Your view on media piracy. How strongly are you against it?

[KitSileya]

51. I am divided in my opinion on it.

I pirate tv shows, but not movies or music. I pay for tv (both the tv license which is mandatory where I live and for the channels) even though I never actually turn it on. I download the shows I watch instead. Increasingly, I just buy them on iTunes instead (for example, this Fall, I have bought Agents of Shield and Almost Human on iTunes rather than pirate them, because now I can pay for them where I couldn't before.) I could just as easily dvr the ones I pirate off my tv, I suppose, but then I'd have to do all the work of converting the files etc. I guess I feel like I have already paid to access tv shows, and so whether I record them or torrent them it's the same difference. However, now that I can more easily buy them through other services, I'll do that. It's just that I hate actually having to watch tv on tv, mostly because they air the shows I like very, very late- late both in terms of time of day, and usually a year after the episodes aired in the US. I remember them showing ST:TNG at 1a.m. back in the mid 90s...the first seasons. The Norwegian cultural elite has always been very dismissive about sci fi shows, but pressure has made them relent somewhat. Now they're only 3 months late, but still has wacky show times.

Films and music, on the other hand, I don't pirate. Those I can go buy in shops or in iTunes. The movie companies aren't doing themselves a favor, however, by clinging to the outmoded region system, and releasing films at different times in different regions. I remember being able to buy the Hobbit on American iTunes in early March, when it was released on dvd on April 8th here in Norway. I believe Japan was even later, May, I think. The movie companies are stupid if they think that that won't lead to pirating - if you know that half the world can buy the film on dvd two to three months before you, but you can't even buy the dvds from internet stores in those regions because they won't play in your dvd players....