Money Saving Idea – Pirating
This money saving idea is highly controversial, but I thought I would bring it up to see what types of insightful comments I would receive.
Money Saving Idea – Pirating – The Background
With the advent of the internet many folks, at one time or another have, pirated material. They got it for free without paying a dime for it. I went to college during the heydays of Napster, and pirating was rampant across campus. Folks in the dorms used to trade gigabytes worth of movies nearly daily. Software applications and games were free-flowing, and times were good for folks with little money that didn’t have a problem bending or breaking the rules.
Money Saving Idea – Pirating – The Big Shift
After several years of this, many companies and industries began to crack down hard. The RIAA, MPAA, and others took down the likes of Napster, Kazaa, isoHunt, and countless others. For folks interested in pirating software, music, movies, and books, things have become a little less easy than they were 10-15 years ago.
But, it seems that every time one major pirate website or sharing program is taken down, two or three more spring up in its place. In the end, I think it’s pretty much impossible to stop pirating. Industries should focus more on making their content EASILY available at reasonable prices. This is what services such as iTunes, Spotify, Steam, and others have done. As a result, many folks are much less likely to pirate software, music, and games just because of the hassle. The amount of money that can be saved by pirating just isn’t worth the slight risk of getting sued and the extra hassle/time wasted.
Money Saving Idea – Pirating – My Experience
You’ll notice that I haven’t given any discussion here as to if I have ever pirated software, movies, music, games, etc. I’m not an idiot, so I’d never post anything incriminating 🙂 I will say that many I know that have pirated in the past are doing it less and less now…
Money Saving Idea – Pirating – Final Thoughts
Sure, using ThePirateBay.org will save you some money on movies, games, books, and software, but I think it’s not in folks best interest to use it going forward. To me, pirating was largely a symptom of corporations not shifting quickly enough to the desires of the new-found digital consumer.
Now that we have companies like Spotify, Netflix, Steam and others, content can be accessed quickly and easily. In addition, more of your money can get into the hands of the content creators without corporations skimming their share off the top. And, I’m all for supporting the folks that make the software, games, music, and books that I love! What are your thoughts – do you think pirating is a good money saving idea, or is it not worth the extra hassle and risk?
I’d rather not mess with it and just conduct things on the up and up these days. In the past I might have given you a different answer, but these days when we want a song/album we hit iTunes.
Dee @ Color Me Frugal recently posted…6 Things You Need Before You Get a Pet
Dee,
Same 🙂 Spotify is so much easier for me. I get great music in seconds without all of the hassle and worry.
I think you’re right, the current services out there are so easy to use, reliable, and relatively inexpensive that it just makes sense to use them. When I just wanted one song, but the only choices i had were a.) get a pirated copy of the song or b.) buy the whole disc, choice A made sense. But when I can buy it for $1, and load it immediately into iTunes and onto my ipod..well, I’ll just pay the $1.
BTW, the whole time I was reading your article I couldn’t help but wonder where my eyepatch and hook were from my pirate costume…AAAAARRRG! 🙂
Brock @Cleverdude recently posted…Are You Trying To Impress People Who Simply Don’t Care?
Brock,
I was going to take a picture dressed up as a pirate for the post, but I decided against it 🙂
Well, I save a lot of money from watching pirated shows and movies, that’s for sure.
David,
Hopefully you’ll take time at some point to do something to support the artists so that more of what you love to enjoy gets produced.
The laws are different in Canada than in the US — here you can’t get in trouble for downloading pirated content, only distributing (or re-distributing) it.
Still, I don’t do it. Honestly I think people deserve to be paid for their work, just like I deserve to be paid for my work, so I always go through iTunes or Netflix. I don’t think anyone should ever be so cheap that they can justify stealing.
Bridget recently posted…Financing My Life Has Never Been a Good Idea
Bridget,
I tend to agree with you mostly 🙂 Thanks for stopping by.
To me, it makes no sense to pay for something that can be accessed for free with the click of a button. The pragmatic in me simply won’t allow it. There are now streaming piracy services like popcorn time that are as easy to use as Netflix, and piracy was never difficult to begin with of you have common sense.
If you are anything below upper middle class and you consume a lot of media, that is money being thrown away that could be saved for retirement or spent investing.
With how tiny the risk is, at the end of the, day, the only thing you are getting for that money is a warm feeling in your tummy for doing the right thing. But if the choice is between more money in my pocket and a warm feeling of self righteousness, I’ll take the money everytime.
The argument about paying people for their work doesn’t really hold water, because, as you see from the responses here and elsewhere on the subject, most people take the moral high ground and are willing to pay, making it so that the rest of us don’t need to and the artist/creators still get their incentive to continue creating. So while I am truly thankful for the majority of you with normal hang ups, I am glad I am not weighed down by them personally. It adds significantly to my quality of life for zero cost.