I also have to take umbrage at the idea that "they're already earning lots, so what's the big deal" is ok. I fail to see the correlation between how much money you have and how much more of a "crime" stealing is. Is the suggestion that it's somehow less offensive to steal from someone who has a lot of money, because they can deal with it easier? The offense is the act of stealing, it's nothing to do with the victim.

Just another example of the small minded pettiness that underlines society. Everyone wants to do well, they just don't want anyone else to do well.

With the music industry, just watch the South Park episode about music piracy, i think it is when they are trying to form a rock band

 There's a full generation out there that believe that they are entitled to have the same things as their neighbours or friends, even if they don't necessary have the same financial means as them.

Hence people getting into huge debt through credit, subprime mortgage or even stealing ( pirating) what they can't afford to buy............

Not every company is a multi billion dollar enterprise. Seriously, you have a very narrow minded view of the subject. If a game comes out from a small publisher and is AWESOME, but the game gets half of its sales pirated, what are the chances that this game is to get a sequel. Or maybe the publisher and developer were banking on this one game to make them some money. If they don't make the money needed off of the game, we may NEVER see a game from the developer again. Wasted talent? Yes indeed.

I support legit sales in this industry because it is MY industry. I love it to death and I want it to flourish greatly.

Don't be greasy. Buy your games from the people that sell them in the right way. Help our industry along.

PS. I am the type of person that doesn't pirate ANYTHING, never mind something that I am fond of.

+1 for that post Squrriel , you just opened my mind up to a new way of thinking about the music industry.

I dont pirate games for the most part and only have problems with people pirating games that need sales. Pirate GTA4, MGS4 or Galaxy for all I care those things bring in more than enough cash for all. But games from smaller devs being bootlegged is no good.

I am going to mod one of my XBOXes so I can pirate games, but only as rentals (Blockbuster/Hollywood video and Gamefly can kiss my ass) and to play local lan games with friends. I also have no remorse pirating games from older systems, no matter if they are on VC/XBL or PSN or not. If they made a VC version of a game with some worthwhile enhancements I would buy it, but I have backup divices and bootleg CDs for my classic systems. Before anyone comes down on me, if I were to get one of these games "legally" it would be a used copy on ebay not the VC/XBL/PSN version.

I often wonder what anti pirates feel about the used game market. If you buy/sell a used game it is as good as stealing money from a dev because you are not buying (or if you are selling not offering) a new game, the only person that makes money is the seller of that used game, which does as much good for the dev.

No it's not, and I wish people would stop trotting out this argument. The secondary market may steal some sales from the primary market, but the alternative is far, far worse.

More piracy = Less profit = Less pay, smaller studios, and less games made.

It's simple economics. If games are pirated, then the end users are taking away profit from the developers.

Due to piracy, we get draconian DRM, less indie games, and more hoops to jump through to play any games.

Also, for extra points: Give me a list of quality developers in countries that have massive piracy. Guess what? Less piracy = more developers. There is a reason behind that. Look at Eastern Europe, Southeast Asia, and South America where piracy of games is rampant. There just aren't many developers. Yes, they certainly exist, but there are very few compared to countries that don't pirate such as Japan, the US and Europe. The simple reason is that the video game markets in said countries is very small, and can't/don't support legitimate titles which would lead to new studios in the said countries. I'd love to see more developers in "others" regions, but we will never see it until consumers adopt to buying new product. Until then, pirates are cutting developers throats in those countries (pun intended).

pirating a psp is a much more difficult task then pirating a ds. With that said why is piracy on the psp so much more extensive and detrimental than on the ds?

The PSP is considered easier because all you need to pirate games on the PSP can be inexpensively bought at any store that sells the system ... The DS is as easy to pirate but (from my understanding) you have to buy a micro-sd adapter card from a questionable website.