OK, accepting your made-up figure of 90%, what about the other 10% who would pay for the item they're pirating?
it's like piracy is the main subject and theft or non-theft piracy would be the stubs.
PIRACY
/ \
LOST REVENUE NO LOST REVENUE
| |
THEFT NOT THEFT
Would you accept that in end cases?
Say you steal a toy from a child that has piles of em? They don't even notice. Not theft?
IP is actually quite similar. Suppose I wrote a book (.pdf) that contains important business information about the future of the oil market. I obtained this information at great personal cost. Your accessing that information doesn't remove that information from me, but it's still stealing access to information you otherwise wouldn't have had.
Saying, "But I wasn't going to buy your crappy business book anyway!" doesn't change the fact that you've still taken information that doesn't belong to you.
and i'm also, apparently, making up statistics.
what if i made the assertion that, in addition, 10% of people who pirated something will also legally purchase the item they pirated?
I want to remind readers that this 10% (or <=10%, as you just phrased it) is a made-up figure.
what if i made the assertion that, in addition, 10% of people who pirated something will also legally purchase the item they pirated?
If you backed up that assertion with hard evidence, and demonstrated that this effect outweighs the loss companies sustain from piracy, I'd take you more seriously.
Are you claiming that these companies overall make more money because of piracy? Software and media companies are diverting hundreds of millions of dollars of their budgets into anti-piracy measures. If piracy didn't drain their profits by at least the aforementioned hundreds of millions of dollars, why on earth would they throw away so much money into something that reduces their bottom line (and annoys me and other consumers, therefore making us less likely to buy their products)? These companies might be capitalistic, greedy and [insert adjective here], but they're not dumb. Follow the money.
canadian governmental study on music piracy:
http://www.pch.gc.ca/pc-ch/pubs/music_industry/tdm_e.cfm
When assessing the P2P downloading population, there was a strong positive relationship between P2P file sharing and CD purchasing. That is, among Canadians actually engaged in it, P2P file sharing increases CD purchases. The study estimates that one additional P2P download per month increases music purchasing by 0.44 CDs per year.
When viewed in the aggreggate (ie. the entire Canadian population), there is no direct relationship between P2P file sharing and CD purchases in Canada. According to the study authors, the analysis of the entire Canadian population does not uncover either a positive or negative relationship between the number of files downloaded from P2P networks and CDs purchased. That is, we find no direct evidence to suggest that the net effect of P2P file sharing on CD purchasing is either positive or negative for Canada as a whole.
Piracy steals income infrequently at best.
You seem to be making an argument about how rates of piracy are distributed across different products. How does this make the effects of piracy any less harmful?
It doesn't matter (to the status of piracy) whether or not piracy is harmful or any other consequences. If 90% of shoplifters get hit with a sudden case of Dostoevsky & slip envelopes under doors resulting in 120% ... It would still be theft. Just like assault is still assault if they sober up & buy you an icecream.
I'm not saying piracy is theft. It is different enough to warrant its own word (& its own treatment). 'Preventing revenue' is not a reasonable explanation. Standing outside a store and yelling like a madman scaring away customers is also preventing (stealing?) revenue.
In some cases, I think that piracy is helpful to companies (photoshop might be an example) in others it's harmful. But that's besides the point. You can invoke that in a wider discussion of how laws should be made or you may be making a moral assertion that rights & such aren't important, only consequences. But that's not really our system (or most people's understanding).
Anyway this discussion is 90% semantics. It's only important to propaganda campaigns (saying stealing is more effective then saying violating copyright).
I think open source also has a more attractive price tag too, but maybe I might consider selling support somewhere down the line...