<story><title>You can take down Pirate Bay, but you can’t kill the Internet it created</title><url>http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2014/12/10/you-can-take-down-pirate-bay-but-you-cant-kill-the-internet-it-created/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>k-mcgrady</author><text>&amp;gt;&amp;gt; &amp;quot;Thus, if all you want to watch is Game of Thrones and nothing else, your only option is to torrent&amp;#x2F;pirate it.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;I get your point but that&amp;#x27;s incorrect. Alternatives include:&lt;p&gt;- paying for the cable + HBO subscription and only watching GoT.&lt;p&gt;- waiting for the blu ray&amp;#x2F;dvd&amp;#x2F;iTunes release&lt;p&gt;Both those options allow you to watch GoT and nothing else. The problem is that people don&amp;#x27;t want to wait for an official release or want a cheaper way to get it &amp;#x27;right now&amp;#x27; (i.e. a cheaper HBO only subscription). I think GoT is a big torrent is because it&amp;#x27;s not available on TV in a lot of countries or there is a big delay between the US airing and the local airing. Another reason is that people don&amp;#x27;t pay for something when they can get it for free. I would like to see how many people who torrent GoT (but say they would pay for it if it was available to them on their terms) would pay $3-5 for an episode via a torrent if there was a button to pay (and get it legally) and a button to get it for free (illegally).</text></item><item><author>larssorenson</author><text>I think the article misses the point of why piracy was a big thing. It was not always (necessarily) about getting what you want free of charge, but the free flowing access to the media and content. For instance, the reason Game of Thrones is watched via torrent downloads more than via HBO is because a large portion of the audience wants to either just watch HBO or just watch Game of Thrones. But to do that, you have to have an HBO subscription through some cable provider, who does not provide a direct subscription for only HBO. Thus, if all you want to watch is Game of Thrones and nothing else, your only option is to torrent&amp;#x2F;pirate it.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>Morgawr</author><text>&amp;gt;Another reason is that people don&amp;#x27;t pay for something when they can get it for free&lt;p&gt;I would like to say this is wrong, but I have no evidence to support my claims. However what I can say empirically is that myself and many other people I know have stopped pirating games and&amp;#x2F;or music ever since easy-to-use services like Steam and Google Music came out.&lt;p&gt;Personally, nowadays I find myself with so many legit games on Steam that my first thought when a new game comes out is &amp;quot;meh, I don&amp;#x27;t have time to play that, I&amp;#x27;ll buy it later when it goes on sale&amp;quot;. Years ago it would&amp;#x27;ve been &amp;quot;let&amp;#x27;s hop on XXXX to see if there&amp;#x27;s a torrent ready!&amp;quot;.&lt;p&gt;It simply is not worth it, to me, to pirate games, set up cracks, be sure I have all the proper files, set up backups in case I want to replay it later, etc etc. With Steam I can just click &amp;quot;download&amp;quot; and it just works.&lt;p&gt;I firmly believe that if you make something easy-to-access, cheap enough (steam sales, anyone?) and immediate in delivery, you will soon realize piracy really does not matter. The market just needs to evolve and adapt to newer technologies.</text></comment>
<story><title>You can take down Pirate Bay, but you can’t kill the Internet it created</title><url>http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2014/12/10/you-can-take-down-pirate-bay-but-you-cant-kill-the-internet-it-created/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>k-mcgrady</author><text>&amp;gt;&amp;gt; &amp;quot;Thus, if all you want to watch is Game of Thrones and nothing else, your only option is to torrent&amp;#x2F;pirate it.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;I get your point but that&amp;#x27;s incorrect. Alternatives include:&lt;p&gt;- paying for the cable + HBO subscription and only watching GoT.&lt;p&gt;- waiting for the blu ray&amp;#x2F;dvd&amp;#x2F;iTunes release&lt;p&gt;Both those options allow you to watch GoT and nothing else. The problem is that people don&amp;#x27;t want to wait for an official release or want a cheaper way to get it &amp;#x27;right now&amp;#x27; (i.e. a cheaper HBO only subscription). I think GoT is a big torrent is because it&amp;#x27;s not available on TV in a lot of countries or there is a big delay between the US airing and the local airing. Another reason is that people don&amp;#x27;t pay for something when they can get it for free. I would like to see how many people who torrent GoT (but say they would pay for it if it was available to them on their terms) would pay $3-5 for an episode via a torrent if there was a button to pay (and get it legally) and a button to get it for free (illegally).</text></item><item><author>larssorenson</author><text>I think the article misses the point of why piracy was a big thing. It was not always (necessarily) about getting what you want free of charge, but the free flowing access to the media and content. For instance, the reason Game of Thrones is watched via torrent downloads more than via HBO is because a large portion of the audience wants to either just watch HBO or just watch Game of Thrones. But to do that, you have to have an HBO subscription through some cable provider, who does not provide a direct subscription for only HBO. Thus, if all you want to watch is Game of Thrones and nothing else, your only option is to torrent&amp;#x2F;pirate it.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>drewblaisdell</author><text>A better question: who would pay $3-5 for an episode of Game of Thrones in 1080p that starts playing with a single mouse click and is available as soon as the episode airs in the earliest timezone (at least an hour before it appears online illegally)?&lt;p&gt;My guess: not everyone, but a &lt;i&gt;lot&lt;/i&gt; of people.</text></comment>