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On Piracy and Respect
15 years ago
🙐✿🙖 The question of piracy has a tendency to be greatly polarizing in any online community. Furry fandom is no exception, and may in fact be among the worse offenders, because the content producers are part of the fandom. It can never become "Us vs. Them" to the same extent as it can when the content producer is a multimillion dollar corporation. And really, that's understandable. To some small extent, it's even appropriate. Denying Adobe or Sony or Ubisoft some of their income is after all a piss in the Atlantic, especially when compared to denying the same dollar amount to a furry artist.
Personally, I have an attitude towards piracy that kind of goes hand-in-hand with my attitude towards fanart (don't earn money off someone else's work, essentially). I find downloading something that's available, especially if it's still available first-hand (I'd prefer buying preowned but let's face it: it hurts Sony just as much if you choose to buy that CD album from the guy down the street who got tired of it, as if you just went and torrented the damn album in the first place), utterly skeevy. If it's something that's been out of print for five or ten years (especially if spokespeople have confirmed that there's no intent of re-publishing), the industry may bitch, but they're losing nothing.
When it comes to art/writing/whatever software, I'm even more in line with my stance on fanart. I don't believe it matters in the grand scheme of things if you use that pirated version of Photoshop to resize that photo you took of your dog, or to scan that doodle you want to show off to your friends, but if you intend to make money off your art you should damn well pay your dues. I had a classmate who decided it was morally/ethically okay for her to use a pirated version of Photoshop to make money, because she'd gotten it through her German boytoy and the hassle of using a German-language copy made up for the money Adobe never got from her. She was doing something wrong. And yes, for the record, I've put my money where my mouth is, and legally own more art software than I really know what to do with. Yes, it sucks that Photoshop costs approximately a bazillion dollars, but if you're not willing to pay, you ought to go for one of the free alternatives out there, whatever they are right now.
So. Whenever an artist speaks up and is (justifiably) upset about people redistributing their material, they tend to get a lot of flak. Now, I'll be the first to admit, some artists can sound incredibly whiny when they say this. I'm not targeting anyone in particular with this statement, just a general observation. Kicking up a huge fuss does tend to make people look bad, even when they're right to do so. If some asshole hit-and-runs your dog and you write letters to all the papers in the area doing everything short of cursing him out (and maybe that, too) and in general kick up a massive fuss, you're going to look bad, too, and I don't think anyone would say you aren't justified in being upset if someone killed your dog.
As artists, we have to accept that people will pirate our stuff. It's perfectly fine to make a calm, rational request for fans not to do so, along the lines of "I put X hours into the material on this portfolio CD, and production costs are Y. If I'm going to make even minimum wage on them, I need to earn a total of $Z. I would like it if you, out of respect for me, consider paying for the material rather than torrenting it somewhere." Calm, rational, and up-front. But there is a flip side to that.
If you make the request for people to respect your wishes and pay for the material, you need to make it available to them. I have friends who've gotten hosed by this; an item is not freely available online, and the publisher won't ship it to their location. As soon as you pull that, you're asking people to pirate. Work with your fans. Someone can't send money from their part of the world? Let them know you'll accept someone else paying on their behalf, or (if applicable) find a way for them to pay in barter. Anything.
As watchers, fans, whatever, we have to accept that artists may want to make money off of their work, at least enough to cover expenses associated with creating it. I will admit, I've voiced my fair share of frustration over the misleading ads for blotch's Dog Days of Summer, which implied that the full story was now available online. But it was their decision to make the ending pay-only. I can voice disappointment, but it gives me no right to disrespect them by obtaining the material without compensating them. It may be a luxury of few to live off of one's furry artwork, but that doesn't mean all artists need to accept working at a loss.
It is never okay to ridicule people because they're trying to make money. Especially not in their space. (If you pass the link to my commission prices around to your friends and you guys privately snicker about it, that's your business. If you comment on my prices in my journal, you're being a disrespectful jerk.) Pirating will happen, and yes, artists need to be aware of that reality, but ripping them a new one over finding it upsetting that, for instance, people are already talking about torrenting their material before it is even published? That is low. I don't have words for how low it is, and I still consider myself pretty fluent in both English and profanity.
Don't call people names. That goes for both sides. Don't call the artist who wants to be able to keep doing art without starving a thin-skinned, greedy cunt. Don't call the people who rag on you for letting people know that you are not Adobe or Microsoft or Apple and actually feel the loss of a single sale a thieving syphilic asswipe. Take a step back. Breathe.
Remember that neither of you would exist without the other.
And for fuck's sake stop gloating to artists about obtaining the fruit of their hard labors in underhanded ways.
Personally, I have an attitude towards piracy that kind of goes hand-in-hand with my attitude towards fanart (don't earn money off someone else's work, essentially). I find downloading something that's available, especially if it's still available first-hand (I'd prefer buying preowned but let's face it: it hurts Sony just as much if you choose to buy that CD album from the guy down the street who got tired of it, as if you just went and torrented the damn album in the first place), utterly skeevy. If it's something that's been out of print for five or ten years (especially if spokespeople have confirmed that there's no intent of re-publishing), the industry may bitch, but they're losing nothing.
When it comes to art/writing/whatever software, I'm even more in line with my stance on fanart. I don't believe it matters in the grand scheme of things if you use that pirated version of Photoshop to resize that photo you took of your dog, or to scan that doodle you want to show off to your friends, but if you intend to make money off your art you should damn well pay your dues. I had a classmate who decided it was morally/ethically okay for her to use a pirated version of Photoshop to make money, because she'd gotten it through her German boytoy and the hassle of using a German-language copy made up for the money Adobe never got from her. She was doing something wrong. And yes, for the record, I've put my money where my mouth is, and legally own more art software than I really know what to do with. Yes, it sucks that Photoshop costs approximately a bazillion dollars, but if you're not willing to pay, you ought to go for one of the free alternatives out there, whatever they are right now.
So. Whenever an artist speaks up and is (justifiably) upset about people redistributing their material, they tend to get a lot of flak. Now, I'll be the first to admit, some artists can sound incredibly whiny when they say this. I'm not targeting anyone in particular with this statement, just a general observation. Kicking up a huge fuss does tend to make people look bad, even when they're right to do so. If some asshole hit-and-runs your dog and you write letters to all the papers in the area doing everything short of cursing him out (and maybe that, too) and in general kick up a massive fuss, you're going to look bad, too, and I don't think anyone would say you aren't justified in being upset if someone killed your dog.
As artists, we have to accept that people will pirate our stuff. It's perfectly fine to make a calm, rational request for fans not to do so, along the lines of "I put X hours into the material on this portfolio CD, and production costs are Y. If I'm going to make even minimum wage on them, I need to earn a total of $Z. I would like it if you, out of respect for me, consider paying for the material rather than torrenting it somewhere." Calm, rational, and up-front. But there is a flip side to that.
If you make the request for people to respect your wishes and pay for the material, you need to make it available to them. I have friends who've gotten hosed by this; an item is not freely available online, and the publisher won't ship it to their location. As soon as you pull that, you're asking people to pirate. Work with your fans. Someone can't send money from their part of the world? Let them know you'll accept someone else paying on their behalf, or (if applicable) find a way for them to pay in barter. Anything.
As watchers, fans, whatever, we have to accept that artists may want to make money off of their work, at least enough to cover expenses associated with creating it. I will admit, I've voiced my fair share of frustration over the misleading ads for blotch's Dog Days of Summer, which implied that the full story was now available online. But it was their decision to make the ending pay-only. I can voice disappointment, but it gives me no right to disrespect them by obtaining the material without compensating them. It may be a luxury of few to live off of one's furry artwork, but that doesn't mean all artists need to accept working at a loss.
It is never okay to ridicule people because they're trying to make money. Especially not in their space. (If you pass the link to my commission prices around to your friends and you guys privately snicker about it, that's your business. If you comment on my prices in my journal, you're being a disrespectful jerk.) Pirating will happen, and yes, artists need to be aware of that reality, but ripping them a new one over finding it upsetting that, for instance, people are already talking about torrenting their material before it is even published? That is low. I don't have words for how low it is, and I still consider myself pretty fluent in both English and profanity.
Don't call people names. That goes for both sides. Don't call the artist who wants to be able to keep doing art without starving a thin-skinned, greedy cunt. Don't call the people who rag on you for letting people know that you are not Adobe or Microsoft or Apple and actually feel the loss of a single sale a thieving syphilic asswipe. Take a step back. Breathe.
Remember that neither of you would exist without the other.
And for fuck's sake stop gloating to artists about obtaining the fruit of their hard labors in underhanded ways.
