A person downloading a pirated copy of a book w/o any DRM for their own leisure use on their own device is different from a multi trillion dollar corporation who is using those books to train an LLM to make AI Slop and make money from it w/o even crediting the authors for their work.
Iconoclast@feddit.uk 9 hours ago
I’m getting the feeling that the average Lemming is a pro-piracy advocate only for as long as it’s them financially benefiting from it but the script interestingly flips when a company they don’t like does the same thing.
If money wasn’t an issue, there’s be no reason to pirate anything. It’s a financial decision. There’s no practical difference between earning fifty bucks and saving that much - in both cases you’re left with 50 more bucks to spend.
sonofearth@lemmy.world 9 hours ago
Iconoclast@feddit.uk 8 hours ago
The difference is only in scale. Stealing is stealing independent of if it’s for personal use or not.
Diurnambule@jlai.lu 8 hours ago
Scale ? How much did Mr random made by selling a shitty copy of the book they pirated ? Meta won at least million using their copy machine yo increase the company stock price.
CoolCat@lemmy.world 8 hours ago
Scale is not the only difference. The companies who do this end up making money with something trained on someone’s else’s work. If a regular Joe Shmoe pirates a book, they don’t earn anything with it.
Iconoclast@feddit.uk 5 hours ago
they don’t earn anything with it.
That’s not entirely true either. There’s no practical difference between saving 50 bucks and earning 50 bucks. In both cases you’re left with more money to spend. Piracy is equally a financial decision even if it’s just for personal use. You’re saving what ever amount it would’ve cost to buy that media.
sonofearth@lemmy.world 6 hours ago
[deleted]Iconoclast@feddit.uk 5 hours ago
I’m using theft an an example due to it being the closest equivalent. The point still stands: if it’s wrong for an company to do it at scale, then it’s wrong when an idividual does it too.
kossa@feddit.org 8 hours ago
I feel you have it the wrong way around. The “average Lemming” is pissed, because private piracy is prosecuted and punished while Meta’s is not.
I, for once, couldn’t care less whether Meta pirates the shit out of all the books if I am allowed to do the same ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Iconoclast@feddit.uk 5 hours ago
That at least would be a morally consistent stance and I have no issue with that. I’m talking about the people who criticize them for pirating while doing it themselves too.
Diurnambule@jlai.lu 3 hours ago
Propaganda 101 : excluding cases which didn’t fit the pursued narrative
Paranoidfactoid@lemmy.world 8 hours ago
Little guys who get caught get the book thrown at them. But oligarchs get to carve out a legal right to pirate for profit. It’s this disparity people are pissed off about here.
yabbadabaddon@lemmy.zip 8 hours ago
I support piracy because I think:
- consolidation ruins concurrency
- I hate ads in services I pay for
- copyright laws kills creativity
- the USA is lobbying the entire world to adopt their view and fuck them
- those laws are there to benefit big companies and not individuals
- it is legal where I live because we pay state tax to have access to media
Iconoclast@feddit.uk 5 hours ago
I’m not arguing against piracy here. I partake in it myself too.
yabbadabaddon@lemmy.zip 5 hours ago
I am not saying you are. I am saying there are a lot of valid reasons and it is not as simple as “if I do it I am for it but when big bad company does it it is bad”.
ilinamorato@lemmy.world 9 hours ago
There’s a pretty big difference in scale, and the perpetrator, and whether or not they’re benefiting monetarily, and much more.
Iconoclast@feddit.uk 9 hours ago
Stealing is wrong whether it’s for personal or business use. Which one is more wrong is besides the point.
Diurnambule@jlai.lu 9 hours ago
Capitalism is on hell of a mind breaker. Most artist will allow IP to be lifted for random people which can’t buy their stuff. Does Meta have monetary issues ? Or may be IP law were never to protect artist but to exploit and get more money.
Iconoclast@feddit.uk 8 hours ago
You can keep the insults to yourself.
It’s virtually never the case that people genuinely can’t afford it or that it’s simply not available for purchase anywhere. In the vast majority of cases, people pirate because they don’t want to pay. It’s a financial decision that leaves them no ground to stand on and criticize others for doing the same.
ilinamorato@lemmy.world 8 hours ago
It’s not really beside the point, from most reasonable perspectives. A multi-billion-dollar company enriching itself on the backs of starving authors so that it can go on enriching itself on the backs of its users is significantly different from a small number of comparatively destitute individuals stealing some temporary enjoyment for themselves. They are both wrong, but the discussion is utterly useless if you don’t talk about the harm involved and who benefits.
Iconoclast@feddit.uk 5 hours ago
I don’t really see that difference there. Of course the difference in scale is massive when you compare a multi-billion company doing it to an individual, but what about the harm when everyone does it as individuals versus one big company doing it? I don’t think the difference matters anymore at that point.
Doing something morally wrong can’t be justified just because only a small number of people are doing it. You wouldn’t use that defense for any other immoral behavior either. Me dumping my car’s old motor oil into the woods is still bad even if I’m the only one in my country who does it - and if I then go ahead criticizing a drilling company for causing an oil spill, I’d be just as much of a hypocrite.