Torrents? For/against?

timespace

What do you guys think of downloading torrents of software/music/etc. and stuff... Like do you guys support it or are you against it? I'm just bored and would like to see what others think...

apena7

I support all legal uses of any particular technology.

For.

Selfmade

No comment, no comment.

mikedisd2

Check what the producers of The Hurt Locker are doing and decide by that.

50,000 sued over "Hurt Locker" piracy - Yahoo! News

Anyway, who's got time for movies/music with all the studying to do, right?

timespace

mikedisd2 wrote: »

Check what the producers of The Hurt Locker are doing and decide by that.

50,000 sued over "Hurt Locker" piracy - Yahoo! News

Anyway, who's got time for movies/music with all the studying to do, right?

I heard about that... I'm somewhat for piracy... I'm only 16 so I don't have $1500 to spend on a program like the CS5 suite. I also don't have thousands of dollars to spend on all the different music I like to listen to. On the other hand, if I really really like a band and want to support them so they can keep making music, I'll buy their albums. As for movies, I don't really download much.

netBooger

It's piracy that keeps driving the cost of software, music, and games up.

I am against piracy completely as it is illegal.

I can't afford a Ferrari but that doesn't mean I should just go steal one.

timespace

netBooger wrote: »

It's piracy that keeps driving the cost of software, music, and games up.

I am against piracy completely as it is illegal.

I can't afford a Ferrari but that doesn't mean I should just go steal one.

hmmm....I never thought of it like that....

timespace

Northbr1dge wrote: »

As long as it's not copyrighted or pirated material, there's nothing wrong with "using torrents".

The way you structured your questions sounds like you're asking if we're for/against piracy. In which case, my answer is no.

haha yeah I had a feeling I was using the wrong terms...
and yeah, I'm was trying to refer to piracy like thepiratebay and whatnot...

but also, I'd like to know why you guys are against it.

earweed

against piracy because it's wrong....
If the material isn't copyrighted or it's meant for open distribution then I guess it's ok.

mikedisd2

timespace wrote: »

haha yeah I had a feeling I was using the wrong terms...
and yeah, I'm was trying to refer to piracy like thepiratebay and whatnot...

but also, I'd like to know why you guys are against it.

Ethics? It's the same reason as a sys admin I don't go snooping through people's emails.

After a while people may decide that they have more self-respect than to just take everything they can get because it's free and instead pay for the goods that they actually want. It shows a more matured mental attitude and will pay dividends in the long run, over an immediate savings on a CD, movie hire, etc.

apena7

timespace wrote: »

haha yeah I had a feeling I was using the wrong terms...
and yeah, I'm was trying to refer to piracy like thepiratebay and whatnot...

but also, I'd like to know why you guys are against it.

Well then, if you're asking about using torrents only for such activities, then I'm against it because it's illegal and wrong .

Things like CS5 carry a high sticker price because it's expensive to make. Take medicine for example -- sure doctors are expensive, but they put in a lot of effort to study at expensive schools and I think they can charge whatever they want because they are the ones with the highly specialized goods/services. If I don't like the high prices, then I'll study and become a doctor myself . Likewise, if I don't want to pay a ridiculous amount of money for a software suite, then I'll build one myself -- but until that time, I'll save my money and fork over the cash if I really want it.

Anyway, if you're 16, you should look into student discounts for software. There are a couple of threads on this board that have links for some deep discounts.

Selfmade

threads like these are always funny, you can bet half the people have . . . . "grabbed" entire hard drives worth of stuff in the past, but yet, come here and give the PC answer to your question

In the end, it hardly matters, Hollywood posted record profits last year, and the music industry isn't in the shitter because of piracy, but because it fails to produce good albums anymore. Who wants to pay $13-16.99 for an album that has only one good song anymore?

That's the whole problem with the music industry these days, no good music is coming out, the whole music business model is obselete and they are slow to capitalize on new technology to bring music to the masses.

I guarantee you that unless it was a self-published music artist, they'd rather have you get their music for free and go to their concerts.

You all know Prince, right? He gave out copies of one of his albums in England's daily newspaper for free and in his advertisement, only asked that if the people liked it, that they attend one of his concerts, and he listed the times and venues of his concerts, they ALL sold out!

THAT is how it should be done, he basically took the money part away from the music executives and put it back in his own pockets minus the costs of the concert fees.

Don't read too much into my post, I don't really care what others do, it has no effect on me

7lowe

I'm sure I'm in the minority, but I don't consider downloading copyrighted material for personal use to be piracy. To me piracy would be the illegal sales of copyrighted material.

Also, I don't buy many of the anti-piracy arguments about lost sales etc... Realistically if I'm not going to buy your product anyway how can you consider it lost revenue if I don't buy it and download it?

I know I've seen at least 1 study that found that people who download music buy more music than those who don't (example Study finds pirates 10 times more likely to buy music | Music | guardian.co.uk ). I fall in the latter category as I could count the # of albums I've bought in the last 10 years on 1 hand & I don't download music either.

I do think artists and developers should get paid, but I also think consumers should get an opportunity to listen, watch, or use the products before committing to the purchase. Also, I think once you purchase an piece of media you should have the continued right to use it on different formats as they change. Until they fix those problems with purchasing people will try to find a way around it.

All that being said I don't use torrents. Not because I think it's wrong, but because it's illegal & frankly I don't have time to consume all the media I already have access so I definitely don't have the time to go around trying to find torrents.

Anyway, you said you were bored so I figured I'd give you a little more to read.

7

erpadmin

Prior to Windows XP (actually scratch that, let's include XP), I don't think I ever bought a MS license. Either I downloaded it, got a CD from work, or through some other means, I had it. The only time a license was ever purchased by me I guess was when I bought a laptop or something for a family member. Does that make me unethical? Did I stop Bill Gates or Paul Allen from earning their billions?

Now by the same token, I don't really need to take that stand anymore. I have a legal copy of Windows because the laptop I am using right now belongs to the company I work for. When I get Windows 7, I will most likely have a legal version, because I'll be buying it at a discount as a student, even though I could afford to pay full price. But then again, I can also afford full price on a Mercedes S-class, but that doesn't mean I'm getting it. LOL.

So yes, I'm for torrents. I won't outright condone piracy, but I will not cast any stones to those who may dabble in it. At the risk of going all religious (and I promise, it will start and end here), as Christ has said, lest he who is without sin, cast the first stone. I don't think I would have any technical knowledge if I didn't use a pirated O/S to learn on. I think many here would pretty much say the same thing (and many doesn't mean ALL...but a damn good number).

Selfmade

Music industry attacks Sunday newspaper's free Prince CD | Business | The Guardian

click that if you want to read about Prince giving away his album

He's a very good musician and I have nothing but respect for him as a businessman, musician, and as a person.

Even better article here, explaining the economics behind why and what he did

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/music/rockandjazzmusic/3666664/How-a-free-album-makes-millions....html

netBooger

Selfmade wrote: »

Music industry attacks Sunday newspaper's free Prince CD | Business | The Guardian

click that if you want to read about Prince giving away his album

He's a very good musician and I have nothing but respect for him as a businessman, musician, and as a person.

Even better article here, explaining the economics behind why and what he did

How a 'free' album makes millions... - Telegraph

I completely agree he is a talented musician and business man. But regardless of whether he gave his CD away for free or charged twice the price for them, his shows still would have all sold out.

I'd be curious to see if he would have given his CD away for free if he wasn't already an accomplished artist.

Selfmade

he made 26 million from the UK tour . . . .

he was paid 300K euros to put his album in the Mail on Sunday newspaper

netBooger

If he wasn't an accomplished artist he would have never made those figures.

He has also supposedly threatened to sue youtube and ebay as well as fan sites for using not only his music but photographs of him as well. That right there tells me he is as greedy as anyone else.

But either way I agree that was a good marketing technique.

pespi_man

Everytime i hear about piracy i think of th IT crowd piracy ad..

YouTube - The IT Crowd - Series 2 - Episode 3: Piracy warning

Paul Boz

Don't copy that floppy

tpatt100

I used to pirate OS's back in the day like Windows 95-98 back in the day. I built my own computers back then and operating systems were expensive. Now a days all my stuff is legit starting with Windows Me which was the first Microsoft OS I bought lol.

But since I buy prebuilts the OS is legit and Windows 7 I got a Student copy for 29 bucks.

RobertKaucher

This is like asking what your opinion about knives is. Knives can be used to do illegal things like rob and murder but knives are not illegal.

There is nothing wrong with bit torrent. It is used by many Linux distributions to allow more efficient downloads of their ISOs. It is used by companies like VMware for the same reason. What you need to understand is that bit torrent is a protocol like DNS or IPSec. It's NOT associated with a specific site and it is not illegal.

What is illegal is using it to "copy the floppy." Now if your question is about the security of the protocol or the security of the various clients, that is an entire other story.

Pash

I saw pauls thread and all the comments after but it's a no brainer.

The internet is about sharing over a large network with people all over the world. Torrents provide the technology for large file transfers over the public domain. What is being shared over the internet, illegaly in some cases, is another story.

I pay out a lot of money on owning my own operating systems, pc games, dvd's, cd's, technet subscription for my studies/study materials (like cbt's, trainsignal videos). I do not feel obliged to waste my time with crappy cam copy films or applications laced with viruses and neither should you.

What is very apparent though, is the lack of choice the film producers, music producers, games producers are giving me and you (the consumer). The only case agaisnt this is probably that little app that many of you may use, Steam. If you wan't to encourage the consumer to buy your products make sure you have a very very good content delivery system, value for money and usability. There is so much potential with services like ilovefilm and Sony's patented internet TV technology. Let's roll with it.

Pash

Paul Boz

Not only am I opposed to BitTorrent because it can be used to carry illegal files, I'm against THE WHOLE INTERNET AND ROUTERS IN PARTICULAR. You know, without routers you couldn't share files illegally.

Aren't hard-line stances retarded?

veritas_libertas

Paul Boz wrote: »

Not only am I opposed to BitTorrent because it can be used to carry illegal files, I'm against THE WHOLE INTERNET AND ROUTERS IN PARTICULAR. You know, without routers you couldn't share files illegally...

LOL

This conversation is really

earweed

veritas_libertas wrote: »

LOL

This conversation is really

How true!

erpadmin

Paul Boz wrote: »

Don't copy that floppy

I haven't used a floppy in years.......lmao.

timespace

Paul Boz wrote: »

Not only am I opposed to BitTorrent because it can be used to carry illegal files, I'm against THE WHOLE INTERNET AND ROUTERS IN PARTICULAR. You know, without routers you couldn't share files illegally.

Aren't hard-line stances retarded?

What do you mean by "hard-line stances" ?

earweed

People being totally against using bit torrents just because they are asociated with people like you getting copyrighted material via bit torrents. There are valid and legal uses for bit torrents as a lot of people have been pointing out.

Paul Boz

timespace wrote: »

What do you mean by "hard-line stances" ?

"you are going to burn in hell if you aren't (insert faith here)"

"All (insert political party here) are idiots"

"I don't use bittorrent because people use it illegally"

"we should have a 100% ban on firearms because some people commit crimes with them"

These are hard-line stances. Unfortunately the world isn't in black and white so they generally make you look foolish.

timespace

Paul Boz wrote: »

"you are going to burn in hell if you aren't (insert faith here)"

"All (insert political party here) are idiots"

"I don't use bittorrent because people use it illegally"

"we should have a 100% ban on firearms because some people commit crimes with them"

These are hard-line stances. Unfortunately the world isn't in black and white so they generally make you look foolish.

That's where I was wrong. In my original question, I asked if you guys thought downloading torrents was wrong.....what I actually meant was downloading copyrighted material.

I guess some people think it's okay while others think it's unethical.

What got me thinking were these 2 statements:

For piracy:

7lowe wrote: »

Realistically if I'm not going to buy your product anyway how can you consider it lost revenue if I don't buy it and download it?

Against piracy:

netBooger wrote: »

It's piracy that keeps driving the cost of software, music, and games up.

I am against piracy completely as it is illegal.

I can't afford a Ferrari but that doesn't mean I should just go steal one.