Hacker News Reader

Comment by egypturnash | Hacker News Reader

Oh come on, “Disney won’t stream their stuff to my niche OS” is not a reason to get their stuff without paying. You can wait for a DVD, you can scrounge a used device that will run their DRM, or you can decide you hate all DRM and boycott their stuff until the unlikely event they offer a copyable version. Lots of people work hard making this shit, and they have bills to pay, these things don’t just spring fully-formed onto a hard drive like Athena from Zeus’ skull. Maybe there’s some morality going on if you buy a ton of merch for what you watch. Maybe.

Or you can reward the companies that do support your niche OS by paying for their stuff, that’s pretty unassailable.

I am far from without sin in this area, but I don’t try to make excuses. Watching stuff without paying its asking price is stealing.

View on HN

Niche or not “Disney won’t sell me content I want to buy” seems like a tough position for Disney to argue past.

This was the argument back in the days when movies wouldn’t be released in many countries as the market is too small.

What do you expect potential customers to do? Should they buy new computers? Not watch Disney stuff?

I think I would expect the latter, but if they aren’t Disney’s customer then them pirating isn’t losing Disney any business.

> Niche or not “Disney won’t sell me content I want to buy” seems like a tough position for Disney to argue past.

I feel that is such an entitled attitude. Watching Disney+ is hardly some inalienable human right nor essential for survival. Why would anyone think their right to use a service, and cosume content, overrides Disneys well-established ownership?

Disney getting paid isn't an inalienable human right either. We're talking about customers paying for entertainment. And their ownership over the IP isn't either. It may be well established in law but it's not like we're talking about the right to air and water.

If Disney won't sell them the stuff they shouldn't be surprised they'll resort to other means to acquire the content.

What’s wrong to entitled attitudes?

I feel like “entitled” is some sort of jerk buzzword. Entitled is a wonderful thing. I think it’s good to be entitled to not being exploited by billion dollar companies making decisions that make like worse for people. Even if it’s just a little worse like not being able to watch a movie with your kids. Sadly, we’re not entitled to such a thing.

Why is Disney entitled to oppressive “well-established ownership?” I’m not sure how one is more entitled than retaining copyright for 70 years after the artists who create something die.

Getting paid isn't some inalienable human right either. Even if it were, Disney is not a human. Disney is a corporation worth tens of billions of dollars. It used a portion of that money to lobby for multiple copyright extensions, eroding the rights of every american. So who's really entitled here? The social contract behind copyright was "we'll pretend your intellectual property is scarce for like 20 years so you can make your profits and once the time's up your work enters the public domain". When was the last time you saw something enter the public domain? You are literally defending the company that did that. They will try again in the 2020s. They have no intention to fulfill their end of the bargain.

If "piracy" could straight up kill Disney, copyright infringement would be a moral imperative. We don't even have that power.

> Watching Disney+ is hardly some inalienable human right nor essential for survival.

Neither are never-expiring copyright laws, and there's no reason someone in a country that doesn't abide by them should have to honor them.

Actually, it is infringing. We have that word for very specific reasons.

In this case, nothing was stolen.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com