Some slogans used to say "to buy and keep".
- Why would you buy it and not keep it? The word "Keep" is clearly used to manipulate you into thinking it's the same as owning.
- Keeping something you buy (not rent) implies ownership as long as you want, not what they want, so this goes against its definition too.
Piracy has never been stealing, nor theft, in the entire period of time when "piracy" has existed as a term for "copyright infringement". Stealing involves depriving someone of a piece of property, not merely the profit from selling it. I'm not aware of anyone, ever, who has been charged with criminal theft because they duplicated an existing work.
Piracy has never been stealing, but until somewhat recently, buying was always owning (in terms of the physical copy, not in terms of the copyright).
If it were possible to scan an object that is protected by patents/trademarks/copyright and later reproduce it with perfect fidelity from raw materials, should that be considered "stealing"? Of course not. It might violate, in some sense, one or more of the rights often lumped into the colloquial term "intellectual property". But it cannot be theft, as the owner of the original object was not, in any way, deprived of their property.
If it goes missing, I will still have spent less than it would have cost me to rent it for a week back in the day.
Those problems also exist with physical belongings.
In a way, the lower price of Steam helped swallow the disappearance of the second hand market. I see the point, but wouldn't set it as a positive thing (neutral at most?)
The worst part is, you can't transfer your 'purchases' to someone else, or even leave them to someone when you die.
abstractspoon•5mo ago