How do you justify not paying for EverQuest?

[shovelquest]

Originally Posted by Ekco [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

if downloading stuff for personal use is a crime, i've stolen a trillion fucking dollars lol.

It is a crime, and also using adblock is a crime.

At least for anyone 20 years younger than you.

And I mean everyone 20 years younger than you.

You got literal punks and metal heads who are like, "I watch the commercials because its how the creators get money! Also piracy is bad for the same reasons."

Fuck this place i hope the whole country burns down.

[Ciderpress]

You're literally stealing a finite resource, which is the labor of the developers. Yes we all get that software can be copied an arbitrary number of times. That doesn't mean there's an arbitrary number of new talented software developers, who are compensated for their talents and efforts by their employer, who is only able to pay them if they bring in money by selling the software that you very well might otherwise buy, if you didn't choose to download it for free instead.

Lars was right. Completely, entirely right, about the napster thing, and the exact same principle applies.

[shovelquest]

The difference is my generation understood that the cost of piracy, and adblock is < the gains you get from selling products at a reasonable price to a reasonably sized audience.

But now everyone thinks that companies should make TRILLIONS of dollars, and anyone who prevents that is anti american.

[Ciderpress]

Companies should make as much money as they deserve to make based on the value they provide to society, because companies are made up of thousand of individual employees who need to get paid. It's impossible to know what kinds of cool shit might have been developed by now if not for piracy, because it was never developed, because of piracy.

Lots of "I'm entitled to your labor for some reason I can't quite articulate" going on itt. Is *anyone* still an unashamed capitalist around here?

[shovelquest]

fuck companies and fuck anyone who sticks up for them.

[Ciderpress]

Shovel, I need a new piece of software to do some amazing thing I want to do. When you have an open weekend can you develop that for me for free?

[shovelquest]

Originally Posted by Ciderpress [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Shovel, I need a new piece of software to do some amazing thing I want to do. When you have an open weekend can you develop that for me for free?

Your strawman is a red harring.

1. Adblock and piracy losses are less than loss prevention costs

2. The only profit made by AdBlock changes are on the executive level, not on the creative levels.

3. new products that are valuable are created at new companies, not old corperations that dont want to compete with themselves.

4. your argument, while hopeful, and coming from a good place... is just not based on reality and instead is a delusion that uneducated lead poisoned boomers who had everything handed to them.

5. facebook became the biggest tech company on the planet from nothing, based purely on not having advertisements, and providing a service for free.

6. Same with youtube.

7. Same with google.

8. Same with apple.

9. Same with Open AI.

10. etc. etc. etc.

[Reiwa]

Originally Posted by Ciderpress [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

You're literally stealing a finite resource, which is the labor of the developers. Yes we all get that software can be copied an arbitrary number of times. That doesn't mean there's an arbitrary number of new talented software developers, who are compensated for their talents and efforts by their employer, who is only able to pay them if they bring in money by selling the software that you very well might otherwise buy, if you didn't choose to download it for free instead.

Lars was right. Completely, entirely right, about the napster thing, and the exact same principle applies.

You're indirectly stealing from the workers who already literally had the surplus value of their labor stolen by the company.

Nor is the software itself finite.

[Reiwa]

*Let software mean the product of their labor which can be reproduced infinitely as the company may choose.

[shovelquest]

The fact that I have to explain to multiple generations why mega corporations, monopiles, and supporting advertisements is bad.

Well... that's why I'm braiding my fingers wishing for ww3. We failed and it's time to see if the next species or whatever we re-evolve into have a shot.