57% of PC users are pirates

[enmaku]

http://codinginmysleep.com/2012/06/57-of-users-admit-to-piracy/

Found a BSA study (I know, lapdogs with erroneous data blah blah) and just had to do a writeup on it. Apparently world-wide 57% of PC users are, to one degree or another, pirates - and those are just the ones who would admit it on an anonymous survey. So my question, as has been applied to so many other realms, boils down to: Is it reasonable to criminalize something that more than half of us do?

I get the feeling I know which side of the piracy argument most Bitcoiners will fall on, but I'm genuinely curious to see where certain peoples' chips fall...

[Garr255]

The Lord hath spoken that 100% of pirates are pirates. 

Enlightening!

[zvs]

http://codinginmysleep.com/2012/06/57-of-users-admit-to-piracy/

Found a BSA study (I know, lapdogs with erroneous data blah blah) and just had to do a writeup on it. Apparently world-wide 57% of PC users are, to one degree or another, pirates - and those are just the ones who would admit it on an anonymous survey. So my question, as has been applied to so many other realms, boils down to: Is it reasonable to criminalize something that more than half of us do?

I get the feeling I know which side of the piracy argument most Bitcoiners will fall on, but I'm genuinely curious to see where certain peoples' chips fall...

only 57%?

sounds like BS

[swissmate]

Ahoy, me hearty! I just docked in Tortuga an' I'm drink'n some blastedly good Rum.
Avast ye varmint you little Freshwater sailor! Myself I'm not a big PC user. My crew and me use Macs.

[juggalodarkclow]

[LoupGaroux]

I'm more concerned with the ratio of pirates using PC's! Imagine an internet using just Somali death threats and instructions to heave to and prepare to be boarded!

Arrr...

[dancupid]

http://codinginmysleep.com/2012/06/57-of-users-admit-to-piracy/

Found a BSA study (I know, lapdogs with erroneous data blah blah) and just had to do a writeup on it. Apparently world-wide 57% of PC users are, to one degree or another, pirates - and those are just the ones who would admit it on an anonymous survey. So my question, as has been applied to so many other realms, boils down to: Is it reasonable to criminalize something that more than half of us do?

I get the feeling I know which side of the piracy argument most Bitcoiners will fall on, but I'm genuinely curious to see where certain peoples' chips fall...

Criminality is not so important, since typically the law requires proof of guilt and a drawn out legal process to prove that guilt - no one is a criminal without a legal due process.
The law doesn't tell you what to do or what not to do - it simply creates a line in the sand that you cross at your own peril.
The American police are not going to put resources into illegal downloads of Beatles albums by a Chinese resident. They may be inclined to put resources into catching a serial killer though.

[LoupGaroux]

Or a 13 year old girl who downloaded a single Rhianna song on her mom's work laptop, because the RIAA, who owns the prosecution in this matter, wants to "make an example". So the little girl is hit with $ 565,000 in fines (lost revenue from that song, extrapolated over 25 years) the mom is brought up on charges for negligence in allowing her 13 to become a felony thief, and the mom's work fires her for abuse of the company equipment in allowed such a heinous crime to be committed on their equipment.

Mom declares bankruptcy, goes on welfare and unemployment, the little girl drops out of school because of the shame and grows up to be a bitter angry anarchist who will eventually die in a bomb-making accident, and society get to tote the bill for the unemployment and welfare, along with the little girl's funeral in a few years.

The record label, having written off ever recovering the half million dollars in restitution that they hoped to squeeze out of this little girl whose life they are about to ruin, goes hat in hand to their pet Congressmen crying poor because of all this nasty piracy, and get a nice fat TARP bail-out to compensate them for all the losses sustained like this, because any industry that sucks up to Washington as hard as this one, surely cannot be allowed to fail. They get $ 7.4 billion dollars, because Congress doesn't know how to write small checks. Our economy sinks a little more into the toilet, we sell a couple of trillion dollars more in junk T-Bills to the Chinese, inflation rises to a staggering 45% per month, Zhou Tong, now Finance Minister of China, declares all notes and obligations from the US Government due upon demand, and when the default happens, forecloses on the United States. ending up owning most of the Western States free and clear in a debt for land swap with the US brokered by President Jenna Hager-Bush, who then moves the White House to Crawford, Texas, declaring "if it ain't Texas, it ain't worth a fuck!". The remaining, now-ungoverned population of the United Remaining States of America, rediscover bitcoin as a medium of exchange, embrace it as a means of national salvation, and we all live happily ever after.

[RodeoX]

I like how a thieving industry like entertainment gets to call a 13yr. old listening to music with friends a "pirate".   
I have receive several letters from my ISP calling me a pirate. Seems that someone used my wifi connection to DL a few games. I was insulted to be accused without any evidence it was me. I called to yell a bit and they demanded my log files.
When I went to my router to investigate I accidentally deleted the log files, oops, silly me. Then I must have messed up my router setting to allow anyone on one of my networks anonymously.  I guess I'll never get the hang of these computer things.   

[LoupGaroux]

I have received two of those same letters for films that I'm pretty damned sure I never downloaded. I did raise the issue that I might have to refer their inquiry to my lawyer for failing to protect the service that I am buying from them from the assault of viruses and hackers. I demanded an apology letter and a statement that my name was clear, and proof that they forwarded the same to the movie studio.

Never heard from them again, so I demanded a free month of service for the poor customer service after their error, which I got.

So there.

[RodeoX]

I have received two of those same letters for films that I'm pretty damned sure I never downloaded. I did raise the issue that I might have to refer their inquiry to my lawyer for failing to protect the service that I am buying from them from the assault of viruses and hackers. I demanded an apology letter and a statement that my name was clear, and proof that they forwarded the same to the movie studio.

Never heard from them again, so I demanded a free month of service for the poor customer service after their error, which I got.

So there.

You are my new hero. lol

[Tittiez]

Uh... Well, I myself... Ehhh...

 

[swissmate]

I have received two of those same letters for films that I'm pretty damned sure I never downloaded. I did raise the issue that I might have to refer their inquiry to my lawyer for failing to protect the service that I am buying from them from the assault of viruses and hackers. I demanded an apology letter and a statement that my name was clear, and proof that they forwarded the same to the movie studio.

Never heard from them again, so I demanded a free month of service for the poor customer service after their error, which I got.

So there.

What the hell, do those kind of things really happen?
I will proudly continue my "illegal" downloading although I've never heard those sort of issues over here where everybody downloads.

[LoupGaroux]

Yeah, sadly enough, they really do happen. One was a fairly popular big release movie that was an obvious plant from the studio to entrap torrent kiddiez, the other was a very obscure Korean movie that might have had 6 downloads in a year, from a completely different studio bitching to my ISP. Same juvenile lawyerish sounding letter telling me that I risk all sorts of grave consequences if I don't stop this behavior immediately etc. Believing that a good offense is the best defense I immediately flew into a rage, challenging their assumed cooperation with an illegal wiretap of my internet usage (nowhere in my TOS do I give them permission to monitor what databits flowing through my connection mean or can be interpreted as meaning...) and I raised the specter of a lawsuit for their actions. Then I explained that it must have been those damn kids next door with their hacking and their viruses, and why the hell didn't my ISP protect me from such hooliganism?

[RodeoX]

I could tell when I was on the phone with my ISP that they did not want to enforce these rules either. They kept saying that I could forget about it and that no further action was needed. I was like, "No. You have to apologize and place a not in my record that I was not involved ."
They also repeatedly demanded that I check my log file and give them the MAC:id of any possible visitors. Haha hahaha ah-haha, was all I could say.