[Pelao]

I am not asking whether you torrent or not, but rather what your views are on torrenting in general. Is it ethical? Is it wholly bad? Are some things ok? What are your views?

 

[LadyO.W.BernieBro]

No thank you.

I don't watch movies or anything. For music I just convert YT videos to mp3.

 

[MegaTuxRacer]

It's a really well done protocol. Nothing wrong with using it.

 

[Metamorphoses]

I don't watch movies or anything. For music I just convert YT videos to mp3.

Don't they still have the ability to track that on youtube servers?

In this digital age... it might be hindering society to limit torrenting. It gives us a huge culture immersion and spreads throughout the deep stretches of the internet. I mean when you create something as a human being, isn't your end goal to share it with everyone possible or to expose it at least before dying?( to get that satisfaction for an idea while still alive.) Before the 21st century, how did ideas spread? Only T.V. pretty much or going out in public... and those things weren't even tangible to the viewer, they had to do something else to really grasp it. Now, you can grasp what you wanted to see or read, most times in less than 20 minutes at most with a good internet connection. And those connections will be improved in the next 20 years as well in the U.S..

This information immersion has potential to change the masses as internet access is slowly becoming a natural human right. It can overthrow governments, maybe even be the solution to enhance societies as Africa is evolved in the 50 years out of its third world state, and encourage creativity with the knowledge it provides for free.

Also, what will be the fate of torrents as regards to copyright laws in the next 20-30 years? Is there really an effective way to truly limit them?

 

[wiarumas]

Technology is only a medium - never the issue. The issue lies within the users and the reason why they are using the technology.

Instead, ask yourself why people use torrents for illegal activities?

Overpriced media, lack of a proper business model to address demand, lack of a business model to provide the format desired, etc.

Its human nature trying to divert around a obstruction. Laws can be applied, but it won't change human behavior. Look at prohibition, the war on drugs, etc.

 

[sorry_neither]

Torrenting is beneficial, neutral at best. It's been shown, time and time again, that pirates actually buy more music than those who don't pirate--and I'm sure it applies to other media as well. Sure, they're probably not buying music from overexposed artists like Lady GaGa, but they're buying music they would have otherwise never heard. (Which I think is the real reason the RIAA has its panties in a bunch.)

There's also this bizzarre myth that every download represents a lost sale. (Copyright math!) For one, probably 90% of the crap out there gets downloaded just because it's there. There are some hardcore pirates who just download gigs and gigs of crap, store it on external harddrives, and never look at it again. They were never going to buy the stuff. If someone bootlegs a Kelly Clarkson album, it's likely they know it's disposable music not worth the price tag; if they couldn't torrent it, they still wouldn't buy it.

Half the time, it doesn't seem like these so-called businesses even want to make money; you can't pay for something that's not available. Undercovers got canceled before the final two episodes could air, but did NBC ever offer the chance for anyone to purchase these episodes? Of course not. Is the series on DVD? Don't be silly. Showtime won't put new Nurse Jackie episodes on iTunes until after a whole season airs. And I thought BBC was supposed to be making an international iPlayer for pay...

And as creative type, I think the copyright laws need to be rewritten from the ground-up.

 

[nonnaci]

Someone has to point out the obvious flaws in digital media reproduction not to mention the rampant degeneration of the cultural consumerism. Its like martyrdom with benefits ftw.

 

[MegaTuxRacer]

To respond to the topic at hand, the fact that anyone pirates anything regardless of method is because media companies are more concerned with the fact that people are pirating their content rather than the fact that they aren't fulfilling demand. Think about what people are used to from the very beginning of home cinema: a person buys a movie, and as long as there is a VHS or DVD player somewhere else, he or she can play that movie there. That means you can bring a movie to your friend's house to watch. Or you can let a friend borrow it. The act of movie watching was a communal experience. Just bring the disc or the tape, pop it in, and watch.

Now let's say you buy a movie off of iTunes. How do you watch it at a friend's? Well you can buy a video adapter for your iOS device and bring that over to watch it. That's more involved, but not prohibitively so, and hey you can watch the movie at your friend's. However, you can't lend the movie without lending your iOS device which contains every other piece of media you own (presumably). So you can do half of what you want to, and the only reason it works is because of audio and video connectivity standards. You could go for the Amazon Video and Netflix approach, but who wants to log into their friend's BluRay player or game console assuming they have one? Even still, you would be violating the EULA and ToS in doing so. You would also have to stream the movie over the internet. For all of the convenience that technology offers us, media companies sure are doing a hell of a job reversing that.

This isn't an issue of greedy people stealing. This is an issue of greedy people who either saw an opportunity to move more units or simply can't or refuse to change their model of business.

 

[Playful Proxy]

Technology is only a medium - never the issue. The issue lies within the users and the reason why they are using the technology.

Instead, ask yourself why people use torrents for illegal activities?

Overpriced media, lack of a proper business model to address demand, lack of a business model to provide the format desired, etc.

Its human nature trying to divert around a obstruction. Laws can be applied, but it won't change human behavior. Look at prohibition, the war on drugs, etc.

Could the price tag in general be that obstruction? You give humanity too much credit. Why pay when you can get it free?

If they do not pirate: Company gains nothing. They do not enjoy the product.
If they pirate: Company gains nothing. They enjoy the product.

In the big picture of things, the company is not affected at all by the decisions of those who torrent. I'm too cheap to buy most things, and if I can't get it free, I will live without it.

My view: If your neighbor has a car and you can make a perfect copy of it, drive off in it, and his is not affected, why not? Sure, the company may not get the money of me not buying the car myself, but guess what? I probably would not have bought it to begin with. They are not losing anything. They simply are not gaining anything from me either.

 

[Transcendence]

If I like something, I buy it. If it isn't available to me...

 

[Eightysixturbo]

Asking NT's opinion about one of their most visited bookmarks