Comment by beloch | Hacker News Reader

Comment by beloch | Hacker News Reader

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I'm sure there are many reading this who have absolutely no sympathy for pirates. They're stealing and that's that.

Well, how do you feel about your government blackmailing, extorting, or otherwise "strong-arming" other sovereign nations in order to foist its laws upon them and then hiding that from you? (It really is a minor miracle this cable was released at all.) Is it truly worth stooping to such measures to ensure that Micky Mouse remains copyright protected for all time everywhere? Don't other nations have the right to make their own laws? How would you feel if some other nation foisted it's laws on the U.S. in such a manner? Why does the U.S. government go to such extremes for private enterprise anyways?[1]

Piracy is bad. What the U.S. government has done in response is worse.

[1]I suggest you google the United Fruit Company's history the next time you're eating a Chiquita banana for a real eye opener.

Copyright holders lose customers because of piracy, but that's not stealing.

If I sell some object and my logistics is that I sell 3 per months, then I manufacture 3 objects per months and wait for customers to buy them. If someone steals one, then I've only 2 remaining objects. I've the choice between telling the 3rd expected customer that I'm out, or to manufacture one extra, which in any case result in a direct loss of money. I'm a victim of theft.

If I'm a film producer and my logistics is that I sell N viewings per month, and someone pirates the movie, then this doesn't interfere with my ability to sell the N viewings to my expected customers. So this isn't theft. Of course, I would like the pirate to be my customer so that I can step up to N+1 viewing per month, but if I want to enforce that I need to turn to who made the copy available to the pirate, which is counterfeit.

After decades of extreme propaganda on the subject, most Americans equate piracy to theft, which is obviously untrue.

Beyond that, there is a hatred toward piracy that is arguably worse than that of theft.

Fighting this propaganda-fueled nonsense is difficult, because piracy, on the surface, is a choice to not pay rightsholders, which is, on the surface, bad.

As soon as one digs beneath the surface, however, it is easy to find many neutral, or even good reasons to "pirate" content.

The abuse by rightsholders, organizations, and even government in the name of protecting copyright is bad, and not simply on the surface. It is a deep-rooted, malicious system, and people ought to understand that whatever hatred they have toward piracy, they should have ten fold toward anti-piracy.

"don't steal, the government hates competition" - some bumper sticker

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