Poll: Would You Pirate Media You Already Own

[RhombusHatesYou]

Yet we have things like Foxtel IQ and Tivo as well as actual DVD recorders - sold quite legally, which allow - infact recording is encouraged and is the actual SELLING point of Tivo and Foxtel IQ, of course a given with a DVD recorder.

'Time Shifting' and 'Format Shifting' are perfectly legal in Australia. Even when the Howard govt tried to tighten up some 'holes' (ie, things our American 'allies' didn't like) they left those alone. That means recording shows to watch later (Time Shifting) and ripping CDs to mp3 (format shifting) are legal here.

Hell, last time I looked making back-up/archival copies of stuff is perfectly legal here.

 

[RhombusHatesYou]

Aszsuming youve trained your cat to press the EULA agreement.

Don't know if they've stitched up the loophole yet or not but in South Australia you could use 'disagreeing with the EULA' as grounds to force a store to accept a game return... all because there was no option to read the EULA before purchase.


Better still is asking to the see the EULA before making a purchase.

Come to think of it, we should really start trying to make that a habit for gaming consumers. DEMAND TO SEE THE EULA PRE-PURCHASE.

 

[Summerstorm]

I do that very often... I pay for it because it is good... then i download an alternate version not available to me.

For example: If you buy some games off Steam or other places in germany you get a cut version which was advertised wrong. (I am looking at YOU FALLOUT 3). So to play the real game i have to download it again.

I find it not moraly objectionable, even if not entirely lawful, i guess. There are other things like DVD-Releases without certain languages or cut scenes or maybe music albums where there is one with a bonus track... i MEAN: COME ON. Oh and also: destroyed CD's. Emule is a nice archive for things you owned and are now not in working condition.

 

[antidonkey]

The title of this thread confuses me. How can you priate something you already own? It's like stealing your own car.

 

[swenson]

Yeah, I don't see anything wrong with it, to be honest. For example, say I have a digital copy of something (a movie, a song, etc.), and it would be difficult for me to transfer it (I lost my flash drive or something). In such a case, it'd be easier to just download a new version than it is to go through the work of transferring the legal copy. Or I have a hard copy of something (a book) and want to be able to search through it quickly, so I download a PDF version. Or for whatever reason, I can't use a CD to install a game (happened to me twice, once because the CD drive was broken, once because I lost the CD), so I download it. That sort of thing. I really don't see what the problem is legally. I already paid the makers for it, I'm not purposefully distributing it to people who haven't paid for it, and I'm not getting any profit out of it other than a new use of something I already own.

And if the creators of something are so uptight that they want to prosecute me for daring to experience their product in a slightly different form than the original, that's just moronic and unfair to paying customers.

 

[AstylahAthrys]

I have once. My disc for Oblivion PC got ravaged by my 4-year-old niece going through my room. I didn't want to buy the whole set of discs again so I downloaded the first disc so I could still play it.

 

[Erja_Perttu]

I don't see a problem with it. You've paid the money, so why not make sure you've got a backup.

 

[Cid Silverwing]

Obviously the media already works (assuming it isn't DRM'd), why steal it if I bought it?

Of course if the DRM denied me my product I would pirate it.

 

[MetalDooley]

Yes and I have.When I was ripping my CD collection to my PC I discovered that several of my older albums were in bad shape through scratches or whatever so I downloaded copies instead.Don't see anything wrong with it.They already got their money from me

 

[thepj]

only if there was no way for me to get it again without paying for it, otherwise no.. that'd be stupid

 

[Nemu]

Yep. I used to do it all of the time (before I learned how to bypass my physical copies' anti-piracy hardware) when it came to certain artists who insisted on making their product "non-piratable", which also meant I couldn't upload it onto my MP3 player.

Frankly, it's BS that I could pay for an over-priced CD then be expected to buy a digital copy.

Since I've bought THOUSANDS of over-priced CDs, cassettes and LPs over the years, I can damn sure download something to determine if it's worth buying.

 

[YoUnG205]

I really see no godd reason to get what I already have agian.

 

[zhoominator]

Yes, in fact I have done so. I forgot to take my CDs down with me to Uni so when I got a new iPod (and iTunes installed on my then-new laptop), I didn't want my parents sending all my CDs down in the mail just so I could have smething to listen to. Hey, as soon as I got home I deleted all of the mp3 files and used my CDs anyway so I didn't really see the problem.

 

[Babitz]

If it weren't for piracy, games wouldn't be so widespread nowadays...

People are very harsh regarding piracy. Well, there is a good reason to it. However, I don't know about you guys, but I was too poor during my childhood to afford original games. If I could, I would've bought tons of them.

But think of it this way: the ones who pirate games and don't buy original ones would've never bought the original ones in the first place. Anti piracy doesn't force anyone to buy the original ones. In fact, many gamers downloaded games and after they've completed them, they decided to buy them. Basically, piracy did some favors to the game industry. A lot of them, in fact. Even some pirate groups tell you to buy original games if you like them.

The best protection against piracy is making a good game, because everyone will be proud to have it on their shelf somewhere as a reminder of their fun times together. I'm not a supporter of piracy, but whether you like it or not, piracy did some great stuff for the gaming industry.

edit
The same's with mp3. I have a friend who downloaded lots of albums out of curiosity. He liked some bands and afterwards he bought tons of albums, shirts and even went to concerts.

 

[Commander Jack Rankin]

There's no point in stealing something I already own.

 

[thenumberthirteen]

I have the first two series of The Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy radio play on Cassette, and I really wanted to listen to it on my trip to Scotland. Buying the CDs, MP3s, or a cassette to MP3 recorder seemed really stupid as I already owned it. So I downloaded the MP3s to put on my iPod.

 

[Eclectic Dreck]

I've done it more than once. For example, I wanted to replay Mass Effect to get a save game before ME2 came out (my original play through, aka my "official" play through was done on 360, which happened to be dead at the time) but I could no longer located my cd key for my PC copy of the game. Rather than simply repurchase the game to acquire a key, I downloaded a cracked version instead. I feel no guilt at having done so as I had already purchased said game twice.

 

[GeraltofSmeg]

Well, why not, i bought the media, and by that, bought the licence to use the content, which makes that "piracy" not so piraty anymore.