US Government Calls Piracy "Unadulterated Theft"

[Logan Westbrook]

US Government Calls Piracy "Unadulterated Theft"

The American government has taken a firm stance on piracy, saying that it is a serious threat to the country's economy.

Pirates - the digital kind, not the nautical kind - are nothing but thieves according to US Secretary of Commerce Gary Locke. Speaking in Nashville, Tennessee, Locke said that tackling piracy was a "fundamental issue of American economic competitiveness."

Locke said that ingenuity, innovation and creativity was America's single greatest asset, and that the piracy of intellectual property was something that the government took very seriously. He called the internet a double-edged sword, as it made piracy possible on a much larger scale than ever before, but it was also an avenue for incredible growth if used properly. He admitted, however, that copyright law needed to evolve to meet the challenges of the 21st century, and the Department of Commerce would soon seek public opinion on the best way to proceed with this goal, as well as try to establish international copyright norms.

Admittedly, Locke was talking about music, which presents different challenges than videogames, but it's unlikely that his opinion on software piracy is much different. Equating piracy to theft is problematic however, as it's not quite the same crime; and despite Locke's assertion that pirates should be "dealt with accordingly," the punishments for piracy are often ridiculously [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/102010-Judge-Declares-File-Sharing-Fine-Unconstitutional] harsh [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/92531-File-Sharing-Single-Mom-Loses-Again].

Source: Ars Technica [http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2010/08/obama-administration-piracy-is-flat-unadulterated-theft.ars]


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[Hiphophippo]

So it's official then? A pirate is "stealing" even though the person he "stole" from doesn't lose anything?

Sounds fishy.

 

[tomtom94]

And as I said in the other thread, it is.
You are taking a service without paying.

EDIT: This metaphor retroactively removed following complaints. Instead I'll just say this:

I'm just going to retroactively delete my metaphor seeing as everyone's berating me for it and completely missing the point - let's not get bogged down with definitions of copyright infringement and theft, you are not paying for something, call it whatever the fuck you want it's still illegal.

 

[rembrandtqeinstein]

I'll just leave this here:

 

[Irridium]

Piracy is not stealing or theft. However it is still wrong(in most cases).
And another thing:

ingenuity, innovation and creativity

That was funnier than it should have been.

 

[ShadowsofHope]

Piracy is theft whichever way you cut it, at least in my opinion. But, piracy is not the leading cause of financial loss for corporations and musicians, either. Greed is.

 

[Fortuan]

i agree a game is indeed an intellectual property you get the game to play it so they should make money on your ability to do so

 

[rembrandtqeinstein]

oh and also

 

[jamesworkshop]

Well i'm sure all the chinese pirates are really going to care

 

[tomtom94]

Think of it like this: A plumber comes round to fix your boiler and asks for £50. You say "I won't pay you because I think you charge too much and you're not losing anything by me not paying you."

Bad example is bad. In your case, the plumber just broke his back for you - of course he loses something if you don't pay him. In the case of piracy, it's like rigging your neighbour's plumbing so that when it ever breaks, fixing it will also fix yours at no additional effort.

Errr...this might just be me being dumb, but that makes no sense, apart from making me wish I could come up with better examples.

Are you saying that the people who work in the special effects studios and the editing studios aren't deserving of their tiny cut of money? Cause I'm fairly certain they break their backs trying to help too.

 

[Karathos]

I'll just leave this here:

I was gonna post a long litany about all this, but found that this picture neatly summarizes what I was going to say. It's hilarious how a GOVERNMENT can't get this simple fact. Feel free to call it a CRIME - but it is not THEFT (until they change the definition of theft anyway).

Also, I would download a car.

 

[Formica Archonis]

It's hilarious how a GOVERNMENT can't get this simple fact.

Not getting facts is one of the mainstays of government. A chain is as strong as its weakest link, and governments are fond of generating more links.

 

[mjc0961]

The government is right, it's stealing. The thieves can put whatever bullshit spin on it that they want, such as "I wouldn't have bought it anyway" or "they still have the original" but the fact remains that you took something without paying for it. That's theft.

 

[razer17]

Their is a difference between the GOVERNMENT saying piracy is theft, and one individual who happens to be in the governments saying it. Same thing I said when people where saying that the UK government wanted MoH banned. No they didn't one guy did.

 

[JaredXE]

Nooooo, no it's not. It's COPYRIGHT INFINGEMENT children. Because nothing physical is actually stolen and nothing prevents the developers(and the publishers and other middle-man people) from recieving money for that game, because nothing was STOLEN.

Christ, I can't believe people still call it theft.

 

[ASnogarD]

Probably find the music record labels have been lobbying for sterner anti piracy laws in the US, like in the UK. They cant overprice thier stuff as buyers will simply pirate them if it gets too expensive, also they cant stuff singles with fillers and sell them for full price so easily with piracy about.

In short if you couldnt pirate music, videos and games the price would rocket, and the value would depreciate.

Still pisses me off, paid £14 for a CD when I heard a song the band played everywhere... I liked the song and bought thier CD but that was the ONLY song I liked on the whole flipping CD and the rest of the songs were nothing like that song, like a totally different group had sung the rest of the CD's songs.

 

[Desworks]

Locke said that ingenuity, innovation and creativity was America's single greatest asset

Shouldn't Locke be celebrating pirates then? They have always shown ingenuity, innovation and creativity when it comes to breaking through all the DRMs that stand between them and their chosen booty. Not to mention all the work they have put into making a pile of very nice file sharing systems!

 

[Jared]

Well, its going to be intresting to see where this leads in terms of policy