UKC

I assume some of the users of this forum, are aware of the website, The Pirate Bay; which allows users to locate torrents for the latest films, music, books etc... has today turned ten years old. Throughout that time, the powers that be, namely the MPAA (Motion Pictures Association of America) have been tackling this breeding ground for copyrighted material through various legislation and busts.

I for one, am pleased to say I have been using The Pirate Bay to download material, not necessarily copyrighted material, for around five years now and find the community continuously growing and bettering itself. I am no self-informed anarchist but I do believe that for too long large motion picture companies and recording labels had been taking for granted the grip they had on the media market, particularly in the mid-nineties when websites like Napster and such-like began to fill the void of not being able to download chosen media legally off of the internet. These large scale companies are now paying the price for their negligence and greed.

Now I can see the point that the pirated material has cost jobs, economic growth etc... but was this false growth, false jobs in the first place? Their careers being built upon the greed of the capitalist system, and its lack of ability to sustain itself.

So I suppose, what I am asking the UKC collective wisdom is, are these sites good for the world, society etc... or are they just big thorns in the side of it? It would also be interesting to hear from small film company owners, Rockfax etc.. that copyrighted material has on them. And finally, what can the MPAA do to stop such illegal recklessness?

I look forward to hearing some good replies!

In reply to Jackwd:

I suppose your opinions will depend on which side of the fence you are from.

Artists who have their works pirated will, I am sure, think that everything should be done to close this and other download sites down.

Downloading pirate software, films, music etc is theft. The fact that the possibility of getting caught and prosecuted is extremely slim is probably the reason why so many people do it. If it was as easy and "safe" to nick something from Dixons then their shelves would be empty. IMO

In reply to mgco3: But what about the smaller artists who don't make a lot of money, would they not benefit from the added publicity and availability of their content on such websites? Take for example the artist Pretty Lights, he struck a deal with uTorrent to have his EP loaded on the first run of their torrent client, resulting in millions of people hearing his music. Although it was released for free at the time, his latest album is high in the American Billboard Charts currently. Is this not a positive?

In reply to Jackwd:

If an artist agrees to distribute his music etc via one of these sites then it isn't theft as consent has been given.

Unfortunately not all content comes under this agreement and is therefore stolen..

In reply to Jackwd: Yet again, Mr Fry has some very good things to say on the matter, and I have to say I agree: youtube.com/watch?v=l4nj0a9rgzA&

In reply to Jackwd:

Personally, I haven't used the bay for 3-4 years. I eventually went elsewhere because I could not trust what was on offer.

If stuff was reasonably priced then I'g buy it.

As for downloadable games from vendors such as Steam, then they need to get their act together. If you were to walk into a store of 'Game' you could walk out with a boxed copy of say BioShock for roughly £30 however the downladable version, where you leave the shop with just a code, will set you back an extra tenner.

How and why should a download code for a Triple rated game cost considerably more than walking out of the shop with a retail box containing a DVD of the game?

Personally, I always pay for my games and will never seek out pirate copies because I do not want to let my computer be subjected to potential malware. At the moment I'd rather get retail copies that download from a server because it is cheaper. Mad!

In reply to mgco3:


No no no no no! It is not theft. It is copyright infringement, not theft. For it to be theft you have to deprive someone of the thing you are taking, copying something is not doing that.

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120329/02304318285/nytimes-oped-explains...

I hope you also don't think downloading something off pirate bay also helps terrorists etc.

In reply to Jackwd:


This subject has been tackled on numerous occasions and very few UKC's seem prepared to endorse file-sharing ! Personally, I've no problems with it whatsoever, but I do avoid most of the big Public Trackers. I am very active with a small Private Tracker ( PassThePopcorn) which is the dogs bollocks as far as film sharing goes. Members seem prepared to make regular donations to keep the site free of publicity and maximise discretion.

As regards copyright infringement : I am a very regular cinema-goer and very rarely download a recent film. I'd give the producers a six month grace period, during which it would be illegal to download their material, after which, it could be openly shared on the web. Personally I'm not going to pay £20 and more for a BluRay that will probably spend most of it's life gathering dust on a shelf.

I also buy an occasional CD, especially from unknown artists who sell their own recordings at their concerts. More often than not they are very reasonably priced ( £5 -£10 ) and you know where most of the money will be going.

In reply to Jackwd:

Still not sure how I feel about pirate copies, but this is frankly genius: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2013-04-29-game-dev-tycoon-forces-those-w...

In reply to JoshOvki:

By downloading pirate music etc you have deprived the rightful owner of income. You have their property and have not paid for it..

Theft !! Plain and simple. You have their music/video etc they dont have the money. Copyright infringement is still a crime no matter how you "sugar coat" it with a fancy title.

I am lost to where the terrorist link came in to it but it is a fact that ANY criminal activity usually has links to other more lucrative criminal activities.

In reply to Jackwd: I'm in favour of everyone in society having access to our creative output. I think sharing in this way is very important to create an inclusive society. File sharing is good, but better still would be to rethink our copyright laws so as not to criminalise people for accessing our cultural material.

Perhaps some kind of modern, tax payer funded digital library system would be an answer so downloads can be monitored and appropriate monies distributed to the creatives.

Also I know people who have got jobs using expensive pieces of software which they were only able to learn to use by downloading a pirate version.

In reply to Jackwd:


There might be more sympathy or support if the decision to distribute (and profit from) their work was in the hands of the artists rather than self-appointed moral arbiters like Pirate bay using pseudo-moral arguments to justify their hypocritical criminality.

In reply to colin8ll:
Our output? I don't know what your creative output is but I'm in favour of being paid for the 40 hours of work I put in each week.


Surely it's more efficient for the users to distribute monies directly to the creatives. At least this acknowledges that those who crate something are entitled to be paid for it, it's just that you want someone else to pay for the stuff you use.


Yep, my industry is blighted by people who claim to have commercial experience of something when in fact they've downloaded something to their PC to help them with their lying.
 

In reply to Jackwd:

I think that the pirate bay is great, and I agree that it is wrong to put our culture behind a paywall, so that only the rich can access it.

In reply to Tyler&offduty: So how do you feel when you hear that the large companies MPAA and industries missed their chance to capitalise on the growth of the internet back in the mid to late 90s? And how should they go about rectifying their errors? Has the ship sailed for them (forgive the pun)? Are the companies going to have to develop new ways of content distribution?

In reply to mgco3:
>
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But you are not depriving them of their money or property, nothing says that you would have bought it if you didn't download it, and the law agrees. My morally it is theft, but legally it is not.


"I do not support copyright infringement any more that I support negligent driving; but just because it is a wrong, it doesn't mean you can pretend it is also a criminal offence."

In reply to JoshOvki:

Except for the fact that copyright infringement IS a criminal offence.

In reply to Jackwd:

I'm fairly ambivalent towards it to be honest and may (or may not) have used such sites in the past to get sneak previews of films and music.

However with the advent of Spotify, Netflix, Sky Go etc and I don't feel the need anymore.

For example on Spotify I pay a tenner a month and get access to as much music as I want with no limits on downloads and the quality is pretty good too. Ok it's not vinyl but you can't have everything The likes of SkyGo and Netflix give me access to more TV and films than I'll ever need.

I listen to a lot of music on Soundcloud and I'm finding it to be another great resource to find new bands. I review a lot of music and to be honest my conscience would bother me if I was sat opposite an artist in the knowledge that I'd pirated some of their music. When I'm researching a band I need to know that the quality is good and I'm not getting shite, there's no guarantee of that with pirated material.... although there's still no guarantee depending on who the band is!

In reply to off-duty:

On a commercial scale it is, but otherwise it isn't. Copyright law is principally civil not criminal law.

In reply to off-duty:

It's actually quicker for me to torrent a digital version of a lot of Cd's I've bought than either download from a legitimate source (if the CD shipped with a download code) or in alot of cases even to BURN the CD!!!

This is a new technology that is far more effective than the current one, I think services such as spotify and netflix are great ideas, and may become more prevelant as broadband width increases and makes TV and such streamable, but with the current technology, torrenting is simply the fastest, so I will continue to buy CD's and torrent them to put on my mp3 player, sometimes I may download a CD and listen to it once before buying it, and delete it if I'm not that impressed.

However, I must say, I think musical discovery is a great part of the adventure of growing up, and being a young teenager and discovering napster was a bit like discovering water in a desert. I think alot of people could articulate this point better than I, but I do think that the more I download music, the more I buy CDs/LPs/go to gigs/discuss things with my friends/buy bands tshirts/fan things. I think its an integral part of the music industry, they won't ever be able to ban it because it fundamentally IS the music industry. The industry isn't doing a good enough job of making music accessible to young people, so the modern "hackers" will, just like radio caroline in the 60s became the establishment of modern BBC radio, so will the new internet technologies become solidified, probably as subscription based services, for future generations.

In reply to dr_botnik:

In the time it took for me to browse the forum, read this thread and respond (20 mins approx) I just downloaded an hour long TV episode.

When the industry gets that, it will be fine. At the minute its just a protectionist racket serving dead institutions that are "too big to fail". I thought that capitalism was meant to support innovation?

In reply to JoshOvki:

I beg to differ:-

Infringing copyrights can be a criminal offence which is punishable by imprisonment. The penalty depends on the offence. The maximum penalty of imprisonment is ten years. It has to be noted that the offender may be liable for both imprisonment and a fine.

http://kb-law.info/wt_dev/kbc.php?article=127&land=UK&mode=1&la...

In reply to mgco3:

Let me quote my last post:

In reply to JoshOvki:

Sorry to disagree again but:- A graduate from London was found guilty of breaching copyright by illegally recording films in cinemas. A mobile phone was used to record the films which were uploaded to the internet and made available to others to watch them or burn them onto illegal DVDs across the world.

No commercial scale involved in this case.. Just one guy copying and distributing




http://www.ipo.gov.uk/about/press/press-release/press-release-2011/press-re...

In reply to dr_botnik:

Your first argument appears to be that because it's quicker to download illegally that somehow means its okay. I don't really buy into that.

Your second argument appears to be that because musical discovery is part of growing up then people should not just be able to listen to it (legitimate) or buy it (legitimate), but also get their own copies to listen to whenever they want for free. I don't really buy into that either.

In reply to Jackwd:

I'm very uncomfortable that Pirate Bay operates as a business by generating advert revenues through collating links to material that they have no license to distribute nor any obligation to reward artists for their work.

I downloaded a few albums of Prate Bay a few years ago and felt uncomfortable doing so. Particularly as I have little interest in commercial/mainstream releases and the albums I was downloading were ones from relatively independent artists that I should have paid for. It's the record companies fault of course that they were to stupid and sclerotic to see the opportunity of digital distribution and p2p technologies.

I'm happier paying a tenner a month to Spotify than using an illegal download site. Not because its legal but at east there's some sort of commercial mechanism in place that allows artists to get some reward for their work. I still buy a lot of vinyl though so maybe I'm in a minority.

When I invested in SteepEdge I was keen to see whether we could create a business model that would enable customers to get what they wanted at a good value price and see filmmakers get rewarded for their efforts. It appears to have worked and I'd rather see more good climbing films coming out than not because of filmmakers giving up because of excessive piracy. It also means that old films are now more accessible.

Certainly Priate Bay and other techno pioneers have their place to show how things could work, but generating thousands or millions of dollars in porn ads based on their stolen content isn't very egalitarian from where I'm sat.

In reply to off-duty:


What's the difference between downloading for personal use or borrowing an LP or single and recording it onto a cassette or indeed recording FM radio ? That's what we did when I was a teenager. Someone bought "Dark Side Of The Moon" and dozens of copies were made ! The only difference I can see is in the quality of the copy. The copiers never had any intention of buying the LP themselves as they didn't have the means. This being the case, they are not depriving the artist of revenue.

In reply to Pyreneenemec:

What's the difference? Not a huge amount - though the fact you can make near identical copies is definitely one element. But at least home tapers didn't make much serious effort to justify their actions with some hypocritical pseudo-moralistic nonsense about "exploitative big companies" or "flawed business models".

I can't really see the justification in the argument "I can't afford it, so it is entirely reasonable to take it for free".

In reply to Pyreneenemec:

The difference is the effort involved vs. the reward. Home taping meant going round to your mates house and forcing them to sit for yet another listen of dark side of the moon whilst you taped it. An analogue process with an expected reciprocal outcome in return. Whilst "seeding" goes someway to mimic the reciprocation it falls far short of input vs. output gained. The network effect and digitisation of assets means the cost and effort of reproduction is negligible.

In reply to Ben_SteepEdge:

I see your point, but it doesn't change the fact that copying and sharing has been going on for a long, long time and has only kept up with the available technology. The time involved in the copying is irrelevant; the first downloads I made ( via p2p with Limewire) took just as long as recording an album onto a cassette !

I see no way of eradicating "illegal downloading". The pathetic attempts by the media companies, such as DRM have been counter-productive. Instead of attracting new customers they fled !

In reply to off-duty:

My first argument was actually "If I bought it, the fastest method to transfer it from CD to MP3 is to download it using torrent" I have got speeds of over 1 MB/sec downloading torrents, this is physically quicker than placing the CD into the drive and ripping it (when I have paid for the CD, it has been shipped, and arrived at my house, from that moment it is still quicker, or even from downloading it off itunes- torrents are several magnitudes quicker). AKA read my f*cking post dumbass.

In reply to dr_botnik:

Read your post and read your polite reply.

"Your first argument appears to be that because it's quicker to download illegally that somehow means its okay. I don't really buy into that."

Nothing you said appears to contradict that. I hate using the analogy of shoplifting but it's similar to suggesting that because you have bought one CD it's ok to nick another one for the car - because that's a whole lot quicker than copying your original.

In reply to off-duty:

Rrrrrrrright, don't think you actually get technology pal. Have you or your kids got an mp3 player? You tend to copy the music from your CD collection onto your computer, then you put the tracks on your phone/ipod/etc, a bit like taking a CD and playing it in your walkman, or on your stereo in your car. or in your bedroom. Or on the hifi in the front room. You own seperate copies for each of these? Geez man, I'm pretty sure thats verging on autistic.

In reply to dr_botnik:

But you don't do you. You buy your CD then use a torrent service to illegally download the same album to produce your extra copies. You do it because it's quicker than copying your CD manually.
Just because something is quicker doesn't somehow mean it is right.

In reply to Jackwd: I recall an interview with an independent film maker who's critically acclaimed film had appeared there pretty much as soon as it was distributed. Small films rarely turn much project and she was effectively killed in this case - her audience , already small, disappeared.

She was near bankrupted and will not be making any more films. Pirating is killing creativity vi independent filmmaking, and the numbers of new films are dropping rather steeply.

What I found more than annoying was that when she complained to Pirate Bay, and explained the situation they pretty much told her to F*** off and stop being a commercial nazi.

In reply to Jackwd: profit rather than project - no feature to edit posts!

In reply to off-duty:

I dont get how its not right to buy a CD, then to access a digital library copy of it rather than manually create my own copy??? The service in itself is not illegal. A bit like how listening to the radio isn't illegal.

In reply to dr_botnik:

It's not a "digital library" though, as you euphemistically describe it. It is a bunch of people illegally sharing the album.
A conspiracy that you choose to participate in because you can't be bothered to spend the time to manually copy your legitimate CD.

In reply to dr_botnik:

You're being very disingenuous here aren't you? You've described a situation which is technically illegal but for which there is some justification but lets face it this accounts for a negligible number of illegal downloads, in fact I'd go as far as to say you are the only person to do this. Even then, if you are trying to tell us that these are the only circumstances under which you use torrent sites I'm calling bullshit.

In reply to dr_botnik:

>I dont get how its not right to buy a CD, then to access a digital library copy of it rather than manually create my own copy??? The service in itself is not illegal. A bit like how listening to the radio isn't illegal.

That's Spotify or Pandora. The legal/not-legal argument is a bit of a red herring, it's more a question of what's acceptable behaviour. PB making money from Ads (like Spotify and Pandora) but without rewarding the artists (unlike Spotify, Pandora and Internet radio) isn't a good thing in my book.

As for making a few digital copies for personal use, that's fine, no-one's going to argue with that, putting something under copyright on a torrent site isn't.

I bought a vinyl album at the weekend that came with the CD and a digital download - I thought that was a pretty good deal.

In reply to mgco3:

So he it was the distributing that was illegal not the downloading...

In reply to JoshOvki:

This is the thing, this technology is a whole step change, its a progression.

In the 50s, there was a thing called "needle time" this was a rule limiting the number of records to be played on a radio, the rest had to be performed by in house bands. Now what happened, was that some guys called tony blackburn and john peel started breaking this rule with an illegal practice using modern technology. What they did, was got a record, and shared it with a load of people. On the radio. The kids listened to it, loved it, bought it, went to the gigs, etc. Alot of people argued that this would kill the music industry. This was immediately prior to the 60s.

Can nobody see the parallels here?

In reply to dr_botnik:

Not really, no. Breaking "needle time" just involved playing records for more than the limited time that they were permitted.
It didn't involve providing copies of those records for the listeners to listen to at leisure.

Furthermore I think the pirate radio stations broadcast records that were supplied to them by the record companies for free - so acting with the consent of the copyright holders.

In reply to Pyreneenemec:

>I see no way of eradicating "illegal downloading".

My view is that as internet speed and streaming technologies develop and new entrants disrupting the traditional stranglehold that the large record companies have held we'll see a decline in illegal downloading. I now pay a tenner a month for Spotify and six quid for LoveFilm and I have no need to download illegally whether I wanted to or not.

In reply to off-duty:

So for more than the 30 secs radio luxembourg played them for, y'know the commercial advertising one. Bit like the samples on many record sites. I just play them a bit longer. I listened to the whole of the Daft Punk record. Glad I didn't pay any money for it, its now deleted after a single listen!

You can buy this box in my hand, but you're not allowed to look in it first...

This is my argument. I don't support not paying for music, I just don't support getting ripped off at £10-15 for something I can't try first. I used to spend hours in HMV listening to records, then I used to seek out small record shops, spending my saturdays trawling through boxes of vinyl picking out bangers. Now i don't have the time, I go for longer periods where i don't listen to new music at all, i don't buy things, then I go to a festival and get inspired, I start downloading, and sure enough I start spending money. I'm not saying everybody who uses this site does so in the same manner, and I don't end up buying every track I like. Yea, its not perfect, but I'm not saying it is, I'm saying its an innovation that won't go away...

Support independant music retailers! Support bands! Support independant festivals and independant venues! F*ck ClearChannel, these guys have probably done more harm to music and small artists than pirate bay have!!!

In reply to Jackwd:

I download more stuff than everyone I know combined.

If I had the spare cash I'd be going to their festival to celebrate with them.

Long live tpb ^^

As for OPs question, seems to me like some of the people responsible for making the shows are finally beginning to understand: http://insidetv.ew.com/2013/03/31/hbo-thrones-piracy/

In reply to Jackwd: "A report from the BI Norwegian School of Management has found that those who download music illegally are also 10 times more likely to pay for songs than those who don't."

http://www.theguardian.com/music/2009/apr/21/study-finds-pirates-buy-more-m...

A study of nearly 2,000 people aged over 15, they were also asked to prove their purchases as well.

In reply to TheoL:

I don't understand the survey:


The Norwegian study looked at almost 2,000 online music users, all over the age of 15. Researchers found that those who downloaded "free" music – whether from lawful or seedy sources – were also 10 times more likely to pay for music.

More likely than who? The population as a whole? It also makes no mention of the proportion of pirated to purchased music these people download.

In reply to Tyler: I would imagine it means 10 times more likely than that of the users in the survey who didn't download illegally. I have tried finding the actual research and was unable to do so which would have been far more helpful and would show the limitations of the research.

In reply to Jackwd: This is going to read rather depressingly and perhaps it's my cynical view of the world but...

I think a lot of people who download illegally know what they are doing deep down is wrong but, why pay for something when you can get it for free?(Not necessarily my opinion)

People try to draw comparisons between actual physical theft I.E stealing from a shop and online piracy I.E downloading a film illegally. The risk of getting caught and the consequences are very different and I think that is why so many people do it. If I was to turn round to my friends and say 'Hey, anyone want to watch this DVD I just stole from TESCO', I think my friends would look down upon that and it would be considered a social taboo. Whereas if I said 'Hey, anyone want to come round and watch this new film (say a big blockbuster that was released a month or so ago)', I'm sure someone would ask how I got it and if I stated I torrented it then my friends probably wouldn't think twice. It not as big of a social taboo, hell even my girlfriends mum asked the other day how she could download music for free.

I can completely see where people are coming from when they say that both are theft but, there is much more of a social taboo with physical theft. Plus the risks are not the same. A few clicks of the mouse and you become an 'illegal' downloader. It takes a lot more to walk into a shop and walk out knowing you haven't paid.

Online piracy seems like a victim-less and anonymous crime, you are just a set of numbers running through servers, downloading bytes. There is no physical theft. That's not to say it doesn't affect real people though...

In reply to Jackwd:
How is this not true for any job in the private sector: car industry, truck driver, shop assistant, flower grower, candlestick maker......?

In reply to Tyler:

http://www.bi.edu/about-bi/News/News-archive-2009/Downloading-music-and-CD-...

Not too hard to find more info about this survey for *ahem* technologically literate folk.

In reply to John1923:

The whole file sharing thing will, if anything, get rid of the non creative element of the music and film business. The money men.

Does anyone think that this type of piracy will ever stop creative people from making films or music? I think in the long run it's all good. I would be happy if commercialism left music alone completely.

In reply to doz generale:
And how exactly are films going to be produced without money?

In reply to Postmanpat:

There is still enough money to be made in film without the copyright issue. You cant download a movie theatre to watch your shared file on! Most of the money made by the first star wars film was on merchandise.

Same with bands, people are always going to want live gigs and collectable items etc. I see the copyright thing as potentially weeding out the crap that is just there to make cash.

In reply to doz generale:
So you still recognise the "money men" have to be invlolved?

>
Problem is nobody knows which is which until the audience decides.

In reply to dr_botnik:

Either you don't understand the "needle time" dispute or you are expressing yourself poorly. The dispute was due to the prohibition on playing more than 6 hours of records per day on the radio.

If you use torrents as a method of "trying before you buy" - it is certainly getting closer to being illegal on a technical level only - but are you honestly claiming that your collection of downloads are duplicated by your collection of legitimate purchases?



Which is of course a different argument to downloading because it's quicker than copying.
As you admit you don't buy copies of everything you download.
Just because downloading is "an innovation" doesn't actually provide you with an argument to justify doing it.


By going to the gigs but not buying the albums?

In reply to Removed User:

Er, congratulations? You can use someone else's computer program to steal someone else's work - well done.

At least you are not trying to justify your actions.