LogFAQs > #884064680

Held off getting back to this topic because I kept meaning to reply to PO's stuff earlier on =x

ParanoidObsessive posted...

There's no moral imperative that obligates any work of art or profit to continue to exist after the creator decides otherwise. Which is usually the point where people will point out the various writers who demanded their unpublished writing be burned or otherwise destroyed after they died, only to have their executor renege and release the writing anyway, in some cases leading to famous classics that would otherwise never have been known to the public. But the executor was still a shit for doing it.

In some senses, there certainly is a moral imperative (and, more importantly, depending on legal arrangements, a creator's work can continue based solely on previous consent) from a cultural standpoint. Likewise, if a creator is choosing to withhold for petty reasons, his decision is morally suspect even if he's legally in the right.

ParanoidObsessive posted...

Except the two things are absolutely related. And I'm not simply justifying a material harm argument as much as I'm elaborating on it.

To wit, the obligations of contractual transaction are essentially that, if someone creates a product intended to accrue profit, then the obligation of the end user is to meet that requirement. If you want to experience the product, you are expected to pay for it. If you are experiencing it without paying for it, then you have subverted your social obligation. You are reaping the benefit without fulfilling your end of the bargain. You do not DESERVE to be able to experience the product for free, simply because you want to really really badly (and are otherwise unable/unwilling to pay).

Again, things like listening to a friend's CD or renting a movie from the library are a grey area, but ultimately, every single one of those products is a tangible physical item that HAS been paid for (even radio airplay involves licensing fees - nothing is entirely "free"), and which can only exist in one place at one time. Once you get into digital copies of games (or books, or music, or movies, etc), you are now bypassing the crucial step that allowed that grey area to exist with mimimum fuss in the first place.

To continue the metaphor, pirated digital games are less the rental copy of a game you're getting from your friend or a library, and more the bootleg home-burned copy you're buying off the back of a truck from a street vendor who won't be there tomorrow.

And honestly, "You can't say a creator lost money because there's no guarantee that a pirate would have paid for it anyway" is a weak argument, because there are absolutely cases where people WOULD have bought it otherwise if not for piracy. So even if it isn't a 100% loss, it's still a greater-than-zero loss.

Which is still a moral argument rather than a material harm argument. And I never disputed that some pirates wouldn't have otherwise purchased, but generally they're in the extreme minority because most serial pirates have far more content than they could afford to buy even if they had sufficient interest in buying it all.

As for digital piracy vs bootlegs, I will at least note that bootlegs are a greater detriment since those buyers ARE committed to spending at least some money (not going to a creator). Therefore the relative harm is actually higher.
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