Piracy is not theft

Ey.
I'm not beating my head against a wall any longer.
The law states it is theft, like it or not.
You are a thief. Deal with it.
 
Beyond.Celsus said:
The code belongs to the creator thereof.
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Great.... no one want's the code, let him keep it.

In practice however that just means that the creator has commercial rights to the exploitation of the results of the code.... just copying the compiled copy is not financially important to anyone.
 
Beyond.Celsus said:
Ey.
I'm not beating my head against a wall any longer.
The law states it is theft, like it or not.
You are a thief. Deal with it.
Click to expand...
You can make lots of arguments about the fact that piracy is wrong and I tend to agree with a lot of them, but it's not theft.
 
Beyond.Celsus said:
Everything?
No.

A lot, yes.

But I am not afraid to admit that I stole and that I left creators out of pocket.
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Will you be handing yourself over to the police and face prosecution?

If not, how about not being a whiney cvnt about this? We have the ANC looting millions every hour, Sir, not downloading torrents.
 
LCBXX said:
Will you be handing yourself over to the police and face prosecution?

If not, how about not being a whiney cvnt about this? We have the ANC looting millions every hour, Sir, not downloading torrents.
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So voicing my opinion on a public forum makes me a whiny cvnt?
Okay then.

Put me on ignore and move on.
 
LCBXX said:
Good! Leave others to do the same. You're are not your brother's keeper.
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Do what you want.
But, I will have my say on a public forum.

Put me on ignore and get it over with.
K. Thanks. Bye.
 
Beyond.Celsus said:
Ey.
I'm not beating my head against a wall any longer.
The law states it is theft, like it or not.
You are a thief. Deal with it.
Click to expand...
Wrong. Theft as a word in the law only relates to physical property. Copyright infringement is not theft:

The terms piracy and theft are often associated with copyright infringement.[4][5] The original meaning of piracy is "robbery or illegal violence at sea",[6] but the term has been in use for centuries as a synonym for acts of copyright infringement.[7][8] Theft, meanwhile, emphasizes the potential commercial harm of infringement to copyright holders. However, copyright is a type of intellectual property, an area of law distinct from that which covers robbery or theft, offenses related only to tangible property. Not all copyright infringement results in commercial loss, and the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1985 that infringement does not easily equate with theft.

Copyright holders frequently refer to copyright infringement as theft, "although such misuse has been rejected by legislatures and courts".
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Its only theft if I hack a companies server, and remove the origonal code or movie and all copies from their servers depriving them of the use of it.

en.wikipedia.org

Copyright infringement - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org

Online piracy is not theft. It is copyright infringement. Different things as has been explained multiple times in this thread.

Yes it is still wrong and I try not to condone it but when the choices of companies and governments make it hard for me as a person who genuinely tries to be law abiding to get it legally then I will resort to piracy as I do not think it is fair to deprive me of entertainment I am interested in and willing to pay for but am prevented from doing so or overcharged because of who I am and where I live. Yes that carries risk but I am happy to carry that risk. If you go a different route good on you but I am comfortable with the decisions I have made.
 
Just a case in point. We introduced my kids to dr Who. Love it, its a clean show that is good family watching. I subscribe to the main two streaming services in SA (Netflix and Showmax). If I happened to live in the UK or the USA Dr who would be covered in the Netflix catalogue. Because I live in SA I am denied it despite paying a comparable fee for a smaller catalogue. Hence I feel nothing to pirate it as I am paying netflix who I know pays the creators of that show (BBC). I also know showmax tends to have a much bigger BBC catalogue than netflix and I pay for that too and watch a lot of BBC stuff on there but because of some arrangement with HBO Max they cannot show Dr Who to us in SA on those two channels. Ironically HBO Max also is not in SA. The only legal way to get it is to fork out a hefty price for the box sets or subscribe to DSTV which is exorbitant. Its discrimination based on country. Africa is at the but end of most streaming platforms plans to roll out. Its blatantly unfair as I see it so I ignore it and get around it. Same issue for any Disney+ exclusive content. They have zero plans to make their channel available here anytime soon, and have made a choice to not sell certain series on to platforms already established here. That is their choice. I have made mine too then. If Disney plus does eventually arrive in SA, or lease their full catalogue to say showmax, I will happily support them. Until then I was never an intended customer of theirs anyways as they have repeatedly made clear so I feel nothing copying their stuff.
 
Cius said:
Wrong. Theft as a word in the law only relates to physical property. Copyright infringement is not theft:

Its only theft if I hack a companies server, and remove the origonal code or movie and all copies from their servers depriving them of the use of it.

en.wikipedia.org

Copyright infringement - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org

Online piracy is not theft. It is copyright infringement. Different things as has been explained multiple times in this thread.
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Even there it's a grey area.... I generally see it as fair use unless I gain financially from it or encourage other to refrain from payment.

Public Libraries are meant for the poor, the rich stock their own libraries. In the modern era each hoarder (especially the NAS experts) for all practical intents functions as a librarian.

Cius said:
Yes it is still wrong and I try not to condone it but when the choices of companies and governments make it hard for me as a person who genuinely tries to be law abiding to get it legally then I will resort to piracy as I do not think it is fair to deprive me of entertainment I am interested in and willing to pay for but am prevented from doing so or overcharged because of who I am and where I live. Yes that carries risk but I am happy to carry that risk. If you go a different route good on you but I am comfortable with the decisions I have made.
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The thing is that even those less well off do an effort to try and pay where they can except for those that literally see nothing wrong with not paying dues. You know that you actually find much more enjoyment in the things you pay for because you paid.... but I would wager you cannot force yourself to pay good money for something you don't yet know if it is worth it.

Stupid example, I looked around for textbook reference books for something..... but all of the apparently good one's are R1k-R2k...... I do not have the disposable income to buy all of them as I would have to because you only REALLY know which is best after having read them all.... just flipping through one would still lead to a gamble. So instead I download everything I can and later when I have a better Idea of what I need I will have to gamble anyway because you can't find them all but I will buy one.

And to boot no one want's you to even flip through the things anymore.

You have to adapt to your circumstances. Those with large incomes forget the luxury it provides to them where every single purchase is not so great a gamble and buyers remorse is small in comparison.
 
rambo919 said:
You cannot loose what you neither had or ever will have had..... you cannot loose projected profit.

I have never paid full price for a game, never will. No game is worth R1k or more to me, and most of the R400 one's are worthless to me. If I get to a point where it's worth what I am willing to pay, I pay. Just because I waited for the R1k game to go down to R300.... does that mean the publisher lost R700?

Either way I pirate the game.... I have never, except once out of curiosity, played a game through it's launcher. I always play pirated and firewalled versions. Here too I am not following the lisence rules but the publisher still gets what the market decides the product is worth.


There is a difference between some kind of immeasurable (objectively) desire and ability to pay or even belief of what something is worth.

It's not a victimless crime if it's not a crime to begin with.
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What illogical magic tomfoolerly is this. Clearly you have ZERO idea how economics work in game development.
A game needs to move a certain amount of copies to break even before it actually becomes profitable. You still get studio's that develop the games and a publisher, however often these days the studio can publish their own game without the middle man.

But often the publisher will be the owner of the studio or have part ownership, general agreements with regards to developing a game it is fronted all or some development costs of the project. With the studio taking all the risk, so generally the publisher will sell at full market related pricing until development costs goals have been reached and profit goals have been met it is only after the publisher has made their profit that a studio will start earning royalties. Royalties work on a inclining block. 5% for the first 20000 units 10% for 100000 units ect.

It is only after the game has made back it's development costs and profit goals have been reached that games are reduced in price not because of the goodness of their heart but because profit and development costs have been reached and sales eventually tapper off.

That is why you get specials on games, the studio and publisher aren't loosing money when they do this, they have already made their profit and development costs back. That said it may take weeks or months before a game have reached profitable goals and targets.

So no your argument is stupid, a publisher doesn't just randomly place a game on special without certain criteria not having been met. Whether down from 700 to 400 rand it is pure profit by the time it goes on special, neither the studio or publisher loses any money. Buying at a cheaper price is common sense if you are willing to wait not sticking it to the man, which you are implying.

There is a difference between some kind of immeasurable (objectively) desire and ability to pay or even belief of what something is worth.
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It isn't your ability to pay it is what the market will bare. Common law disagrees with you, as it states the seller can put any value on what it wants to sell as long as it has tangible value, the only provision is that what is being sold has to be some thing that exist or will exist. You can't conclude a sales transaction by selling nothing and giving nothing.There has to be physical exchange of some thing.

In other words it isn't up to the buyer to decide the value and while the seller/ buyer can negotiate on the price it is still the seller right to have a reserve price, with the buyer either accepting the value or rejecting it.By rejecting it gives you no right to whatever was sold.

The common law is pretty clear on this matter. Argue all you want.
In fact here is the common law of sales

South African law of sale - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org

In other words it is illegal to take some thing that is not yours whether by stealing it or by means of piracy. There is no grey area.

You seem to use piracy laws and the associated fair use laws as the right to infringe on copyrights, but you need to read up on fair use laws as you don't fall into that category. While it was true piracy under South African law especially with regards to illegally downloading content being a civil matter and requiring the copyright holder to sue you for damages not exceeding the value of the copyright, downloading/uploading and sharing of a copyright with others is a criminal offense.

It is the intention of law makers is to criminalize the downloading and infringing of copyright as well and rightfully so.

First copyright laws date back to 1790 and the first known copyright dates back to 1710, while copyrights applied only to copying of books initially it was expanded over the years. Copyrights is well established and not some thing new and will continually evolve it is just how a modern society works.Laws can't stagnate as they eventually become out of date and do more harm then good. Should they criminalize and protect copyright infringements yes.

Being poor or disadvantage is no excuse, there is literally 100's of digital copyrights that offer versions of extended trials or for educational purposes there is no excuse to piracy.
 
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