Philosophical Quandry: Piracy

[Jack Simth]

Originally posted by Imperator Fyron:
Yes, it is beyond a shadow of a doubt illegal piracy. I am not asking about legality, but about morality. Is it wrong to do this? Why or why not?

Technically, you are asking about ethics, not morality; ethics are rules of right and wrong (which is what you are asking); morals are how well those rules are followed. However, this distinction is seldom material, and more people don't get it than do get it, even in professional literature on the subject. I suppose then 'what exactly do those terms mean?' becomes a question of where language gets its meaning: from usage or from some concrete thing out there? I suppose it doesn't really matter - it's mostly a distinction without a difference.

As for what you are asking ... here's a little riddle to add fuel to the fire:

All ethics are absolute. All ethics are arbitrary. All ethics are applied universally.

These aren't actually contradictory, even though they first appear so.

An explanation:
Part 1) All ethics are absolute.
Ethics are rules, by definition. If the rules include a line saying that this situation or that situation or all situations are ethically fuzzy, then (for those rules) this situation or that situation or all situations are ethically fuzzy. Period. That's absolute, even though it leads to relative situations and variable conclusions about particular instances and general cases.

Part 2) All ethics are arbitrary.
If you take any ethic (any ethic at all - it doesn't matter which one or from what ethical system) and ask "why?" (and actually get a response, oc) you get an underlying principal of some kind (e.g. because of this other rule, because of these other rules, because of these principals, because X said so, because that's the way I feel, because that works the best, et cetera). If the response is one of the "because of X" where X is a principal or rule or principals or rules or any combination thereof (including X said so), you can ask "why" again (or an appropriet variant, such as "why should that be important?" for things that are obvious facts, as an example; "why should we follow what he/she/it/they said?" if an entity/group/person/being is referenced; or even "So why should logic matter?" if all else fails). You can repeat this process until one of several things happen: 1: Responses cease to be forthcoming. 2: The responses fall into a loop ("Why A?" "B" "Why B?" "C" "Why C?" "A"). 3: The response becomes one that is obviously arbitrary (e.g. "Because that's the way I feel" "It just is"). 4: The response becomes one of an emotional argument (e.g. "don't you feel that way?").
1 demonstrates that there isn't really a reason (no reason -> arbitrary), or that the responder has had enough of questions (no data one way or another; find a different respondant/starting question). 2 implies arbitrary as such loops are arbitrary (which loop to pick? There are theoretically an infinite number of such loops). 3 is obviously arbitrary by definition. With 4, it should be pointed out that different people/beings/Groups feel different ways; choosing which person's/being's/group's feelings is an arbitrary choice.
As long as case 1 doesn't happen, the ethic is arbitrary. If case 1 happens, there are a few sub-possibilities: a) there is no reason, thus it is arbitrary; b) the respondant doesn't know, and is trusting an arbitrary source; thus the ethic is arbitrary; c) the respondant is just tired of the questions/dead/gone/sleeping/whatever. 1c is just thrown in for completeness; it is rather immaterial. Cases of an eventual 1c are assumed to be arbitrary. I'll leave it up to a potential opponent to argue that it isn't.

Part 3: All ethics are applied universally.
Implicitly or explicitly, everyone has a system of ethics that they univerally apply. Note that an ethical system includes (implicitly or explicitly) how to deal with those who follow a different system (e.g. calling differences wrong or not).

Parts 1 and 2 aren't contradictory: arbitrary refers to the basis of the ethic while absolute refers to the ethic itself. Parts 2 and 3 aren't contradictory: arbitrary refers to the basis of the ethic while 'applied universally' refers to the judging actions and/or people.

Ethics are arbitrary, so when people disagree, debate doesn't cause agreement unless one side (A) can find something in the other side's (B's) ethics of more importance that supports A's Version (also requires that B's ethics include weighing contradictory ethics to rule one out for the situation in question; some ethical systems could allow for contradiction).
Barring that (also barring altering a person's stance by other means), agreement will not be reached on points of contention.

The original question was very clearly only to provoke comments, and so my absolute ruling on it is utterly unimportant, as I have now commented.

Perhaps I should have held off on the explanation in the interest of furthering discussion? Ahh well, it's done.

[PvK]

Ok, so I think when Geo says murder and stealing are wrong, that might translate to the "culturally correct" as "every human society defines some acts of killing and taking from others as wrong".

PvK

[Will]

Well, I'm jumping in a bit late, it seems...

So people don't have to read through six pages of stuff, like I just did, the original question :

Suppose you make a copy of SE4 for a friend. Your friend will play the game for a bit and decide if he likes it or not. If he likes it, he will buy it. If not, he will uninstall it and be done with it. Just him forever playing on this copy is not an option to be considered in this thread.

In this specific situation, I don't really think it is immoral. From my view, to say otherwise is very close to saying it's immoral to letting the same friend play your copy, on YOUR computer. I don't think anyone would question the morality of bringing your computer to a friends' house to try out the game, with no copying issues. However, an option like that is not always feasible, so you bring the CD, install, try, uninstall.

I can't seem to find a copy of the SEIV EULA -- and I don't feel like digging out my CD and starting an install to read it -- but I will assume that it prohibits installing on someone else's computer without uninstalling on yours. So, yes, it's illegal. The morality of it, however, is different. Some have said that they already provide the demo, and that should provide for the trial instead of trying out someone else's complete copy, and it would be immoral to give something other than the demo to try out the game. But I wonder, when Shrapnel was at Origins, did the computer that had SEIV running have the Demo, or Gold? I would assume that since there was almost no risk of the copy on that computer going anywhere, that they would have put Gold on it; show off the full functionality of the product, and you have a better chance of getting a buyer. Letting my friend play the full Version has little chance of the game going anywhere else; if I had the slightest doubt that it would be distributed elsewhere, I would install, show off, and uninstall all in one sitting.

[geoschmo]

Originally posted by Will:
But I wonder, when Shrapnel was at Origins, did the computer that had SEIV running have the Demo, or Gold? I would assume that since there was almost no risk of the copy on that computer going anywhere, that they would have put Gold on it; show off the full functionality of the product, and you have a better chance of getting a buyer.

Well it was the full Version. But as the publisher they have the right to make this decision. And regardless of whether your supposition is correct or not you really don't have the right to make that decision for you and your friends. I could agree with the suposition (I don't, but I could) that a fully enabled Version would generate more sales then a demo, but not being the developer or publisher I don't get the right to set their policies regarding the best way to gfenerate more sales.

The reason I don't agree with your suposition is that I believe that someone can tell in 100 turns if they like the game or not enough to buy the full Version. The reason for using the full Version at Origins is one of practicality. People didn't sit there at the convention and play 100+ turns. Richard played the game in between talking to people all weekend long and people would walk up and watch for a while, or do a few turns themselves. It would be a little inconveinent if someone walked up at turn 98 and wanted to watch a few turns and he had to restart right away. That's not an issue for someone playing the demo from the start.

Geoschmo

[Will]

Yes, the publisher can decide how their product is distributed, and with what limitations. However, in this case, it isn't really being distributed... the game is there for maybe an hour, and then it's gone, and the friend decides whether to buy or not. If you physically brought your system over to your friend's house to show of the game, is that still immoral? Or, the slightly easier route, bring your friend to your system to show off the game, is that immoral? How about uninstalling on your system, installing on your friend's, uninstalling on your friend's, then reinstalling on yours? All bring about essentially the same results, and in all situations, Malfador and Shrapnel aren't affected (except perhaps by getting a new buyer). To me, it all just seems like varying numbers of flaming hoops to jump through, when there really is no necessity for any hoops.

[Fyron]

Originally posted by Arkcon:

quote:

---

Originally posted by geoschmo:

... is immoral or merely a cultural belief. The question was whether or not copying software was moral. I said it was not and then got roped into a discussion of whether or not anyone has the right to say whether anything is moral or not.

Geoschmo

Hey there, I'm jumping in with a carefully snipped quote from Geo because it meshes well with my point of view.

Consider a "community" of hackers and software crackers, who've developed a "culture" of stealing software.

I think their culture is wrong. A bad culture. Bad. Bad. Bad. ... Bad.

I won't accept the premise that I have to respect that culture -- in my own mind.

I may not have any right to condemn it publicly, or act against it. After all myself or any group that holds similar convictions are as fallible as anyone other individual or group.

But I agree with Geo, the most basic fundamental rules of right and wrong shouldn't be lost on anyone. And I've said so before in a slightly different context. Link: Conceptually it is wrong.

I will agree that maybe stolen software registrations are hard to compare perfectly with a household burglary. And yes, the definition of killing gets messy when we consider warfare, government executions, and heck even the decision not to be a vegan.

But the Golden Rule works pretty good in many instances.

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The problem with that is that you are bending the word culture to suit your purposes. That is a sub-culture at best (probably not even that).

[teal]

Personally I find EULAs to be slightly immoral.

Since the company has a monopoly on the product they are distributing in a sense they are coercing you into agreeing to the EULA. (admittedly a very very mild form of coercion, but a form of coercion nevertheless.) As an aside I believe this is why all the forms you have to sign in order to take a chemistry class waiving the school of any responsiblity should you get hurt are invalid. They wouldn't let you take the class without the form so they were coercing you into signing it. The end result is the same as if you hadn't signed the form, the school is liable if they were negligent and/or actively caused you harm and not liable if they weren't. Sorry I'm tired, it tends to cause more pointless asides...

Back on topic... Since the EULA is basically forced upon you it is not valid. On the other hand one can't have uneforceable agreements because in a certain sense everything is coercion because if both sides didn't need what the other had, why were they deeling in the first place? So a compromise must be reached. The company can't ask you to agree to *anything* in order to use thier product and the customer must still follow certain agreements if they are considered to be reasonable requests.

Strangely enough this has come up before in history... I don't know the exact chain of historical events. But the long and the short of it was somebody tried to prevent libraries from loaning out books on similar legal grounds to what we are discussing. Understandably the libraries sued. The courts saw that this was silly and came up with the "doctrine of first sale". A copywrite owner has the right of first sale of their product. After that the new owner can do whatever they please with their purchase. Including loaning it to a friend. As far as I'm concerned, this is the appropriate moral ground for software sale as well. Liscensing is like "renting" a book. Not just renting a book, but forcing me to rent a book by not offering the reasonable opportunity to buy that book. (EULAs also often force you to read that book in only one certain location and with only one pair of glasses....)

Transactions involving copywrited materials can not work perfectly using free market ideals because they are inherently mini-monopolistic things. Since they are monopolies the consumer needs protection against the copywrite holder. The right of first sale is an important protection for the consumer and I, for one, am dissapointed to see it thrown out of the world in the digital age by the despicable legal trick of EULAs. Consequently I think it is the moral thing to do to continue to act as if the contracts governing the sale of books are in force with software as well.

So back to the original question posed by Fyron. Yes it is immoral to copy your SEIV game and give it to a friend (no matter how long or short they intend to use it). Because this is something that you could not do morally do with a book. On the other hand it would not be immoral to uninstall SEIV from your computer and loan it to your friend for a bit and then get it back.

There is a wrinkle here though. With a traditional boardgame you are not required to buy one copy for each player involved (not even such games as Magic:the gathering in which most players do just that). So why could you not set up your SEIV game on several different computers at once for simultaneus (or even PBW) play assuming (since this whole discussion is hypothetical anyways) that the players only played games with each other. I believe that you could do so and still remain morally in the right.

One more thing I just thought of. It is not immoral to make a mixed tape for your friend. I suppose this is because of the fair use provision. It is permissible to copy something when used for certain purposes and one of those is furthering the bonds of friendship by sharing something with your friends. How the fact that I want to say making a mixed tape is ok, but copying SEIV is not ok can be resolved I'm not sure... In any case I'm sure I have rambled enough...

Teal