Piracy: ꜱᴀɪʟ ᴛʜᴇ ʜɪɢʜ ꜱᴇᴀꜱ

Is it wrong to pirate {anything}

No.

Asking if pirating something is wrong in a pro pirating group.......

There's a couple angles you can take on this. My favourite is from the dotCommunist Manifesto:

Society confronts the simple fact that when everyone can possess every intellectual work of beauty and utility—reaping all the human value of every increase of knowledge—at the same cost that any one person can possess them, it is no longer moral to exclude.

Essentially, this argues that the unethical position is the one that creates the false scarcity.

Another less extreme position would be that many countries allow for exemptions for format shifting: if you buy a CD with some music, you're legally permitted to rip it so long as you don't distribute copies. One could argue that someone in your position is operating within the spirit of these laws... provided that you haven't torrented the videos since that necessarily includes some partial distribution.

Finally, the least generous interpretation would point out that you didn't buy the videos in the first place, but rather a licence to let Vudu stream them to you. Given that you don't own anything, you're not morally entitled to own it in a different format. This is why many people have rejected the streaming model.

As someone in camp #1, I think you're a-ok ethically, but I thought you might want a broader perspective.

It's not even wrong to pirate movies you don't own and put them on your plex server

One of the rights we are continually trying to claw back from the IP Maximalist lobby (and their minions in office) is the right to enjoy the media you own in a format available to you.

However, the studios and labels like taking another bite of the apple by releasing new versions, or versions in new formats, sometimes twice as they release better versions that correct for bad transfers (e.g. the lightsaber problem with the early blu-ray release.)

Hollywood has established though repeated bad-faith behavior, it's not interested in getting your money legitimately or while retaining a positive customer experience, but extracting your money any way they can.

The DMCA forbids breaking DRM even for legal or non-copyright violating reasons (which is how we lost the right to repair or even jailbreak phones). And they could use this to prevent you from converting formats of your media to one you can actually use, but they'd have to make a stretchy case in court.

Sony also overcharges for scratched or failed media, so they've been caught treating their stuff as licenses or media when it legally suits them.

PS: Illegal ≠ Wrong. LGBT+ people are not grooming children, but religious ministries are.

Ethically spotless, yet still a crime.

Is it wrong to pirate movies...

...lemme stop you right there

nothing is wrong with piracy

It's completely down to your opinion. Legally I would guess that you're not allowed to do it, but nowadays we live in a hellscape where we own nothing so I wouldn't base your moral compass off of the rules that corporations set. Personally if I've already bought it somewhere it is mine. They're lucky I even purchased one copy, they're not getting anything else from me.

Super illegal. Straight to super jail.

Arrr, you'd better watch this to get a more nuanced perspective!

It's never wrong to pirate movies.

Personally, I feel the same way you do about DRM. If you've paid to own it, then it should be owned outright. With this in mind, I would say pirating them wouldn't lose you any moral ground.

Intellectual property doesn't exist, so no, not wrong at all.

No, because artificial scarcity is immoral.

Legally, yes it is wrong.

Morally? That depends on the person. I think asking a piracy focused community means you're going to get a heavily skewed set of answers that all veer towards various forms of "Not wrong" or "It's good actually. Don't even support the platforms that make the content legally available because DRM sucks" etc.

Generally speaking though, most older visual media releases no longer make money for anyone who worked on them directly. Use that information however you see fit. I know it changes how I think about piracy in general.

I don't want to fund the extremely unethical industry behind all of this and think piracy is the only way to oppose the rediculess hellscape that is the current copyright system so if anything it's wrong to buy the movies in the first place.

Since you're talking about "wrong", rather than "illegal", you seem to approach this from a moral angle instead of a legal one. And when it comes to morality, that's something you can only define for yourself.

Personally I don't see any problems there, nor do I see a problem with pirating unlicensed content. If I would never have paid to watch a certain movie, the rightsholder doesn't make a factual loss. They can cry about opportunity costs all day long, but if it's not a "cinema vs. piracy" but a "piracy vs. nothing at all" discussion, it's pretty much a moot point.

It's just a little less bad than murder.

When you purchase a physical copy of a movie in general; you obtain and retain the right to "copy your copy" and "use it strictly for personal use" ad infinitum.

So yes, it's completely 💯% ethical piracy to pirate titles you already paid for but found the format to be lacking. You don't owe filmmakers a second purchase for a new or better format. Don't bother getting into the weeds over per-screen or per-head copies either; you don't owe them that either. Just don't screen a film for more than 3-5 people outside of your immediate household family who are not related to you by blood or name and you'll probably never run into Copyright Lawsuits... because it'll never be worth their time to bother.

Pirate away happily matey. Don't let people fool you into thinking you are more or less ethical in your piracy than what you yourself believes is ethical or unethical. You decide how you will and want to pirate because a pirate is free.

It is never wrong to be a pirate.

You're asking this in a community that's specifically about doing piracy. Pretty hard to take your question seriously in this context.

Legally, it is illegal. Ethically, I think you're fine. If you pay for something you should be allowed to use the thing.

I feel like that basic interpretation of the law probably predates the code of Hammurabi.

You have to decide if you have a duty to follow licensing agreements or not. Most folks here do not believe they do.

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ethics-deontological/#DeoThe

This is a corporate run late stage capitalism hell hole. Do whatever you want that doesn’t hurt people, unless they’re bad people.

Only if you brag of it in Lemmy.world, that way the police will catch you /s

I'm gonna just cut thru the larger spiel I would normally give.

No, it is not wrong. You paid for it in the sense of reasonable expectations of ownership. That means being able to watch it in as convenient a method as if you'd bought the VHS back in the day. While this may not line up with legal definitions of licenses, fuck them. Replace "file" or "stream" with "tape" and it becomes crystal clear.

I don't see the problem, I see it as a personal backup of a media you legally licensed. Unless you resell the original without getting rid of the copy, or give a copy to someone who doesn't own a license, it's fair game.

yeah go for it! Do what you want. You already gave them money.