Software Piracy Seen as Normal

Spad writes "The BBC is reporting that people don't see downloading copyrighted material as theft, despite concerted efforts by the games, music and movie industries to convince them otherwise. The report, titled Fake Nation, claims that '[People] just don't see it as theft. They just see it as inevitable, particularly as new technologies become available...The purchase of counterfeit goods or illegal downloading are seen as normal leisure practices,' However, they also found that while people are generally not buying counterfeit software from dodgy dealers on street corners, they are still happy to purchase them from people they know at the office/pub/school in addition to downloading them. Nobody can really be that suprised by the 'popularity' of downloading pirated software, but I was a little thrown by the apparent willingness of people to pay for pirated copies of it."

Comments

Not surprising

[Anonymous Coward]

Piracy isn't theft. Theft is the action in wich one denies others acces to the stolen goods. Piracy doesn't deny anoyne acces to the pirated goods. So piracy is per definition not theft.

Re:Not surprising

[Zebidiah]

I never said it was okay, but you were right when you said

"i wasn't gonna pay for it anyway, so it's not stealing"

because it isn't stealing.

Re:Not surprising

[Zebidiah]

There are two words for it: "Copyright Infringement"

Re:Not surprising

[DrHyde]

Yes, it is piracy. From the OED:

" 2 fig. The appropriation and reproduction of an invention or work of another for one's own profit, without authority; infringement of the rights
conferred by a patent or copyright. "

It goes on to illustrate this with a few quotation, the earliest of which dates from 1771.

Re:Not surprising

[Xerp]

Well, in my dictionary by definition it is theft:

theft (n)

the action or crime of stealing.

steal (v)

verb (past stole; past part. stolen) 1 take (something) without permission or legal right and without intending to return it. 2 give or take surreptitiously or without permission: I stole a look at my watch. 3 move somewhere quietly or surreptitiously. 4 (in various sports) gain (a point, advantage, etc.) unexpectedly or by exploiting the temporary distraction of an opponent.

propaganda

[Sweetshark]

... despite concerted efforts by the games, music and movie industries to convince them otherwise ...
Here (germany) these TV-commercials are as bad as the mainstream (streamlined) popmusic. They are without heart. In cinemas they often get booed at. They are even less convincing than the products these guys want to sell.

piracy is just a natural phenomenon

[Gopal.V]

I am too young to remember the age of freedom before the commercial world took over software. But I can make out how it would have felt from whatever Free Software is doing to the youngsters today. It must've felt like the current astrophysics or higher mathematics of today. I wonder what happens when those things have real applications and multinationals pushing reasearch ( already grant money seems to be corrupting them ).

> [People] just don't see it as theft. They just see it as inevitable, particularly as new technologies become available...

Userfriendly has hit the nail on the head with this explanation of the economics of software piracy. The costs of piracy had hit companies way back in late nineties, these days the piracy factor is calculated into the initial pricing. Where I was working before, they had estimated ~19% piracy rate for a mobile phone app. It is slowly starting to become a market force for the software industry - and the companies hate that. (price it too high, we'll pirate !)

The american corporate's blood sucking is slowly starting to show on the economy. what price for - America Inc (specializing in mergers with oil rich countries with dictators) ?.

Breach of contract isn't theft

[evilandi]

The reason people don't see breaching copyright as theft, is because it isn't theft.

In order for something to be theft, there has to be an "intention to permanently deprive". You have to take something away from someone. That's the legal definition.

If you copy something, the original is still perfectly usable. Nobody is deprived of the original for a moment.

The copyright "industry's" attempts to equate breach of copyright with theft has fallen upon deaf ears because people aren't that stupid; they know the analogy is stupid from the start.

Bodies which name themselves using the phrase "copyright theft" are open to public ridicule, because everyone knows that breach of copyright absolutely not the same nor even similar to theft.