Hello ! I'm currently doing a report for uni and I would like to know everyone here's stance on piracy. Wether you approve or disapprove of it, I won't judge you. What I do want is your opinion about it and the reason for that opinion.

I would appreciate your answers very much.

If you don't wish to say your stance on this in public space you're more than welcome to messege me !

Thanks in advance :)

(btw, I'd also like your stances on other forms of media than just games. IE, software in general, music and movies... All would be appreciated.)

EDIT: Note i'm not looking for why piracy is there. For now. it is what it is. I'm looking for your opinion on piracy. Your personal opinon and the reasoning behind it.

IE:

Why do you pirate?

why don't you ?

If you wish to further elaborate, you are very welcome to state your opinion on piracy in general, why you think it's done and what can be done to reduce it though.. but the reason you do it or doesn't do it. It is the most important thing right now for my report. :)

People pirate things because they can. It's cheaper and less risky.
Things that are pirated are usually not bought anyway, so it's not a big deal.
Piracy gives companies a way to market their company in a very strong way, and spreads word of mouth and strengthens brand (if the game is actually good).

If the game is not good, then it would harm the game's and brand's reputation and cause even fewer sales later on. Either way, if you release a bad game you will pay for it, whether through piracy or other.

as a musician who has seen mp3s fuck the music industry a bit

id say there is nothing you can do about it, so why worry?

pirates are not customers

i may not agree, but good luck trying to do anythign about it

I rarely pirate anything anymore but I buy the good stuff. The cost of things nowadays is just do out of control that I think it is a very good option that developers should learn to deal with. Devs should program in some kind of lock out date system and just provide their products for free online, i think.

My stance on piracy is, there will always be piracy, in any industry. Be in video games, movies, music, jewelry, perfume, caviar, toilet paper, etc. You name it, someone is always going to try to make a cheaper or free version of it, either by copying the original or undercutting the original product in price with an inferior product.

As for how to combat piracy, that's the major dilemma. Most companies try to combat it with 'anti-piracy' measures like codes on games, region locking on systems, self-authorizing games, etc. However, I feel that if you really want to combat piracy, you need to produce a better quality product and distribute it well. If people are so infatuated with your product that they only want to buy YOUR product, then they will. If they are only somewhat interested, then they will pirate it and 'try it out' or just plain use it without buying it. No thing like region locking or installation codes are going to stop 100% of people.

i will say some things are begging to be pirated, like movies

take a girl to a movie, buy pop and popcorn, its about 60 bucks these days

so go piracy there to stop the insanity

plus, there is a bed in the next room if you pirate it.....maybe movie theaters should start supplying bedrooms?

@theprof

you can obviously still grab the bj in the theatre ;)

I've done more than that in a theater lol. I actually got a girl completely naked in the back row before. I think it was a harisson ford movie.

In principle I'm against it I as I believe it denies earnings to those who worked on whatever was pirated, however in practice clearly pirating digital assets is easy and many seem to take the view they're just copying something they wouldn't buy anyway.

It's clearly wrong in principle, but without hard evidence of how many pirates would buy if pirating weren't possible, it's hard to say how big a deal it really is.

I have no doubt that perfectly fine games are pirated (music, too) so it's not as simple as saying bad games don't deserve the sales. Good games get pirated, too. And I'd bet more than games that are bad.

Looking at PCs though, I am concerned that enough piracy of games could affect any platform if it became endemic enough - so it's not something without impact, either. I'd hate to be in a position where consoles ended up where PCs are right now with Ubisoft, for example, and the only way to play a game was to have a constant internet connection and accept if you lose you're connection you can't play the game you've paid for.

Like anything, if you really enjoy videogames you should pay to ensure the developers, etc. who actually sit, as way to earn a living, and spend years developing games are able to keep doing so.

In the end actually that's probably how I feel about piracy. Like theft it's an essentially selfish act, one that can have an impact on others, but presumably the pirate, like the thief, doesn't care about that so long as they get what they want.