>Then I asked him to imagine if the product in question represented several months or even years of his life. All that time he was creating, writing, editing, and marketing this thing in order to fund his next project. And then everyone downloaded it, illegally, for free.
So he responded to an actual argument with an appeal to emotions? And he seems to be proud of this?
Sorry, no. If you have a problem with an argument, you point out the flaw in the argument. You don't try to make the person giving the argument feel bad for the conclusion.
> It turns out that we view ourselves categorically as either good or bad, and moving from being 3% legal to being 4% legal is not a very compelling motivation.
This is very silly reasoning. People who download illegally don't view themselves as "bad", and most people I know who download illegally (aka "most people I know") also buy stuff in the same category as what they download.
Yes, I would love to hear this man explain how prices should be structured for a country like India or China.
Oh, you make less than 20$ a day? Well, I guess that means there is no legal way for you to become culturally enlightened.
I mean the claims that pirating are bad are easy for me to buy for pure entertainment, but I think it really falls apart when it comes to music and especially books. The idea of being able to distribute ereaders with 100g sticks filled with textbooks in any wanted language - it astounds me. It's so cheap. So easy. So many children would be able to get such a head start on life, with so many wonderful words to guide them on their path to becoming an adult.
But it will never, ever happen. Not until people start thinking less about exchanging money with other rich people.
> So he responded to an actual argument with an appeal to emotions? And he seems to be proud of this?
Not only that; his question is flawed and ironically very dishonest. Anyone who produces music, movies, games or books knows from the beginning they will be downloaded for free whether the author allows it or not. He will not unexpectedly find himself in that situation as the article implies.
With that in mind, anyone who wish to product music etc. has to reconcile themselves with this fact, and find a business model that works in the real world, not some idealized result of wishful thinking. Anything else would be madness.
Therefore, the answer to the question should be "AWESOME! Everyone downloaded it." Your worst nightmare should be that no one finds it worth pirating.
So he responded to an actual argument with an appeal to emotions? And he seems to be proud of this?
Sorry, no. If you have a problem with an argument, you point out the flaw in the argument. You don't try to make the person giving the argument feel bad for the conclusion.
> It turns out that we view ourselves categorically as either good or bad, and moving from being 3% legal to being 4% legal is not a very compelling motivation.
This is very silly reasoning. People who download illegally don't view themselves as "bad", and most people I know who download illegally (aka "most people I know") also buy stuff in the same category as what they download.