Now music and movies do make alot of money but if more and more people follow little by little it grows. What about the beginner musician or movie maker who cant get financial backing because costs rise and profits get smaller and the companies don't want to take a finacial risk.
I will typically pirate any music I want. When you buy an album, something like 75-95% of that money will end up in a record company's coffers rather than the artists hands. For smaller, less-known bands on independent labels, this is less true.
Furthermore, when I pirate music, it doesn't signal that I would have purchased the album/song anyways. If it's a band/musician/MC[I'm a huge hip hop head] that I really like and really respect, I'll end up supporting in a number of ways. The first is going to a performance/show/concert, which is one of the few ways that fans can directly support artists. Secondly, if I go to a show, I'll end up with (non-music) merchandise if I have the money, be it a t-shirt, a sticker, anything. Third, if the merch table has music for sale, a lot of musicians these days offer vinyl records at the merch table, often having a free download code inside. I'll buy the vinyl because I feel like it's a lasting physical form of the music, though my turntable stopped working a while ago. Also, the music on sale at a merchandise table has been bought from the label/distributor by the artist and so the money is going directly to the artist.
Mostly, though, when I pirate something, I'd most likely not have bought the album regardless. I'm a fickle shopper.
With movies, I'm never too sure about that. I've only bought a handful of movies in my life (my favorite movies, obviously). I don't think I'd buy movies anyway because I don't watch as much television/as many movies as most people do.
with software, if there's an opensource version, I'll get that. If not, I feel like I'm not taking away from sales when I pirate an expensive program (because I wouldn't have purchased it anyways)
Where I typically REFUSE to pirate is with books, except overly expensive textbooks. major textbook publishing companies and campus bookstores make a huge net profit off each textbook sold; a $300 text for physics gives the publisher of that at least HALF of the money returned in net profit while the mark up for the book at the store will mostly end up in the pocket of whatever business owner the university contracted to run a barnes and noble (or what have you) on campus.
HOWEVER, I will usually check for an affordable, used textbook first.
With literature, if it's REALLY old (and therefore in the public domain), i'll print it myself unless it's huge like Ana Karenina or too recent to be in the public domain. In that case, I'll go to a LOCALLY-OWNED bookstore and usually try to cop a used edition for cheap (and support a local business rather than a corrupt multinational, also avoiding benefits to a huge publishing house). If it's a contemporary writer, i'll try to get it new because then that writer will actually make money off of it (though publishing companies still take a sizable portion of that money like record companies do).
Sorry for the rant about pirating, i'm WIRED on some espressos and taking a mental break from a long final paper. Sanity's hard to come by at times like this
