The Student Room Group

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Before people start referring to various statistics on the impact of piracy, they might want to have a look at these:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/jun/05/ben-goldacre-bad-science-music-downloads
http://www.computerworlduk.com/community/blogs/index.cfm?entryid=2912&blogid=14&pn=1
http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2007/11/mpaa-talks-turk/
http://www.p2pnet.net/story/16795
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2008/10/dodgy-digits-behind-the-war-on-piracy.ars/1
http://www.freedom-to-tinker.com/blog/tblee/piracy-statistics-and-importance-journalistic-skepticism

A couple of interesting papers I stumbled across (among several):
http://www.allacademic.com//meta/p_mla_apa_research_citation/1/7/2/9/6/pages172966/p172966-1.php
http://www.springerlink.com/content/3c880fte1fyw03ed/fulltext.pdf


D.R.E
As for DVDs, you have to be rather stupid to gather a collection of films on had formats that become obsolete within 2-4 years of release. Film companies need to wise up; buying/keeping DVDs is impractical so why not release new films online cheaply so people can watch them when they like and they can easily update the files available when new tech like HD or 3D turns up. Instead of releasing a new version of the same things every 2 years.

VHS was released to the public in 1976, and the last major distribution was at the end of 2008. DVDs have been on the market in Japan since 1996, America since 1997, and Europe since 1998. They are still going strong, despite the introduction of HD optical discs, and are unlikely to disappear any time soon (looking, for example, at the time it took for VHS to die after the introduction of DVDs), especially given the backwards-compatibility of Blu-Ray and the like.
As much as I agree with the sentiment of your post, your media time-estimates are way out.

And as for unemployment: until anyone can give any shred of evidence that piracy has caused significant unemployment, anything at all with credibility that hasn't been spat out by the MPAA, RIAA as a means of profit-inflating propaganda, I will continue to ignore such claims with disdain.
Reply 101
BermyHopeful
First of all, this is not a very good point, because you cannot just 'make an exact copy of a physical object', especially with the little effort of a click of a button, and with a lack of material cost like you can when you download/pirate files, so this kind of arbitrary comparison is impossible.

Second, while not being physical theft, technically it is still another form of theft, because you are stealing the 'RIGHT' or priviledge to watch a movie when you download it (without paying the company), rather than stealing the physical file. It's very similar to as if you snuck into the movie theatre itself, or say a football match, without paying. Not only have you stolen the right to be in the stadium/theatre for that period in the value of ticket costs, you have avoided complying by the same rules which 95% of others have abided by, meaning that you are morally cheating).

(Whether you would have paid or not if you had to is irrelevant, you are still thieving it, so morally breaking the rules. It brings up a lot of complications in life, like the practicality of morality, and if you should cheat the system if you can, blah blah blah.)

It really depends on one's personal moral designs, and how one defines theft...


That's ridiculous, everyone knows that you would need a computer and internet connection to download files illegally. I wouldn't define a computer and internet connection as 'a lack of material cost'. I think anyone would agree that '£500 for decent computer + monthly internet bills' is not a small sum of money.

Also, it is possible make an exact same copy of a physical object. In some cases, this would be easier than having the money to buy a computer and to support the internet bills.
The reason ticket prices at the cinema is because of the extortionate way in which studios lean on the cinemas. The reason food is so expensive at the cinema is because it is one of the few ways in which cinemas can recoup money. This cycle might not be caused directly by piracy, but it certainly doesn't help it.

People who try to justify piracy are idiots. Everyone who partakes in piracy knows that they are doing something wrong, they just don't care.
Reply 103
It does have an effect, but so does pricing like people on here have said.

I used to go to my local cinema every single week when it was like £2-3 for a ticket. And the food was cheap there.

Now I'm lucky if I can afford to go once a month- the small local one closed down. Of course, I'm a student so not that representative. But I can't imagine how families manage, it would be easy to spend like £40-50 just to take your kids and get them all a drink. So whether or not they pirate, it stops them going.
W.H.T
That's ridiculous, everyone knows that you would need a computer and internet connection to download files illegally. I wouldn't define a computer and internet connection as 'a lack of material cost'. I think anyone would agree that '£500 for decent computer + monthly internet bills' is not a small sum of money.

Also, it is possible make an exact same copy of a physical object. In some cases, this would be easier than having the money to buy a computer and to support the internet bills.


Lol, what I mean is you are not paying specifically for MAKING that single copy, are you? Whilst you pay for the service that allows you to, the physical action is costless. Most people would already have a computer and internet connection in modern society, they didn't just buy it to pirate movies :rolleyes:

There is no way to make matter out of nothing, so you cannot just 'create' a copy of a clock, without having to pay for the material it is made out of (rather than the tools/techniques involved). However, with the click of a button, files can be created out of no material in the digital world, merely taking up digital space (or at least, with a disproportionately small amount of effort and cost).

In this case, the 'computer hardware' that you refer to is equivalent to paying for the equipment or person which makes/creates the copy of a physical object, whilst in comparison the material costs of the physical object itself are equivalent to the zero material costs of downloading (unless you count the space it takes up, in which case physical objects take up physical space).

And..

Phalanges
The reason ticket prices at the cinema is because of the extortionate way in which studios lean on the cinemas. The reason food is so expensive at the cinema is because it is one of the few ways in which cinemas can recoup money. This cycle might not be caused directly by piracy, but it certainly doesn't help it.

People who try to justify piracy are idiots. Everyone who partakes in piracy knows that they are doing something wrong, they just don't care.


:yep: This, basically. Not much of a better way to sum it up...