Piracy Eithics

[JDUK]

Out of intrest & seeing as most of us here are of a mautre nature... Where do you stand on piracy? what is fair game for emulaiton?
We know "abandonware" is more a moral part of the ethical pirates code and not actualy "the 5 years and its anybodys game" law. So were do you stand?

*Is it ok to pirate GBA games on the PC if you never plan to own a GBA or a GBA game so Nintendo are loosing nothing form your piracy ?
*And does that mean its ok to steal if you dont want what your stealing ? <_<
*Is piracy a victimless crime?
*Is it only the big company's who suffer? Or is there a knock on effect that effects the quailty or prices of games? And is it ok to commit a crime if its some against some one who can afford the loss ?

*Does any one read PCZone? if so what do you think about a main stream magazine dedicateing a section (Emulaiton Zone) to the Emulaiton of games that can still be purchaced (mainly GBA games)?

I have my own oppinions on all the above. But would really like to hear a broad spectrum of oppinions from ppl in a comunity that survies (in part) on emulation?
Please be mature and sensible enough to comment on this without bringing up things that will get this thread locked or deleted, etc.


Thanks

 

[Dozer]

I don't think piracy can be classed as stealing, as you are not taking something away from someone so they don't have it anymore, it is always a copy. I use roms and emulators all the time and I think that if i was the owner of the company of the roms i wouldnt b 2 happy. However, i think that as im never planned to buy any of these games anyway, roms only showed me what they were like and so may tempt me to buy them in future.

 

[JDUK]

@Dozer RE: Piracy

Im not saying your wrong but i would like to spark some debate by sugesting you look at it like this.

1)You have money with which you might buy a game, instead you copy that game so you now have your money and a peice of intelectual property that has a monetary value that some one has paid to develop. >>> You have thier product and did not pay for it.


2)Now imagine you wrote a game for the GP and priced it at lets say £5/$8 It took you 8 months to make in all your spare time. Now every one on this forum pirated it. There are about 1000 of us. So instead of you having £5,000/$8,000. You have nothing. Now i know this isnt exactly how big games companies operate/suffer but this is on a personal scale where you can see and make sense of your actual losses.

Look at the above examples. In number 1 you are in a great situattion you have you money and a free game. In number 2 you have lost 8 months making a game and lost £5,000 because of piracy. In both examples the pirate wins/makes profit or gain while the producer/programmer/whatever looses. This isnt a fair buiseness deal and is not somthing you would asociate with "fiar trade" and MUCH closer to stealing than it may first seem. ?

 

[Dozer]

But those 1000s of people mite not hav even looked at your game in the first place. Its just the fact that it was free that got people initially interested. This mite lead to larger sales in the long run. Im not saying that taking these roms is a good thing, it is imoral, its just that it happens and u mite as well c the good side 2

 

[JDUK]

I know piracy will happen no matter what, but when you start discussing the inevitability of any thing every thing becomes pointless as we will grow old and die, the universe will end & nothing will matter. So best to keep it on a moral level.

Sticking to my point why should those ppl who only played it because they stole it deserve to play it? So it is ok to steal as long as you don't want what your stealing?

As an intresting aside: If you could flick a switch and end piracy of all comericaly viable(i.e still on sale) software would you do it?

 

[Bohica]

Nah. There's no good side to piracy.

The argument that you weren't going to but it anyhow cuts no ice. I wasn't going to buy it so you should give it to me for free? I might try that one next time I'm out *not* shopping for trainers I'm *not* going to buy anyway.

I'm lucky in that I worked in the games industry for many years and have a substantial collection of games and most of the games I play on my GP32 I own any way.

There are some titles, however, I don't own, and never have owned. I have downloaded these and now have illegal copies of them. There's nobody producing these titles, so nobody to buy them from. But it's still copyright infringement, at least that's how its termed by UK law.

Somebody owns the intellectual property and choosing not to sell it does not justify piracy.

Hey, look at Amstrad - they're selling Spectrum games for its emailer product. Or Tulip reviving Commodore (I know, not a software publisher, but will they try to acquire rights?).

And that's just the games you can't buy. If you can buy these products, new (say GBA games), then you should purchase them. There is no excuse at all for ripping off a business's investment because you're too tight to stump up the price its asking for its development/research/testing/marketing/office cleaners/phone bills etc.

 

[angrypants]

This is a topic that could go around and around forever. Everyone has their own opinion on what is and is not justifiable. In my opnion I have no problem downloading roms for older systems that are no longer being sold and can't be purchased. That is the whole point of emulation right? The idea is to preserve games for systems that can't be purchased and are no longer available. It just so happens that a nice side affect is that you can play these games. On the other hand emulation of brand new systems such as the gba which had emulators available even before the system was released is flat out piracy. The same can be said a few years back when n64 and psx emulators were available when the games could still be purchaed new on the shelves. I would consider stuff like that flat out piracy because it had the potential to hurt the company financialy. The same goes for the pirated versions of the gp32 games that were released on the net. There is a big diffrence between playing mario brothers on an emulator and playing a cracked version of gpfight. The companies who have created those games are fairly small comapnies and thanks to joy gp they have given everyone a chance to get their software extremly cheap and in a way that is very conveient. I know that some of the things I have said you might see as being wrong but thats fine its my opinion.

 

[JDUK]

<Grins Evily>

There is a big diffrence between playing mario brothers on an emulator and playing a cracked version of gpfight.

The Mairo games can be purchaced for the GBA, well 2, 3, World and Yoshi's '. Though i have the NES versions of the ones I play 1 & 3, SNES Version of World and GBA of 2.

 

[kram]

Piracy sometimes can help because it can motivate people to buy that product. For instance, I used to pirate some PSX games back in the day, but it just didn't feel right with the printed covers and cd labels so I ended buying the games just for that quality.

 

[Dozer]

I agree, its like with mp3s. I get loads of songs from different artists i havnt heard before and if i like their music i buy their album. Like mario on the snes emu i think ill get the new mario 4 my gba

 

[angrypants]

yeah you bought some psx games but you still pirated some other games and the companys that produced them didn't profit from it. I will admit I have a ton of mp3's (don't we all) I have found out about so many amazing bands and have gone to shows and purchased shirts that I would have never bought if I had not downloaded a few mp3's from the band first. However I still have a bunch of mp3's from bands that I have not seen or bought other merch from. Those bands are not making a proft from me and I am still listening to their music. I still buy tons of records and that sort of thing but every band that I have music of I have not purchaed products from so they are not making a profit off of products which I have possesion of. Is it wrong? hell yeah it is, will I stop doing it? hell no I won't. My habits as far as purchasing these products have acctually gone up since I started downloading music years ago but I am not using that as a way of justifying what I and what seems like the rest of the world has been doing.

 

[moora101]

For instance, I used to pirate some PSX games back in the day

lol!!! back in the day of what, 96??!?!?!!!!??

That really makes me laugh when people refer to "back in the day" when it was about 4 years ago. Who are you, Craig David??!?!

Craig David all over your... <boing>

 

[Twimfy]

For instance, I used to pirate some PSX games back in the day

lol!!! back in the day of what, 96??!?!?!!!!??

That really makes me laugh when people refer to "back in the day" when it was about 4 years ago. Who are you, Craig David??!?!

Craig David all over your... <boing>

Actually '96 is 7 years ago. Scary when you think that 1995 is no longer 5 years ago. Time moves to quickly these days (its relative y'see :rolleyes: )

 

[wave]

I only buy a game if it's worth paying for it, there are lots of games that are crap, most companies lose money but this is only beacause their game isn't worth to buy.
Look at FF series, they don't lose money, but it's a game that a lot of people has pirated.
I've had really bad experiences buying games that ended in crap.... They look so cool on their boxes.
And another thing it's the price.... 60€ for some GBA games....

 

[JDUK]

I only buy a game if it's worth paying for it, there are lots of games that are crap, most companies lose money but this is only beacause their game isn't worth to buy.
Look at FF series, they don't lose money, but it's a game that a lot of people has pirated.
I've had really bad experiences buying games that ended in crap.... They look so cool on their boxes.
And another thing it's the price.... 60€ for some GBA games....

So its ok to steal FF because the company makes a profit any way?
So its ok if I take £100 out of your wage skip at the end of the week because that still leaves you with £250 ?
And its ok to steal from others just because YOU have made bad decisions in the past ?
And saying you like "x,y,z" because you wouldn't have listened/played/watched them if you hadn't pirated there stuff is basically you stealing because you make bad decisions or are unadventurous in your purchases.

So piracy basically comes down to you taking from others because of your own deficiency (buying crap, not bothering to give a product a chance, not having the money, etc). At the end of the day the media industry is loosing money to piracy. You think you know better than a whole media industries combined financial teams and that it all balances out? If it wasn't loosing them money it wouldn't be illegal, they would call it advertising and shove 3 disks a month thru your letter box AOL style. The fact that 1 in 3 CD's are copies cannot be good for the industry that one third of their profit that they are not seeing. Would you like some one to steal one third of your money? No but because its some big faceless company you will never have to face or deal with means you can forget all your morals and human decency.

Sorry im just provoking responses and putting some arguments out there. Its not directed at any one or group of peeps

Keep it up its intresting to see what every ones thoughs and copying habbits are

 

[Twimfy]

I have to admit, I enjoy piracy at times. Thanks to the GP32 I've recently discovered that I'm more interested in the technology of games rather than actually playing them, therefore a pirate game is quite an interesting piece of software in its own right as it has broken technological bounds. This does not mean however that own nothin but pirate games. I much prefer having the packaging, manual or original zpk file or whatever than a cheap copy.

 

[wave]

I only say the fact that they're also stealing us with their abusibe prices....
That's not the case of gamepark now.
Well I don't have anyway 250£
Hey you don't steal from them, you get a copy of their work, that's not acually stealing.
Well they're not losing money, they simply don't get it.

Don't take my example of buying crap software 100% of the time, but this things happen.

 

[JDUK]

A good example of ppl not careing about crime just because they cant see the vintims, and also a kind of moral tale that tickles me....

A friend of mine works in law enforcment, he works day in, day out keeping criminals in check. But this guy has a stacks of MP3 compressed CDS up to his chest full of pirate music, multiple albums per disk. A ton of pirate VCDs and about 3 shelves full of pirate games. Joe bloggs he has locked up for stealing a toaster is the thieving scum of the earth to him yet he owns pirate software thats market value is close to that of his house! Remember no matter your moral stance these are both forms of theft. Now my disk burning buddy recently had his CD player stolen from his car, and he went ape shit. Somthing in me just giggled when he told me. There he is, by the value of his ill gotten gains a pretty acomplished crook and frequent offender, complaining that life isnt fair because some cheeky teenager lifted his CD player. His
"its all good baby....... well, till it happens to me" out look on life just tickled me & I think pretty much sums up about every pirates out look on faceless victims Vs pesonal loss/morals.

Dunno maybe im strange ? maybe i should laugh when my mates get robbed

 

[kram]

lol!!! back in the day of what, 96??!?!?!!!!??

That really makes me laugh when people refer to "back in the day" when it was about 4 years ago. Who are you, Craig David??!?!

Craig David all over your... <boing>

Hey, I'm still pretty damn young and 7 years ago (learn to subtract you fool) was pretty far back for me. Yeah 7 years doesn't feel to long for the 65 year old you are but it does for me.

yeah you bought some psx games but you still pirated some other games and the companys that produced them didn't profit from it.

Did you read my post?! Me copying the games motivated me to BUY the games of which the company that made the game gets money for.

 

[JDUK]

Hey you don't steal from them, you get a copy of their work, that's not acually stealing.
Well they're not losing money, they simply don't get it.

A good example of this effecting you.

Imagine you get a job as a window cleaner, you come round, clean my windows. When its time to pay i tell you to get lost.

I havent stolen any thing from you, you still have your ladder, your bucket of soapy water and shammy. ....... So that isnt stealing or wrong?

You cleaned my windows> I have clean windows > I should pay you

A company makes a game> you have the game > you should pay them

Not phisicaly taking somthing from some one is not in any way a guage of what you should pay for the product/service recived. In the above example using your logic it is fine for me not to pay for Washed windows, Taxi cabs, hair cuts, baby sitters, etc, etc , the list goes on and on.