How do you feel about pirates?

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Traditional theft and pirating never cured despotism, and it digital piracy wont cure the ills of capitalism either.

Dont steal. Vote with absence of wallet and selection of cheaper product.

Here is my guess: the explosion of linux and netbooks will cause windows 7 to be priced significantly lower.

Absence of wallet and selection of cheaper product.

Two words - Open Source.

Who needs to pay for the milk when the cow is free...or something like that...

Hope you are not talking about open source (open sores?) prostitutes!!

Open source is the way to go, it's of the idea of that rather than making software for the purpose of making money, it's making software for the advancement of technology. I run Ubuntu, the only reason I have Windows on my computer is because it came with it. I have hundreds of programs on my computer that I didn't pay for, yet I downloaded all of them legally.

But by the idea that pirating software is stealing because creators of software don't get paid for it, is it also stealing when you use a program that's free but is designed to do everything a paid program can do? Anything I've ever used photoshop for, I can do in Gimp, and Gimp doesn't cost anything, so is my use of it ripping off Adobe?

As the owner of a lot of DVDs (2000+) which obviously cost a lot, I get really miffed when people pirate films. I hate it when these people offer me the chance to view a poor quality film too. That said, I've got a "pirated" version of The Keep. I had the VHS but for storage reasons I wanted it on disc. I will buy it IF and when they release it but in the meantime, I've got no choice.

A similar situation exists for Doctor Who. I download it so that I can watch it before spoilers are everywhere. As soon as it comes out on DVD, I buy it to replace my copy.

Software.... I used to pirate heaps back when I was in University. Now I'm clean. I buy software but most of the time, I try to obtain free and/or Open Source. It's my way of supporting the movement.

Then there's reverse piracy.... I want to talk about that.

Have you ever bought a game, like The Simpsons game for PS2 and paid top dollar only to find that it was impossible to get past the first level?
What about when you buy a book and it sucks... badly
What about when you buy an album because you've heard one great song on the radio, only to find that the rest is rubbish.

I don't know how it works in Australia, but here in the States, most music stores will buy your used CDs and DVDs back from you (at a reduced price), and they'll sell them in the bargain bin. You won't get your full cost back, but it's better than being stuck with a cd you can't stand to listen to.

Nope. You are denying them a sale though.

Think of it as growing your own vegetables rather than buying them at the market.

Using open source is a good way to protest high prices, and that promotes development in the third world. It helps very smart but very poor people enter the digital age, which is good for all of humanity. It promotes unity and community among all participants.

Everyone should have access to good software, and everyone should be able to contribute to humanities endeavours.

One word:

Yaarr!

Either buy it or go open source.

I really don't see it as stealing - someone had a shirt that said "when you download music, a CD doesn't magically disappear from the store." I'm against the entire concept of intellectual property.

And why do you dispute intellectual property? If I write a useful program, it is the product of my time, talent, and effort. Do you have as great a claim on that program as I do? If someone produces something, they own it, end of story. The only way that changes is if they decide they want to share. If they don't want to share, they don't have to. And if they want to charge money to use it, they are well within their rights.

I really think most pirates could care less about any of these stupid ideological justifications, and just want to get something for nothing.

It's also a good way of sticking it to the man. I'm against Capitalism in general really.

A better way to stick it to the man is to boycott the product entirely. Microsoft doesn't want you to pirate, but they'd rather you pirate their stuff than go with a competing product, because if you use something else you learn that there are viable alternatives to Microsoft, and that hurts their market dominance. So if you want to hurt Microsoft, stop running Windows and Internet Explorer. Get Ubuntu and Firefox to start off with, that should be easy enough even for the technically incompetent.

Well, the IE and Windows I have are legal (they came with my computer.) As expained before, Firefox is Wayyyyy beyond my technical ability.

I honestly can't understand how you would fail to understand how to use Firefox. It's not that complicated, and certainly can't be much harder than software piracy.

Oh, and if you're pirating software while running IE6, and you're as computer-illiterate as you claim, I can just about guarantee you're part of a botnet.

Personally, I don't know where to stand on piracy. It's obviously a bad thing to do and there really is no way to justify that. Hard working programmers are not getting the money they deserve and some are losing jobs because of it. However, I am against the enforcement of it, not to mention the claims being made leaves more of a bitter taste in my mouth.

The loss claims made are usually built upon some poor assumptions, and are also usually not made by an objective 3rd party, so the legitimacy is extremely questionable. I'm not saying it isn't hurting the industry -- it definitely is, but blowing it out of proportion is dirty justice. This isn't exclusive to this either: the issue of morality is also being skewed by giving it the same stigma as stealing. Bear with me on this one, and also keep in mind this is not justifying the action, but instead questions the personal moral implication of piracy. Stealing in the traditional sense is not easy at all and requires active planning and action, and is obviously much harder than abiding by law. This, unless the thief is a sociopath, create a heavy sense of immorality. Acting on this sense is what makes a person criminal. However, when a person is given the access and the incentive that current piracy has created -- not having to stop at a store, or an online site to fill out a whole bunch of personal information, and then shell out money for it, versus downloading an application, finding what you want with a few simple clicks, saving a considerable amount of money, all on top of being offered a plethora of goods for free -- you do not have to have a criminal mind to outweigh the almost effortless criminality with the huge incentive it creates. The feeling of immorality obviously doesn't last because of how accessible to impulse the process is, too. And on top of that, right now there is a whole computer-savvy generation growing up with a much larger incentive because most they do not have steady income or a developed sense of morality. Any kid out there that knows how to use a computer and has internet connection won't think twice into venturing into piracy if there's a CD out there that they want, but can't afford to get, or if they want to see the newest action flick, but their parents refuse to take them to see it. Sure, teaching that piracy is immoral and making sure they don't do it is what parents 'aught to do, but realistically that isn't going to happen. And obviously, piracy isn't going to make these kids go and try to steal an iPod for all of those new CDs.

Ridding of all piracy methods is also pretty much an impossible task without overhauling the internet, so this is out of the question.

So, what I'm trying to say is that the current system of digital distribution is outdated and generally incompatible with the internet, and it would be an injustice to keep things the way they are and bar people up for something that hardly requires a criminal to commit, which will be moreso true as time passes. Fortunately, some distributors are well on their way with getting it right (iTunes comes to mind as far as concept), and there are even blueprints being made for legal, free P2P that could help solve this problem.

Anyways, that's my 2 cents on it.

Viva la revolution?