In this age of easy exchange of information, it is becoming harder and harder to enforce laws and ideas that limit the exchange of information. If I hear a song on the radio and like it; I can download the complete discography of that artist within a few minutes. If I watch a movie in the theater, I can go home and download it the same day.
I am not exactly a good consumer. I almost never buy products based on advertising. When you go to the movies, most of the cost of the movie is paid for by the thirty minutes of advertisements you have to sit through at the beginning. The same method is used in television and radio. Personally, these ads often leave me wanting to never buy the product.
So is there something morally wrong with downloading content I am not truly paying for in the first place? Is it any different from recording a song you like from the radio? Is it different from recording a movie in a theater? When a television show is made, the creators are paid by the network that buys it. The network then makes money off of showing commercials. I ignore commercials anyways, do I thus steal the content?
If this rational is reasonable... Why is piracy wrong? Music piracy? Movie piracy? Television piracy? Game piracy? These industries all have their different methods of paying the creators. Sometimes its obvious that it is stealing. Most of the time it isn't. If something is easily down-loadable it makes it much easier for the consumer to decide whether or not they want to support the artist creating the work. How can these industries evolve to further serve their customers and themselves?
(edit) I put this in the Philosophy and Theology section because it is an issue of morality. If it fits better somewhere else feel free to move it.
Piracy
Moderator: Charon
#2
While the ads in theaters are annoying as fuck, I can actually understand the reasoning behind them. See, the actual theaters get a tiny amount of money from the sale of the tickets. They tend to make most of their money on concessions (which is why they're so massively overpriced). I'm not entirely sure, but I'm fairly confident that the advertising revenue goes to the theater itself, because Hollywood has fucked them out of the money from the ticket sales.
Now, the MPAA and the RIAA are corrupt institutions involved in price gouging and unfair business practices, and they certainly deserve scorn and a swift kick in the ass. However, at the end of the line, artists deserve support. Consider this: YOU are the artist. You are acting or singing or writing or what have you. You are literally spending hours of your life working on things that make other people feel good/bad/whatever. People want what you create. Is this not demand? Logically, should you not be compensated for the work you have done in creating this? If I don't get any monetary compensation at all, the only reason for me to do it is that I love doing it, but at the end of the day, love doesn't put food on my plate or a roof over my head. If artists could not make a living doing what they do, art would be much scarcer. Now, maybe that would be a good thing in that our society would move away from the "entertain me NOW" trend that's occuring, but I'm not sure we would like the results.
In the case of Radio and Television, you ARE paying for it, and I'll tell you how. You pay for it because you bought the television from an electronics company. You pay for it because you pay for each electron that powers it. You pay for it because when an ad comes on TV, there's a good chance that you might see the product and get interested in buying it or a product very similar to it, which goes to the company that made the ad. If advertisements didn't work, they would be pulled from television and radio. Take a look at what happened on the Internet about four years ago: Advertisers ran away from websites in droves because what they were spending on ads were not being made back with actual sales, but I digress. You pay for it because when you get cable you pay for the service for the extra channels, and then you pay again if you want the ad-free channels. All of this payment is just so you can watch the programming the networks want to give you. You don't get a say in the matter unless you're ordering pay-per-view.
Now, with the advent of On-Demand television, Digital Video Recorders, and so on, the market is beginning to change. People are beginning to realize that the middlemen aren't all necessary. The ads needed to create revinue for both the companies and the television stations aren't needed if you can sell a TV show directly. Even DVD sales may become a thing of the past in twenty years when some enterprising company sells DVRs with DVD burners, but I digress.
Piracy is not THEFT. It is COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT. Copyright laws have become horrible mangled beasts in the service of their corporate masters over the last 100 years. The core of the copyright law, that the creators of something get to distribute it for money in compensation for the time they spent creating it, is solid. The fact that someone of no relation to Walt Disney can create something related to Mickey Mouse a thousand years after his death and still hold copyright is an abomination.
Now, the MPAA and the RIAA are corrupt institutions involved in price gouging and unfair business practices, and they certainly deserve scorn and a swift kick in the ass. However, at the end of the line, artists deserve support. Consider this: YOU are the artist. You are acting or singing or writing or what have you. You are literally spending hours of your life working on things that make other people feel good/bad/whatever. People want what you create. Is this not demand? Logically, should you not be compensated for the work you have done in creating this? If I don't get any monetary compensation at all, the only reason for me to do it is that I love doing it, but at the end of the day, love doesn't put food on my plate or a roof over my head. If artists could not make a living doing what they do, art would be much scarcer. Now, maybe that would be a good thing in that our society would move away from the "entertain me NOW" trend that's occuring, but I'm not sure we would like the results.
In the case of Radio and Television, you ARE paying for it, and I'll tell you how. You pay for it because you bought the television from an electronics company. You pay for it because you pay for each electron that powers it. You pay for it because when an ad comes on TV, there's a good chance that you might see the product and get interested in buying it or a product very similar to it, which goes to the company that made the ad. If advertisements didn't work, they would be pulled from television and radio. Take a look at what happened on the Internet about four years ago: Advertisers ran away from websites in droves because what they were spending on ads were not being made back with actual sales, but I digress. You pay for it because when you get cable you pay for the service for the extra channels, and then you pay again if you want the ad-free channels. All of this payment is just so you can watch the programming the networks want to give you. You don't get a say in the matter unless you're ordering pay-per-view.
Now, with the advent of On-Demand television, Digital Video Recorders, and so on, the market is beginning to change. People are beginning to realize that the middlemen aren't all necessary. The ads needed to create revinue for both the companies and the television stations aren't needed if you can sell a TV show directly. Even DVD sales may become a thing of the past in twenty years when some enterprising company sells DVRs with DVD burners, but I digress.
Piracy is not THEFT. It is COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT. Copyright laws have become horrible mangled beasts in the service of their corporate masters over the last 100 years. The core of the copyright law, that the creators of something get to distribute it for money in compensation for the time they spent creating it, is solid. The fact that someone of no relation to Walt Disney can create something related to Mickey Mouse a thousand years after his death and still hold copyright is an abomination.
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Josh
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#3
On the matter of movies, it is direct sales that affect their profitability, hence why they always refer to box office sales and overseas sales, then line those up with the cost of production. If they were making their dime off of ad placement, there'd be far more spots of regular commercial products and far less trailers for other movies.
On television advertising, remember the most important fact- viewers are the product that the TV industry delivers to the advertisers. Content in between advertisements is the bait to draw in the eyeballs.
Now, do you never buy products on the basis of advertising? Unlikely, because most people don't even realize the myriad ways they're being influenced. The two stages of advertising here would be brand awareness and brand reinforcement. One is telling about a product, the other is reminding you that it exists. The first is fairly obvious, while the second is so thoroughly saturated into our culture that the vast majority of people don't ever notice it. When a guy in a movie takes a big drink from a bottle of water and the camera zips by the logo on the bottle, you've just been hit with brand reinforcement.
That's all tangential to the question of piracy, but I'll take my swing at that when I get back from work.
On television advertising, remember the most important fact- viewers are the product that the TV industry delivers to the advertisers. Content in between advertisements is the bait to draw in the eyeballs.
Now, do you never buy products on the basis of advertising? Unlikely, because most people don't even realize the myriad ways they're being influenced. The two stages of advertising here would be brand awareness and brand reinforcement. One is telling about a product, the other is reminding you that it exists. The first is fairly obvious, while the second is so thoroughly saturated into our culture that the vast majority of people don't ever notice it. When a guy in a movie takes a big drink from a bottle of water and the camera zips by the logo on the bottle, you've just been hit with brand reinforcement.
That's all tangential to the question of piracy, but I'll take my swing at that when I get back from work.
When the Frog God smiles, arm yourself.
"'Flammable' and 'inflammable' have the same meaning! This language is insane!"
GIVE ME COFFEE AND I WILL ALLOW YOU TO LIVE!- Frigid
"Ork 'as no automatic code o' survival. 'is partic'lar distinction from all udda livin' gits is tha necessity ta act inna face o' alternatives by means o' dakka."
I created the sound of madness, wrote the book on pain
"'Flammable' and 'inflammable' have the same meaning! This language is insane!"
GIVE ME COFFEE AND I WILL ALLOW YOU TO LIVE!- Frigid
"Ork 'as no automatic code o' survival. 'is partic'lar distinction from all udda livin' gits is tha necessity ta act inna face o' alternatives by means o' dakka."
I created the sound of madness, wrote the book on pain
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B4UTRUST
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#4
Alright, but how does one say that the artist isn't being supported when tv, magazines, books, radio, the internet, etc. all display said artists driving around in brand new cars with 24s and killer sound systems, living in huge mansions, etc. Can you say that the artist isn't being supported when multiple surveys and research reports have stated time and time again that the sales of music and such are actually up since the age where Napster began and have grown, rather then declined? And moreso, why should one support an artist that, for instance, manages to produce one listenable song on a cd of 15 songs. Do you still feel that $15-20 or more is a fair price to pay just for one song that you like and 14 others that suck more then Richard Simmons at an all male orgy?Hotfoot wrote: Now, the MPAA and the RIAA are corrupt institutions involved in price gouging and unfair business practices, and they certainly deserve scorn and a swift kick in the ass. However, at the end of the line, artists deserve support. Consider this: YOU are the artist. You are acting or singing or writing or what have you. You are literally spending hours of your life working on things that make other people feel good/bad/whatever. People want what you create. Is this not demand? Logically, should you not be compensated for the work you have done in creating this? If I don't get any monetary compensation at all, the only reason for me to do it is that I love doing it, but at the end of the day, love doesn't put food on my plate or a roof over my head. If artists could not make a living doing what they do, art would be much scarcer. Now, maybe that would be a good thing in that our society would move away from the "entertain me NOW" trend that's occuring, but I'm not sure we would like the results.
These aren't directed questions at Hotfoot specifically, rather questions in general that I'd like some discussion on.
Saint Annihilus - Patron Saint of Dealing with Stupid Customers
#5
And they're good questions, but I think they go to the point of the current level of corruption of the industry, rather than the basic concept of the law as it was originally intended.
It's clear that internet distribution of songs doesn't necessarily hurt sales or compensation, but had the napster model somehow gathered mainstream support and was as iTunes is now (but free), the industry WOULD have a problem. If the free versions are as easy to get as the retail versions, and have the same quality and versatility, there is no incentive aside from decency to give artists money. At that point, you really are just making money from T-Shirt sales.
It should also be noted that as glamorous as the life of stars tend to be, most of that is off of gifts from the middlemen, rather than direct profit. The people making the real money are men in suits who promote the musicians and manage them, not the actual artists (this changes somewhat in movies/TV, but not by that much, apparently).
On the smaller scale though, a garage band in Indiana would want to prevent the larger companies from stealing their songs and selling them for a profit without permission or sending the red cent to the original creators.
Like I said, Copyright law as a concept is good, but it's grown into a monster.
And as for the price of CDs, yeah, we know it's BS. They've been gouging that since the early 90's. It's like how the phone companies got away with charging us such outrageous rates for long distance calls. Ten cents a minute may sound good compared to what they used to charge, but if you look at what it really costs to send a call like that, it's damn clear they're pretty much printing money.
It's clear that internet distribution of songs doesn't necessarily hurt sales or compensation, but had the napster model somehow gathered mainstream support and was as iTunes is now (but free), the industry WOULD have a problem. If the free versions are as easy to get as the retail versions, and have the same quality and versatility, there is no incentive aside from decency to give artists money. At that point, you really are just making money from T-Shirt sales.
It should also be noted that as glamorous as the life of stars tend to be, most of that is off of gifts from the middlemen, rather than direct profit. The people making the real money are men in suits who promote the musicians and manage them, not the actual artists (this changes somewhat in movies/TV, but not by that much, apparently).
On the smaller scale though, a garage band in Indiana would want to prevent the larger companies from stealing their songs and selling them for a profit without permission or sending the red cent to the original creators.
Like I said, Copyright law as a concept is good, but it's grown into a monster.
And as for the price of CDs, yeah, we know it's BS. They've been gouging that since the early 90's. It's like how the phone companies got away with charging us such outrageous rates for long distance calls. Ten cents a minute may sound good compared to what they used to charge, but if you look at what it really costs to send a call like that, it's damn clear they're pretty much printing money.
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Josh
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#6
Stars make their money touring, not selling albums.
My view? Right or wrong, RIAA and the MPAA are going to have to adapt. What they're doing now is essentially tantamount to charging for oxygen in the substantive sense (if not the ethical one). The material is going to get out on the net, and no amount of countermeasures on their part will stop it.
Hence, the price of recorded media is simply going to have to come to reflect market reality. They can't handle that? Tough shit. A lot of auto glass cutters got put out of jobs when they introduced curved windshields, too. Seen many retail blacksmiths lately?
(Tev and Nit don't count for the last part.
)
My view? Right or wrong, RIAA and the MPAA are going to have to adapt. What they're doing now is essentially tantamount to charging for oxygen in the substantive sense (if not the ethical one). The material is going to get out on the net, and no amount of countermeasures on their part will stop it.
Hence, the price of recorded media is simply going to have to come to reflect market reality. They can't handle that? Tough shit. A lot of auto glass cutters got put out of jobs when they introduced curved windshields, too. Seen many retail blacksmiths lately?
(Tev and Nit don't count for the last part.
)When the Frog God smiles, arm yourself.
"'Flammable' and 'inflammable' have the same meaning! This language is insane!"
GIVE ME COFFEE AND I WILL ALLOW YOU TO LIVE!- Frigid
"Ork 'as no automatic code o' survival. 'is partic'lar distinction from all udda livin' gits is tha necessity ta act inna face o' alternatives by means o' dakka."
I created the sound of madness, wrote the book on pain
"'Flammable' and 'inflammable' have the same meaning! This language is insane!"
GIVE ME COFFEE AND I WILL ALLOW YOU TO LIVE!- Frigid
"Ork 'as no automatic code o' survival. 'is partic'lar distinction from all udda livin' gits is tha necessity ta act inna face o' alternatives by means o' dakka."
I created the sound of madness, wrote the book on pain
#7
As someone who's worked for a record company, I have to reinforce what Petrosjko says. Truly successful labels use a path that works kind of like this:
Record Album > Schedule Tour > Market Album > Public Appearances to Market Album > Viral Marketing and More Public Appearances to Market Tour > Tour > Merch.
Some labels that don't want to try that hard go this route:
Record Single > Market Single > Record 10-11 Filler Tracks and 2-3 More Singles > Public Appearances and Viral to Market Album > Merch.
But if you really want success in the music world, the merch and the album don't mean shit compared to the tour. Here's some data from a particularly good tour I worked with on one show:
Tour ran from March 24, 2001 - December 2, 2001. 3 legs. 113 shows.
Total revenue? $110 million just in ticket sales.
Unless you can consistently put out fucking excellent albums with godsent marketing, you simply can't make that much off of records.
Oh, and the follow-up tour to the tour I listed above?
4 legs, 120 shows, not finished yet. Revenue so far? $260 million in ticket sales in 2005 alone.
Record Album > Schedule Tour > Market Album > Public Appearances to Market Album > Viral Marketing and More Public Appearances to Market Tour > Tour > Merch.
Some labels that don't want to try that hard go this route:
Record Single > Market Single > Record 10-11 Filler Tracks and 2-3 More Singles > Public Appearances and Viral to Market Album > Merch.
But if you really want success in the music world, the merch and the album don't mean shit compared to the tour. Here's some data from a particularly good tour I worked with on one show:
Tour ran from March 24, 2001 - December 2, 2001. 3 legs. 113 shows.
Total revenue? $110 million just in ticket sales.
Unless you can consistently put out fucking excellent albums with godsent marketing, you simply can't make that much off of records.
Oh, and the follow-up tour to the tour I listed above?
4 legs, 120 shows, not finished yet. Revenue so far? $260 million in ticket sales in 2005 alone.
#8
As far as I can see, taking something without the owner's permission is wrong if you deprive the rightful owner of property or compensation.
Piracy obviously does not deprive the rightful owner of property, because the pirated good is something that an unlimited number of people can own at the same time.
So, then it comes down to compensation.
Obviously, if a title is out of print, you can't possibly be depriving the rightful owner of compensation, because you are incapable of purchasing the good.
Alternately, if you are trying the good to see if you like it, you're doing nothing more 'wrong' than reading the first chapter of a novel in a bookstore to see if it's worth your $7.50. As far as I can see, this is what most of the piracy/sharing of music is. Most people will either listen to a song once and then delete it or forget about it, or they will love it, and become very likely to buy an album or a concert ticket.
Thirdly, if you would be unwilling to pay the marked price for something, or ask for it as a gift, or save up and buy it, or anything of that sort, because you think the utility you would gain from it is not worth the cost, you are not depriving the owner of compensation by aquiring it without paying. Pennilless students, for example, will probably never spend twenty dollars on an album of an artist that they havn't already learned to like through free media of some sort; they might, however, grow up to be wealthy white-collar workers who, by borrowing/downloading/sharing music in their earlier years, decided they love a particular artist, and buy a half dozen albums.
That's as far as my thinking has taken me. If anyone has a counterargument or adition to it, I'd be happy to hear it.
Piracy obviously does not deprive the rightful owner of property, because the pirated good is something that an unlimited number of people can own at the same time.
So, then it comes down to compensation.
Obviously, if a title is out of print, you can't possibly be depriving the rightful owner of compensation, because you are incapable of purchasing the good.
Alternately, if you are trying the good to see if you like it, you're doing nothing more 'wrong' than reading the first chapter of a novel in a bookstore to see if it's worth your $7.50. As far as I can see, this is what most of the piracy/sharing of music is. Most people will either listen to a song once and then delete it or forget about it, or they will love it, and become very likely to buy an album or a concert ticket.
Thirdly, if you would be unwilling to pay the marked price for something, or ask for it as a gift, or save up and buy it, or anything of that sort, because you think the utility you would gain from it is not worth the cost, you are not depriving the owner of compensation by aquiring it without paying. Pennilless students, for example, will probably never spend twenty dollars on an album of an artist that they havn't already learned to like through free media of some sort; they might, however, grow up to be wealthy white-collar workers who, by borrowing/downloading/sharing music in their earlier years, decided they love a particular artist, and buy a half dozen albums.
That's as far as my thinking has taken me. If anyone has a counterargument or adition to it, I'd be happy to hear it.