On Fri, 21 Jan 2011 20:35:36 -0700, Patrick Elliott wrote:

> Ah, well. "Harm" is the billions and billions lost to people not buying
> the overpriced books

The problem I have always had with that "harm", though, is the assumption 
that those who illegally copy would have paid for the product if they had 
no other choice.

It's probably fair to say that the vast majority of those who pirate 
wouldn't pay even if they had no choice.  Take Jammie Thomas, for example 
- if her reason for downloading was because she didn't want to pay, it 
was probably because she couldn't afford to pay.  So of course, now 
they're suing her into lifelong bankruptcy because their product was 
above what she could afford anyways (not strictly true, I know, because 
it's not finalized and it's not clear that she illegally downloaded since 
the case is more about her distribution of the songs rather than how she 
obtained them in the first place).

Software piracy is like that, though:  Most of the offenders in computer 
games are kids who can't afford the steep prices of many of the 
products.  Even if the software was DRM'ed, it doesn't cost to work to 
break the copy protection, and if you don't have $75 for the game, it's 
not right to claim that as lost revenue from those who don't have $75 
worth of discretionary income to spend.

Jim

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