It’s easy to shirk copyright law without moral consideration when it’s become so draconian against citizens.
Is denying a faceless corporation profit from finding some bits elsewhere theft? It seems the public consensus is no. This is the digital content market seeking equilibrium. Competing against free is hard, but possible! Don’t whine as a CEO that your job is hard, it’s supposed to be hard.
I feel like that’s a cop-out. I agree that draconian criminal enforcement of what is a civil tort is unwarranted. But do people really see it as a form of civil disobedience, or do they just feel entitled to stuff for free? And if it’s civil disobedience, why not do it in a principled way? Download and share but don’t watch it.
I’d liken it more to the looting and vandalism in response to police brutality. More opportunism than civil disobedience.
I think comparing it to looting and vandalism is a bit hyperbole. It’s closer to copying a book at the library and taking the copy home. No one is deprived of an object or the content when duplicated, they only miss out on whatever revenue they were attempting to capture.
I dislike the book analogy because it puts on the cloak of “sharing learning.” The kinda of things people are pirating are consumer goods—created solely for the purpose of being sold for entertainment. It’s stealing candy, not stealing bread.
Let's split the difference. It'd be like parking outside the drive-in theater and watching the movie from the top of your car without having bought a ticket. Still not good, but of limited harm caused.
It's a bit of a convoluted analogy, but if you want to extend it to cars, it's like stealing a car off the end of the assembly line, and leaving behind a briefcase full of cash to cover the marginal cost of production.
Even then, imagine not being able to buy any given book at a few different stores. I can get just about any of them on Amazon, B&N and others. Imagine having to go to 6 different stores, with a membership club fee, to check out 6 different books. Vs a single store or library.
More like, I can buy an apple or surface at BestBuy, Amazon and a number of other places. Neither is exclusive to where you can only get it at the one place.
Is denying a faceless corporation profit from finding some bits elsewhere theft? It seems the public consensus is no. This is the digital content market seeking equilibrium. Competing against free is hard, but possible! Don’t whine as a CEO that your job is hard, it’s supposed to be hard.