Is piracy a serious issue for game developers?

[Viktyr Gehrig]

In economic terms sunshine is a bit of a special case. Open source is a complicated case as effectively the cost of supporting the developers has to come from somewhere, whether its employers allowing staff to release code, support for universities and students, etc. In other words it is paid for in an indirect manner.

This is true-- there's no such thing as a free lunch. What makes these things relevant to this thread, however, is that the costs are not paid by the people who are benefitting. They're paid by other people, who are generally benefitting in some other fashion.

The Personnel Director or the VP of Research and Development don't benefit from the code the programmer releases-- they benefit from the programmer's improved morale because he's allowed to do what he loves. The person who benefits from the code doesn't pay anything for it beyond his opportunity costs and whatever he already pays for his internet access.

 

[Umbran]

All else being equal, the first is econoically neutral - nothing is created or destroyed - while the second is economically good, a new thing is created.

Not quite - the second is economically good if and only if in the process of creation there is some addition to the economy. If the new thing is created such that it does not actually take part in the economy (like copying a file and not paying for it), no good is done in the economy. Ergo, downloading the file and not paying for it is, at best, economically neutral.

 

[Viktyr Gehrig]

But by defining "your property" as "something you can limit others from using" you have made a legal relationship between yourself and the object

Only if the law actually backs me up. Since I don't have legislative authority, I can't define the legal relationship between myself and anything.

I think we're starting to get a little too political for this forum; in any case, we've discussed this a few times on RPGnet, though I can't blame you if you've forgotten. My stance boils down to the idea that moral rights and legal rights are the same kind of animal-- justification for the use of force in defense of those "rights", which exist only as long as they can be enforced.

If you're inclined to discuss this further, my email address is korimyr@yahoo.com.

 

[Viktyr Gehrig]

I've noticed that there does seem to be a lot more insults & anger coming from your side than from the opposition. The fervour seems almost ...religious *eek*

To be fair, according to my side of the argument, the worst thing they're doing to me is calling me a thief; they're not responsible for the copyright laws, after all. (Disregarding worse things I may or may not have been called-- they're not central to the argument.)

According to their side of the argument, I am snatching the food from their childrens' mouths.

They've got more reason to get upset than I do.

 

[Bloodstone Press]

Taking something that costs money without paying for it is theft. It’s as simple as that. It makes no difference if that "something" is a "copy" of something else. You should have paid for it and you didn't, i.e. You STOLE it.

It makes no difference if the producer of that material has a theoretically unlimited supply of copies either. Nor does it matter that you theoretically have not deprived the producer of anything. You still should have paid for your copy, and you didn't. You obtained valuable goods without paying for it. i.e. you STOLE it.

If you use a descrambler to gain access to cable TV without subscribing, you are STEALING cable, not "freely downloading a copy of a data stream and thereby increasing economic value of TV broadcasts."

 

[Storm Raven]

Only if the law actually backs me up. Since I don't have legislative authority, I can't define the legal relationship between myself and anything.

Okay, let's be even more nitpicky accurate - you are referencing a legal relationship between you and the thing.

I think we're starting to get a little too political for this forum; in any case, we've discussed this a few times on RPGnet, though I can't blame you if you've forgotten. My stance boils down to the idea that moral rights and legal rights are the same kind of animal-- justification for the use of force in defense of those "rights", which exist only as long as they can be enforced.

If you equate them, why make the big deal about whether you are talking about property in the legal sense or the moral sense?

 

[Viktyr Gehrig]

If you equate them, why make the big deal about whether you are talking about property in the legal sense or the moral sense?

Because they don't always agree; morality is personal, and most people have at least minor variations on their moral values. They are the same in nature, but different in implementation and impact.

The law, however subjectively it is created and enforced, is objective. You can pick up a book and know the law-- thus, there's no point in laymen arguing it. The areas where the law can be argued are, to use your term, "nitpicky"; I know the broad strokes of law, but can't argue the fine points of it.

The distinction was also important because I was in the position (incredibly rare for me) of arguing that something is moral despite it being clearly and obviously illegal.

 

[Storm Raven]

Because they don't always agree; morality is personal, and most people have at least minor variations on their moral values. They are the same in nature, but different in implementation and impact.

But if morals are inherently personal, and apparently subjective, how can there be a "moral definition of property"? I suppose you could have a personal view of property, but that makes almost no sense, since property relates to your relationships to a thing with respect to other people. I simply don't see how this sort of argument can be made, and I really don't see how it has any bearing on whether one can own something intangible.

 

[Psionicist]

Taking something that costs money without paying for it is theft. It’s as simple as that. It makes no difference if that "something" is a "copy" of something else. You should have paid for it and you didn't, i.e. You STOLE it.

"Argumentum ad nauseam or argument from repetition is the false proof of a statement by (prolonged) repetition, possibly by different people. This logical fallacy is commonly used as a form of rhetoric by politicians, and it is one of the mechanisms of reinforcing urban legends. In its extreme form, it can also be a form of brainwashing. Though a logical fallacy, nonetheless it is convincing to people because, as one of history's main practitioners of this propaganda technique, [a guy], observed, if something is repeated as true often enough, people will eventually come to believe it is true."

 

[The Persian]

Why say something when someone has said better already? Nice work