In 2005 it was revealed that the implementation of copy protection measures on about 22 million CDs distributed by Sony BMG installed one of two pieces of software that provided a form of digital rights management (DRM) by modifying the operating system to interfere with CD copying. Neither program could easily be uninstalled, and they created vulnerabilities that were exploited by unrelated malware. One of the programs would install and "phone home" with reports on the user's private listening habits, even if the user refused its end-user license agreement (EULA), while the other was not mentioned in the EULA at all. Both programs contained code from several pieces of copylefted free software in an apparent infringement of copyright, and configured the operating system to hide the software's existence, leading to both programs being classified as rootkits.
Yup, if you present me a side-by-side of the free one and the paid one when the free one is better even disregarding costs, I'm pirating 100% of the time.
"Oh, you'll only have access to this as long as our servers remain online or as long as we keep renewing the license."
"Sorry, your device needs to phone home to use this."
"Don't you love ads in your paid product?"
"You'll need to juggle several different services if you want what you can otherwise get for free on a central hub."
"Yes, you can only use this on one or two devices at a time thanks to DRM."
"Fuck you, you'll need an account with us to use this even though you bought it without that account somewhere else."
"This thing's only ongoing cost on our end is version updates you totally need and want, so it'll be an indefinite subscription (which we'll make a pain in the ass to cancel)."
"This game runs noticeably worse because of the shitty DRM we shoehorned in."
"You're saying you don't like being spied on for ad targeting?"
"You can only get this bundled with a bunch of other bullshit you don't want and would never pay for individually."
"Our UI that you're forced to interact with to use this is fucking garbage."
"We don't sell this anymore; ask Scalper4478 on eBay."
"We use the money that you pay us to lobby against your rights as a consumer."
"We somehow lack QoL features that the free version has."
You'll need to juggle several different services if you want what you can otherwise get for free on a central hub.
This one, while common, I kind of take issue with. You’re basically complaining that there is no one, all-consuming media oligarchy that owns EVERY show/movie, and distributes it on their singular massively overpriced service (and yes, with that market stranglehold, they would massively overprice it)
Shouldn’t the principle of competition mean there are multiple services, each trying to present better content? People reasonably contend with only being subscribed to a few they care about - I don’t know who is assuming they should get access to all media, all the time, without paying truckloads of money.
I will grant that for games, no service beats Steam, but I will absolutely buy games from other platforms like Itch and GOG in the spirit of competition when their prices or better or the dev has avoided Steam for reasons of adult content censorship.
I have a game my ex me for my Xbox I think it was rainbow six I've never played because I couldn't get through the obnoxious sign up process to play a goddamned game that I owned.
If a peach seller has a harvest of 1,000 peaches that will go bad in a week, he doesn’t care about “only having 940 peaches” when someone steals 60 of them. He cares that he spent all that effort and money growing the peaches on the bet he’d make a profit, rented the shop space in the market, hired an assistant to bag and sell them, and some douchebag still didn’t pay for them.
The quantity of product a seller maintains is generally almost completely irrelevant to the costs. It’s about the societal expectations of paying your due to people who have put work into something you want.
Ok so alternatively, instead of "stealing" peaches, I pay $10 monthly for Peaches+, which means I get to look at the peaches whenever I want to until they go bad. Sometimes new peaches arrive but they rarely look as good as the previous ones. Then when I eventually cancel my Peaches+ subscription I still don't own a single peach even though I paid a lot of money.
Let's say that no matter how much is "stolen" the peach seller has an infinite inventory. It never depletes, and it never goes bad.
The peach seller takes all the money, increases the selling price of the peach, and each peach you buy is a contract that allows the seller to kill your wife.
What if someone richer than the peach grower took a picture of the peaches, and then demanded everyone else pay them instead of the peach grower for copies of the photo of the peaches? Would you still be upset if the peach photographer didn't make money from every single person who obtained a copy of the photo of the peaches? In some cases, the peach grower got paid before the photo started being sold, in other cases the peach grower gets 0.0004% of the profit from each peach photo sold.
When people hear the concept of thought crimes described to them, they rightfully recoil in disgust at that kind of dystopic idea. However, euphemize the concept as intellectual property, and for some reason, most people are fine with it.
This is the problematic view here. You think the monetary value is attached to the product itself, when it's actually attached to the perceived satisfaction you thought you would've gained before purchasing it.
But hey, property is theft anyways so who the fuck cares if I copy media without paying the ghouls who “own” the work made by other people they pay pennies of their dollar
I pirate because I want to watch Last Exile now, not 3 months ago when Hulu had the rights to it, and not some time in the future when they may acquire the rights again
Also it's easier than finding physical copies of 30 year old OVAs
The left picture is lemmings trying to justify how its their right to watch youtube for free and without ads, because all the infrastructure that delivers the content is free I guess, bonus points if they bitched about Youtube not paying the creators properly in another comment