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Don't Make Me Steal

dontmakemesteal.com

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Re: Don't Make Me Steal

#121

Post by drivebyacct2 »

pyrmont wrote: post #99
drivebyacct2 wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sigh, I am not interested in an argument. I did NOT come here to justify my actions, piracy or to complain and nothing in my post can be construed as an attempt to do so. I came to point out that watching a movie, legally, in Linux is a complete disaster, to the point that it's not worth the hassle for me. I understand it's breaking the law. I'd rather break the law than go through the nightmare of obtaining the movi…

I think the problem that I (and presumably the others in this thread) had with your point was two-fold: 1) your tone and choice of language implied entitlement; 2) if not a defence of piracy, did not add a great deal to the conversation. So what if watching movies in Linux is a complete disaster for you? If you agree that you are not entitled to be able to do this and do not believe that it justifies piracy, it's not…

1. Watching movies legally is more of a hassle than not.

2. The cost is not the prohibitive factor for me. The hassle, slash near-complete inability to purchase them in Linux is.

3. This article is a discussion of making movies available, legally, with a monetary exchange, if they were made more accessible to a wider audience.

4. Everyone wins by me being able to watch movies legally. Movie associations receive more income, I don't violate the law, and everyone is a tiny bit happier.

Considering that this article is about making movies more accessible for the exchange of money... how exactly are my observations not contributing to the discussion?

Call it entitlement or whatever you want, but as I'm sitting here, I'm kinda bemused by the notion that I'm expected to just not have any access to cost-based media because I'm a Linux user. I know I have no "right" to it, but again, I'm sitting here saying I'm willing to pay, and the industry is ignoring me.

From a purely business perspective, that makes NO sense.

Re: Don't Make Me Steal

#122

Post by mattgreenrocks »

randallsquared wrote: post #57
mattgreenrocks wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find it amusing that second-rate grammar (loose/lose) and spelling is the norm for some communities, but the second this topic comes up, everyone turns into a armchair semantic guru.

There hasn't been a decades-long campaign to deliberately confuse the concepts of "lose" and "loose". It's just a mistake.

My meta-commentary was on the fact that the issue of semantics seems to serve as a all-too-convenient cognitive escape hatch in these discussions, diverting them from the harder topic at hand: that of intellectual property rights. I find it regrettable that it is employed, as it hinders being able to discuss the problem in a mature, logical fashion.

Re: Don't Make Me Steal

#124

Post by buffalo476 »

rubidium wrote: post #10

I really don't like the "don't make me steal" attitude. It undermines a good society. The creators of this campaign decided that "Purchase should not exceed the cinema price." Really? What if we did that for, say, organic bread. "I won't buy organic bread unless it's x3 or less than the cost of the generic white bread. If it is more expensive, I'm entitled to steal it." Sorry folks, you're entitled to not buy it, not…

I agree, most people feel entitled to pirate, whatever the reason. But many times I have bought media, and it has been significantly more restrictive than a pirated copy.

To illustrate, I bought a bluray movie a few years ago, and put the digital copy on my computer. And since I had just purchased a new video mp3 player, I thought it would be cool to play the movie on there. It even worked great, that is until I accidentally deleted the movie from that device. Too bad the DRM on the digital copy would not let me make another. This was a legally purchased copy that was more restrictive than any pirated version.

Content creators are treating their customers like criminals first, sources of money second, and customers third. So yes, "don't make me steal" does have some arbitrary demands, but a lot of what they say just makes good business sense.

Re: Don't Make Me Steal

#125

Post by Cadsby »

The music industry in particular is infamous for making it's fortunes via the deliberate exploitation of artist and musicians over the decades. So when those same industries turn around and try and take the moral high ground regarding piracy, for better or worse, consumers mostly laugh at the hypocrisy and continue pirating.

I agree pirating is morally indefensible. But the reality is consumers will never be swayed by those arguments. Give consumers the product they want, at the price point they would like to pay. That is the only practical solution to this issue, regardless of how loudly the content industries screams about "stealing."

Failure to accept this reality will only lead to piracy continuing if not increasing.

Re: Don't Make Me Steal

#126

Post by mattgreenrocks »

citricsquid wrote: post #69
kijinbear wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> People aren't judged for stealing because it costs the store owner money, they're judged because it's immoral! I'm not sure it's as simple as that. One could always ask: "Why is it immoral to steal?" and the answer usually revolves around how stealing deprives the owner of something he had a legitimate claim to, etc. etc. That's how our moral intuitions have evolved over thousands of years. The fact that this age-o…

I must be completely insane then, because I don't see stealing as wrong because it deprives the owner of their property, I see it as wrong because you're taking something you don't own on your own terms, not the terms of the person who owns it. If John the shop owner wants to sell bread for $10/loaf and you take it for free, that's immoral because it was his bread and he wanted $10 for it. If Tony the musician wants…

You're not insane. I think the near-victimless nature of this crime makes it easy to compartmentalize away. Arguments such as "zero distribution costs," "it's just numbers," and "don't call it stealing!" tend to oversimplify the discussion in the hopes of avoiding the vast moral chasm that exists between enjoying media, compensating creators, and being part of a sometimes exploitative system.

Contrast the easy-going attitudes exhibited towards major IP rights holders ("it doesn't matter if I copy this movie...") toward the furor incited when a company is found using modified GPL code, but they didn't release the source modifications. The exact same infraction is occurring in both directions. Yet, in the first scenario, the "companies had it coming" and the media is "too expensive." In the second scenario, "each offender must be punished severely in order to prevent widespread neglect of the GPL."

Sometimes, the tone of each post says more than the post itself.

Re: Don't Make Me Steal

#127

Post by Cadsby »

pmiller2 wrote: post #100
citricsquid wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Sorry folks, you're entitled to not buy it, not to steal it." EXACTLY. Yes, downloading a movie isn't exactly stealing, but it's still taking something without permission and it should be frowned upon just as much as stealing is. If a person pirates a movie they're taking something without reimbursing the rights owner with what they want. People aren't judged for stealing because it costs the store owner money, they…

Re: immorality of theft. I would counter that it isn't necessarily always morally wrong to steal. Suppose I need some medicine to survive and I have neither the money for it nor the ability to get the money legally. I would argue that since I will die if I don't get the medicine, it's then morally acceptable to either steal the money necessary to purchase it or to outright steal the medicine itself, provided doing so…

Your comparing a life and death scenario to one regarding obtaining an entertainment product. It's a silly comparison and not terribly relevant to the topic under discussion.

But even within the logic of your analogy, you're confusing a moral argument with an argument centered around practical necessity. You could argue that stealing a life saving medicine is necessary, as you would die without it. But that still doesn't make the act of stealing it a moral one, even considering most people would sympathize and likely agree with your actions.

Re: Don't Make Me Steal

#128

Post by yummyfajitas »

bena wrote: post #109
yummyfajitas wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

$10.00 or $2.70, it's a moot point to the issue at hand. The baker has lost something. If I have the same pattern of bits on my hard drive that a movie studio has on theirs, the movie studio has lost $0.00. That's the fundamental difference between piracy and theft. If you want to assert that we, as a society, have made an agreement to limit people's freedom to configure their bits as they see fit in order to encoura…

Bullshit. Movie studios are in the business of providing a service. The studios have given their time and money in order to produce a motion picture. They are entitled to recompense from people in exchange for performances. Think of a film as a performance caught in time. The actors, directors, grips, etc. were all fronted money by the studios for their performances. In doing so, the studio has assumed all of the ris…

In a traditional theft of services, the service is only performed because of the promise of a thief. I.e., a taxi will not drive across town unless I promise to pay them - thus, the driver is deprived of that time/effort. In contrast, both movie pirates and people who choose not to view the movie made no promise to a movie studio.

Sneaking into a concert without a ticket is trespassing.

Re: Don't Make Me Steal

#129

Post by gaius »

Silhouette wrote: post #118
yummyfajitas wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

$10.00 or $2.70, it's a moot point to the issue at hand. The baker has lost something. If I have the same pattern of bits on my hard drive that a movie studio has on theirs, the movie studio has lost $0.00. That's the fundamental difference between piracy and theft. If you want to assert that we, as a society, have made an agreement to limit people's freedom to configure their bits as they see fit in order to encoura…

> $10.00 or $2.70, it's a moot point to the issue at hand. The baker has lost something. He has lost something of value only if he was going to sell that loaf of bread to a paying customer. How can you be sure that anyone was going to buy it? If no-one bought it before the end of the day then it would just be waste anyway, right?

You'ce still robbed him of the right of disposing of it as he sees fit.

Here in the UK we have a chain of sandwich stores called Pret, at the end of the day they give their food away to the homeless - so by stealing something even if it was due to be given away, you're harming someone.

Re: Don't Make Me Steal

#130

Post by nooneelse »

bena wrote: post #109
yummyfajitas wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

$10.00 or $2.70, it's a moot point to the issue at hand. The baker has lost something. If I have the same pattern of bits on my hard drive that a movie studio has on theirs, the movie studio has lost $0.00. That's the fundamental difference between piracy and theft. If you want to assert that we, as a society, have made an agreement to limit people's freedom to configure their bits as they see fit in order to encoura…

Bullshit. Movie studios are in the business of providing a service. The studios have given their time and money in order to produce a motion picture. They are entitled to recompense from people in exchange for performances. Think of a film as a performance caught in time. The actors, directors, grips, etc. were all fronted money by the studios for their performances. In doing so, the studio has assumed all of the ris…

Movie studios are in the business of providing a service. The studios have given their time and money in order to produce a motion picture. They are entitled to recompense from people in exchange for performances.

Bob is in the business of making blickits. Bob has given his time and money in order to produce blickits in the street. Bob is entitled to recompense from people for them seeing his blickits.

Really? "Entitled"? You want to have that generalization around? Everything from blickit=crazy rant to blickit=fart? This seems like the opposite of a clear foundation for morality or legality with known and known good implications.

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