I just can't wrap my mind around any links you try to shove into this argumentative, b0rsuk.

Sure, there are some business alternatives.

Sure, Gates has enough bazillions to not worry about Piracy -- heck he even wouldn't bend down to pick a juicy $100 bill since by the time he walks back again, that 10 seconds worth of wasting time costed him 10+ times as much.

Want theory? I'll give you one.

Piracy would control 100% of anything distributed worldwide (software or not, btw). Who's getting paid for **manufacturing** products?

You're asking for global economic chaos and work oblivion. Don't come complaining here when you run out of cash & FOOD though.

You steal anything, you're a thief.

I'm... okay, not to defend piracy here, but I'm trying to understand the mindset as expressed by Zyx and others that poor people must somehow not need entertainment. Please enlighten me?

Well, Zyx in particular is just in conflict with his own philosophical leanings, but generally speaking you break life down into two parts.  What you need, and what you want.

What you need is the bare essentials for survival, food and shelter.  What you want is everything else, video games ain't food.  Those of us who aren't socialists don't give a flying rats ass whether you can afford your video games or not, the ones that are would rather no one can afford them than only some people.

How he's ended up against third world piracy is a mystery to me.  It's an illogical argument to begin with, but a hardcore socialist should be hating on the rich guy instead of calling out some poor putz making 12k a year in Romania.  I write it off as a market solution to a pricing problem at the global scale.  Western civlization has a pricing problem, the pirates provide the solution.  The intelligent businesses seem to agree with me, but our entertainment industry is run by creative idiots that can't think analytically, so I doubt they'll ever catch on.

Regardless, poor people do not need entertainment.  It's a want.

I think this is a false distinction. Or rather, that placing entertainment into that category falsely labels it as "optional." It's only optional in the sense that you're not restricted to doing one thing for entertainment. It's not necessary to keep you alive, but is this only about a strictly utilitarian principle and quality of life has no meaning?

Zyx, this is remarkably without any nuance. If the problem is (as in Russia) that people simply cannot afford access to products, the problem does not lie with pirates (and pirates aren't costing actual sales because the people pirating wouldn't by the product). The problem exists on a deeper, more fundamental level - economically speaking, people aren't making enough money and the economy itself is already a failure (except for those few who are affluent enough to be able to meet their needs and wants).

Locating the problem with people who can't afford movies and video games pirating them ignores much larger, more endemic problems that are only becoming worse. It can't be broken down into something so simple as "Right or wrong, black and white." There has to be a better way to deal with this stuff than by criminalizing people who already don't have much. The question shouldn't be "Are these people criminals?" but rather "Why is society in such a state that people cannot afford such items?"

And I don't really buy the idea that luxury items means that working class or unemployed people shouldn't have access to them. "Luxury" doesn't have to mean expensive, nor should it necessarily mean "unattainable." And I'm not saying that this means that piracy should be okay. Instead, I'm saying that the market itself is flawed, and creates the environment in which piracy becomes the appealing choice.

People were not miserable before the invention of the TV.  If you're unhappy because you lack one, you are unhappy because you envy others.  The aquisition of a TV wont change anything, there is always someone with more until you're the richest man in the world, at which point you'll run out of things to obtain and discover that you're still miserable.  That's not to say you can't enjoy watching TV, but it wont turn an unhappy person into a happy one.

Happiness is typically gained through friends and family, niether of which fall under copyright, at least for now.  For someone like me that means a cave with broadband internet in the middle of nowhere, and maybe a nuclear apocalypse.

Entertainment is just a distraction.

Entertainment is a reward when you pay for it. It also gives a sense of contribution to something greater than one personal egocentric self-sufficient arrogance against society in general.

I can't afford more than what i'm working for. Youth doesn't yet understand that much. Toddlers suck a bottle of milk. Adults *MUST* live.

It's not that having fun in life should be a privilege but that it has to be earned. Tough & rough as it is.

Everything i own, everything i achieved was a direct result of hard work... in schools, at multiple working places for someone else and myself. I gained success by seeking it for reasons; drove cars, put rings on wife fingers, better shoes and HDTeeVees, arcade & cinema visits, etc.

Do you have kids? If you do, you know exactly what it means to be responsible for their own future including your present - you provide for them; you even must STAY poor and forget entertainment altogether as parents when the going gets tougher.

That's the struggle, that's the nature of the beast.

Oh yeah - well, listen up.

You've got absolutely no right to claim knowing how i think or determine what "philosophic" terminology i use to express opinions. Call a fool's bluff once more and you'll have another conflict to solve.

1) Free-Market Capitalism.

2) See #1.

Zyx,

Well, if you're saying that free market capitalism is flawed and makes piracy appealing, I totally agree with you.

Incidentally, I'm not talking about largely privileged people who copy games, movies, and television shows and torrent them because they can - I'm talking about people who are literally unable to afford these things, and pirate them anyway. I think the demand is there, and I think that under a better system, they wouldn't be pirating it.

Psychoak,

You're oversimplifying. Of course people weren't miserable before television, but there was always a certain level of entertainment in cultural discourse - whether it's gossip, newspapers, books, magazines, television, movies, video games. By denying that some people should be able to access that discourse, you're denying them access to their own culture. By saying that poor people have less right to access their own culture, you're reinforcing the system that justifies maintaining their lower economic status. When you strictly define someone as a pariah, you're defining them as outside the culture, as not deserving access to that culture. I'm not saying you're defining working class / lower economic class people as being pariahs, but by instituting a value system in which more money = more deserving, you're definitely laying the groundwork.

You're also setting up a false dichotomy by saying that people get happiness from friends or family, and not entertainment - considering that people frequently experience entertainment along with their friends and family.

Do you remember your "Earth -- today" thread?  I don't have to claim anything, you wrote it.  Anyone that thinks the rest of the world is made poor by consumption in a particular country, if applying views logically, should be overjoyed that those poor people can get our products for free.  When I look at that last reply you made, a gold plated endorsement of hard work and self reliance, it's hilarious.  I'm sitting here grinning like an idiot just thinking about it.

Thanks though, I'd have been terribly sad if my smartass comment had gone unnoticed.  You shouldn't tempt someone who obviously likes to argue with promises of another conflict.

Edit:  There is no false dichotomy.  Having them in the first place is the whole equation, a distraction is just something to do.  You can prove this to yourself by spending a few hours sitting on your ass doing absolutely nothing with a friend, then compare it to how lousy life is when you're lonely no matter what you do with the time.

I also disagree that entertainment should be a reward. I think that again sets up the idea that simply having more money = having more merit, when that's simply not the case. People who have more money simply have more money. They might have it because they worked harder for it, they might have it because they inherited it. They might have it because they got lucky in some way, or their competition was wrongly considered less worthy of employment/promotion/etc. I'm not trying to devalue anyone's hard work, but I suggest that hard work does not consistently (or even frequently) pay off.

I agree - money is not merit, it is a rough approximation of merit. It has many flaws, but I can't think of a beter system, unfortunately.

--

There are two points that are rarely mentioned, but they're fundamental and worth mentioning.

- people like to share with each other. They are taught from childhood that you should help each other, even if it's minor thing. Everyone ends up better this way. People also like to share experiences (going to a party together, eating together...). They're especially likely to do so it it doesn't cost them a lot. Demonizing piracy aggravates pirates because it's telling them it's wrong to share, it's wrong to be altruistic, do each other favours etc.  If you've ever been to a forum where pirates share stuff, you could observe they do that for free, without any obvious reason other than to share with each other. They're doing each other favours. It's been a loong time (before the internet) since I've seen pirates who earn anything by pirating. Actually, i'ts not even sharing in the strict sense, because sharing implies finite resources. There's no finite resource in case in case of copying. It's almost as if - oh, I know that one ! - if copying was spreading information and not stealing.

"Then copyright infringement is spreading information that causes lost sales !". This road leads to madness. What should we do about movie critics ? Reviews ? If I tell my friend they can buy better and cheaper stuff in another shop, is that wrong ? If I tell someone there's a cheaper medicine with the same effect, is that wrong ?  If I tell someone how to do X instead of paying someone to do that...

- people like to learn do things themselves. I can pay for a complete PC, but I can also buy parts and assemble one myself (IT degree). I can pay for Windows, or I can install Linux, because I know the difference and are capable of doing this myself. I can paint walls in my flat or pay someone to do that. This one is not too hard. But when I want to have old windows replaced, I'd rather pay someone to do that instead of spending some time and effort learning what I think is boring stuff.  I'm also not too keen to learn cooking. I prefer to pay extra and save a lot of time each day, to eat regularly and have a broader choice. Think what would happen if room painters started to complain I owe them money because I painted rooms myself instead of hiring them. Bar owners revolt because people can cook food themselves ! Proffesional translators protest because people learn languages ! Software publishers protest because people can copy faster and cheaper ! Oh, wait.

Suddenly it becomes wrong to be able to do something yourself, and you don't take anything from anyone or hurt anyone. People can do their job faster and easier, provide too good service and that's bad for profits ! As a software publisher, I'm entitled to be the only one who can copy software. People should come to me and pay me, free market protects inefficiency. Or planned economy ? I'm so confused.

You can reach a startling conclusion. Giving copyright select few people smells a lot like planned economy.

------------------

I think focusing too much on whether Russians can pay for games is missing the point. The old system isn't working anymore, and it's in poorer countries that it becomes apparent faster. Poor countries are not the problem - they merely highlight the problem that is bad business model. Having less money just makes it easier to question the old system.

I'd also like to point out something interesting I've noticed. In my previous post, I quoted (WSJ) an attempt to create an essentially decentralized patronage system for game developers, with hardcore fans who buy anything instead of a single entity. This sounds a lot like Stardock's (or Brad Wardell's ) idea of "focus on customers, don't worry about piracy". Although both Blurst and Brad Wardell/Stardock may not realize that, they're aiming for the same goal, but they approach it from opposite sides. Stardock from fully proprietary, Blurst from fully free. If this approach works, they're likely to meet somewhere in the middle and will end up with the same busines model. Interesting.

The patronage model is the old system, copyright exists because it fucking sucks.

You're a bit of a propagandist, the pirates sound like carebears.

Gotcha, but the process is public. We both are solidly "attached" to our personal opinions and_or prides.

I prefer meeting a person eye to eye when discussing serious subjects. I respect intelligence but not insults. Anyone has a right to "judge" other people... but within a valid perspective. Forums limit us, you, me.

I have enough guts to admit when being wrong or flawed in my reasonings...  i have yet to witness such fairplay behavior from you, psychoak.

Besides, i hate speaking with 2009 years old "virtual" geeks or nut cases who aren't at least considered close friends (by proof) or family (by life).

There's MUCH more to GC2 members than what they type online. That tricky comment may even include you as a real "Pirate" to spin this messy argument back to topic, right... IIRC?