One in Three Broadband Subscribers is a Pirate
Written by Ernesto on February 03, 2009A recently published survey found that one third of all broadband Internet subscribers worldwide admits to having downloaded movies or TV-shows illegally. The majority of these downloaders are well aware that their habits are illegal, but it doesn’t play on their conscience.
Every other month a new survey pops up, and they all seem to draw the same conclusion: millions of people worldwide download files from filesharing networks such as BitTorrent – and they don’t think this is morally wrong.
Most recently, Ovum researchers surveyed a large group of broadband Internet subscribers who also own a TV, and polled their video download habits. The video trends survey found that nearly one third of the respondents watch illegally downloaded video. Because music and software wasn’t included, it is safe to say that the overall piracy rate among broadband subscribers is even higher.
Most people do not download copyrighted videos on a regular basis though. The survey found that only 4% of the total sample admitted doing so. Interestingly, two thirds of the sample – including the ones that never download illegally – didn’t see it as morally wrong. This discrepancy between the perceived morality and the legal status lies at the core of the ever increasing piracy rate.
Despite the continuous efforts of the anti-piracy lobby attempted to change the public’s attitude towards piracy, without much success. The infamous “You wouldn’t steal…” campaign is a prime example of such a failed campaign. There hasn’t been much of a change in the attitudes of the public. Instead, TV and movie insiders themselves have regularly made fun of the strategy.
For several years the entertainment industry has ignored the endless possibilities the Internet has offered them, while striving to preserve their outdated business models. Thereby they ignored the cause of the problem. The rise of illegal downloading is clearly a signal that customers want something that is unavailable through other channels.
So, should sharing copyrighted material be legalized? Not per se, but the entertainment industry should focus on monetizing filesharing networks instead of bringing them down. The movie industry has said many times that it treats piracy as just another competitor, so one day it will hopefully see that sharing is not only a good thing but also an unstoppable thing – with a multitude of profit-making possibilities attached to it.
Previously: Top 10 Most Pirated TV Shows on BitTorrent
Next: Code Aims to Quell New Zealand “3 Strikes” Fears
88 Responses
I never took a survey
I say it would be easier to install some brains into Paris Hilton and make her less sluttier than stop people from downloading.
But if the MAFIAA want to keep throwing millions into efforts to try to do so… I certainly dont want to be the one to stop them from doing so, cant really think of a more deserving bunch of scumbag companies who should be throwing money into a vortex for no reason at all.
Arrrrrrr me matey!
Cheers!
http://www.eZee.se
It’s also bullshit.
http://markshroyer.com/files/piracy.png
YAAARRR
Surveys don’t include everyone in the world usually. It’s hard to get everyone to take a survey unless it’s at gun point, but that takes too long.
LOL!! Fuck you RIAA!!
If i don’t download movies from the internet, why on earth i have to get 25Mbit connection for ?
I can browse internet with 512kbps.
if ISPs stop downloading, no one will use their bandwidth, they will be bankrupt ;)
Clean and clear answer !
My favorite: http://www.TorrentSpy.cd
If i don’t download movies from the internet, why on earth i have to get 25Mbit connection for ?
I can browse internet with 512kbps.
if ISPs stop downloading, no one will use their bandwidth, they will be bankrupt ;)
Clean and clear answer !
My favorite: TorrentSpy.cd
Wow more info we already know! but we here to stay :)
I think we shouldn’t be calling it illegal, as, technically, something illegal is a crime, and filesharing isn’t a criminal offense.
@James:
Filesharing isn’t illegal true, but sharing copyrighted material is illegal in some countries, so nothing wrong with the use of the word ‘illegal’ here I guess?
the famous you would’t steal a car AD
or at least what everyone thought of it
http://ie.youtube.com/watch?v=964MLq1db4s
Even my mother of 71 downloads movies and TV shows.
those antipiracy clips in movie intros always makes me laugh. some of the things is like comparing david and goliath(w/e you spell it).
and if i couldnt dl movies like i do i prolly wouldnt own any movies at all (- would you pay $20 for a mystery box?? especially in the world we live in now?!? -). i can barely afford rent let alone a dvd and the movies i own are all movies i like the most which imo deserve to be bought( which means mpaa and their brothers make a profit…)
^^ damn i should register >_>
edit: anyways, in my mind its sorta a win-win.
Well, if the government is for the people and by the people, and the people don’t think “piracy” is morally wrong, maybe piracy should be legalised. (Shock horror.)
“…Well, if the government is for the people and by the people, and the people don’t think “piracy” is morally wrong, maybe piracy should be legalised. (Shock horror.)…”
I agree, but the reality is that government (at least here in the USA) is not for the people; it’s paid for by lobbyists and corporations and that’s who the American government supports. Not “the people”, as sad as that is.
“I agree, but the reality is that government (at least here in the USA) is not for the people; it’s paid for by lobbyists and corporations and that’s who the American government supports. Not “the people”, as sad as that is.”
Of course Government is for the People. The people who can afford those lobbyists. So, if you’ve got a shit-ton of cash laying around you can get stuff done!
Perhaps it may be more helpful if the article included a link to the survey itself, so that we could know more about the survey, like the sample size, the margin of error, and the confidence level.
If that percentage of people do not perceive it as morally wrong, then what do the same percentage of people think about all of these anti-piracy measures taken lately, like three strikes, and things like that? I think that this would be a more interesting question.
If illegal sharing is good and unstoppable, then there is no reason for it to be illegal. After all, it is what is providing people with what is unavailable through legal means, and most likely always will.
One thing is whether these file-sharing networks themselves want to be monetized or not. What are their opinions on any possible or current attempt from the entertainment industry to monetize them?
@3 Feb 03, 2009 at 23:38 by Anonymous
Offering people a little reward could possibly reduce the abstention rate.
@12 Rob
“it?s paid for by lobbyists and corporations and that?s who the American government supports”
Although the United States has some corruption, and is more corruption than certain countries like, Sweden, Denmark, or New Zealand, it is not so bad. “Corruption rules everything” would be more true of poorer places like Sudan, or Haiti. Perhaps you could take a look at the corruption perceptions index, which could be a good indication of the level of corruption in a country.
ooooh. what happened to
4 Feb 04, 2009 at 00:00 by David
512 kbps…
I love those comments. Why not 7 KB/s
What about software or game reviews?
I don’t want to wait 30 min for 100 MB.
5 Mbps should be fine.
12 Feb 04, 2009 at 01:37 by Rob
Maybe we should start to make our own casting to find V.
Sciene, how I love the movie’s beginning. Much better than the comic.
- …. voracious violation of volition. … the name’s V.
- Are you like a crazy person?
- I’m quite sure they will say so.
ooooh. what happened to intensedebate.com?
4 Feb 04, 2009 at 00:00 by David
512 kbps…
I love those comments. Why not 7 KB/s
What about software or game reviews?
I don’t want to wait 30 min for 100 MB.
5 Mbps should be fine.
12 Feb 04, 2009 at 01:37 by Rob
Maybe we should start to make our own casting to find V.
Sciene, how I love the movie’s beginning. Much better than the comic.
- …. voracious violation of volition. … the name’s V.
- Are you like a crazy person?
- I’m quite sure they will say so.
9 Feb 04, 2009 at 01:14 by Ethereal
lol
You got to love those surveys and statistics. How many people took part? 1500? lol
15000… shakira: lolo lolei lolei
anyways why aren’t we called neo pirates?
YOU ARE PIRATE?!
no…
YOU ARE!
interesting I didn’t know that about me.
((14 Feb 04, 2009 at 02:06 by http://www.10ch.org))
who cares if the monetize?
What do you think the prices would be like?
“Although the United States has some corruption, and is more corruption than certain countries…”
————-
wow roze. you need to immediately relinquish your grammar nazi armband.
What thats it? Just one in three? I was thinking more like three out of five dude!
privacy.de.tc
@17 Jack Beaner
It is just that file-sharing and such are not promoted enough with great publicity. See, file-sharing, although somewhat public, is also somewhat underground, and is thus not plainly found. Due to this, many people are unaware of file-sharing. Surely this percentage will increase if file-sharing becomes more publicized.
If I wasn’t downloading I could get by with 3-5 Mbps for web browsing and “legal” uses. There isn’t any other reason besides major downloading that I pay for 20 Mbps speeds.
Wow, what new and exciting information. Seriously who funds this?
you can download movies !!! just kidding what about music to , i like breaking the law, keeps me careful and im always looking over my shoulder
I would still pay for the speeds….but I currently pay for 130GB per month…which we all know where THAT goes.. (50-60GB on wrestling alone!)
The record companies had a monopoly on our music and are greedy pigs. I’ve have only ever downloaded dead oldies from dead artists and have purchased 100 times the music that I’ve file shared. If they had not been so greedy and paranoid their profit margins would be a lot higher today. They are managers without vision sucking on the bones of the truly gifted. Yet we still let them dictate our music. Checkout the top hits, all scantily dressed young women shaking their tits and singing the same style of tune. it’s pathetic.
I dont believe that stat, although its fast on the rise. Illegal file sharing will not last. If illegal downloading becomes mainstream and common practice, there will be no money TV shows and Movies, if there is no money they wont be made. Simple. So its either movies and tv shows dont get made or ISP’s stop the user from downloading.
I pay for cable… What’s wrong with downloading the shows that I would be able to record on my PVR anyhow?
@ sly burg…
The ISP’s do NOT have the right to control what goes through their network.
What would you do if the postman decided to open all your mail and decide whether or not you should receive it?
ISP’s have the right to control their network, but not to pick and choose what they throttle.
my response is awaiting moderation. So much for free speech on this sight.
YARRRR!
The problem for someone like me in Australia. Is the fact that we hardly get some great tv shows from USA or even movies till months later or never at all. We have to wait ages for the DVD or it might not even get released here on DVD.
The only way to see if a show or movie is worth buying is to download a few eps or the movie itself and then if I like it enough I’ll go buy the DVD.
Which I am planning to do with a new series a mate in the states told me about.
How can these companies not look at this as an advantage in marketing? If it wasn’t for filesharing I would never been given the chance to see the show and they wouldn’t have sold some more copies of their DVD’s.
as long as your not making money out of it then it is illegal. some people who downloaded copyrighted files use to sell it on the market which is wrong but if you download a file and share it to those who want a copy then it is right. just like what they said “ANYTHING YOU GOT FOR FREE SHOULD BE SHARED FOR FREE”
It’s only “One in three” because 2/3 of the users on the net today have no clue how to do anything other than open a web browser and check email.
1. Why would downloading have anything to do with “their conscience?” I see nothing morally amiss in bitch-slapping life-plus-seventy into the dustbin of history, myself. Copyright is SUPPOSED to expire and genuinely free up the “content” they claim it “protects”.
2. Yet again, this is good news, because no matter what the lobby-pigs attempt to get, it’s logistically impossible to even enforce most of the “laws” on the books now. Do you REALLY think that the various governments planetwode REALLY have the resources/manpower to waste on yet another “war”?
I mean, they’re already fighting (losing) wars on: “terrorism” and drugs. They simply don’t have the manpower to actually jail (or even meaningfully inconvenience) everyone downloading.
I’m glad to see people willing to admit that they don’t see it as a problem, myself. I see life-plus-70 as the problem, and p2p technology/mass “piracy” as the solution. The RIAA/mpaa should have been forcibly disbanded YEARS ago, when Idiot-boy Valenti compared VCR’s to the Boston Strangler. ANYBODY who can take the RIAA/MPAA seriously at this point is either stupid, or on their payroll.
Rock on.
>So, should sharing copyrighted
>material be legalized?
For private, non-commercial peer-2-peer sharing? Of course it should, if you want to call your country a democracy. Copyright enforcement on such a low level (ordinary people) and at such a wide scale (everybody with a internet connection) is nothing else but for-profit censorship.
If a line of business (production and seling of copies) can not survive because technology advancement (PCs and internet in every home) made it obsolete, just freaking let it die already, instead of legislating us all back into the 50s where every copy of something was tied to a physical record.
It wouldnt be the first and not the last industry branch dying because technological advancement made it obsolete.
It sounds about right that one of three people on the internet are downloading some things ‘illegally’.
Personally, I stick with old games that aren’t sold anymore in the stores and there is no other way to get them, and new version of Windows OS’s.
I heard the DRM already admit that it is unstoppable.
Sharing is a GOOD thing
- God
glad to see TF comments back to the old way……..
my mother (62yrs old) fileshares TV an movies
myself (40+) fileshares TV and movies
my wife (40+) fileshares TV and movies
my son (6yrs) DOESNT……..(but he`s learning!
my Daughter (14yrs) DOESNT ,thinks its so “totally wrong”
so if im an avarage family then id say that the overall world avarage would be 4 out of 5 do file share……….
What happened to IntenseDebate ?
This is interesting news – whilst most of the finding don’t surprise me, one thing certainly did – 4% download reguarly? That seems remarkably low especially considering how popular TV episodes are… doesn’t it?
“I dont believe that stat, although its fast on the rise. Illegal file sharing will not last. If illegal downloading becomes mainstream and common practice, there will be no money TV shows and Movies, if there is no money they wont be made. Simple. So its either movies and tv shows dont get made or ISP’s stop the user from downloading.”
Your looking at it way too black and white. There’ll “always” be people that purchase and provide money – for the considerable future anyhow. Game and application piracy has been around for donkeys years and those 2 areas still make money.
Intense Debate was better.
I think it’s more like one-third of broadband users admit to downloading pirated content and another third lies about it.
@7Seven7
Man, I’m worried about your daughter.
It’s very weird she finds filesharing totally wrong.
Did she receive propaganda lessons at school or something ?
When I was 14 I was always going to school with a bunch of floppies in the bag to swap stuff with my amiga friends. And pretty everybody was doing that.
@all
Anyway, people outside the usa, stop downloading the american mainstream tv/movies.
It’s just asking to be “civilized” by those yankee rednecks. One of you said more piracy = no more tv shows ? I say good, maybe then Culture will stand a chance.
I worry about my daughter.
Hope she’s not going to buy any CD’s or DVD’s. That would just support the suing and destroying lives that RIAA and MPAA are doing.
It’s not easy being a parent these days, and I fear the day when she will come home with a CD bought in the shop…
I think highlander is right. One third is definitely lying about it. So that’s two thirds. Seems about right. Still shocked about the 4% regularly stat though. That won’t be enough.
Legalize it!
@41
well i dont know what it is about her but she`s aginst it, she really doesnt watch much TV, an rarely listens to the radio, owns no CD`s (that im aware of, unless her mother got them for(legally))
her school work is the most important to her ATM.
offtopic: im glad that intense debate BS is gone, i was gettng e-mails from ppl i dont even know that do alot of posting here an personally i thought my addy WAS SUPPOSED TO BE CONFIDENTAL!!!!
Ahoy Matiess !!!
:D
“One third of all broadband Internet subscribers worldwide admits to having downloaded movies or TV-shows illegally.”
What they do not say is that the fast connection is very sought of mainly for that purpose.
“Most people do not download copyrighted videos on a regular basis though. The survey found that only 4% of the total sample admitted doing so. ”
Well one always wonders that there are so many stupid’s who risk just on the sake of truth.
Luckily the higher percentage belongs to the ones who know how to shut their mouth…
“You wouldn’t steal…” campaign is a prime example of a failed campaign.
Why should you be ashamed to do in a very small scale what most do at a larger scale?
And I am talking of Bankers, Managers, Politicians.
One steals as he can… with his small or big chances…
“The rise of illegal downloading is clearly a signal that customers want something that is unavailable through other channels.”
And especially something that comes for free…
In a marketing world where what mostly sells is the “special offer” “pay one and grab two”, the “pay nothing and grab as much as you like” sounds beautifully.
“So, should sharing copyrighted material be legalized?”
Where would the fun be? And the profits of the high speed internet providers?
Some may object that content IS NOT KING, but in this case is at least “Queen”.
At the moment I am downloading Sims 2 iso, because the physical cd’s are wrecked. And Adobe CS4 for a friend who is unable to afford it but needs it for animation classes. Not only that, World of Warcraft (I have the original plus BC discs in front of me but not Lich King, because noone stocks it near me). Not only that, but I am also busy making images of every disc that I own in case the discs end up damaged (might as well fill up the 3 Terabytes of space that I have!)
@ Wolfy
I remember my Quake 3 disc basicly exploding in the drive ruining it, only time i bought a new drive, was time for the upgrade to dvd anyway ;)
Images is whats done today, i have tons of originals many with scratched CD’s, my Diablo II cd’s are to full of errors for a install.. C&C errors.. most of those old super great games are worn out.. they dont make games like back then anymore!
D2 1.12 has no-cd so i was thankfull for that, now that i dont play it and my CD’s are broken they add legal no-cd lol, why couldnt they do it before? why cd checks?
Cash milkers ruining legit users grr.. no respect from me!
I think they even tried to develop CD’s with limited lifetime once or something like that.. MAFFIA suckers! no wonder CD’s brake, their designed to..
Installing games with many cd’s can be irritating, often causing damages to the CD’s as you switch them around, lay them under a lamp or whatnot.. what is it 9 cd’s for WoW now? SWG was a few aswell i think, and some RPG’s.. oh Baldurs gate! classic! :P new games realy do suck nowadays.. :(
Plastic discs are dead, give us memory sticks instead ;) something usefull! always loose mine lol!
and no fricking mem-stick-failromtrojanbullshitcrap, or starwarsBSODpcdeathvirus or SONYmalwareRING0hacksortrojans..
thx for being sutch great friends, i need to vent sometimes and its great to have a place to go.. ;)
The UK government is busy rolling out plans to make sure that EVERY UK household has access to broadband within a few years. This is part of their stategy to ensure that the UK can keep up with the rest of the world when it comes to IT education, so that more of it’s citizens are able to compete for jobs and contribute to the countries recovery.
If this is sucessful, then the UK economy can begin to stabilize over a period of years.
The music industry, etc wants to initialise a ‘three strike’ system, which will see innocent people being prevented from using the internet (this ranges from those wrongly accused, to the families of the accused who may need the internet for studies, etc).
Therefore, the music industry is in direct violation of the UK governments strategy to help the UK out of it’s recession. Maybe if every broadband subscriber told this to their local MP’s…
@7SeVeN7
I really wouldn’t worry about your daughters attitude to filesharing. It’s common for kids to rebel against their parents beliefs. Just let her find her own way in life and eventually she will come around! All the best to you and your family!
@ every other poster here…
Thanks for the entertaining @ informative read. Makes a nice change from all the usual heavy @ off-topic posts…
LONG LIVE TPB… LONG LIVE TF!
;o)
Are the other two ninjas?
AAAARRRRGGGGGHHHHH MATEY!!
@49
I know, cds are woeful. Most tragic was when I had Baldur’s Gate 1 on the original 5 discs, I put Disc 5 into my drive, heard a noise, ejected it and the cd was now in four seperate pieces. And this was after it was no longer on the shelves. Another game I have, Phantasy Star Universe: Ambition of the Illuminus, refused to play because the installer “forgot” to install Gameguard, the authenticity program. Not only that, but half the time I do get a game that works on my laptop, the cd drive spins so fast that my computer unexpectedly restarts (not to mention it sounds like a jackhammer, drowning out even headphones on full volume).
“Most recently, Ovum researchers surveyed a large group of broadband Internet subscribers who also own a TV, and polled their video download habits. The video trends survey found that nearly one third of the respondents watch illegally downloaded video. Because music and software wasn’t included, it is safe to say that the overall piracy rate among broadband subscribers is even higher.” … sounds about right — isn’t it about time to change the law to suit such a large minority …
Actually, in hungary 50% of all users cheat the system or are fake, just like http://www.opentopix.com
If they come after me for downloading old TV shows, I say Bring It! The stuff I’m downloading is generally so down-sampled (350MB for an hour or less of footage) I could only play it on the computer anyway, and they wouldn’t have the GUTS to try and actually SELL me something like that. So it’s not a “lost sale” by any stretch. In court, I’d try to play the video on an HDTV in front of the judge to prove my point.
So I wonder if the owner of this site is a console fanboy! where is your proof!
It’s funny when nintendo lost 1 billion to pircay alone to pircay.
It’s is funny game devs talk about pircay on the pc when console lose alot more from.
the use game market
trade games
rented games
http://news.softpedia.com/news/Almost-1-Billion-Dollars-Lost-by-Nintendo-in-2007-78918.shtml
pircay is so bad on console as soon as a game goes gols it’s pirated.
you kow how much is 1 billion right pirated on consoles.
pirates on console make a living of console games.
http://kotaku.com/5127249/elspa-celebrates-first-anti+piracy-raid-of-2009
downloading is illegal? news to me..
9 Feb 04, 2009 at 01:14 by Ethereal
lol
You got to love those surveys and statistics. How many people took part? 1500? lol
15000… shakira: lolo lolei lolei
anyways why aren’t we called neo pirates?
YOU ARE PIRATE?!
no…
YOU ARE!
interesting I didn’t know that about me.
14 Feb 04, 2009 at 02:06 by http://www.10ch.org
who cares if the monetize?
What do you think the prices would be like?
“What would you do if the postman decided to open all your mail and decide whether or not you should receive it?”
———————-
your mail IS opened if it is deemed suspicious. it’s chemically tested (if something is seen to be leaking through)and drug sniffing dogs are brought in if the package is the least bit suspect. depending on the results of such tests, your package is then opened and examined.
so all in all, great analogy…
“And Adobe CS4 for a friend who is unable to afford it but needs it for animation classes.”
—————
he can afford expensive collage courses but can’t afford the requisite software at the student discount price?
“What happened to IntenseDebate ?”
roze signed himself up for 217 different accounts and the whole thing crashed…
” Sharing is a GOOD thing
– God”
—————
“you shall not steal”
– God
No shit the infamous anti-piracy campaign didn’t work.
The only times I got to see those “you wouldn’t steal” ads, was when I had actually paid $12 to see a stupid movie ONCE on a movie theater.
How the hell did they expect shit like that to work if you’re targeting the customers that are feeding you and treating them like criminals.
The funny thing is that I’d sometimes yell very loud on the theater
“Copying is not Stealing!!!”
@Payed MAFIAA shill:
“roze signed himself up for 217 different accounts and the whole thing crashed…”
As opposed to your multiple accounts?
Pot, kettle.
@Payed MAFIAA shill:
“you shall not steal
- God”
Theft
1. (Law) The act of stealing; specifically, the felonious taking and removing of personal property, with an intent to deprive the rightful owner of the same; larceny.
Cop·y
n. pl. cop·ies
1. An imitation or reproduction of an original; a duplicate: a copy of a painting; made two copies of the letter.
- Dictionary
“The video trends survey found that nearly one third of the respondents watch illegally downloaded video.”
I digress. Downloading copyrighted material without distribution is not copyright infringement, and thus is not illegal.
Regardless, laws are irrelevant and should be repealed when the majority ignore them. Copyright and patents encourage monopolistic practises and restrict creative liberties. Abolition is inevitable.
@66 FLB
FYI, he doesn’t have an income, is unable to work part-time because animation takes up all of his time and just to let you know, Adobe CS4 costs 4000 or so. Plus he wouldn’t have the money anyway to pay for a student discount version, which wouldn’t licence him to create commercial content.
I don’t think the problem is so much a matter of a different way to deliver the medium–music/movies/tv shows but rather the cost. I would rather get something for free than pay for it. I’d rather download music illegally then pay to download it on itunes.
“As opposed to your multiple accounts?
Pot, kettle.”
—————–
no roze (yes, i know it’s you)
unlike you, i never had multiple accounts, only multiple names in an effort to dodge default post moderation. [Mods note - there is no way changing names would alter moderation standards being applied to yout posts. Same username, different ones - it makes no difference]
“Theft
1. (Law) The act of stealing; specifically, the felonious taking and removing of personal property, with an intent to deprive the rightful owner of the same; larceny.”
————
that’s one definition, here’s another: “the illegal taking of another person’s property without that person’s freely-given consent.” [moderators note - being deprived of the use is one of the two key elements to the definition of theft. Without it, it's not theft]
“FYI, he doesn’t have an income, is unable to work part-time because animation takes up all of his time and just to let you know, Adobe CS4 costs 4000 or so.”
—————-
really? that’s strange. according to adobe’s website, it costs $200 for students…hopefully karma will come through and he will be negatively affected by copyright infringement in his future career.
man, i don’t care what anyone says, ever since i got my lappy back in June of 08, i’ve pry dled or in this case “pirated” well over a grand in software, movies, videos, music, and games. who cares? what is it to anyone?
downloadin 24/7
“The majority of these downloaders are well aware that their habits are illegal, but it doesn’t play on their conscience.”
Why, should it play on our conscience?! When you borrow class notes from a friend to catch up, do you have to pay him royalties?! And if not, one should feel guilty atleast, right?
Knowledge is free and without limits, contrary to what the monopolists want us to believe, and therefore they will always fail.
hi
copyright is being abused by the industries to leach money from the consumers and the artist. copy right laws were intended for intellectual property not physical property. It protects people from having their ideas or art credited to someone else. I think most people realized the hypocracy of this when vcr’s came out and we used them knowing that it was technically illegal to record shows and movies off television. Selling bootleg copies of something or taking song lyrics and using them in your own song. These are crimes. Filesharing is not.
I don’t steal, I don’t rob.
I don’t rape, I don’t kill.
I am not on a ship or an airplane.
I am not in international waters, nor outside the realm of national jurisdictions.
I am not a pirate.
(regardless of how much I desire to emulate your faux-cool)
There’s one simple reason why I believe it is absolutely moral, and should be legal, for me to download TV shows and movies:
I pay for cable television and I’m allowed to record the same programs off the TV. And I suspect the vast majority of people that are also DLing from my system have television service too (who has broadband but not basic cable?).
Therefore I do not see it as morally wrong to download and watch these programs when I want on whatever device I want. Why is there not more outrage over the hypocrisy of TiVo being legal but then getting the same stuff from a torrent, and bam you’re in court. It’s bullshit. My friend has hundreds of VHS tapes of movies in his closet, all recorded from TV. I don’t see anything wrong with sourcing them from a computer and storing them on a hard drive instead of his method.
Hmm, no numbers?
No numbers no believe say I.
here is another perspective:
the studios dont care who pays them as long as they get their money from SOMEWHERE. consider this. how many times have you watched content that was once available as a movie, later as dvd, then as a paid from cable content, and then via free-to-air TV ? it happens all the time. now if you take the last part, you’ll realize that the free-to-air channels do in fact pay the studios to get the content, but we dont, because the station also broadcasts ads in the hopes to make some money to pay for the content, their expenses and also make some profit. but since they have no mechanism to see who is actually paying (we viewers by buying stuff that they advertise) in reality they give that content to us for FREE. so in reality the studios DO GIVE their content for free, but some one else (the station) paid them. so they dont care since they got their money already. this example clearly shows that the whole mechanism is flawed and needs a new design from the ground up so that everyone can benefit. I used to work for TV and media so we have to admit that companies need to pay their people, so they cant afford to lose money all the time, they need however to find other ways to monetize the content.
What’s illegal about file sharing? Somebody bought the file before sharing it.
10 in 10 CEOs are crooks.
10 in 10 congressmen are whores.
I’m a Pirate!! I’m a Pirate!! I’m a Pirate!!
And I don’t give a damn.
308 BR-RW and counting :)
I don’t mind to pay $8 to see a movie in the cinema, some movies you just have to see on the big screen.
What I do mind is when i have to pay $4 for a cup of coke filled with 50% ice and $4 for a bucket of popcorn, now that’s called Grand Theft :)
So these days I go to walmart buy myself drinks, candy and popcorn watch a brand new screener while i download at the same time two other new screeners :) or occasionally br/dvd-rips in 1080p
Long Life Broadband and my Philips BR-RW :)
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