broadcaster, the quality may be finished (lower resolution or framerate). If I pirate the games, every game is on the same web page. Every game is 1080p at 60fps. I just click my bookmark and hit play when the game starts.

I'm in a good place financially, and I want to financially support things that I like so I can get more things that I like. But if a company isn't going to make a game available for me to buy, then it's getting pirated (Nintendo, I'm looking at you).

I do, movies and TV shows. Occasionally books, but I buy them much more often than I do pirate. When I was in my teens and early 20s I also pirated games, but I'm too lazy to do that anymore. Movies and TV shows are too fucking expensive for the value they provide. I also pay for a few streaming services, so I only pirate stuff that isn't there.

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.

Not really, with books and movies I only buy/download when I want to watch/read. With games I buy a lot more than I play, but I don't pirate those, so it's not relevant.

I don’t pirate at the moment but my philosophy is that if something is not available to buy, it is free to pirate in my book.

Otherwise, every company that makes a game and rakes in more than 100% profit from it is fair game imo. (That would be revenue devided by the engineer’s salaries, machines and office related stuff times 100. explicitly leaving out ceos overinflated salaries. They should not be tax deductible anyway.)

When i was younger, physical copies pf games and the used market were common things. Now pc games get no physical release, or if they do these are tied to steam or epic games, and consoles are pushing towards going all digital.

All while raising the prices even though there is no logistics involved anymore.

So i should pay more for something that i can't resell and can get taken away from me for one of several reasons (account gets banned, game gets delisted, service eol...)?

So that's why if it can get pirated, i will pirate it.