this post was submitted on 06 Jul 2023
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Memes

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[–] [email protected] 183 points 1 year ago (16 children)

That's.. a good argument. I never thought of it like that.

[–] MostlyHarmless 14 points 1 year ago (10 children)

Is it stealing if you don't pay for the cinema? You don't own anything new after.

Is it stealing if you don't pay for your haircut? You don't own anything new after.

Is it stealing if you don't pay for your car service? You don't own anything new after.

[–] [email protected] 28 points 1 year ago (8 children)

In those three cases, you're receiving a service (showing you the movie, cutting your hair and servicing your car), so yeah, you're stealing their work, which is arguably much worse than stealing objects.

In contrast, copying a copy of a movie or a game or whatever without removing the original or even a copy of it is not stealing.

And before you chime in with "but future income!", those profits are hypothetical, so even in the most uncharitable rational definition, you have stolen something that someone MIGHT have gotten.

Copying is not theft and you can't steal something that doesn't and might never exist.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago (4 children)

The gray area where I live is that streaming is not piracy. I didn't pay for it, but I also didn't retain a copy.

Putlocker and Wootly were my go-to spots in college because I wouldn't get a piracy warning from my internet provider.

If there are better places these days, please let me know. I miss seeing new movies the same day they hit the digital marketplace

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[–] [email protected] 27 points 1 year ago (2 children)

That is actually, by law, NOT stealing, thats called fraud.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago (1 children)

You're technically correct, the best kind of correct.

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[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 year ago (2 children)

This needs to clarify digital piracy (even though the term already implies that) so people stop comparing renting physical things and spaces to it.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I would download a car if I could.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Make a copy of a car, meaning nothing has been taken away from anyone else? Me too, absolutely!

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[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Exactly. If I bought a movie on Amazon, and Amazon stops existing, do I receive a physical copy/the ability to download my media? I paid for it.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I think we have to rephrase the meme here. If I BOUGHT a game on steam I do not own it even though I basically bought my own copy. I dont think rental or paying for a service is the same. They should just not disguise paying for a service as buying a product.

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[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 year ago (2 children)

The difference is that in your later two examples, a business lost something, their time / labor. If you took someones seat at the theater, there will be a disruption at the least, maybe the customer does not get their seat or you have to be kicked out or cleaned up after, but if you don't disrupt anything or make a mess, you caused no harm whatsoever.

No one looses anything when someone copies a file without permission. The FBI and other propaganda sources would have you believe that media companies would make more money if you didn't copy the file, there is no evidence of that, only evidence to the contrary, even so, if it were true, taking an action that causes someone to earn less money than if the action were not taken is not theft. If I open up a store, next to your store, and sell the kind of products you sell, you will make less money than if i don't, but no person with any self respect would ever claim that I stole anything from you, except you, the angry store owner. The reality is that these laws and their associated propaganda exist because the wealthy ruling class is terrified of making slightly less money for their investors.

Think back to the moment you learned that copying was considered theft, you knew it was ridiculous at the time, but you've seen so many FBI warnings, and so much of your favorite youtubers whining about facebook videos that belong to them with more views than theirs, steeling their precious views, even though almost no one on earth watches videos on facebook and on youtube, and no one who knows and wants to support a creator would ever watch their content in a way that would instead support someone else who provided no new value. The reality is that the youtuber was never going to get any views from the audience of the facebook video if the facebook video didn't exist, but because it did, many people followed the comment saying that the video was stolen right back to the original creator. Likewise the people who are pirating software or media are probably not going to buy it in any timeline, but now that they copied the content, they might promote it to people who will actually buy it, people who otherwise would not know about it.

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago (4 children)

You wouldn't download a car

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[–] [email protected] 87 points 1 year ago (3 children)

internet piracy? i never ever would do such a thing, it is illegal. instead i will pay for 5 streaming services and never own anything. remember, you wouldn't steal a car.

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[–] [email protected] 48 points 1 year ago

“Harry Potter is no longer available on this platform”

[–] [email protected] 35 points 1 year ago (1 children)

The only thing I would (totally naively and magically) wish for is some kind of really well organized and curated time capsule mainly for movies and music preservation.

I don’t want all the music and movies for myself, I wouldn’t be able to watch/hear it all but I wish for anyone from any time in the future — to have a simple/legal option to just dig anything out, public domain or whatever will work best.

People have created some amazing gems.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 13 points 1 year ago

Well, yes. This exist — I am really grateful for that, but.. This audio library now contains 15M positions. It is a big number, no doubt about it.

Then, Spotify has over 80M files in the library with around 4M podcasts.

Estimated existing music amount is unclear but around 90-200M and growing all the time.

And suddenly 15M is getting somehow small in terms of preserving, and this is with music only.

With movies I even remember some interviews with Tarantino and Nolan talking about how badly some movies are being mistreated, lost cuts, not even close to proper/safe long time storing, fires, accidents and so on..

[–] [email protected] 26 points 1 year ago

This statement feels so wrong yet also feels so correct. If companies can't let ppl own what they paid they shouldn't complain when ppl pirate.

[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago (2 children)

If you think about it, Lemmy federation itself is just reposting other instances' content onto your own 😋

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[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 year ago
[–] [email protected] 13 points 1 year ago (2 children)
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[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 year ago (4 children)

You have to pay to use a rental car, but you don't own it. Do you think that rental cars can't be stolen?

[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 year ago

Yet another nonsense comparison. If you steal a car, rental or otherwise, the owner won't have it anymore. If you somehow figure out a way to make an exact duplicate of the car and then return the original, you have not stolen anything.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 year ago

You have to pay to use a heated seat now, but you don't own it. Do you think that heated seats can't be bypassed?

[–] pythonoob 10 points 1 year ago

But you could also theoretically buy that car and own it. If you bought that car no one would say, well, you only paid for the right to drive it temporarily.

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago

I’m gonna show this to my landlord before I kick his ass

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago

pirate pirate pirate pirate pirate let's pirate let's pirate let's pirate pirate

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago
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