US commissions Swedish IP law (WikiLeaks/Pirate Party)

[TheHammer]

Awesome, only 2 replies before hitting a utterly wrong "copyright violation is stealing" bullshit.

And how, exactly, is it bullshit?

Becaue if I stole someone's copyright they would physically be unable to use it. That's the dictionary and legal definition of stealing; depriving the owner of thier property by taking it without payment or authorization. Copyright violation is an unauthorized copying, the original IP holder still has thier IP but now I have a copy.

It's also a lie and utterly inaccurate to claim that all copyright violations are actually a lost sale.

It is a theft of a service, same as if you snuck into a movie theatre without paying, or stayed at a hotel without paying. Sure they get to keep the "property" but you've still stolen something. Obviously, no sane person is claiming that every copyright violation is a lost sale, however a good chunk of them are.

While I feel that some of the fines and penalties levied against "copyright infringement" are insane, I do think that there should be some form of punishment and enforcement of copyright protection.

[darthdavid]

If you were given a choice to buy an item or receive it for free, what would you do?

Assuming that there are no such people who would pay for the item but now just rather get it for free is the crux of what seems to be those who want file sharing. So please, stop giving us headaches all around and stop thinking there is no harm done.

Except time and time again studies have shown that pirates spend more than the average amount on music and such. It serves the same purpose that getting radio play used to (and to a certain extent still does) serve. You hear something for free. If you like it you buy a copy or go to a concert or whatever.

[TheHammer]

If you were given a choice to buy an item or receive it for free, what would you do?

Assuming that there are no such people who would pay for the item but now just rather get it for free is the crux of what seems to be those who want file sharing. So please, stop giving us headaches all around and stop thinking there is no harm done.

Except time and time again studies have shown that pirates spend more than the average amount on music and such. It serves the same purpose that getting radio play used to (and to a certain extent still does) serve. You hear something for free. If you like it you buy a copy or go to a concert or whatever.

*coughbullshitcough*

IF you have a free copy, you keep using the free copy. You may go to a concert, if a concert for that particular band happens to be playing in a geographically convenient location. If its free software in your possession, then you're going to keep using the free copy. Don't honestly expect me to believe in this concept of the "honorable pirate" who will, at his leisure, decide to go make a rightful purchase of IP that he has already downloaded illegally.

[Oni Koneko Damien]

Counterpoint to the "No one who gets something for free will ever choose to go out and buy a copy" crowd:

If you didn't have the ability to get entertainment item A that you kinda-sorta like for free, can you predict exactly how likely you are to take the risk and go pay money for it anyways? No? Weird, looks like we don't have psychic powers that can flawlessly predict exactly what the availability of free copies does to one's purchasing decisions! In that case I guess we'll just have to go with the evidence and studies available, which indicates... oh hey! It indicates that individual file-sharing has either completely negligible impact on sales, or actually helps sales through free advertising!

Seriously, this bullshit cycle gets repeated in every thread about file-sharing: People claim file-sharing is stealing, they get shot down. People then try to equivocate file-sharing with mass-piracy, they get shot down. People then make vacuous claims that file-sharing impacts sales, and they get shot down with the multiple, readily available studies on the subject, thread after thread after thread. Do you people just have a fetish for getting shot? Do you have the collective memory capacity of a goldfish? What the hell is your defect that you adhere so fanatically to a viewpoint that's been repeatedly shown to be false? This isn't even a religion.

Now, either refute the rather large number of studies done on this subject, or retract the claim that file-sharing stops people from paying money for something they may or may not have wanted to buy at some undefined point in their lives.

[Purple]

Ok than. Allow me to present something completely different and probably newer before seen.
To start.

There is a really interesting part to this that is rarely if ever properly explored. And I believe that it is the one true reason for all the hatred toward any sort of file sharing by big companies. You see, there is something much more important and dangerous for them than the fact that people are getting something nominally theirs for free. And it is unlike the formerly mentioned VHS copy incidents and other similar cases a relatively new development. I am talking of course about the way the ability to acquire goods previously only available for money for free changes the established paradigms upon which the intangible goods market is based. With the availability of fast internet and easy file sharing any person can acquire any software, music video or other similar intangible 'product' for free and with a speed and ease newer seen before in human history. Therefore, the act of purchasing a product and paying money for it to the legitimate creator has changed meaning. Instead of the established and traditional trading of money for the acquisition of a product it has become the choice to give money for something even thou you don't have to as a gesture of support for the creator in question. In other words it is no longer enough for a company to produce a good product. In order to earn money from said product they have to prove them self worth supporting to the user base and provide them with good reasons why they should pay more than they have to for something they can get for free. Now, there are many ways to do this. Some include beneficial stimulus like being an environmentally and socially active company with a good image, free patches and updates, high quality customer support, special actions etc. Others rely on draconian violent DLC measures meant to convince the potential customer that pirating the product is more trouble than its worth. Both sides however share one thing. They cost money, and lots of it.

I think at this point you can see where this is going. What it basically means is that a modern software or music developer has to invest much more money into the same thing to achieve the same level of profitability than they had to several years ago. And as more and more companies jump on the train it will only get worse for the profit margins. As such you can't blame the companies for using all their power to try and fight that. The problem is that I don't believe it can be fought or at least not effectively. They can't plug up the internet and sooner or later they will have to go the way of the indie designers and start changing or be overrun by the times.

It's all quite fascinating when you think about it.

[Oni Koneko Damien]

Eh, I've seen that point before, mulled it over myself. I still fully support file-sharing. Of course file-sharing means that producers will have to put out a higher-quality product if they expect to remain competitive, and that's good. Even so, with the ease of digital reproduction, it also means that the total overhead costs for reproduction of a product are far less (by far less, I mean effectively nil), which is a big help in compensating for the now higher standards entertainment producers are held to by the paying consumer. So really there's not a whole lot of excuse left to try and cling to the old standard of "You'll pay for the shit we produce and we'll do everything in our power to keep things that way".

It's been this way throughout history: Butter manufacturers fought tooth and nail to prevent cheaper, arguably healthier margarine from cutting into their profit margins. Linen, clothing and rope manufacturers did their level best to remove the competition that hemp provided, and is still somewhat succeeding by the fact that marijuana is still illegal in many places to this day (it's been somewhat persuasively argued that this is the base reason why weed is illegal in the first place, at least in the US), though this looks like it's going to change in the near future. Hard-copy books are currently in the process of being displaced by digital versions, though in this case the transition seems to be going a lot more peacefully than most.

As far as "You can't blame the companies for using all their power to try and fight that", that statement only holds true if you believe that companies being immoral, unethical, wholly profit-driven entities that don't give a shit about the betterment of society or the human condition is an acceptable state. I don't, so I damn will blame the companies for engaging in beliefs and practices that are detrimental to the advancement/proliferation of technology and to peoples' enjoyment and comfort in life with no tangible benefits other than a theoretical slight expansion to their bank accounts.

Personal anecdote time: Over the past half decade or so, music-wise, I've only ever purchased albums from a select few artists and labels. These aren't exactly hugely popular names, things like VNV Nation, Rasputina, Tartanic, The Venetian Snares, VAST, The Genitorturers, Freezepop, etc. I *only* became aware of these bands through file-sharing, in each and every case, after receiving some of their material for free, I subsequently went out and purchased more of their stuff, kept an eye out for concerts I could attend. I would not have done this if file-sharing had not made me aware of their existence and given me a good taste of what they put out. File-sharing has gotten more purchases from me than nearly anything else as far as music is concerned. With the state of the internet, file-sharing and word-of-mouth is slowly rendering the massive costs of promotion that were once covered by huge labels obsolete, and in my opinion that's a very good thing.

[Purple]

As far as "You can't blame the companies for using all their power to try and fight that", that statement only holds true if you believe that companies being immoral, unethical, wholly profit-driven entities that don't give a shit about the betterment of society or the human condition is an acceptable state. I don't, so I damn will blame the companies for engaging in beliefs and practices that are detrimental to the advancement/proliferation of technology and to peoples' enjoyment and comfort in life with no tangible benefits other than a theoretical slight expansion to their bank accounts.

But they are immoral, unethical, wholly profit-driven entities. Or at least most of them are. I am yet to find a company (A modern one) that did not act just the way you described except for the purposes of gaining a reputation in the public eye in order to better advance their profit. But that is another story altogether.

[Oni Koneko Damien]

But they are immoral, unethical, wholly profit-driven entities. Or at least most of them are. I am yet to find a company (A modern one) that did not act just the way you described except for the purposes of gaining a reputation in the public eye in order to better advance their profit. But that is another story altogether.

I never said they weren't, I only said that this isn't an acceptable state, especially when they have the sort of legal and financial power they do today, as evidenced by the article in the OP. I can blame them for being immoral and harmful because in the end, they are run by people who make decisions to continue this practice. Of course they aren't the only ones to blame, as they only got to this level of power and influence through lack of government oversight and regulation, but that doesn't change the fact that this sort of thing is a definite net loss for society and needs to change. The reality of the difficulties for such a massive social upheaval is not relevant to my idealism, it will only impact how I apply that idealism to the world around me.

[Purple]

I never said they weren't, I only said that this isn't an acceptable state, especially when they have the sort of legal and financial power they do today, as evidenced by the article in the OP. I can blame them for being immoral and harmful because in the end, they are run by people who make decisions to continue this practice. Of course they aren't the only ones to blame, as they only got to this level of power and influence through lack of government oversight and regulation, but that doesn't change the fact that this sort of thing is a definite net loss for society and needs to change. The reality of the difficulties for such a massive social upheaval is not relevant to my idealism, it will only impact how I apply that idealism to the world around me.

Oh, than I misunderstood you.
This said, I don't think you can avoid corporations based on the limited liability shareholder principal from being evil sociopathic entities. You see, corporations are by their very design incapable of being anything but immoral and evil. That is becouse the people who make decisions are not the owners of the cash behind them but rather employees of said cash owners. What this means is that the responsibility for decisions and their source are not one and the same. The people with the power to make decisions are obliged to make the sort of decisions that benefit the cash flow of the owners (big stock holders) or else be replaced by someone who will. Meanwhile the cash holders are free from any responsibility for the actions of the corporate entity and can therefore demand amoral and evil things be done without risk to them self. The chairman of a corporate entity is literally little more than a scape goat designed to take the blame for the evil a corporation does and in case of a scandal be replaced whilst the corporate entity and its cash holders continue business as usual. This can clearly be seen in the many, many examples where a corporation has crossed the line to the point where a scandal occurs. Everyone blames the chairman, the board and the corporation. No one blames the more or less anonymous millionaires actually making the decisions for them. And as long as this sort of thing is allowed to exist, there can be no avoiding it. It would take a radical redesign of many American and international laws to get rid of it.

[MarshalPurnell]

So corporations are evil, therefore Internet piracy is alright?

Okay, yeah, copyright law can be ridiculously restrictive. Media companies exist to make profit and are in a tug-of-war over money with artists. Many of the people who download something would never have bought it at all. Sometimes widespread file-share distribution gives a product free publicity that boosts its overall profitability. DRM software is terrible and EULAs would have you sign over your immortal soul if such a thing had any tangible value. We need some serious reform to how copyrights work and how the entertainment industry functions.

Notwithstanding all that, downloading copyrighted stuff online is illegal. And it should be illegal without the consent of the copyright holder. Fundamentally, if you create an item of software or a novel or a film, it is work. Some people do vanity publishing but I hardly think it desirable to encourage that. Some people have embraced "digital distribution" and come up with ways to make money despite having their content freely available, and good for them. But controlling how content is distributed is a matter that is fundamental to making investment in these kinds of intangible works pay off. If you abrogate the right of copyright holders to control distribution you will wind up discouraging investment in the field, which means overall fewer works will be produced. More of those works will be of limited resources, with lesser scope, and with less professional content. The entertainment industry will no doubt survive in some form, but the Internet already shows the possibilities and limits of allowing anyone to produce and post content.

What does society gain by divorcing distribution rights from copyright holders? Well, lots of people can watch stuff for free they would not otherwise purchase or would have had to pay money to see. Is that a gain that is balanced against the (real or perceived, in so far as perception will drive investment decisions) damage to the viability of the entertainment industry? The wild frontier of digital distribution and amateur content production will not be held back by existing copyright law, since the people temperamentally suited to pioneering such methods already are. The traditional methods of content distribution can co-exist alongside the old and would probably lead to a richer entertainment industry and more works than would allowing the old model to be uprooted by pervasive copyright violation.

As far as "nations lobby others according to their interests" this is not news. It may be news that the Swedish government lied about the sources of data that it used for its case. Of course that doesn't mean the data is, ipso facto, to be discounted out of hand. That the United States would seriously like to control piracy is a given because the US has the most lucrative and important entertainment industry in the world, which is a fairly important part of the overall economy and a major export center. If it is being undermined by people in other parts of the world disrespecting IP law then of course the US will try to get other countries to tighten up. And as broomstick pointed out there are clearer still cases where this is an obvious problem, such as with the pervasive sales of illegal bootleg copies of new movies in Asia. Those do eat into the profits of those works because they glut the market before the rights-holders can get their own product out, and the entire situation is ignored or even tacitly encouraged by governments in the region.

[Magis]

I'm going to propose an analogy that I think is better than the one involving underpants.

Let's say I do consulting work (which I do). And let's say that someone hires me to do some consulting. I accept their offer, and then spend my time to produce some analysis that the client requested. I have to use hardware that I had purchased, and knowledge/training that came from an expensive education. Upon completion of my analysis, the client takes it and doesn't pay me. Is that stealing? Heck, I haven't lost anything if I still have hard copies of the work product in my office. What's the harm? You may even argue that because I charge such a high fee that the client wouldn't have ever paid for it anyway, so I'm not really missing out on any revenue. Or maybe I'm already rich so it's okay to take the work from me without compensation. It's up to the client to decide how much money I'm entitled to, right?

Wrong.

Artists and production companies have to spend time creating entertainment. They have to buy hardware to facilitate their production. They have to pay for marketing and manufacturing and take loans, and pay interest, and ship items to distributors. They spend that time and money because their works can be sold, not so that they can be taken for free buy someone who isn't even willing to contribute enough to cover their related expenses.

If a customer thinks something is too expensive, they have every right to not buy it. They don't have the right to enjoy something that has some nominal market value by making an impromptu judgement that since they maybe wouldn't have bought it anyway, nobody is harmed. And it's clearly not the case that nobody is financially harmed. File sharing has caused a noticeable and measurable decline in the sales of physical media. Is anyone denying that? If not, how can the argument be made that there is no harm?

[TheHammer]

Eh, I've seen that point before, mulled it over myself. I still fully support file-sharing. Of course file-sharing means that producers will have to put out a higher-quality product if they expect to remain competitive, and that's good. Even so, with the ease of digital reproduction, it also means that the total overhead costs for reproduction of a product are far less (by far less, I mean effectively nil), which is a big help in compensating for the now higher standards entertainment producers are held to by the paying consumer. So really there's not a whole lot of excuse left to try and cling to the old standard of "You'll pay for the shit we produce and we'll do everything in our power to keep things that way".

No one forces a consumer to "pay for the shit" they produce. For any major media release, there are tons of information in the way of excerpts, reviews, etc that should give you adequate information as to whether or not you wish to pay for that particular "shit".

It's been this way throughout history: Butter manufacturers fought tooth and nail to prevent cheaper, arguably healthier margarine from cutting into their profit margins. Linen, clothing and rope manufacturers did their level best to remove the competition that hemp provided, and is still somewhat succeeding by the fact that marijuana is still illegal in many places to this day (it's been somewhat persuasively argued that this is the base reason why weed is illegal in the first place, at least in the US), though this looks like it's going to change in the near future. Hard-copy books are currently in the process of being displaced by digital versions, though in this case the transition seems to be going a lot more peacefully than most.

As far as "You can't blame the companies for using all their power to try and fight that", that statement only holds true if you believe that companies being immoral, unethical, wholly profit-driven entities that don't give a shit about the betterment of society or the human condition is an acceptable state. I don't, so I damn will blame the companies for engaging in beliefs and practices that are detrimental to the advancement/proliferation of technology and to peoples' enjoyment and comfort in life with no tangible benefits other than a theoretical slight expansion to their bank accounts.

I don't think the move is to "kill digital copies". Its to kill the ability to get protected digital content for free. You get into business to make money. That's a simple fact. You spout about all these studies that you proclaim are "proof" that file sharing is good for business. Why don't these business agree with you? It may well be that keeping limited piracy might help certain lesser known artists or genres get more exposure, but for better known artists who already spend big money on advertising, it is strictly a drain. Further, if they chose not to fight piracy at all, then you would see a serious negative impact to sales.

Personal anecdote time: Over the past half decade or so, music-wise, I've only ever purchased albums from a select few artists and labels. These aren't exactly hugely popular names, things like VNV Nation, Rasputina, Tartanic, The Venetian Snares, VAST, The Genitorturers, Freezepop, etc. I *only* became aware of these bands through file-sharing, in each and every case, after receiving some of their material for free, I subsequently went out and purchased more of their stuff, kept an eye out for concerts I could attend. I would not have done this if file-sharing had not made me aware of their existence and given me a good taste of what they put out. File-sharing has gotten more purchases from me than nearly anything else as far as music is concerned. With the state of the internet, file-sharing and word-of-mouth is slowly rendering the massive costs of promotion that were once covered by huge labels obsolete, and in my opinion that's a very good thing.

That's great. Looks like it worked out well for them. However, shouldn't it be there right to decide whether or not their content gets shared?

You can argue all day about whether or not you feel these IP owners are making a bad business decision. But that doesn't change their moral or legal right to protect that IP.

[Mr Bean]

Magis is also an idiot because there has been something stolen from him
Time
Time is also a resource, your example sucks.

[Oni Koneko Damien]

So... it's more of the "Stop stealing their work, even though it isn't 'stealing' in any sense of the word!" and, "File-sharing hurts creativity and producers despite multiple studies proving the opposite!"

Oh, and another bad analogy thrown in for good measure.

Goldfish-memory it is, then.

[TheHammer]

Magis is also an idiot because there has been something stolen from him
Time
Time is also a resource, your example sucks.

I believe the point he was trying to make is that theft of services is theft none the less.

[Mr Bean]

Magis is also an idiot because there has been something stolen from him
Time
Time is also a resource, your example sucks.

I believe the point he was trying to make is that theft of services is theft none the less.

Which IS true.
But has no bearing on a discussion involving copyright infringement.

Which is why Magis is an idiot because that's not the discussion going on now. It's the same discussion we have every few months and idiotic examples are commonplace as well as missing the point.

[Broomstick]

Both mass-piracy and 'file-sharing' have existed long before things started moving over to an almost wholly digital medium. The former showed up in things like mass-production of bootleg VHS tapes from third-world countries, the latter in the form of someone recording a cassette tape and giving it to his friend. The former does hurt sales, the latter has been proven time and again to either have either completely negligible impact, or actually help sales in the form of free advertisement. They were completely different activities, with completely different motives, scale, and effects on sales then, they are still completely different activities now.

The line between them isn't as sharp as you imply.

Sure, make one copy and give it to one friend... almost no one is going to bitch about that. But if you make TEN copies and start passing them out the line is getting fuzzier. What if you offer to make a free copy if your buddies give you a tape to use? What if 25 friends take you up on that offer?

In the bad old analog days copying was limited because each successive copier became shittier. After a certain point you'd say "fuck it" and buy a legit copy just so you'd get something decent. Digital copies, though, copy perfectly every time. There's no copy decay to help limit it.

Even supposedly "free" copies were never free - YOU aren't charged for listening to broadcast radio, but the radio station most certainly does have to pay royalties for every song played. I borrow books from the library for "free" but the library paid for those copies. For that matter, my local library now provides e-books and music downloads for "free" but in reality the library paid for those, too. The creator/copyright owner gets a slice of the pie for those as well at the over-the-counter items sold.

[Aniron]

*coughbullshitcough*

IF you have a free copy, you keep using the free copy. You may go to a concert, if a concert for that particular band happens to be playing in a geographically convenient location. If its free software in your possession, then you're going to keep using the free copy. Don't honestly expect me to believe in this concept of the "honorable pirate" who will, at his leisure, decide to go make a rightful purchase of IP that he has already downloaded illegally.

I did this in the past every time I downloaded something illegally (I no longer do it). I would download a copy of a music album or a film, in terrible quality, and then go buy the $30 Blu-ray, the $15 album, the $15 DVD, etc. People do it.

[Broomstick]

I think one possible solution to some of this is to have a two-tier system of quality - readily available for free or nominal cost is one so-so copy, but for a higher price you can get a really clean, fantastic copy. That way you could try it out for free, and people who wouldn't have otherwise bought it could still see it (and maybe give you some word of mouth advertising, hopefully positive) but your big fans could say "thank you, and here's some support" in a monetary fashion and get a little extra in return.

For example - many BBC offerings are currently pirated because 1) people want to see them and 2) the official copies are either considered expensive or 3) are hard or impossible to obtain. If the BBC made low-rez viewing of these possible it would make the fan-base happier, but they'd probably still capture quite a few sales from people who like the offering but want a better copy. Or people like me, who can't afford to shell out for every BBC production I'd like, might ask our library to buy a copy (because, remember, library copies are still paid for). And having it all above-board is probably a positive all around - if the low-rez version was available directly from the BBC they could get a better grasp on just how popular world-wide certain creations are, and maybe even front the download with an ad or two (cause, let's face it, most of us will sit through a 30 second ad to get 45 or 90 minutes of programming we'd like to see for little or no cost). This might also lead them to offer the premium version in more areas than previously, knowing there's a significant interest they might not otherwise be aware of.

Their current tactic of making trailers and excerpts available, but locking out foreign viewers, is probably encouraging MORE piracy, not less.

But I'm not letting pirates off the hook. At the end of the day, the creative types have to make enough money to live on. If you really do like their stuff you need to show some financial support. And if you do - if you really do buy the albums, the videos, the books, whatever because you got them free and liked them - good for you. However, there are far too many dickheads in the world who will cheerfully take something for nothing, say "fuck that shit" when someone mentions paying something, and will eventually wonder why artist X or group Z is no longer putting stuff out. It's because they had to go out and get "real jobs" because their landlord doesn't give a rat's ass if bit-torrent babies are thrilled with them, the landlord wants the rent money.

[ThomasP]

*coughbullshitcough*

IF you have a free copy, you keep using the free copy. You may go to a concert, if a concert for that particular band happens to be playing in a geographically convenient location. If its free software in your possession, then you're going to keep using the free copy. Don't honestly expect me to believe in this concept of the "honorable pirate" who will, at his leisure, decide to go make a rightful purchase of IP that he has already downloaded illegally.

It would be better to look at "pirates" as being heavy consumers of media, regardless of source. Pirates may well download things, but there are more than a few studies that show this as a trend towards overall consumption -- that is, they purchase more than the average non-downloading individual as well.

This make sense if you think about it; any given person will only have so much disposable income to spend on entertainment. A heavy consumer who can't afford to purchase more may well download as part of that consumption.

Of course, the "purchasing pirate" is only one possibility. There will be free riders, of course, but these are the "lazy welfare mothers" of the file-sharing debate: worst-case scenarios thrown out to create an emotional reaction, when in reality these are a minority of offenders. Free riders undoubtedly exist, but consider the data.

Both music and movie income has not only grown, but reached all-time highs in a trend that stretches back to at least 2005. CD sales are down, yes, but iTunes, Netflix, Amazon, and a whole range of cheap, easily-accessed services have shown that, firstly, you can compete with free (people are willing to pay for value, if not product), and secondly, piracy is not having the impact so often claimed.

With this debate, the issue is not so much the copyright infringement or the "well they're breaking the law" argument, but why media companies are so resistant to offering products that the consumers are demanding -- up to and including their heavy lobbying for ridiculous copyright extensions and enforcement penalties. It's easy to frame the debate as simple moralism or legalism when you're purchasing the laws that define the norms in the first place...

[Thanas]

The rise of instruments like Spotify, grooveshark and youtube kinda suggests that the companies have realized that free distribution of their works to stimulate people into buying stuff is the way to go. Heck, just a few months ago, the recording industry lambasted the German IP agency because they blocked hundreds of legal and illegal uploads of their songs on youtube. Why? Because they lost out of ad money and free advertisement.

So the argument that artists and copyright holders are unilaterally against filesharing and that filesharing disturbs them greatly holds no water.

[Alyeska]

*coughbullshitcough*

IF you have a free copy, you keep using the free copy. You may go to a concert, if a concert for that particular band happens to be playing in a geographically convenient location. If its free software in your possession, then you're going to keep using the free copy. Don't honestly expect me to believe in this concept of the "honorable pirate" who will, at his leisure, decide to go make a rightful purchase of IP that he has already downloaded illegally.

I was given a copy of Oblivion on the PC. Downloaded copy on a DVD-R. Loved it so much I ended up purchasing the game and all of its content three times over. I downloaded GTA3 for the PC. Loved it so much I bought the game twice.

[Xon]

It is a theft of a service, same as if you snuck into a movie theatre without paying, or stayed at a hotel without paying. Sure they get to keep the "property" but you've still stolen something. Obviously, no sane person is claiming that every copyright violation is a lost sale, however a good chunk of them are.

You have simply no understanding of how digital copies work do you?

Hint; your examples entail consuming limited physical resources owned by someone else. Downloading a torrent hosted by a 3rd party does not consume any physical resources of the original IP holder.

[Stark]

Moving to 'pay for benefit' models means that people who 'steal' something can become paying customers anyway, whether through subscriptions, microtransactions, marketing revenue, or whatever. Attempts to measure the pirate:lost sale ratio have either failed or produced extremely low results.

Frankly music is probably the worst thing for 'anti piracy' people to harp on, because it's so cheap it's almost not worth torrenting compared to the convenience of online stores and the sad facts that most of that money doesn't go to artists anyway and revenues aren't evaporating.

In the modern world of no demos, Alyeska has a solid angle.

[Xon]

The line between them isn't as sharp as you imply.

In one case someone is getting money out of it. In the other someone is spending time and effort providing the service for free. That is the only difference that matters, and in fact is posible to determine between the two.

Lets take the Anime subbing scene. They have extensive contacts in the host country which provide raws tv/dvd/bluray rips, teams of people who speed translate, QA, encode it into a portable format and time the subs to the source media and encode. This is for one subbing group, and there are a stupid number of them. This is a massive amount of effort, requiring at least +3 people at a time and a fair chunk of computational resources to encode stuff quickly, and a lot of man-hours to translate and check even roughly.

The only 'profit' they make off this, is being able to watch a bunch of content which is likely never going to be released elsewhere or have massive time-lag between the original release and the export version.

Broomstick, you of all people should know that a personal budget is a zero-sum game for what you can purchase for entertainment. If you buy hundred of dollars worth of some tv series dvd collection or perhaps recreational flying, something else in your budget has to have that money taken away from it if you want to remain financially solvent. And you are still going to have more time to you could use for entertainment than your budget could support.