Downloading movies?

What do all of you think about downloading different things online? I am not saying that I do it. But in my opinion I think some movies should be allowed to be downloaded but others shouldn't. Older movies that are very hard to find then sure. Newer movies like movies in theaters shouldn't be downloaded. But enough of this. What do all of you think?

 

I do download, but I still watch movies in theaters, I buy lots of DVDs, BluRays and games, so I don' t feel guiltier than when I used tapes to record TV or CDs with my VCR or my radio when I was younger. Downloading allowed me to play games that weren' t released in Europe and never will be (like Chrono Cross or Xenogears), and it' s also very useful in order to watch TV shows at a convenient time rather than having to watch them one year later on TV, often in French (translations usually aren' t great).

 

I've never felt an ounce of guilt for downloading movies. I still see them in theaters all the time, and I would never buy DVD's, at the very most I'll get them from a Red Box or something. My $1 isn't going to impact the sales of the movie that much.

 

If it's a movie I can't obtain by other methods (excluding purchasing the DVD), I will usually download it. However if it's a recent movie that I want to see for some strange reason, I'll go to the cinema to watch it. After all, the cinema is a higher quality than my laptop, it doesn't use bandwidth, and I can do it with friends.

Morally, I have very few qualms with outright piracy. I can gain from it, and I lose nothing.

 

The price on anything in Norway is pretty insane, so I support it. I highly support it.

 

Would you stop if you lived in America?

 

I buy movies and the download the ones I like it does seem slightly pointless but I don't feel gilty because I downloaded, though I do agree that new movies shouldn't be downloadable

 

Probably not, but I think it would be easier for me to buy a movie then. I don't know what Blue-Ray prices are though, cause I prefer HD movies.

So no, but I would do it less.

 

My opinion, if the movie is good enough, I'll buy it. The special features that some movies have with them are just amazing. Like I downloaded Wall-e, but I later I bought the DVD. The DVD's special features were fun to watch because of not just the short that came with it, but there was a little documentary about how they made all the sounds in the movie, since there wasn't much human speech in the movie and they needed to use sounds to tell the mood of the movie.

It just really sucks when you by a DVD and get nothing great for special features....

 

I lost my post again. There should be a block for this. A "Do you want to clear the posting field?" box or something when you accidentally push a key that pushes the Reply to Thread button again. Goddess.

I have a simple view on all piracy that extends to this, and it has to do with contradicting rights. When it comes down to it, when I download something, I am imprinting data onto my hard drive. I own that hard drive. I am simply changing the shape of my physical property. Copyright attempts to control the shape of my property against my will, and that is a violation of my physical property rights. Any notion of intellectual property will result in such a contradiction. One area that I view a violation as immoral or unethical in is when you try to profit from a copied idea by selling it as your own. Particularly when it pertains to art, that is an act of malice that does harm the artist's reputation unless otherwise noted. To expand on my earlier point and make it more accessible on a wider scale, let me give an example.

Let us say that you live next door to someone, and you see that he has a large stone standing up in the center of his back yard. Curious, you watch as he comes out, measures it, and begins to chip away at it with some tools at his belt. Fascinated, you watch him until he is completely done, and the rock has become a beautiful statue. Because you like it so much, you go up and ask him how much he will sell it for. He charges a price that you are clearly not willing to pay. An outrageous sum, not worth the effort needed to make one. Disheartened, you go back home.

Later that day or early the next day, you remember that you have a rock of about the same size in your own yard. You know how it was made. What is stopping you from carving a copy yourself, at a fraction of the cost? So you set to work on it. Due to your irreproachable memory and technical skill, you are able to make an exact copy of the statue, same stone consistency and all. What luck!

Now, let's say that the original artist stands there watching you do this. After noticing what you have done, he comes over and demands payment for his idea. But wait! Isn't he saying that you are not allowed to carve your stone in any way that you want by demanding payment? When did he get the right to control your rock like that?

Likewise, if you were the artist in this situation, what gave you the right to control what he did with his rock? Surely ideas do not win out over physical property. That makes no sense.

And so ends my illustration of the absurdity of intellectual property.

 

This seems spot on to me.

Another thing; doesn't the copyright law say you are not allowed to distribute (share) other people's work? In other words, download is legal, only not seeding? I'm not sure, but I'm wondering.

 

I dont see anything wrong with downloading movies,though not movies that are still in the cinema.
I mean,come on,if you want to see a movie thats only just out,it makes more sense to go to the cinema and watch it there,where it has better quality and surround sound.
But movies that are out of the cinemas are fine to download,espesically those old ones that you cant get anywhere.

 

The third time it happened to me was the charm, I always ctrl+c my posts before sending them now.

First, selling a DVD for 20 bucks when said movie required millions to be made in the first place is not "outrageous" in my book.
Second, you DON' T know how it was made, you werent there to see them make it, and even if you were you certainly don' t have the same technical skills and material as a hundred professionals. Please recreate Star Wars or Kingdom Hearts in your backyard. Even better, make us KH3, since you already "know" the process.

Would pedophilia or crime photos be legal if they were to be found on your hard drive ? You didn' t "simply change the physical form of your property", you used a computer to replicate the photo, which is the same as replicating reality taking the photo yourself.
My point is, you didn' t put an ounce of effort into downloading or replicating a DVD, chances are you just pushed a button.


I know pirates love to argue about law issues, but at the end of the day duplicating someone else' s professional work using a machine is forgery, whether you sell it or give it for free. I get why people don' t feel too guilty when they download, after all artists still manage to make a living, and in some cases it' s very useful since it' s the only way to obtain the coveted data. Hell, I do it myself. However when someone tries to justify downloading as not being a moral issue at all, whatever the data is, whether it' s a legal issue or not, I just laugh my ass out. It reminds me of what P said about the invisibility ring, in one of the threads about moral : if stealing didn' t require any skill or effort and that it couldn' t have any consequences to you then you would soon stop viewing it as a moral problem.

 

Yeah, this. I pirate, I am a pirate, I will be a pirate for a long time (Not always). However, trying to justify piracy or say it's not theft is just dumb. No matter how you slice it, it is theft. It's just really not that big of a deal. It's like stealing a bag of sunflower seeds from walmart. It's exactly detrimental.

 

You know, you can always try typing your post (especially a long one) in Microsoft Word, or Notepad if you don't have Word, type it in there, copy and paste it into the post and 'Reply'. It's what I do occassionally when my PC is going a bit slow or the internet is acting up.

But in response, I do agree with Makaze to most of an extent. Music is leaked, sometimes intentionally, countless number of times by production crews in order to expose the music to the audience in order to encite a positive reaction to the music because people feel 'Oh, i'm the first person to hear this!' and such, which puts a positive spin on the music. I doubt movie exposure is any worse off, and can possibly help create its own popularity like in eastercat's case, buying WALL-E after watching a pirated version. I'm not too bothered, I watch movies when they appear on Sky t.v. for free, so I'm not to bothered about watching that many films at the cinema or downloading them unless I really want to watch it.

 

I'm fairly sure that you can download safely for the most part.

This was mid-post. Couldn't have done anything, because whatever happened happened at a stray keystroke.

Rather, it took them millions to get the data that they wrote onto the DVD. If I can do it faster by changing the shape of my disc to fit their finished one, why shouldn't I? It does not cost them that much per disc, and I did not agree to pay them those millions for producing the film. If I can burn a disc for a few cents, then paying twenty dollars for an official looking one is outrageous.

If I knew the shape of the data, that would be enough. It would take me a few hours at most to change the shape of my disc at a very low cost. But alas, I am not creative enough for that. Sorry about your luck. Knowing the process was just an example. Perhaps I should have said that you had a 3D printer ready, and could make the statue with that? It would be better, surely...

Another discussion, but I also disagree with that being a crime. Don't bring other laws into this; you only confuse the matter.

And that's the way it should be. Produce the widest range of enjoyment as fast as possible at the lowest cost to the end user, right? Or don't they have our best interests at heart?

Define forgery for me. Because, as I see it, forgery applies to instances in which something like money is produced with no effort. Printed money is forged money, forged documents and checks used to obtain more money, et cetera. If you do not sell it, where is the forgery? You are not committing fraud against anyone.

One point of interest. You claimed that it was forgery without any preceding or following points. Simply a claim. Not a good practice in any argument, let alone one regarding ethics, as ethics is a science of reason, and not claims to fact.

I fail to see how you refuted my argument here other than insisting that the price was not outrageous, which is a matter of some subjectivity... Please clarify on where I erred with my example, other than laughing at it as you seem to be doing. Laughing is not an argument, when last I checked...

I did this after losing it the first time. Much appreciated.

 

I only feel guilty when I stream a movie that's out in theaters. I never save it to my hard drive. I don't have any movies on my actual laptop, but I do stream. For some reason that minimizes the feeling of guilt--and also, for some reason, in my area, they monitor that stuff A LOT. My aunt used to download movies to her laptop while she was staying here for a bit, and they shut our internet down and called us telling my mom she was going to have to pay a fine if it continued.

But they can't do anything about streaming. It's strange. But even before that, I would stream. If it's a classic Disney movie or something, not an ounce of guilt. If it's in theaters, I don't touch it.

If I see it in theaters and love it, I buy it. If I see it in theaters, and feel like watching it again someday but it wasn't really that great, I'll stream it. I also stream it if I want to watch it with someone else simultaneously.​

 

The big thing for me is music. Movies I don't download often just because the ones I want to see come onto television enough that I can catch them, video on demand helps if I'm really dying to see something, and then there's always DVDs at the library.

But I'm guilty of downloading music. I don't have a lot of money, mostly because I'm a teenager, and my family isn't well off by any means either, so I don't have the luxury of being able to buy CDs and stuff. If I could I most definitely would. But I don't think my financial situation should limit me from enjoying music. I'm not doing anything nefarious with it, and I'm certainly not profiting from the music--it's just to listen to. I could just as easily stream it legally through a site like last.fm, Pandora, YouTube, etc etc. Just now I have it saved on my hard drive so I can enjoy it offline.

I don't think there's really anything wrong with that. Sometimes I do have a guilt trip about it and stop for a few days, but I still buy albums and merch and would go to shows if there were any nearby.

 

Look, I' m not a lawyer, you' re not gonna get a very precise definition of what forgery is by law standards out of me. IMO replicating someone else' s work using a machine isn' t a moral problem if the original material/data was either free or yours.

The lowest profitable cost, they do it for a living. They have their interest at heart first.
The lowest profitable cost probably isn' t 20 bucks, I' ll give you that.

You copied something you should have paid for otherwise, someone in there has indeed been deprived of money.
As someone French would put it "Tu as eu le beurre et l' argent du beurre" (rough translation : "you got both the butter and the butter's money")

I already noticed that you' re very skilled with words so there' s probably a way for you to twist that around. I' m not that skilled, I know there' s plenty of ways to play with words around piracy issues. Morals are subjective anyway, if you refuse to consider copying copyrighted data without paying its author a single cent as a theft/forgery/you name it, a moral issue of some sort, there' s not an argument in the world that could convince you otherwise.

 

That's the thing. The data isn't anyone's. It is a bunch of scratches on a disc. My disc, your disc. All that you own is the disc. You don't own the pattern of scratches on it.

True. And that really is beside the point. It is in my best interest to profit them if I can; I want them to produce it, after all.

The question is more about ethics than incentive.

Whether I should have paid for it or not is the question. Assuming that I should pay for it as a means of proving that they lost money is a bit of a fallacy. I can't steal from them if the obligation to pay them has not been sorted out, which it hasn't.

But that's the thing. This isn't a question of morals. If I were going to argue this morally, I would say that you should support the artist. Like how you should give to starving people if you can. You might have noticed that I used the word ethics instead. This was not a mistake. There is a crucial difference between the two.

Ethics is essentially a way to work out contradictions and determine what is or is not a double standard in a transaction or interaction between two or more people. It is not necessarily morally wrong for me to kill you, because that is subjective. But it is ethically wrong, because if I am claiming a right to my life, that would mean that you automatically have a right to yours. Killing you would be acting out on a double standard. A person has bad logic here without fail, while whether killing you is "wrong" or not depends on who you ask.

Intellectual property is one such subject. What happens when someone claims the exclusive right to control an idea is they claim the right to control my physical property. So, every time that someone copyrights something, they own my things a little bit more than before. Eventually I will not be able to do anything with my disc, because everything that I could scratch on it will have a price on it. Is the disc even mine at that point? That is a question of property rights and ethics, not of what is right and wrong. How much do I really own my things if any idea can infringe on my right to it?