View from the Road: When I Was a Pirate

[sunpop]

I don't pirate games and technically I never have unless you count old outdated games that I play on emulators. You know those games the devs wouldn't see a penny from the sales of anyway because it's used. However some times I am willing to like with ubisoft, I want to play the new settlers game but the only good version is the cracked version. I could buy it then pirate it but I would rather not boost their sales as long as they have that horrible internet connection drm.

I haven't pirated it so far but I will admit I'm very tempted.

 

[ionveau]

2. I pirate and play the game and don't mention it at all to anyone. Nothing to you.
3. I don't pirate the game, and don't play it. Nothing to you.

So, there's a difference between 2 and 3 apart from me losing out?

Yes. C, who didn't want to pirate, have had the same enjoyment you did while doing 2. C is the one who is paying the developers so that they can pay they workers and release more games. Only now C feels like an idiot because he coughed up $60, which he felt was well spent, until he realized you played the same game and didn't pay a dime.

Think of the C.

Yes the teen living the perfect life, living in a house in a rich area with no crime, with a mom and dad with high income jobs, he/she can have any game console he wants a wii PS3 xbox anything, His mom and dad even buy him collectors editions for his birthday so he can have the little toy or the art book that come with it, Yes life is good why would he need to pirate right?


Or lets talk about his counterpart

Lets talk about Teen B, B lives with one of his parents, his mom after his dad lift them, his mother works all day at a restaurant, Teen B cant go out side because the area he lives in is known for crime, The only entertainment he has is his computer.


Overall i agree that pricey is bad, No its not bad because its stealing no. Its wrong because it distroys the social higharcy, You see a person without money should not be happy with his life, or should not be entertained, there should always be a struggle to be better, by having people just take what they want we are one step closer to everything being free,

You see people say that the poor play a key role in society, they are there so we work hard or study hard to not be where they are, now that a person with not so much money can own the whole library of adobe CS5, the whole fear is starting to leave people.

 

[Space Jawa]

I had something I was going to add to the conversation that wasn't a reply, but then John Funk pretty much said anything I was going to and probably better than I could have said it. So I'll summarize my thoughts on this matter as "John Funk is right."

OK, I'm now officially speaking as someone coming to the end of a games design course, who is in the rounds of pitching a game idea to publishers.

I have spent four years of my life designing a game. They have been long, hard years where my only goal has been creating the world from scratch, populating it with a host of NPCs, designing rules, systems, and character creation, building models, writing scripts and dialogue, drawing concept art and breathing life into a creation that is distinctly my own. In that time, I have worked shitty jobs to keep my software up to date, I have gone to college and spent two years being told I'll never get anywhere with what "isn't a real qualification", my grandmother has died never seeing me ammount to anything, I have lived with people who hate me and in bedsits full of rats to save money for the games that I love and want to spend my life making.

If you aren't willing to pay for what I have suffered for, you do not get to play it.

Also, I think due to Chipperz stake in the matter, they have a lot better perspective on the matter than most, if not all, the rest of us. I say that in addition to John Funk being right, we should all take the time to listen to Chipperz.

Lets talk about Teen B, B lives with one of his parents, his mom after his dad lift them, his mother works all day at a restaurant, Teen B cant go out side because the area he lives in is known for crime, The only entertainment he has is his computer.

Or perhaps instead of wasting his time in front of his computer playing games, Teen B could try to improve his life by working hard, saving his money, trying to do better in school, and make an effort to establish a better future for himself where his kids won't experience the same life he's living. A better future may not be a sure thing, but it is a sure thing that Teen Bs life will never get better if he doesn't try. It would help if his Father was around to take care of his family and raise the kid too, but that's a discussion for a whole other topic.

 

[ionveau]

I had something I was going to add to the conversation that wasn't a reply, but then John Funk pretty much said anything I was going to and probably better than I could have said it. So I'll summarize my thoughts on this matter as "John Funk is right."

OK, I'm now officially speaking as someone coming to the end of a games design course, who is in the rounds of pitching a game idea to publishers.

I have spent four years of my life designing a game. They have been long, hard years where my only goal has been creating the world from scratch, populating it with a host of NPCs, designing rules, systems, and character creation, building models, writing scripts and dialogue, drawing concept art and breathing life into a creation that is distinctly my own. In that time, I have worked shitty jobs to keep my software up to date, I have gone to college and spent two years being told I'll never get anywhere with what "isn't a real qualification", my grandmother has died never seeing me ammount to anything, I have lived with people who hate me and in bedsits full of rats to save money for the games that I love and want to spend my life making.

If you aren't willing to pay for what I have suffered for, you do not get to play it.

Also, I think due to Chipperz stake in the matter, they have a lot better perspective on the matter than most, if not all, the rest of us. I say that in addition to John Funk being right, we should all take the time to listen to Chipperz.

Lets talk about Teen B, B lives with one of his parents, his mom after his dad lift them, his mother works all day at a restaurant, Teen B cant go out side because the area he lives in is known for crime, The only entertainment he has is his computer.

Or perhaps instead of wasting his time in front of his computer playing games, Teen B could try to improve his life by working hard, saving his money, trying to do better in school, and make an effort to establish a better future for himself where his kids won't experience the same life he's living. A better future may not be a sure thing, but it is a sure thing that Teen Bs life will never get better if he doesn't try. It would help if his Father was around to take care of his family and raise the kid too, but that's a discussion for a whole other topic.

thats not the point read again

 

[Branches]

People will always want something for free, and there will always be a provider for such goods and services. This won't stop any time soon, the most you can do is hope that it dies down through firm enforcement, which from the looks of things, isn't happening as well as it used to.

 

[Rorschach_pln]

Well I'm from Bulgaria, and here piracy is the status quo. If you buy an original game, people look at you like "What the hell is he smoking?" Pirating is so built into our routine, we don't event think about it. "Hey, did you go see that movie" "Nah, I'm gonna wait for the dvd release". Movies aside, with games there is very little option. The problem is they are just so expensive. We recently became a part of the EU, so we get games prices in euros. That's fine, but the price is the same as in other, much larger counties. The average wage in my country is about $500, or less 400 euros, and our games cost about 50 euros. So in a month, you'd be able ot buy a maximum of 8 games and starve to death. Well, 8 games is a lot, but still, you buy 2 new games and thats more that 25% of you salary right there. There are no rentals here, buy it or pirate it. And the choice is obvious.
Now, the way I see it, you can still be somewhat successful in sales here. The most successful game is WoW, and soon probably SC2. In both cases you have to own the game to play online, so thats all the protection you need right there. And we all know Blizzard make great games, so a lot of us are going to dish out the cash for them. But if companies had a different pricing here, we would certainly buy a lot more. But that won't happen, so pirates we remain ...

 

[ionveau]

Well I'm from Bulgaria, and here piracy is the status quo. If you buy an original game, people look at you like "What the hell is he smoking?" Pirating is so built into our routine, we don't event think about it. "Hey, did you go see that movie" "Nah, I'm gonna wait for the dvd release". Movies aside, with games there is very little option. The problem is they are just so expensive. We recently became a part of the EU, so we get games prices in euros. That's fine, but the price is the same as in other, much larger counties. The average wage in my country is about $500, or less 400 euros, and our games cost about 50 euros. So in a month, you'd be able ot buy a maximum of 8 games and starve to death. Well, 8 games is a lot, but still, you buy 2 new games and thats more that 25% of you salary right there. There are no rentals here, buy it or pirate it. And the choice is obvious.
Now, the way I see it, you can still be somewhat successful in sales here. The most successful game is WoW, and soon probably SC2. In both cases you have to own the game to play online, so thats all the protection you need right there. And we all know Blizzard make great games, so a lot of us are going to dish out the cash for them. But if companies had a different pricing here, we would certainly buy a lot more. But that won't happen, so pirates we remain ...

The problem is not money, the main problem is people enjoying being poor, if a person can be happy with just his computer then we as a society have run into a problem,

Example getting something for nothing, taxes tariffs and other trade barriers, why dont we question those? we dont because we are told they are good, basically all of us(myself as well) are sheep told to baa baa the same sound over and over.

Soo overall getting something for nothing is ok if its a tax or a terrif, not if its a software copy,

Pirecy helps "the people" = bad
Taxes,terrifs help goverments = good

Both are getting something for nothing explain why support one but not the other,
anyways i explained why i supported anti pirecy you explain now

Overall i dont expect deep thinking or insight

 

[Weaver]

The Wolfire blog probably says it best:
http://blog.wolfire.com/2010/05/Another-view-of-game-piracy

 

[Lyri]

Exactly.

You don't get everything you want because WAAHHHH I WANT IT NOW. For Christ's sake, people went without for the whole of human civilization. Kids with noses pressed up against the windows of stores looking at the thing they want and saving their allowance. They don't get a Red Ryder BB Gun away because they think they're entitled to it.

It's a rationalization, and it's total bunk.

Except, a Red Ryder BB gun isn't the same as a Video game.
You can hold that gun in your hands and show it off to your friends, it's tangible and real. You can even break it up and smash it.
Pieces are still on the floor for you to pick up.

Sure, video games are tangible in one way via the fact you get a CD with the information on it. However, this is my point.
The actual game, the part you pay for isn't actually there.
That's probably a large factor in the mindset of folks, you're not actually taking anything.
Now factor in the internet's Anonymity and here's my question to you.

"How do you stop somebody you don't know stealing nothing?"

I also see your point about the "You weren't going to buy it anyway" spiel, however it doesn't make it any less true.
Advertising is designed to make people buy the game, if you see an advert for a game and you think, "Yes, I will buy this game" then it has reached it's target audience.
Now, flipside of that is those that think "Nah" or those that think "That looks cool, I'll download it".
Whilst neither ethically or morally sound, it didn't affect the sales. There will be some who dislike the product and there maybe some that do like the product and go and buy it, either way mixed bag that balances out.
That said, No it's not an excuse to pirate.

Final note: It's 7:42am here and I'm on a giant brain fart, I apologize if the gist of my post is unintelligible.
I also had some point about Micro transaction items being classed as digital goods and if they are lost, nothing is done.
Do we detect irony, something like that blah blah.

 

[Shjade]

Example getting something for nothing, taxes tariffs and other trade barriers, why dont we question those? we dont because we are told they are good, basically all of us(myself as well) are sheep told to baa baa the same sound over and over.

Soo overall getting something for nothing is ok if its a tax or a terrif, not if its a software copy,

Pirecy helps "the people" = bad
Taxes,terrifs help goverments = good

Both are getting something for nothing explain why support one but not the other,
anyways i explained why i supported anti pirecy you explain now

Overall i dont expect deep thinking or insight

I was trying to take you seriously before, but...did you really just compare game piracy with governmental taxation?

Are you high?

Holy hell I actually started to write out a response refuting it before I realized I was trying to present a reasonable counterpoint to madness. Nevermind. You go on enjoying your misguided pseudo-anarchistic fantasies. Here, have a cookie.

Cripes, I thought I'd seen everything when it came to piracy defenses.

 

[WhiteTigerShiro]

Picking up burned games in a Chinese electronics store doesn't sound much different from buying used game off Amazon. Sure, someone's getting paid; but the developers don't get a cent of it, & that's how the financially worseoff get their games.

The difference is that for every copy of a game posted on Amazon, the company at least made the initial sale. Where if you just copy a game and sell it to people, then the company only made one legit sale regardless of how many copies you sell.

Assuming I wouldn't have bought the game in the first place:

1. I pirate and play the game and like it, and then tell my friends about it. Free advertising for you.
2. I pirate and play the game and don't mention it at all to anyone. Nothing to you.
3. I don't pirate the game, and don't play it. Nothing to you.

So, there's a difference between 2 and 3 apart from me losing out?

Now, you pirates love to hide behind the defense that "I wouldn't have bought the game anyway", but that's nothing more than a convenient scapegoat. You would have bought the game if piracy wasn't an option because at some point you WERE buying games. I doubt you just woke-up one day and decided "I'm gonna start downloading video games, that sounds like fun". No no. You used to buy games, then one day decided that the cost of nothing was far better than going to a store to pay $60 for something that could just funnel-in through your cable for free.

Maybe it started with some rationale that seemed "right" in your mind at the time. Maybe you were a poor college student, maybe mom decided she was sick of buying games for you when you were younger (maybe you're still in the situation, whatever it may be). So you turned to pirating as the only resort. At this point the barrier was broken. You've seen how easy it is, and after a couple years of the "hard life" where you "had" to pirate games, now you're used to it. It's just how you get your games now. What's that? Games are $60 these days? Fuck that, I'm just gonna download it.

So of course you can claim that "you weren't going to buy the game anyway" when you've already decided before a game is even announced that you're going to pirate it. However, if piracy wasn't an option, then you would have bought the game because the only alternative would be to try and steal it from the retailer, and we all know that you're too much of a pussy to try something real like that.

So no, I'm sorry. I don't buy your cute little scapegoat. Try another and maybe I'll go for that instead... but I doubt it.

 

[Nuke_em_05]

I think we need to stop calling it "piracy". The only folks in the game-cracking and file-sharing "underground" I would call "pirates" are the folks who acquire source materials (sometimes pre-release) and actually "crack" the DRM. Then there are the less adventurous who acquire such cracked versions and host them on a fileshare. Still "risky", I guess, but not a lot of effort involved really. Then there are the majority of so-called "pirates"; the people who download such cracked versions for use. I think "crackers", "hosts", and "users" are better labels. Strangely, that almost fits pretty well with illicit drug markets...

I think pro-"crack/host/use" folks are either unfamiliar with the concept of value, or simply choose to ignore it.

We don't value anything by only the cost of raw materials. Aside from maybe the raw materials, but even then there's the cost of harvesting such materials. Yes, with digital distribution, you aren't stealing a physical CD, but only about $0.25 of a $20.00 CD or DVD is the actual cost of materials. Yes, the "you wouldn't steal a car" argument doesn't make a lot of sense at face value, but there's some merit to the argument "You wouldn't take a car from a lot and only throw enough money to cover the scrap metal value at the dealer". Though comparisons like that would be hard to convey in a 5-30 second PSA. Does anyone actually bring raw materials to their employer to earn their wage? What if you worked all day and your employer didn't pay you? They didn't take anything physically from you.

The ever popular strawman counter-argument "Illegal Copy != Lost Sale". True enough, I suppose, if you weren't going to pay for it in the first place, the developer wouldn't get any money. If you wanted the game, but didn't have the money, or didn't want to spend that much money, you wouldn't buy it. That is how the market works. You weigh pros and cons and make your choice as a consumer. If you would never have paid for it, you are implying that you ascribe no value to it. If it has no value to you, you wouldn't even download it. By offering a "free" option, file-sharing violates the product's right to compete. That has been the point of copyright law for the past two centuries in the United States at least.

As for other countries; they don't have a "right" to these games. Be it their median income, standard of living, government restrictions, or developer choice, if they can't get the game, they can't get the game. I can't afford a PS3, that doesn't give me a right to take one. Certain fireworks are illegal in Spokane City limits; that doesn't give me the right to import them and fire them off anyway, let alone steal them from some guy in Moscow, ID. The Subways here stopped carrying pepper jack cheese for a while. I could still buy it somewhere else and put it on afterwards, that doesn't mean I have to steal it.

There are a lot of unethical, illegal, and downright sick things that are the "norm" in many places: illicit drugs, weapons trade, child labor, nose-picking, adultery, burning electronics waste, fish-farming... Illegally copied games are far from the worst, of course, and actually quite petty in perspective, but are still an issue nonetheless. To excuse it by saying "that's the norm there" I suppose is fine if you are truly amoral or a moral relativist; just don't complain about Wal-Mart selling fish that have been farmed such that they destroy the local ecosystems in central America, or about Nike off-shore outsourcing to child labor sweatshops, or local "recycling" companies sending electronics off to China to have families and children burn CRT monitors to melt out the "useful" scrap from them.

It's just how things are done over there and don't you dare apply your arbitrary "magical" standards to it.

 

[Weaver]

I think a problem is western culture as well. Games are advertised like this

"LOOK HOW FUCKING AWESOME THIS IS!
IF YOU DON'T HAVE THIS YOU AREN'T COOL AND YOUR FRIENDS, WHO ALL HAVE IT, WILL ALIENATE YOU"

Turns out though, little Jimmy isn't from a family as well off as his friends and can't afford the game. If the game wasn't advertised evoking feelings of "YOU ABSOLUTELY NEED TO PLAY THIS" then maybe Jimmy wouldn't feel like he ABSOLUTELY needed to play it.

But feeling like he NEEDS to play it, Jimmy pirates it online.
It's not right of him to do so, and yes it's illegal, but he's being told this product is mandatory to have so he gets it within his means.

Of course as you get older you realize this isn't true, but I remember being a kid and remember the randomest shit that got "cool" in our group and you were basically in our out on the latest fad. From playing with cars in the sand, to paintball guns, to little toy turtles and tamagochis.

 

[MaltesePigeon]

I can't believe I'm arguing this.

I don't understand how pirates, at least of modern games, can keep justifying themselves. It doesn't matter that a pirate isn't a lost sale, it's that they got something for free that someone else had to pay for. If everyone decided to pirate, games would make no money and would stop existing. By pirating, you are basically saying you are better than everyone else. And no, it's not the same as reselling a game, because someone had to actually buy it first. Unlike with pirating, there is no way 90% of a game's players could have bought a game secondhand.

A serious pirate does believe that they are better than everyone who buys the game. Try to think of it this way. It's smarter to pay nothing instead of paying $60. In a pirates mind (or any criminal for that matter) good means something positive for me and bad means something negative for me. The non pirate has a different view, good helps or doesn't hurt anyone, and bad hurts someone.

Let me try to explain it another way. If you can successfully rob a bank and get away then you are smart and clever, like Bill Murray(Grimm) in Quick Change. Or you are an evil villain, destined to be taken down by Bruce Willis(John McClane)like Jeremy Irons(Simon Gruber)was in Die Hard 3(WITH A VENGEANCE!)

A person who wants to pirate might not for 2 reasons: fear of being immoral and fear of punishment. Fear of punishment for piracy is unlikely in "western countries" and nonexistent in places like China. So that leaves morality, and piracy hits so many levels of morality. I'll try to put Chinese piracy on a scale where I(opinion!) believe it belongs.

1. I downloaded the Quest for Glory Collection via torrent. I own the cdrom to this game, and I had bought all of the games separetly on 3.5 disks. I registered them with Sierra Online(owned by Activision now) because back in the day they sent you a magazine when you did. They should have records indicating that I have a right to play this.

2. I downloaded Final Fantasy 8 for PC via torrent. I own the playstation version of it, but I wanted to play the chocobo game that you could only play if you bought a special memory card that was only available in Japan.

3. I downloaded Doom 2 via torrent, and gave it to my 65 year old uncle. I owned it at one point, but I can't find the disk. I probably could have downloaded it from Steam but it was something that I had already purchased.

4. I downloaded Rapelay via torrent to see what all the fuss was about. I in no way have any legal right to own this game, but there was no other way to see what it really was.

5. I downloaded Assassins Creed 2 via torrent as soon as it was hacked. I'm lovin' killing all those people for free.

In my unhumble opinion Chinese piracy belongs between 3 and 4. Other opinions on morality may differ. But it doesn't matter. Our collective "western" morality classifies all these acts as criminal.

 

[adam5396]

The R4. I've actually got a TTDS (Same thing) Myself. I was using it. but I pretty much bought all the games I copied. I'd get the american version so I can play it a bit and make my inner gamer happy. But when it gets released down here I'll buy it. Plus, I can play homebrew games.

Now I don't really bother. Nintendo and other companies are actually putting something on the DS games to stop it working. There are patches. But it's too much of ahassle for something I'm gonna get anyway. Plus, Australia seems to be getting DS games first now for some reason.

 

[Whoracle]

The one reason why I used to download has been the lack of decent demos. As long as I don't get to try the product I'm supposed to shell out money for, I simply won't. That said, I stopped downloading games almost 4 years ago, mostly because no games today really interest me. But I' absolutely sure that if we got the demos back, piracy rates would sink. Not vanish, surely, but decrease significantly.

Are there any comparisons of piracy of demoed games vs non-demoed games?

 

[RMcD94]

2. I pirate and play the game and don't mention it at all to anyone. Nothing to you.
3. I don't pirate the game, and don't play it. Nothing to you.

So, there's a difference between 2 and 3 apart from me losing out?

Yes. C, who didn't want to pirate, have had the same enjoyment you did while doing 2. C is the one who is paying the developers so that they can pay they workers and release more games. Only now C feels like an idiot because he coughed up $60, which he felt was well spent, until he realized you played the same game and didn't pay a dime.

Think of the C.

Apart from, why will any of the letters care about each other. B was never going to pay for it. C was. If C decides to turn into a pirate, well then he's making the company lose out on a sale. Can't blame B for that.

Side note: What's your opinion on charities? Giving stuff people have to work for to people who don't need to work for it.

 

[ionveau]

2. I pirate and play the game and don't mention it at all to anyone. Nothing to you.
3. I don't pirate the game, and don't play it. Nothing to you.

So, there's a difference between 2 and 3 apart from me losing out?

Yes. C, who didn't want to pirate, have had the same enjoyment you did while doing 2. C is the one who is paying the developers so that they can pay they workers and release more games. Only now C feels like an idiot because he coughed up $60, which he felt was well spent, until he realized you played the same game and didn't pay a dime.

Think of the C.

Apart from, why will any of the letters care about each other. B was never going to pay for it. C was. If C decides to turn into a pirate, well then he's making the company lose out on a sale. Can't blame B for that.

Side note: What's your opinion on charities? Giving stuff people have to work for to people who don't need to work for it.

most of it goes too the workers anyway, the 10$ turns into 2 when the people in need see it

 

[Frank_Sinatra_]

Piracy puts me in an akward position. On one hand I pirate certain software to survive college since the programs are f*cking expensive, while on the other hand I'm essentially doing something I know I'm going to be bitching about people doing to me in the future.

See I'd only support piracy if it's used for survival for people who don't have the kind of dosh that they need.
NEED and WANT are 2 things that sadly get mixed up in society.

You are taking something that someone spent time and money on, for free, when they have the right to receive money for their hard work.

I'd have to disagree with that a pirate is actually "taking" the game from the developers. If I "took" the game I'd have to get in their office, take the hard-drive/media containing the actual game, and then claim it as my own. A person could spend time and money to make a car that could get stolen, but anything that is digital these days are so easy to copy that implying the words "stolen" or "taking" confuses me. Trying to steal something that is abundant/easy to copy is like a person claiming they are stealing air or water, in my opinion.

However I do agree that because software is easy to copy that it is becoming an issue for developers, especially with China, and it should be something that has to be resolved. I think the problem is most people tend to think anything digital is an exclusive item--an economic term where an item is denied to consumers unless they pay for it. Obviously that is not true in China as you pointed out in your experience there. Offering other services with the product as you pointed out is a good work-around, though I don't know why they limit this just to multiplayer services. What if they sold add-ons to those games? Like more items/enemies or tutorials on how to make independent games from that game, similar to the editor for "Dragon Age"?

Bullshit.
Piracy involving a digital medium works differently.
Here you copy the product and sell it to people in order to make money off the original.
This is something that artists do with their paintings (make multiple prints).
If you steal the copy, you essentially stole the original because the creator didn't make any money off the product.

 

[The_Emperor]

ok. So at what point does piracy become slightly less unethical? I live in a place with no jobs where unemployment is super high and alot of people live on £100 a week. I live in a poor part of the north east of england where when I was a child piracy was almost the norm because single mums still couldnt afford games I had a chipped psx when I was 12 I didnt know the extent of what I was given but I knew it was illegal but I really wanted to play games, so i wasnt bored and I could experience these wonderous new things!
In my mind I was just doing what I had to do to enjoy myself even at someone elses expense! (btw all the food you eat and clothes and things you enjoy are also at someones expense somewhere along the line, especially if you own anything made in china, so please dont judge me I was 12)

Can poor western ppl pirate games? £200 a month must be similar to paid job in a devoloping country. so does poverty make it ok? or understandable? Personaly economy has more to do with poverty than the overall economy or development of a nation, so for a hobo is it understandable for him to buy an r4 for an old DS he found?

If there is no other viable way of getting games is it somehow "not their fault they have to game"? I've just seen people smacking down college students for not being able to afford stuff and people just say "you just have to deal with it blah blah its still stealin" which isnt the sentiment reflected on other impoverished people such as the poor chinese gamers, because it is infinitely more difficult to get games in china but does that make it more ok?.

What about the altruistic hacker who thinks data should be free? is he a selfish jerk? or is he fighting for what he believes in and his overall goal is worth more to him than the wage of a dev team? surely with a perspective based on politics a developers wage is microcosm compared to the macrocosm of his political belief?

The guy in the store could import like 5 games and wait for a few rich chinese ppl to come around and buy his stuff and be all legit and support the games world but no he PIRATES FOR PROFIT! those who want the localised games they could just learn english to support the devs and save all year for 1 game. The guy who owns the store is the real pirate he must know its not legal. he could open an import store but he doesn't cos hes poor. is he a selfish jerk?

The answer is that the issue of piracy is multi faceted and not black and white at all.

I dont dl games anymore because of wider availability of digital distribution. I can get them pretty cheap online but thats only pc games. plus i like knowing I'm supporting a dev now that im a bit older and wiser. Thats my perspective.

tbh I don't see piracy as something good or morally objective its merely a factor. people pirate for so many reasons. If solutions need to be found to make piracy unnecessary in developing nations those solutions are as follows:

Hope the economy or currency springs up and makes it easier for people to buy games.(even then personal eco etc)
sell things at a super low price in such a way that you can still make profit.
Get rid of the monetary system and find out a way to make everything free.

stop arguing about the ethics of the situation and come up with a solution until then you are all doing it wrong.

convincing people that they are doing something morally dubious will no stop piracy. Philosophy has more to do with the argument than "omg ur stealin" and "omg but i wusnt buyin it anyway" either person will cling to their personal beliefs and the problem is they are both right and wrong so it doesnt matter just try and work out how to fix it pls or be quiet.

nice article Mr.Funk but stop trolling the forums with your piracy flamewars or I'll tell a mod! lol jk important issue

*my point earlier kinda assumes that at some point stealing becomes less unethical the poorer you get so dont retort with "omg but itz stealinz"