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| quote: | Originally posted by kitphillips
I disagree with you, and aside from the actual disagreement, you're caricaturing his argument.
He's just saying that not every unlicensed user was a potential buyer. If you disagree with that then you're incredibly naive IMO. The number of unlicensed users who actually would have brought the product is open to conjecture, but Kysora was pointing out a flaw in your argument which you don't have an answer for; you simply don't know how much money companies are losing because of piracy.
Are they losing some? Yes. Are they gaining some? Maybe. How much are they losing? Who knows.
Can anybody do ANYTHING about the situation? No. So whats the point of wasting your time arguing about it. |
Actually, if anything, I was specifically trying to avoid caricaturing anyone's argument. In fact, I was trying to adopt the position I would be using if I were actually taking the opposite side. I deliberately avoided setting up a straw-man logical fallacy in order to set the opposition to my arguments in a position to which then attack the weaknesses of them.
What's telling is that both you and Keysora, to a lesser extent, basically see a position I would use if I were on the opposite side of this as either a 'caricature' or 'not as good as'. Now was it a bit simplified? Yes - but only to avoid unnecessary details which don't necessarily impact the salient merits of the arguments.
My bottom line is that I'm not going to have an argument where I have in-as-much conceded that the real harm is both unquantified and unquantifiable if I cannot quantify the opposition's opinion into something which is, in itself, static. What happens when such stasis is neglected is that people change the points they are arguing to, thereby reducing the relevance of my own arguments.
I've seen it, even in this thread, where clear delineations not being made about what people are actually arguing about creates unwarranted sticking points and fosters beliefs on both sides which actually have people about arguing over something they fundamentally agree on.
Finally, I respect your position but an insistence that I am naive is largely irrelevant since such an argument is only supported with speculation on my actual knowledge concerning this issue. It remains, however, quite unsubstantiated without specific information provided which supports it. It is, at its heart, either an appeal to populace logical fallacy (everybody knows your position is naive) or an appeal to a higher authority logical fallacy (Diginut would think you are naive); both of which support a deductive Boolean ad hominem (x=1 not 0 therefore you are naive). If you think this debate is fundamentally useless, then there is actually nothing for you to agree or disagree with.
Personally, I'm doing it for my own entertainment.
| quote: | Originally posted by Kysora
This wasn't really the main aspect of my argument, and it sounds a lot better in the context of what I was saying than how you're putting it here -- I simply said that to illustrate that the act of piracy does not directly negatively affect the financial situation of a developer if that person never intended to purchase the software in the first place.
I think you focused too much on "target market", I probably tossed that term around -- either way all I was saying is that while the percentage of pirated software vs legitimately purchased software is very high, that percentage is due to a very small fraction of people compared to the people still purchasing it.
Consider this: About 80% of iPhone apps are pirated, but only maybe 10% of iPhones are jailbroken (this is a very liberal estimate). That's simply because pirates download WAY more than legitimate buyers can ever purchase. But without those jailbroken phones, the apps would probably sell just as many copies, with maybe a very, very slight increase in sales. That's basically all I'm saying.
You seem to understand my argument but don't get focused on "target market", I simply considered the target market to be the group of people that would actually purchase the product, vs the people that would pirate it and not put a dime towards the software otherwise. Probably an incorrect term but I'm not sure where you're about to go off with your argument, and I don't want you focusing on that. |
| quote: | | And on that topic, I don't equate software piracy to stealing. Stealing implies a loss on the part of the owners. If you go into a convenience store and pocket a candy bar or something, you're stealing something physical, something that has monetary value due to its physical components and the processes that got it to that state. Software is code that has no value other than the work that went into it and the team that did said work. I'm not trying to devalue all of that work, I'm merely saying it's not intrinsic, it's implied. And nothing is actually "lost" other than potential sales. As Richie's been saying, there is no potential in the group of people pirating those programs, simply because they would never buy that product in the first place. Either they download it, and have the software, or they don't and it doesn't get bought either way. Is downloading it really that bad in that situation? |
The above, I believe and even to the benefit of your argument, equates to:
| quote: | | Computer software is not a tangible good and is therefore NOT subject to market forces which would affect its price, such as scarcity, and this is one reason why piracy has little impact on the profitability of the industry. |
To further expound upon its benefits to your argument is the practicality behind what a licensed user is accorded which is support for the product, after the product has been installed on the machine; essentially outside of any legal consideration or ethical dilemma, the only other plausible reason within a person's own interest for which to pay for software, in the first place.
Target market is simply a useful reference point; a word I believe has been bandied about but which I adopted so I could clearly pose your arguments (and M4B's) as both a way to illustrate my fundamental understanding along with aligning it within the context of our disagreement.
The crux of your second argument is that because the population of unlicensed users would never have paid for what they are taking AND that because they do not comprise a percentage larger than the number of paying customers, in the first place, there is little revenue lost to the software company as those who have paid for being licensed comprise a substantial enough market share.
If we are agreed on these definitions, let me know.
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Now with extra singles!
my old stuff, not quite up to snuff - but I still dig it - UPDATED 9/23/2012
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