Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Why I get my entertainment via BitTorrent

luminarious.tumblr.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

131–140 of 191 posts

Re: Why I get my entertainment via BitTorrent

#131

Post by thirdsun »

microtonal wrote: post #34
Nate75Sanders wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, didn't realize that. Maybe gifting or something would work.

The better alternative is iTunes. You don't need a VPN, since Apple is not blocking based on IP address. You'll only need a US address (I am at Starbucks pretty much all day) and a US iTunes gift card (easy to get by), and you are settled. It's a grey area, but MAFIAA should prefer it over piracy ;).

It certainly isn't complicated but compared to starting a bittorrent client it seems like a lot of hassle.

Re: Why I get my entertainment via BitTorrent

#132

Post by xutopia »

rb2k_ wrote: post #107

I recently found an interesting DNS based service that will allow you to access some of them: http://blog.marc-seeger.de/2011/04/07/hulu-and-iplayer-outsi... The advantage over a VPN-based solution is that there is no need to route all of your traffic over the VPN. Most of the time they only redirect the geo-location stuff and once you receive the videostream URL, that transfer will go over your 'regular' connection.…

For many of the services listed you need a credit card with an American address.

Re: Why I get my entertainment via BitTorrent

#133

Post by jerf »

tomjen3 wrote: post #90
Tyrannosaurs wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is true - it doesn't make it right (necessarily) but it is true. The other thing I'd say though is that most people will still operate within their own moral code. In the UK technically platform shifting (transferring music from CD to MP3 for instance) is illegal but that doesn't stop anyone as people see it as a historic oddity and not something which is even remotely morally wrong. It's not uncommon that the s…

Honestly if there is no chance that I ever buy something (say because it is not available for sale) what does it matter if I download it? I can see the argument for torrent over buy, but not really torrent over nothing.

"Honestly if there is no chance that I ever buy something (say because it is not available for sale) what does it matter if I download it?"

Devil's advocate: You spend time consuming the thing you torrented instead of buying something that was legally available to you and consuming that instead. But yes, this is getting to "penumbric emanation"-level of arguing, though I think that the limited nature of your time is something that should be pointed out.

Re: Why I get my entertainment via BitTorrent

#134

Post by mauriciob »

warseph wrote: post #121

Same thing happens in Argentina, I tried some times to buy certain games online, but for some weird reason for digital content, the purchased is limited to the US and Mexico. Why does this limitation even exist for digital content?

I've only seen one Steam game that couldn't be bought in Brazil (I still don't know why).

I'm guessing it depends at which store you are buying it. Many of the US stores don't sell to foreigners, though. Could they be afraid of fraud?

Re: Why I get my entertainment via BitTorrent

#135

Post by imgabe »

DarkShikari wrote: post #63
rrrazdan wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The whole system makes eminent sense. Content that has been permitted by the owner is released in your country, when the owner permits. If you are resort to piracy because of this, you are still stealing.

Content that has been permitted by the owner is released in your country, when the owner permits. There is no legal means for someone to restrict where and when I can and cannot choose to view or use content I own, as much as they would love to think so. And they indeed love to think so: I've actually seen companies claim that it is illegal to use the software they sell outside of the country they sell it in . If a m…

> I've actually seen companies claim that it is illegal to use the software they sell outside of the country they sell it in.

This isn't directly relevant to copyright, but there are indeed export controls on some technologies to prevent them from leaving the country and it is illegal to export them.

Re: Why I get my entertainment via BitTorrent

#136

Post by ramdac »

StudyAnimal wrote: post #9

As an English speaker in Germany I was particularly interested in using things like iTunes (which is available here) to access TV. What do you know, it is exclusively German language content. And it is also only released when it airs in Germany rather than when it first airs in the US or the UK. Where is the logic there? If I wanted to get German language TV when it airs on TV, I would just watch TV. The whole system…

is an US-based proxy server an option?

edit: I see that option has been discussed elsewhere in this thread. Sorry for the repeat.

Re: Why I get my entertainment via BitTorrent

#138

Post by roel_v »

steve19 wrote: post #49
roel_v wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, and a 250k Lamborghini is also a huge budget hit for me in the West. Which is why I drive a shitty Citroen. I'm sick and tired of the entitled whining. Nobody owes you the right to listen to the latest album of whoever is at the top of the charts; in fact, nobody owes you anything but what they agreed on. The proposition is very clear: there are people who create something. They give it to you, on the conditio…

Don't confuse copyright infringement, aka. pirating, to stealing. You may well believe that they are morally the same thing, but they are not legally the same thing. Theft has existed as long as man, copyright infringement was invented about 100 years ago. copyright infringement varies wildly in penalties. In some countries it is a serious offense, in others it is legal.

I'm a lawyer, thank you very much, I know perfectly well about the difference, and this is another thing I'm sick and tired of - people making minute semantic arguments that have nothing to do with the substance of the matter. Note that nowhere I equated piracy with stealing, exactly because I know that when I do somebody will come with this remark.

While we're nitpicking, your second sentence contradicts itself - if copyright infringement is legal, it's not infringement any more.

Also you're wrong about the history of copyright and intellectual property. Although not named as such and part of a broader concept of exclusive rights on information, guilds in Medieval times had privileges granted to them that would nowadays be called, amongst others, copyright. You're trying to make it sound as if copyright is something that was just made up out of thin air 100 years ago and that it has no relationship to physical property law at all; that argument is misleading as the actual history and relationship is much more nuanced.

Re: Why I get my entertainment via BitTorrent

#139

Post by jamaicahest »

DarkShikari wrote: post #63
rrrazdan wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The whole system makes eminent sense. Content that has been permitted by the owner is released in your country, when the owner permits. If you are resort to piracy because of this, you are still stealing.

Content that has been permitted by the owner is released in your country, when the owner permits. There is no legal means for someone to restrict where and when I can and cannot choose to view or use content I own, as much as they would love to think so. And they indeed love to think so: I've actually seen companies claim that it is illegal to use the software they sell outside of the country they sell it in . If a m…

In Denmark they passed a law some years ago making it illegal for shops to import region 1 DVDs to resell. And I doubt we're the only country with laws like that.

Re: Why I get my entertainment via BitTorrent

#140

Post by hxa7241 »

roel_v wrote: post #36
microtonal wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed. I'd add to that that paying 15 Euro for a BluRay may be perfectly acceptable in the Western world, but a huge budget hit in the rest of the world. The buy 'physical media via the Internet' argument doesn't fly there either.

Right, and a 250k Lamborghini is also a huge budget hit for me in the West. Which is why I drive a shitty Citroen. I'm sick and tired of the entitled whining. Nobody owes you the right to listen to the latest album of whoever is at the top of the charts; in fact, nobody owes you anything but what they agreed on. The proposition is very clear: there are people who create something. They give it to you, on the conditio…

The morality is quite different to physical goods. Infringement is a malum prohibitum not a malum in se.

Copying is not immoral in itself. Quite the opposite: it is something we would want to encourage.

It can only really be immoral in so far as the law is moral. And the law is only moral in that it serves an economic purpose -- that is, to be clear, it serves us overall. The law is not there to 'protect' or benefit copyright 'owners', they are the means not the end.

So is it serving us overall to restrict access to goods where there is no need to? to charge more than can be afforded, yet the cost of supply is negligible?

If the intrinsic act is moral, and the law obstructing it is in some case seemingly immoral, it is easy to support doing the act anyway.

Post reply on HN