Hacks, Warez discussion: A (harmless) conversation

[Soulstorm]

Please, do not take this the wrong way. I'm not here to provide any information about warez and such or to request anything, so do not delete this thread before you read it! I just want to express some questions I have for a long time concerning those matters;

1)Some sites-places that give programs are well-know in the community. What prevents them from closing, since everybody knows about them? I am talking about torrent sites, P2P networks, and hack sites.
2)Why do they exist in the first place? The company that provides space for the people to place their site, aren't they afraid to host such a site in their server?
3)Do you think that if companies had more reasonable prices, we wouldn't have had piracy to such a big extent?
4)Do you think that some forms of piracy (such as p2p programs) promote (in a good sense) music and make it available to music listeners?
5)Do you think that sometimes piracy is good to a certain extent?

Sorry if in any way I violate the rules of this site. If that happens in any way, I apologize and I wouldn't be surprized if this thread was deleted.

 

[Mitthrawnuruodo]

Although these topics are really frowned upon here at MR, I think you can defend a discussion of the principals of piracy, so I'll bite:

1) The legislation differs (greatly) from country to country, so what's illegal some places might be considered okay elsewhere...

2) See 1)

3) No I think people would steal no matter what prizes you could get legally, "free" is better than "something".

4) That is a common excuse, "music pirates buy more music", and even if that was true to a certain degree, music sales are hurt by downloaders, why would most people buy all those songs they've downloaded for "free" (even if you might "discover" a few artists and like them enough to go buy a CD or two.)

5) No, piracy is not legal (most places) and definitively not morally right (any places). If you want free music, visit a public library...

 

[CanadaRAM]

1)Some sites-places that give programs are well-know in the community. What prevents them from closing, since everybody knows about them? I am talking about torrent sites, P2P networks, and hack sites.
2)Why do they exist in the first place? The company that provides space for the people to place their site, aren't they afraid to host such a site in their server?
3)Do you think that if companies had more reasonable prices, we wouldn't have had piracy to such a big extent?

1) What makes you think that because an address is known, that the individuals responsible can be tracked down and sued? (because legal action would be necessary to shut something down). Then when you track down the IP address, you find it's an open proxy at a school in Korea and the real site is somewhere, anywhere else.

2) What makes you think that the ISPs or whoever is selling the connection to these sites is aware of or condones the site? When you buy hosting, you sign a contract with the ISP, which usually includes various clauses to protect the ISP such as no Warez, no pr0n. But then you are free to put on whatever you like and the ISP may or may not find out to enforce it.
If they do, you just buy a hosting account in China, where if you pay in hard currency there doesn't seem to be enforcement of anything.

3) The entire scenario is driven by greed -- the greed of the consumers who feel they are entitled to something for nothing. They think they can get away with stealing because the chance of being tracked down is negligeable. Then they squeal like pigs when they are singled out for legal action. Greed.

 

[dotdotdot]

For number two, they don't use a host most of the time - you don't need a host, you can run your own server... Also, if they are so good at hacking apps, they can hack a URL to refer to their site...

So, for example typing in Google.com (if it were a Warez site) would instantly refer to some IP address...

OR, as said, it's legal in some countries.

 

[Sun Baked]

Although these topics are really frowned upon here at MR, I think you can defend a discussion of the principals of piracy, so I'll bite:

arn said a political type discussion on the sites is OK a long time ago.

Just can't stray into naming sites or asking how-to/help-me type questions.

As for why they stay open when they are a bad secret, it's probably because organizations like the Business Software Alliance really haven't got their act together to fight them.

The BSA has their act together if you point out a company that is downloading and using the stuff -- they'll show up at the door with armed US Marshalls, FBI agents, or local police and put you through an IRS-style audit (ie, not pleasant and quite similar in the types of probing you go through).

But, I really haven't heard of them raiding the actual sites.

You get a cash reward for turning people into the IRS or BSA, but you really don't get much under the current RIAA and MPAA reward programs in you turn in sites or people.

 

[mkrishnan]

Okay, I'll bite too...

1)Some sites-places that give programs are well-know in the community. What prevents them from closing, since everybody knows about them? I am talking about torrent sites, P2P networks, and hack sites.

Beyond what Mitthrawnuruodo has already said, I think it's also a visibility issue -- some of these sites are likely to be owned/hosted in countries where the activities involved *are* illegal. The people who work at "cracking down" go after the highest bandwidth sites, and also the ones that get publicity. Systems/sites like soulseek, that are "well known in the community," but are not widely *explicitly* advertised, can fly under the radar, just because the community is so large and there is such a large bandwidth of "discussion."

2)Why do they exist in the first place? The company that provides space for the people to place their site, aren't they afraid to host such a site in their server?

Well, you don't make a pitch to a site that hosts, saying, "I want to use my hosting for purpose xxx," much less saying I want to use it to pirate. You just by bandwidth. So the answer is no different than (1).

3)Do you think that if companies had more reasonable prices, we wouldn't have had piracy to such a big extent?

I think the two are loosely related. Piracy seems to be worst to me with very low price items (music CDs) and higher price items (software like Photoshop, operating systems -- especially the Windows "pro" versions, which are not cheap, MS Office, etc). I don't think making prices lower by itself would eliminate piracy, nor do I think unreasonably high prices are the distal cause of all piracy. I just don't buy that the average pirate is a case of Jean Valjean stealing to feed a hungry child.

4)Do you think that some forms of piracy (such as p2p programs) promote (in a good sense) music and make it available to music listeners?
5)Do you think that sometimes piracy is good to a certain extent?

I'm going to go out on a limb and shock you here by saying yes. But I have a specific case in mind: abandonware. Both in music or other documents that are out of print, and in software that is out of print. Copyrights are a good and proper thing to allow companies to produce return on investment on their development and to spur the production of good intellectual property. But I don't respect the concept of squatting, particularly with the perpetual nature of copyright in the US (where there are weak / no public domain laws). There should rather be a use-it-or-lose-it approach in at least some cases; if a company has no intention to make a product available, I don't feel bad about people pirating it.

 

[Omen88]

I think for some types of professional applications, actually the software companies condone piracy for hobbyists and students. For example if Visual Studio .net gets illegally downloaded, people will try and figure out how to work with it. Then when companies hire those people, they will have an influence on which software is bought by those companies (which will be the software they know best).

As a student I got Visual Studio for free from Microsoft. And Oracle and MySQL can also be downloaded for home use for free.

 

[mkrishnan]

As a student I got Visual Studio for free from Microsoft. And Oracle and MySQL can also be downloaded for home use for free.

I think policies like Oracle's are great for deterring casual piracy. Oracle is *very* good about making their software available to developers. Even if they are evil in many other ways.

 

[dubbz]

3)Do you think that if companies had more reasonable prices, we wouldn't have had piracy to such a big extent?
4)Do you think that some forms of piracy (such as p2p programs) promote (in a good sense) music and make it available to music listeners?
5)Do you think that sometimes piracy is good to a certain extent?

3. It might decrease, but I doubt it'd go away..

4/5. I know several people who use P2P to download and listen to music, then buy the CD, or start buying CDs of that band/artist. They're all around 20 or older (some, much older). But I also know people who whould never buy music. P2P is probably a good thing for lesser known artists, who are not as heavy promoted by RIAA & Co...It'll increase the chances that someone will discover them and their music. And perhaps one of those who download it, buy their CDs. Without P2P they might never have been found...

Also, when it comes to software, things like Photoshop and 3D Max might be some of the most pirated software around. Usually copied by people who couldn't afford it anyway, but will grow up using these apps, learning their usage and might some day use them professionally. It'll benefit the companies in the end.

I also happen to belive that if MS were to make it impossible to use Windows ilegally, they whould dig their own grave as less people used their OS, leading to a Domino effect... I'm not saying that piracy doesn't hurt MS, but I do belive that piracy is one of the reasons they've reached the position they're in today.

Edit: Just had to add something after reading the two comments above: Learning Editions, and similar variants where you can use an app free for personal use, is a great thing. Allowing you to learn using expensive applications without adding more fuel to BSA and various piracy statistics.

/Please keep this civil. And no links to sites that might be questionable.

 

[mkrishnan]

Also, when it comes to software, things like Photoshop and 3D Max might be some of the most pirated software around. Usually copied by people who couldn't afford it anyway, but will grow up using these apps, learning their usage and might some day use them professionally. It'll benefit the companies in the end.

I agree with this in principle, but Photoshop is a great example of a company (Adobe) making a great effort to be reasonable and having it fall on deaf ears. The *vast* majority of people who pirate CS or CS2 could do everything they need to do on PSE3. And PSE3 is $99 MSRP, $69 MSRP for students, and available legally on the street for as little as $40. Considering the level of interoperability between CS2 and PSE3 (people on FredMiranda routinely give instructions without asking whether a person is using CS or PSE and almost never have to clarify), PSE is a very good "learning environment" for CS.

To me, there is no justifiability to me to pirate CS2 so that one can do the things one could do on PSE3 for $40, which is definitely an extremely reasonable price in the US for software of PSE's capabilities....

 

[dubbz]

...

Totally forgot about PSE . You're probably right; there's little excuse now that Adobe has made a cut-down, low-cost version. It's a good thing for everyone.

 

[Mitthrawnuruodo]

As a student I got Visual Studio for free from Microsoft. And Oracle and MySQL can also be downloaded for home use for free.

All MS apps for Windows are free for most college and university students in Norway (except Office and maybe Windows which are very cheap with an EDU discount), through some sort of MS development connection (or whatever) deal, they'll throw Visual Studio .Net after you . Still I didn't bite, not even on college when I had a decent Windows 98 machine, and used Visual Studio 6 for two subjects, one in Windows programming and another in Technical Computer Applications. (I actually programmed a bit assembly using Virtual PC for another subject. Funny, but not all registers "were there", so the result varied... )