If I Were A Pirate...

I must begin by stating, with the exception of this disclaimer, the content of this post is directly quoted from a friend of mine, I added the images for lols. We shall call him 'Mr E' (Mystery, geddit?).

So, I've been a pirate pretty much constantly since I was desperate to have my own copy of Hitman: Blood Money, which I had failed to finish at a friend's house back in 2006. After torrenting 4 different copies of the Spanish demo, I finally got the hang of spotting a decent torrent from a virus-filled pile of troll, mounting and burning iso files and cracking the installs. Since then I've probably downloaded thousands of episodes of TV shows, films, albums and games. By far the biggest contributor to those numbers has to be TV. The regular shows I'm addicted to that only air in the US; House, Boardwalk Empire, 30 Rock, Californication etc. as well as entire back-catalogues of TV shows such as Lost, Frasier and the Star Trek series.

Some Films Just Repel Money


The films that I download are nearly always the newest DVD releases, usually US rips, which means I can watch them a full few months before the DVD is released in the UK. On occasion, I'll have a craving for a certain film, or as I've been doing recently with Nicolas Cage, torrent every reputable film an actor/director has done in order to binge. Some people justify their torrenting by saying they only torrent "bad movies" that they wouldn't pay to see in the cinema. What they're really saying is "I want to see this, but I don't want you to see me seeing it. Unless it's ironically."

I used to torrent every game I could, the last successful torrent being the point-click Jurassic Park game late last year, but before that there is a yawning gap all the way back to Dawn of War II in 2009. I do not torrent games anymore.

The same goes for music, I tend to either buy physical albums from the bands I adore because I enjoy having an actual copy, usually special edition copies. Sometimes I might hear a song I don't recognise and torrent the album just to listen. If I like it, I keep it and listen a lot. If I don't, it falls into the near-endless bucket that is my iTunes library where I get no enjoyment from it.

So that was me, Pirate King, and my torrenting activities circa 2006-2011. So what's changed? Well, I've been repeatedly enlightened by the wonderful and truly insightful Jim Sterling. He has, with his recent Jimquisition mini-series on Pirating (hosted on The Escapist, check it out), altered my perspective on pirating. I used to be of the mindset that "if it's free, why not?" However, with my new enlightened outlook on the subject, I am disavowing as much torrenting as I can in favour of the On-Demand Revolution.


Here's my piracy situation at present:

--> I barely torrent music anymore, I've bought more CDs in the last year than I have in the last 5

--> I do NOT torrent games anymore, specifically because of Steam (more on that later)

--> I do still torrent some films, but that will change soon

--> I still do and will continue to torrent those regular US-shown TV shows.


And here's why I've changed:


On-Demand is the hot stuff.

I'm sure most people have seen, via Facebook, a few of their friends start a 1 Month free trial with Netflix recently. I signed myself up as well. Now, whilst Netflix UK is only offering a very limited (mostly Bollywood) supply of movies to stream for only £6 a month, the idea really hit home with me. Yes, it's been around for ages, along with it's chief competitors Amazon On-Demand, Hulu, SkyGo, iTunes etc, but I'd never given it much attention because, frankly, it wanted my money and torrenting didn't.

But £6 a month....for all the reasonably new (as well as lots of classic) films and TV shows you could want to watch, streamed straight to your PC or PS3, XBOX, Wii or even your smartphone. That's far too good to ignore.

Currently, Netflix has a dire selection due to licencing issues, but that is set to improve. The other companies I mentioned offer a similar service, however I have yet to explore any of these alternatives. The important point, the revolutionary point, is the business model. It is, as I understand it, thus: Netflix buys a TV show or film from the studios, and distributes it as many times as demand calls for, without expending our planet's natural resources to press and distribute discs. Each member pays a flat rate, so the more members the more Netflix has to spend on procuring more content. It can only get bigger and better. In my mind, the entire company is effectively some servers, a Purchasing department and a PR department. And it's the bloody future.

The same model has been seen for years, iTunes has done exactly the same for the music industry. Since the iTunes Store became the nearly-endless pit of music that it is today music piracy has plummeted, mine included. Now, whilst I don't use the iTunes store, I am a big fan of it. Selling music, games, apps and even films and TV episodes to anyone, regardless of whether they own an 'i' product.

Steam is the exact same model, but for gaming. A digital store which functions by spending money acquiring games, and then selling them endlessly as demand dictates. It has completely removed my desire to torrent ANY game, especially indie games like The Binding of Isaac. I picked this great game up on Steam for £1.85, barely the price of a pint. Why quibble that amount of money? If you say you can't afford to pay that to a bunch of indie developers making such wonderful products and torrent it instead, then what business do you have owning a PC? Surely the several hundred pounds of PC you're reading this on could be better spent elsewhere. £1.85 is so little money I even felt bad after playing the same for nearly 20 hours; I wanted to buy it again, just to give the developers some more money. So I bought it for a friend instead.


Some of you might be thinking why I, currently unemployed and penniless, would be willing to ignore the free option for the paid. The simple answer is convenience. Steam, iTunes, Netflix, they all provide the content for much less than a high street shop, and they do it instantly. Granted, your internet connection might affect that somewhat, but you can't argue with 25% off the RRP of new game titles such as Skyrim and Modern Warfare 3. Or an entire new album for £7.99. Or an entire month of TV and film for £6.

This is a ridiculous thing for people to be ignoring, and why I feel a tad ashamed that I've continued to torrent when services such as this are so readily available. I strongly suggest you head to Netflix and take advantage of their free month trial, just remember they'll begin to charge you automatically after 30 days (though, you can sign up, then cancel the same day, and still use it for the next 30 days). Similarly, if you're a PC gamer and you don't have Steam....well, I can't really believe you exist so I shan't patronise you. And everyone knows about iTunes. [I would post links, but let's face it, we're the Google Generation, do it yourself]


So it would appear that the industry has ever base covered then. Not entirely. There is still the matter of international On-Demand services. Currently, the BBC, ITV, Channel 4 and Five all have on-demand services, but they're not available outside of the UK because of licencing issues; stupid, backwards licencing issues. (Example: did you ever watch live TV at uni on your laptop without a TV licence? Congratulations on breaking the law, I know I did!) The US has similar on-demand services, Hulu, Amazon and iTunes to name a few. The problem, for me at least, is with the lack of international legality. I can't watch The Big Bang Theory legally in the UK without waiting an arbitrary number of weeks for it to be shown on E4, and some shows like House, just don't get shown in the UK, unless you wait 2-3 years and are watching Five during the mid afternoon because you're unemployed.

It seems to me that there is a gaping hole in the market for a company or companies to bridge the gap, legally. Torrenting has been doing it illegally for years now, with my full support. Because of the vast differences between the TV industry in the US and in the UK there is very little compatibility. Were a company such as Netflix to bridge this gap, possibly by charging their members an extra few pounds a month, they could bounce shows from the UK to the US and vice versa. Surprisingly it truly is a two-way street, something that was made very clear by the latest instalment of the BBC series Sherlock. Many Americans enjoy this show, and I'm sure quite a few had to resort to less than legal means in order to watch it.

My take-home message is this; stop torrenting if you have the means to procure your entertainment in a legal fashion. It's always your consumer responsibility to seek out the best deals, but free is not the best deal because of complex economics and pie charts regarding money flow and something called 'synergising backward overflow.' If you haven't got the means to take advantage of these cheaper-than-crotch-shots services, then sell your PC and feed your family.

If you continue to torrent for whatever reason, I'm not judging you in the slightest, but do try to ween yourself off them. Nobody wants the feds breaking down your door at 3am to seize your all-MLP hard drive and count the number of episodes you've watched. Each one takes a year off your life, so I've heard....


Oh, and yes, we all would: