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Comment by b3nji | Hacker News Reader

Sadly, piracy.

I'd argue that it isn't sad but in fact quite wonderful that piracy is an option. These companies don't deserve our sympathies. They are doing it to themselves.

> These companies don't deserve our sympathies.

No, but then neither do we deserve to watch their shows. Just as they have no inherit right to our money, we have no inherit right to their product.

In a sense, I agree with you. But in another sense, I think it’s important to remember that copyright is a restriction on people’s behavior that does not naturally exist, but has been created by law.

It’s easier to see the moral case for this if we think about cases other than the simple “pirating” of a show. For example, preservation. Doctor Who is a popular show that predates the practice of saving the original tapes. There are several episodes that have been lost forever because the BBC did not routinely record (or did routinely record over) their own broadcasts. Many other episodes were thought to be lost, but thanks to enterprising individuals who made unauthorized copies, have since been preserved. Is the world worse off or better off with those people?

Or take Star Wars. George Lucas famously hated that anyone could prefer the pre‐Special Editions of the original trilogy, and only grudgingly allowed it to be released once afterward, in a highly compressed anamorphic format on one set of DVDs. No other version has been released since. People who like the original special effects, dialogue, and editing have since done 4k scans of original theater prints from the 70s and 80s. People don’t deserve to be able to watch copies of those—legally speaking, the copyright holder Lucas (and now Disney) is the arbiter of that. But would a world without the option be better than our world today?

And remember, laws are capricious. The movie industry was terrified of home video. They thought it would materially damage them by removing the desire to watch movies in theater, where they made their money. (Remember MPAA president Jack Valenti testifying before Congress? “I say to you that the VCR is to the American film producer and the American public as the Boston strangler is to the woman home alone.”) The VCR came within one vote of being outlawed as a piracy tool by the Supreme Court. A 5–4 decision. Because it survived, though, the people received a huge benefit from the new capabilities (like time shifting and media shifting) provided by this technology. And the movie industry benefited too, earning billions of dollars by embracing this new market… after they had tried to murder it in its crib.

How would today’s world look if one justice had voted the other way?

> But in another sense, I think it’s important to remember that copyright is a restriction on people’s behavior that does not naturally exist, but has been created by law.

So is physical property ownership. Someone not walking up to your car and taking it from you at the end of a shotgun is a restriction placed on everyone by law. The only natural right you have to your car is whether you can keep it from everyone else by sheer force.

And yes, just like piracy, people can still break the law and take your car regardless. But you at least have the force of the state on your side.

Possession grants no "natural" rights by itself.

> So is physical property ownership. Someone not walking up to your car and taking it from you at the end of a shotgun is a restriction placed on everyone by law. The only natural right you have to your car is whether you can keep it from everyone else by sheer force.

Good point. Property implies violence.

Point for the pirates, I mean.

These are interesting points, and worth making. But it's quite clear that the most pirated films/Tv programmes are the ones that have recently been released and are freely available if you're willing to pay.

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