Quote:
Originally Posted by psyang
Honestly, I have no problem with your approach. If you download a song, don't like it, and remove it from your system, then not paying for it makes sense to me - especially since the cost to the artist of you downloading the song is virtually 0. This is just my opinion, and I understand things get murky when, say, you've listened to a song 5 times before deciding to remove it. What is right or wrong suddenly becomes quite subjective, and the model becomes based on the honor system. But it's still better than outright piracy.
I also don't know what to make of HBO. My understanding is that their revenue stream comes mainly from their licensing deals with cable providers. As such, you could say that all of their content is already paid for - it's up to the cable providers to ensure they get enough subscribers to justify having HBO in their lineup. As such, there's no incentive for HBO to curb piracy of their shows - that responsibility has been delegated to the cable providers.
I agree - I don't think piracy can be stopped unless an absolutely full-proof copy protection scheme magically appeared. I think the idea of focusing on services instead of content makes a lot of sense - but unless a content provider actually offers their content for free, I don't feel I have a right to download it.
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I know that what I do isn't exactly right. I am still downloading someone elses hard work for free. I get that. I am also probably in the minority of people who would actually go out and buy a CD or DVD. But that doesn't make it right. I don't know what the solution is but most people aren't going to spend money if they know they can get something for free. They have to provide something that is easy, safe and more convenient than going to a torrent site without all the DRM attached. Shaming people isn't really going to solve the problem and DRM only impacts those who are legally buying the product in the first place. They have to get people to look at illegally downloading as more of a hassle. I
could pirate a video game but it's way easier for me to pick it up on sale where I don't have to worry about viruses or spyware infecting my PC. I think Valve has done a pretty good job at, not so much combating piracy, but encouraging people to pay for games.