Consumer first; Citizen second

hertg@infosec.pub to Technology@beehaw.org – 110 points – Consumer first; Citizen second | hertig.blog
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From housing, to media, to printers, to everything else. Get ready to own nothing; pay rent on everything.

Disclaimer: I am the author

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I'm not sure if that is a sustainable model for the whole society. Pirating as a solution for everything feels like giving up to me. Also I can't pirate my vacuum cleaner.

I feel like the "pirate everything" mindset focuses on shitty corporations but ignores that paying for media also helps the creators pay their rent.

I think there's a big difference between the things you pirate. If you're pirating some very old books written by people that died a century ago, I don't think it's all that bad. If you're pirating text books made by companies that will intentionally jumble the chapters and paragraphs around just so you can't buy them second hand, piracy should be encouraged. If you're pirating from a small independent author, I think piracy is only acceptable in very few situations.

I've pirated copies or books I bought because I couldn't strip the DRM. I think that's completely fair. Sure, I helped spread the torrent to a few other people in the process, but I just wanted to open the thing I bought on Linux without running a bunch of shady tools.

I can agree with this. Or pirating old games that aren't available through GOG, Steam, etc. Like if I want to play Battletoads, I don't have many options…