It’s a fair point that copyright infringement might be a better term, except I’m not certain it applies here which is why I didn’t use that term. I think I’ve even used the same argument myself in the past that we shouldn’t call torrenting theft because the owner doesn’t lose it. I’m all for clarity. However, your definition of stealing is incorrect, the word is not limited to physical goods that cannot be replaced. Stealing is simply taking something you don’t have the right to take. (Look it up, I googled dozens of definitions.) Yes I might be using it as a shorthand for breaking copyright law or something else more specific. Breaking copyright law is a subset of stealing.
> Netflix is still getting paid.
Torrents are also commonly paid for by the first viewer, the person who ripped the DVD, so borrowing someone’s account is no different in that respect. Netflix is subtly different in that you still need an account, and because of that, a single account might not be shared as widely as a single torrent. The monetary discrepancy between a single torrent and a million shared accounts might be equal or even larger for Netflix, who knows. I wouldn’t be very surprised if Netflix believes they’re seeing larger losses than pirated movies, precisely because borrowing accounts is so widely believed to not be illegal, and because people feel like it’s no different from using profiles, so cross-household account sharing occurs more often.
> they don’t implicitly ban it
They don’t have to if it’s against the law already.