Online piracy: Difference between revisions

[[File:Qbittorrent-Interface-4.2.1.png|thumb|upright=1.35|alt=An image of a qbittorrent interface; a popular torrenting program due to its free and open-sourced design.|[[qBittorrent]] is one of the most widely used torrenting programs due to its [[Free software|free]] and [[Openopen-source software|free and open-sourcedsource]] nature.]]

'''Online piracy''' or '''software piracy''' is the practice of [[download]]ing and distributing [[copyrighted]] works digitally without permission, such as [[music]], [[movies]] or [[software]].<ref name=":03">{{Cite journal|last1=Choi|first1=David Y.|last2=Perez|first2=Arturo|date=April 2007|title=Online piracy, innovation, and legitimate business models|journal=Technovation|volume=27|issue=4|pages=168–178|doi=10.1016/j.technovation.2006.09.004|issn=0166-4972}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.pcmag.com/encyclopedia/term/63907/internet-piracy|title=Definition of: Internet piracy|website=[[PC Magazine]] Encyclopedia|access-date=26 October 2018}}</ref> The principle behind [[piracy]] has predated the creation of the [[Internet]], but its online popularity arose alongside the internet.{{Not verified in body |date=April 2024}} Despite its explicit [[illegality]] in many [[Developed country|developed countries]], online piracy is still widely practiced, due to both the ease with which it can be done, the often defensible [[ethics]] behind it, and access to files that would normally cost money or be otherwise unobtainable. Some of the most pirated software includes [[Adobe Inc.|Adobe]] software and [[Microsoft Office]].{{Not verified in body |date=April 2024}}

The economic loss caused by digital piracy before the year 2000 is estimated to be worth $265B and in 2004 it was found that 4% of box office receipts were lost. Both piracy and economic losses due to piracy are trending upwards. Lost revenues due to digital piracy couldwere estimated to reach $5 billion by the end of 2005.<ref name=":03"/><ref>Al-Rafee, S., Cronan, T.P. Digital Piracy: Factors that Influence Attitude Toward Behavior. J Bus Ethics 63, 237–259 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-005-1902-9</ref> Understanding digital privacy can be supplemented by the exploration of the consequences of digital piracy, using a base model and several extensions (with consumer sampling, network effects, and indirect appropriation).<ref>Belleflamme, Paul and Peitz, Martin, Digital Piracy: Theory (October 27, 2010). CESifo Working Paper Series No. 3222. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1698618</ref> According to the IP Commission Report the annual cost of [[intellectual property theft]] to the U.S. economy "continues to exceed $225 billion in counterfeit goods, pirated software, and theft of trade secrets and could be as high as $600 billion."<ref>{{cite web |title=IP Commission Report |url=https://www.nbr.org/wp-content/uploads/pdfs/publications/IP_Commission_Report_Update.pdf |website=NBR.org |access-date=1 September 2021}}</ref>

While these sites are occasionally shut down, they are often quickly replaced, and may move through successive national legal jurisdictions to avoid law enforcement. These efforts at detection and enforcement are further complicated by the often prohibitive amount of time, resources and number of personnel required.<ref name="Scott20162">{{cite book|last=Scott|first=Gini Graham|url=https://archive.org/details/internetbookpira0000scot|url-access=registration|title=Internet Book Piracy: The Fight to Protect Authors, Publishers, and Our Culture|date=22 March 2016|publisher=Allworth Press|isbn=978-1-62153-495-2}}</ref>

Online piracy has led to improvements into file sharing technology that has bettered information distribution as a whole. Additionally, pirating communities tend to model market trends well, as members of those communities tend to be early adopters. Piracy can also lead to businesses developing new models that better account for the current market.<ref name=":03"/> It has been argued that online piracy may help in preventing businesses from investing in unnecessary marketing campaigns. In addition to helping screen businesses, research proposes that some organizations may be better off servicing only their most valued and legitimate customers, or those who buy legitimate copies of their products. Because pirated copies of software are expected to attract customers who are sensitive to price, it may not be to businesses' best interest to engage in extraneous price wars with their competitors or invest heavily in anti-piracy campaigns to win target customers.<ref>Ernan Haruvy, E.,Vijay Mahajan, V. and Ashutosh Prasad, A. (2004), “The effect of piracy on the market penetration of subscription software”, Journal of Business, Vol. 77 No. 2, pp. 81–107.</ref>

Despite the discourse on the digital threat of piracy, it has been shown that innovation and the creation of new works is flourishing more than ever on the Internet.<ref name=":2">Frosio, G. F. (2016). Digital piracy debunked: a short note on digital threats and intermediary liability. Internet Policy Review, 5(1). [[doi:10.14763/2016.1.400]]</ref> Piracy has also benefittedbenefited users in countries where content is either unavailable or delayed. In the case of [[ABC Studios|ABC's]] ''[[Lost (2004 TV series)|Lost]]'', the fear of its last episode being pirated in European and Middle Eastern countries pushed the network to accelerate the episode's distribution to those countries, resulting in the episode being available in those countries 24–48 hours after the original American broadcast.<ref name=":2" />

In many countries the laws on copyright are clear and penalties are heavy. The prevalence of piracy in face of these potential penalties is due to the fact that individuals do not see piracy as inappropriate, let alone illegalagreeing on its illegality, instead viewing it as ethically acceptable due to the core execution of piracy being that: it creates a copy of the file;, thus nothing tangible is being taken away from the inventor of the work.<ref name=":2" /><ref>{{cite journal|author1=M. Limayem|author2=M. Khalifa|author3=W. W. Chin|title=Factors motivating software piracy: a longitudinal study|journal=IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management|volume=51|issue=4|pages=414–425|date=Nov 2004|doi=10.1109/TEM.2004.835087|s2cid=12666182 |url=http://aisel.aisnet.org/icis1999/12 }}</ref> Additionally, despite the massive realm of copying and sharing digital content, consumers who pirate are more willing to pay for legal content when the content is consumer-friendly.<ref>{{cite conference|author1=P. D. M. Fetscherin|author2=P. D. C. Lattemann|title=Motives and Willingness to Pay for Digital Music|conference=Third International Conference on Automated Production of Cross Media Content for Multi-Channel Distribution (AXMEDIS'07)|location=Barcelona|date=Nov 2007|pages=189–196|doi=10.1109/AXMEDIS.2007.41}}</ref> A person's ethical and moral predispositions and the judgments that they use to make decisions may indicate consistency across various ethical dilemmas and also indicate their likelihood to pirate software.<ref>{{cite journal|author1=Wagner, S.C.|author2= Sanders, G.L.|title=Considerations in Ethical Decision-Making and Software Piracy|journal=Journal of Business Ethics|volume=29|pages=161–167|date=Jan 2001 |doi=10.1023/A:1006415514200|s2cid= 141745605}}</ref>