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shinew · 12-09-2011, 05:54 PM

The pros & cons for both sides for the whole file/app/music/ebook sharing thing(not always legal or right, but it's never stealing!) is that it's little more complicated than some people(and IRAA) make it to be.

There're many reasons for people to get "free contents" through file sharing. It could be that they don't respect intellectual property, can't afford it, there is no legal ways available to get it(it happens), being cheap, much more convenient to get, or just habitually hoarding stuff that they don't necessarily need, etc...

The argument from the publisher side(and some consumers) is that every single copy that's illegally distributed is a revenue loss, that's how they count the loss in millions & billions. But the truth is that vast majority of those people would've never "acquired" those contents in the first place if they had to pay for those. Same as most people who always pay for the contents would not have copied them for free even given a choice.

It's also proven that file sharing could actually benefit the publishers and help them to gain dominance and popularity to the market, there're plenty of those cases, such as Microsoft Windows, Office, Adobe products(ex:Photohop), and lots of new music from both well known & unknown artists, etc...
I don't know about others but if I were a publisher, I would rather have those people who would never have paid for my contents anyway to have it and serve as free ad through word of mouth than to get pissed about every "potential revenue loss" or say something like, "OMG you didn't pay for them! You must delete them NOW or you're a thief!!".

12-09-2011, 05:54 PM	#33
shinew Addict Posts: 309 Karma: 1008082 Join Date: Feb 2009 Location: NYC Device: Kindle PW, K4 Touch, iPad2, Samsung Galaxy S II	The pros & cons for both sides for the whole file/app/music/ebook sharing thing(not always legal or right, but it's never stealing!) is that it's little more complicated than some people(and IRAA) make it to be. There're many reasons for people to get "free contents" through file sharing. It could be that they don't respect intellectual property, can't afford it, there is no legal ways available to get it(it happens), being cheap, much more convenient to get, or just habitually hoarding stuff that they don't necessarily need, etc... The argument from the publisher side(and some consumers) is that every single copy that's illegally distributed is a revenue loss, that's how they count the loss in millions & billions. But the truth is that vast majority of those people would've never "acquired" those contents in the first place if they had to pay for those. Same as most people who always pay for the contents would not have copied them for free even given a choice. It's also proven that file sharing could actually benefit the publishers and help them to gain dominance and popularity to the market, there're plenty of those cases, such as Microsoft Windows, Office, Adobe products(ex:Photohop), and lots of new music from both well known & unknown artists, etc... I don't know about others but if I were a publisher, I would rather have those people who would never have paid for my contents anyway to have it and serve as free ad through word of mouth than to get pissed about every "potential revenue loss" or say something like, "OMG you didn't pay for them! You must delete them NOW or you're a thief!!". Last edited by shinew; 12-09-2011 at 06:41 PM.