Current Events > Pirating is not theft

(+) Yeah! (+)

They are both immoral but they're not the same crime. I would say they're in the same family of moral crimes, but one is clearly worse (theft).
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taxation is theft
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Does it matter?

If they're both wrong, isn't that the important part?
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Alrighty.
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To 500!
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DevsBro posted...

Does it matter?

If they're both wrong, isn't that the important part?

Personally I just find the philosophical question interesting, I don't think it's all that consequential.
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How is it not theft, because it's digital? That's dumb. If you take a product, physical or otherwise, without paying for it that's theft.
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It's duplication, not theft.

Pirating is like punching someone in the dark. Its a victimless crime.
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Goats posted...

You wouldn't download a goat

you'd just steal it from me anyway
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voldothegr8 posted...

How is it not theft, because it's digital? That's dumb. If you take a product, physical or otherwise, without paying for it that's theft.

I think part of the essence of theft is that it's not available to the person you stole it from anymore. With pirating you don't remove anyone's ownership of something. You could say you're stealing from potential sales, but I think that's only if you distribute the digital item.
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The case law and IP statutes disagree with you. Keep yelling in the wind for all the good itll do you.
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On_The_Edge posted...

voldothegr8 posted...

How is it not theft, because it's digital? That's dumb. If you take a product, physical or otherwise, without paying for it that's theft.

I think part of the essence of theft is that it's not available to the person you stole it from anymore. With pirating you don't remove anyone's ownership of something. You could say you're stealing from potential sales, but I think that's only if you distribute the digital item.

Slice it anyway you want, but if you take a product without paying for it that's theft. That goes for even obscure shit.
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Neither is squatting
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Piracy is not theft but it's so cringe when videogame pirates jot this down smugly as if to say "ah-hah! I tomfooleried you with my semantical distinction, the matter is closed".
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unclekoolaid73 posted...

Pirating is like punching someone in the dark. Its a victimless crime.

Downloading something illegally might be a victimless crime... but certainly not making it available in the first place
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voldothegr8 posted...

Slice it anyway you want, but if you take a product without paying for it that's theft. That goes for even obscure shit.

Nothing is actually "taken" though, that's an important distinction to make, although it's not really a defense like pirates think it is.

The actual crime is that the pirate does exactly what the content creator expressly asked them not to do and sees no wrong in that.
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On_The_Edge posted...

voldothegr8 posted...

How is it not theft, because it's digital? That's dumb. If you take a product, physical or otherwise, without paying for it that's theft.

I think part of the essence of theft is that it's not available to the person you stole it from anymore. With pirating you don't remove anyone's ownership of something. You could say you're stealing from potential sales, but I think that's only if you distribute the digital item.

You could say it's a lot like plagiarism, It's then theft of intellectual property.
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voldothegr8 posted...

On_The_Edge posted...

voldothegr8 posted...

How is it not theft, because it's digital? That's dumb. If you take a product, physical or otherwise, without paying for it that's theft.

I think part of the essence of theft is that it's not available to the person you stole it from anymore. With pirating you don't remove anyone's ownership of something. You could say you're stealing from potential sales, but I think that's only if you distribute the digital item.

Slice it anyway you want, but if you take a product without paying for it that's theft. That goes for even obscure shit.

It's wrong, but I don't know if theft is the right word? Surely downloading a copy of a file and depriving someone of their property are not in the same category? I think the question is interesting because it seems like a very recent moral problem, did anyone before the digital age have to answer this question?
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I don't even understand the "stealing means you take something so that person doesn't have it anymore" thing. There's plenty of non-digital item examples in our society where we use steal or theft to denote using something without permission from its owner or duplicating something without permission, etc.
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Its duplicating. Pirating is only a moral dilemna because its consumer good that can be produced infinitely out of nothing.
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Anteaterking posted...

I don't even understand the "stealing means you take something so that person doesn't have it anymore" thing. There's plenty of non-digital item examples in our society where we use steal or theft to denote using something without permission from its owner or duplicating something without permission, etc.

Like what? I can't think of any
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The best case I can make for it being illegal

Pirating is the same as going to a random yard and striking/cloning their raspberry bush. They put in work to get that bush and you just have a clone that makes sweet, delicious berries. You didn't even have to do work and now you're eating like a king. The owner of the original bush still eats well and doesn't care.

It should be legal.
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Pirating is theft. You're producing a copy of something for personal use, or to distribute to others. Both of these things take money away from the artists/developers of media.

Because you're too cheap to pay $5-$10 for something that artists worked really hard on.
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On_The_Edge posted...

Like what? I can't think of any

Identity theft
Theft of ideas or methods (e.g. anything involving plagiarism or patents)
for crimes

For expressions
steal a kiss
steal someone's thunder
steal a look

etc.
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Anteaterking posted...

On_The_Edge posted...

Like what? I can't think of any

Identity theft
Theft of ideas or methods (e.g. anything involving plagiarism or patents)
for crimes

For expressions
steal a kiss
steal someone's thunder
steal a look

etc.

Interesting

I think the latter stuff are just expression like you said

But identity theft is interesting. Doesn't that entail actual theft of objective physical property, though?

Plagiarism is the closest thing you listed that I see a similarity with so maybe you are right
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Is a man not entitled to the sweat of his brow?
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If you think piracy is theft, you're thinking exactly how giant corporations want you to think.
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On_The_Edge posted...

But identity theft is interesting. Doesn't that entail actual theft of objective physical property, though?

No, I could steal your social security number in order to work a job. I don't have to actually take your money or anything like that. It's still identity theft.

Also, I included the expressions just to show how implicitly we understand that theft is more than just one person taking physical property.

As another example of a "well defined" thing (though not a crime in most places) we have "stealing valor". Obviously you're not taking any explicit thing from people, but the people who get upset about it would claim that you're devaluing the medals that people actually got.
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I don't really think the expressions are all that relevant to the moral question. But the identity theft and plagiarism examples are more interesting. I don't know enough about identity theft to make a worthwhile rebuttal, but might it be a case of using the wrong word? Is impersonation the same as theft? Maybe it is, I'm not sure, it's an interesting case.

With the plagiarism it seems to me what you steal when you plagiarize is the fame/recognition/money that would have accrued to the original owner. I'm not sure if piracy is stealing anything. I would agree for sure that if you intentionally distribute pirated material, that is theft, since you're stealing potential profits. But if you are a consumer who would not otherwise purchase the material, are you depriving the creator of anything by downloading it? Maybe you are, I'm not trying to obtuse I'm actually really interested in the question
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Garioshi posted...

If you think piracy is theft, you're thinking exactly how giant corporations want you to think.

How dare companies not want to give out their products for free.
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voldothegr8 posted...

Garioshi posted...

If you think piracy is theft, you're thinking exactly how giant corporations want you to think.

How dare companies not want to give out their products for free.

They should
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Just because it's not theft doesn't mean it's okay

voldothegr8 posted...

Garioshi posted...

If you think piracy is theft, you're thinking exactly how giant corporations want you to think.

How dare companies not want to give out their products for free.

The idea that piracy is theft implies that you're taking away sales of a product that the company is selling. However, Nintendo, for example, refuses to bring Mother 3 to the West. It is not selling Mother 3 in any capacity. It is not selling any Gamecube games in any capacity. It is not providing any sort of alternative, yet attempting to experience these games for yourself without dropping ludicrous amounts of cash on them is somehow "theft". It's not theft unless they provide a readily-available alternative, and when they do, you'll find that most people tend to buy the game instead of pirating it. Additionally, corporations are absolute garbage at preserving their games, and piracy is sometimes the only way that some games can survive the erosion of time.
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On_The_Edge posted...

I don't really think the expressions are all that relevant to the moral question. But the identity theft and plagiarism examples are more interesting. I don't know enough about identity theft to make a worthwhile rebuttal, but might it be a case of using the wrong word? Is impersonation the same as theft? Maybe it is, I'm not sure, it's an interesting case.

But see, you're already going away from the moral question anyway. You follow it up with "Is theft the right word for identity theft?" which isn't a moral question. It's exactly the etymological question that those expressions show has not held for a while.

On_The_Edge posted...

With the plagiarism it seems to me what you steal when you plagiarize is the fame/recognition/money that would have accrued to the original owner. I'm not sure if piracy is stealing anything. I would agree for sure that if you intentionally distribute pirated material, that is theft, since you're stealing potential profits. But if you are a consumer who would not otherwise purchase the material, are you depriving the creator of anything by downloading it? Maybe you are, I'm not trying to obtuse I'm actually really interested in the question

For one, I'm not sure if the argument of "I'm not stealing, I'm just benefiting from other people stealing" is a worthwhile one. As to the second part, I think the question of whether you would have purchased it or not is unimportant, because it obviously follows from however you feel about piracy. If you think that using a creator's product without permission is bad, then taking it is still bad even if you wouldn't have it otherwise. If you think that physical things are all that matter, then whether they would buy it or not is irrelevant.
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If I duplicated your chicken dinner using my own resources, would you say I stole your chicken dinner?

RoboLaserGandhi posted...

Just because it's not theft doesn't mean it's okay

Because corporations must have your money ?

voldothegr8 posted...

How is it not theft, because it's digital? That's dumb. If you take a product, physical or otherwise, without paying for it that's theft.

Theft of a physical product removes that product from the seller/owner. Piracy does not remove the product from the seller/owner.
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MaverickXeo posted...

voldothegr8 posted...

How is it not theft, because it's digital? That's dumb. If you take a product, physical or otherwise, without paying for it that's theft.

Theft of a physical product removes that product from the seller/owner. Piracy does not remove the product from the seller/owner.

But you're still taking a product without paying for it. Regardless what happens on the "victim" side of things, that's theft.
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voldothegr8 posted...

MaverickXeo posted...

voldothegr8 posted...

How is it not theft, because it's digital? That's dumb. If you take a product, physical or otherwise, without paying for it that's theft.

Theft of a physical product removes that product from the seller/owner. Piracy does not remove the product from the seller/owner.

But you're still taking a product without paying for it. Regardless what happens on the "victim" side of things, that's theft.

But if the product still exists, is it considered 'stolen?' 'Copied' is a better term.

That said, piracy is still a crime, but I do not find 'theft' to be a good comparison to it.
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MaverickXeo posted...

voldothegr8 posted...

MaverickXeo posted...

voldothegr8 posted...

How is it not theft, because it's digital? That's dumb. If you take a product, physical or otherwise, without paying for it that's theft.

Theft of a physical product removes that product from the seller/owner. Piracy does not remove the product from the seller/owner.

But you're still taking a product without paying for it. Regardless what happens on the "victim" side of things, that's theft.

But if the product still exists, is it considered 'stolen?' 'Copied' is a better term.

That said, piracy is still a crime, but I do not find 'theft' to be a good comparison to it.

Potential sales lost are usually less impactful than something physically getting lifted, but theft is still theft.
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voldothegr8 posted...

MaverickXeo posted...

voldothegr8 posted...

How is it not theft, because it's digital? That's dumb. If you take a product, physical or otherwise, without paying for it that's theft.

Theft of a physical product removes that product from the seller/owner. Piracy does not remove the product from the seller/owner.

But you're still taking a product without paying for it. Regardless what happens on the "victim" side of things, that's theft.

The concept of theft and the widespread belief that it is an immoral act is 100% derived from the fact that somebody's belongings have been removed from them, and thus any utility that one would derive from having said thing in their possession would be lost.

That simply does not happen with piracy. You guys can split hairs about whether or not it's moral or not, and that's fine I don't care to have that discussion because I can see both sides. But piracy is definitely not theft. It's duplication. It's copying.

Even if people are copying your intellectual property...you still have that intellectual property. What is happening is that people are intruding on your monopoly of that intellectual property.

Personally, I think companies and artists have the means in which to protect their intellectual property from being protected, but they don't use it. They instead rely on the legality and enforcement by the government. If we didn't have that, we'd see more companies issuing control over the format mediums they issue their products on and things like that. In other words, you can make stuff hard to copy if you want.

But, whether or not that's a more efficient method for society overall than having IP laws is another debate. I don't know the answer to it, either.

Just here to watch the hoops being jumped through.
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