piracy are we being conned?

[yoda313]

I know the difference between Blu-Ray burners and Blu-Ray roms....

kay...just checking Wanted to make sure I read it right

[deadrats]

There is another variable you're missing, supply and demand. Freely available illegal downloads dilute the value of the legal ones.

i would argue the exact opposite, at least in my case, i have downloaded loads of movies over the years and doing so has definitely caused me to go buy legit copies. in all cases it was a combination of 2 things:

1) the supposed illegal download exposed me to content i either didn't know about or hadn't considered because of a preconceived notion that it wasn't any good

2) the quality of the download wasn't that good and i wanted to get a higher quality version.

because of napster i ended up buying hundreds of cd's, from meatloaf to abba to troggs to all sorts of genres, only because i found their stuff by accident, liked it and looked for pristine versions.

furthermore, so-called illegal downloads have been a major catalyst of the pc market growth, bigger hard drives, faster processors, more ram, faster internet connections and yes, even sites like this, all owe their popularity and demand to the availability of "illegal" downloads.

big content missed a golden opportunity to ingratiate with all the so-called pirates and turn them into paying customers; what they should have done instead of suing everyone under the sun, which only made the lawyers even richer, was start their own napster and offer low quality encodes of their content for free, with links to where you can buy high quality, pristine versions, i think they could have monetized napster, kazaa, limewire and all the rest very easily.

unfortunately big content is run by short sighted morons, imbeciles with no vision, they deserve what they get.

[thecoalman]

i would argue the exact opposite, at least in my case, i have downloaded loads of movies over the years and doing so has definitely caused me to go buy legit copies. in all cases it was a combination of 2 things:

I'm sure that is true for some people but I doubt that is the case for most people.

big content missed a golden opportunity to ingratiate with all the so-called pirates and turn them into paying customers; what they should have done instead of suing everyone under the sun, which only made the lawyers even richer, was start their own napster and offer low quality encodes of their content for free, with links to where you can buy high quality, pristine versions, i think they could have monetized napster, kazaa, limewire and all the rest very easily.

unfortunately big content is run by short sighted morons, imbeciles with no vision, they deserve what they get.

I'd agree they missed the boat and continue to miss the boat but it's their content, no one owes you anything.

[deadrats]

http://hothardware.com/News/Game-of-Thrones-Breaks-BitTorrent-Piracy-Record-HBO-Takes-...ews-in-Stride/

[yoda313]

One thing about movie piracy is not everyone has fast enough broadband to reliably download 2gb and up movie files. Without taking days to do it though.

Plus I know I'm in a minority but when I buy (watch) a movie I want the extras like commentary and background featurettes and the like. Sure some end up on youtube but usually the quality isn't great and you can't get everything thats offered on the disc anyway.

I am in no way condoning any piracy but there are still a lot of obstacles to it, internet speed being the main one.

[davexnet]

http://hothardware.com/News/Game-of-Thrones-Breaks-BitTorrent-Piracy-Record-HBO-Takes-...ews-in-Stride/

refreshing attitude from HBO, thanks for posting the link.

[KBeee]

Easy to make a "loss" in movies.
Return of the Jedi has NEVER (officially) made a profit. Cos if it DID (officially) make a profit, then actors that were offered a % of the Net profits, instead of Gross prifits, would have to be paid.
Piracy complaints remind me too much of Mafia Bosses complaining about lack of law enforcement when their cars get stolen.

[Noahtuck]

http://youtu.be/GZadCj8O1-0

LMAO!!!!

It's just funny how they say "We lost money".......
It could be that they did not LOSE it, they just never made it!!!

Because I am sure there are tons of people that DL stuff that could never afford to buy it so that is profit the RIAA or the movie studios would have never made anyways!!!

But they need to word it like they "lost" money they would have never made to begin with so they can seem like they are such big victims, when in fact they are the biggest crooks of all!!!!!!
LOL!!

[thecoalman]

As far as the audio goes I would suggest their biggest loss is from people like myself. I owned vinyl and cassette copies of many albums and in some cases multiple copies. When I was in my late teens into early adulthood I probably averaged one cassette every two weeks, just wish I had digital versions of that collection.....

Those repetitive purchases ended when the CD came on the market and to add insult to industry I only buy used CD's. I rarely purchase those anymore, I have what I want and CD is good enough. About the only thing that might get me to purchase new versions is when they re-release these albums in the future but that will only happen if they are DRM free and the remastering has unfucked what the remastering on the CD's fucked up.

[yoda313]

I only buy used CD's. I rarely purchase those anymore

As for disc purchases I'm pretty much the same way. I think Weird Al Yankovics Alpacolypse album from the other year was the last new in case disc purchase I have made.

I did buy The Killers new album on amazon late last year or early this year whenever it was released. But it was the mp3 album.

but that will only happen if they are DRM free and the remastering

I don't think there are any digital download stores that have drm locked music tracks anymore. The only case would be to subscription services of course. As for remastering that would have to be explicitly stated on the release and of course you always get the thirty second sample before buying.

[thecoalman]

I don't think there are any digital download stores that have drm locked music tracks anymore. The only case would be to subscription services of course. As for remastering that would have to be explicitly stated on the release and of course you always get the thirty second sample before buying.

Yoda What I'm talking about here is high quality encoding beyond CD, CD is good enough but it could be better. As far as the remastering goes....

[aedipuss]

hey coalman, long time no see. i'd have agree that compressors were the death of beautiful music. to bad there isn't any way to get back what's lost with an "un-compressor".

[Hikmet]

Im a studio level DVD/BD author and can tell you first hand Piracy has personally and directly affected me and my industry.

Piracy not directly affected you, actually distributors affected you and we. Real devil is not piracy, real devil is distribute and publish industry.

[Noahtuck]

Well, ya know, that 50 billion dollars a year in ringtone theft adds up for & affects everyone!!!

[yoda313]

Well, ya know, that 50 billion dollars a year in ringtone theft adds up for & affects everyone!!!

No that's the industry ripping users off. A buck or 2 for a twenty second sound clip? My god what rip off.......

[ConverterCrazy]

Very interesting thread. Thank you all the participants.

Didn't know so many pro- and con- factors on piracy.

To use an old phrase, piracy, in my view, is rooted in the mindset "make hey while the Sun shines" of the producers of all kinds of media.

[p_l]

What the hey?

[TreeTops]

Gotta love that P_I

[Noahtuck]

Well, ya know, that 50 billion dollars a year in ringtone theft adds up for & affects everyone!!!

No that's the industry ripping users off. A buck or 2 for a twenty second sound clip? My god what rip off.......

Watch the video I posted a link to