MobileRead Forums - View Single Post - E-books drive older women to digital piracy

Alisa · 05-25-2011, 06:37 PM

I'm 40 and I'm rare amongst my friends in that I feel obliged to pay for digital content. Pretty much everyone I know gets their media from the darknets. We were in our 20s when Napster was huge. My friends thought I was nuts for actually paying for songs.

I thought this would change as they got older and more prosperous, but it didn't. Most of my friends don't have TV service. The shows they want to watch are available online "for free" shortly after they've aired. They'll listen to Pandora and complain about the ads but it doesn't occur to them to just kick down some money. It seems to just bug them to pay for anything they can get "for free". Some of them have become digital hoarders downloading terabytes of art they'll never experience. They do it just to have it.

I don't think its so much an age thing as it is the comfort level with the technology. My parents and older siblings have no qualms about pirating stuff. They just aren't very good at it. When I mentioned usenet bins to my older sister, I thought her head was going to explode with joy. She, of course, assured me that she would only use it to download things she had in paper form, but I know she's likely hitting it up for more than that. The news group thing is funny. Part of my comfort with it is because I'm older. It was the internet we had when I was in university. People both older and younger than me are likely less aware of how it works.

I think setting the bar for "older" at 35 gives them a blurb that makes headlines but it isn't a good line to draw as far as technological literacy.

05-25-2011, 06:37 PM	#123
Alisa Gadget Geek Posts: 2,324 Karma: 22221 Join Date: Aug 2007 Device: Paperwhite, Kindle 3 (retired), Skindle 1.2 (retired)	I'm 40 and I'm rare amongst my friends in that I feel obliged to pay for digital content. Pretty much everyone I know gets their media from the darknets. We were in our 20s when Napster was huge. My friends thought I was nuts for actually paying for songs. I thought this would change as they got older and more prosperous, but it didn't. Most of my friends don't have TV service. The shows they want to watch are available online "for free" shortly after they've aired. They'll listen to Pandora and complain about the ads but it doesn't occur to them to just kick down some money. It seems to just bug them to pay for anything they can get "for free". Some of them have become digital hoarders downloading terabytes of art they'll never experience. They do it just to have it. I don't think its so much an age thing as it is the comfort level with the technology. My parents and older siblings have no qualms about pirating stuff. They just aren't very good at it. When I mentioned usenet bins to my older sister, I thought her head was going to explode with joy. She, of course, assured me that she would only use it to download things she had in paper form, but I know she's likely hitting it up for more than that. The news group thing is funny. Part of my comfort with it is because I'm older. It was the internet we had when I was in university. People both older and younger than me are likely less aware of how it works. I think setting the bar for "older" at 35 gives them a blurb that makes headlines but it isn't a good line to draw as far as technological literacy.