OK, ill admit back when I was younger, and didn't have a source of income I did download a few games through not so legal methods. Ever since I've had money coming in though, all that has changed. I've bought the games I pirated through Steam (I love steam) and have bought even more games. Despite knowing that I won't play them, I felt obliged to give the developers money for a game I previously enjoyed without spending anything for it. I guess you could say my conscious played part in it. I haven't pirated anything as of recent. Actually bought a few games at full price, even though some of them I regretted buying. (Example: Rage). Would of rather not played it at all than pay 60 dollars for it. Considering just 2 months later it went on sale for 15. Game is worth 15 dollars, just not the 60 I paid for it. Guess that is what I get for trusting Id to release a good game. I don't know if I would say pirating is justifiable, but it is most defiantly not a lost sale. Most people who pirate wouldn't of bought the game anyways, don't have the money to buy it, or downloaded it just to increase the leech number to troll idiotic publishers. Considering most publishers say that each Torrent of their game downloaded is a lost sale, that is idiotic, and untrue. Take what I said above in consideration, then listen to this. There are people that download GAMES THEY BOUGHT through torrents. I have a legal purchased CD key for Call of Duty 4. My disc worked on other computers, but for mine it simply would not install right. So I downloaded the file through a torrent website and used my legal CD-Key and played Multiplayer. I've done this through other games too. Some that I've bought on steam, that I didn't want steam integration with due to singleplayer launch issues when my internet is down. There are other cases of people who have Skyrim and didn't want steam to mess their stuff up, so they downloaded the torrent of it. Publishers fail to realize, that the number of leechers don't amount to the number of lost sales. Considering some of the people they might try to take legal action on actually own a license to their game.

You can't prove that at all. There is nothing to prove that if I hadn't pirated Xenoblade in September I would have bought something else. At that time I was spending $1.99 to rent a game per night at my local Red Box Kiosk and beating them. Only costed me $3.98 to beat Uncharted 3.

Who is to say that had I not had the ability to get it for free I would have used my $50+ to buy new collared shirts for work? Nothing proves that money not spent on a title would have otherwise been spent on that title or on one of a different company had an avenue for piracy not been available. 

Nope, seeing as how the Wii and DS are region-locked. Nintendo gave me no choice but to pirate a copy and/or void my console warranty just to play a game.

Personally though, in my case, 9 times out of 10 I rarely play beyond an hour or so of any game I pirate. Don't know why it is but for some reason I don't get much satisfaction from something I don't own the original disc for. of course Xenoblade happened to be a big exception, the game is phenomenal.

Just to put a positive spin on things, we can just say that thanks to people like me pirating the game the game recieved some real good word of mouth. My downloaded copy, followed by praise for the title in and out of the interwebs contributes to the pre-orders shown on the weekly charts. That is how I like to see it. A guy who would have most likely never bought it anyways ends up possibly helping the title sell, even if it is 1 or 2 copies.

If we can assume I lost them money, can't we also assume that I helped them make money?

you definitly would have done spent the time you spent playing Xenoblade doing something else, you can't argue that.

Now if you guys want to promote a society where people spent their time at home enjoying free entertainment, that's something else ( and remember when you can get your entertainment for free , that's one less motivation to go out and earn money...).

You seriously comparing a copy of a product purchased and owned by someone else and then copied by that same person and placed on the internet to a man entering and robbing a store?

If I make a copy of one of my music albums and place it on Mediafire and you download it, who did you rob?

piracy is the act of stealing/unlawfully gaining an item for free.
software piracy with the use of torrent is simply making a copy of the original item. nothing has been taken. people download music, games, movies and tv shows all the time from the net.

lots of other people do it and no one gets hurt. software piracy is virtually impossible to stop.

I don't see your point though seeing as it is common sense that if you aren't doing one thing you are obvious doing something else.

Then I must ask this now... why assume now that we are unemployed, unmotivated drains on society?

Just last night I had my parents over and they were telling me about how they are in season 3 of Breaking Bad with 4 episodes to go, but season 4 isn't on Netflix yet. They had no way to watch it, it isn't on Netflix and it isn't on DVD or BluRay yet since the season just ended in October. I told them to go to a site (Which I wrote down for them) and told them they could stream it there. I assume that tonight they must be started on season 4.

Anyways, they are now streaming it, for free! OH MY!

Anyways, like I said, it isn't on DVD yet, it isn't on Netflix (which they have, so this barely matters anyways). I am not sure of AMCs schedule right now and whether or not they are airing repeats of season 4. So, what did AMC lose that night? Mind you they weren't going to buy it anyways, but rather maybe have to wait for it to pop up on the service they already pay for.

I want to watch that new movie but I don't buy DVDs, I like to just wait for them to air on Starz, Showtime, HBO, you name it. I won't ever pay for it, but I know I will eventually watch it, no real harm to anyone in watching it now right? I'm still going to be paying that Cablevision bill by the time it arrives on one of those channels.

I am just one case, but surely there are others just like me. Everyones case is different, but what do many of these cases show? Just because I didn't pay to watch Breaking Bad doesn't mean I would have ever purchased it. Hell, the only reason I even got into it in the first place is because my brother-in-law owned it and tossed it my way and suggested I check it out. I eventually did after a month or so. AMC lost just as much there as they would have had I learned of it on the net and downloaded the first season.

Is borrowing bad too? I would say no, because in the end, after borrowing season 1 and downloading seasons 2 and 3, they gained attiditional ratings during season 4 and trust me, I will be there watching during season 5 as well. 

Eh, double post...

I don't think that's really a fair argument to make. Apart from the obvious difficulty in gauging the "potentially" of future consumer behaviour (i.e. just because I am not interested in buying a product now doesn't mean I won't be a few months down the line), there still remains serious moral problems with piracy in the instance you have outlined.

Okay, so I have no intention of buying album "X", so therefore it's okay to steal it and enjoy its content while the producers of the album reap no rewards? This is not a morally justifiable position to take. People have the right to own what they create, I don't think anyone should disagree with that. This right gives creators the ability to sell their creation, if they so choose, and to set the terms under which it is sold. If they enter into an agreement with a distributor, such as a record label for example, fine, that's their choice. The point is, they agree how their creation should be distributed. By stealing their creation, even though you claim you would never have spent money on that creation, you trample on the ownership rights of the creator. You have violated their right to choose what to do with their creation, how it is distributed and sold. This is simply not moral.

In addition, by conducting piracy in this way you help to construct an atmosphere of social acceptability towards thievery. You enable thievery by passively promoting it as justifiable practice. Your actions affect others and enable those who may or may not have "bought it anyway" to steal.

I think it's sad that we all can't hold our hands up and say that theft under any name is still theft and it is simply wrong.

I think your argument is a tad one sided though, because it seems to completely neglect the ownership rights of the guy who bought the album, to then do as he pleases with his property, even if it be to give out copies to let's say, his friends. Is excepting a copy considered as theft?

Then that bothers me about something else. If you answer "yes", does that mean we don't actually "own" what we buy?

Hey, another question!

Was I stealing when I would record songs off the radio back in the day with cassettes? I used to do that all the time! I would make some good mix tapes.