I’m with Gabe Newell on this one. High piracy rates indicate a service problem.

I can’t find very good data on this, but my suspicion is that PC piracy rates are lower than they were a decade ago. I’m betting piracy of movies and TV shows is far, far higher than it was a decade ago. It’s pretty easy to see why. If you want a PC game, you can usually (EGS timed exclusives aside) buy it from your digital storefront of choice, or add it to your wishlist and wait for a sale. Once it’s in your library it’s effectively there to stay. Game doesn’t work on your PC, or you don’t enjoy it like you thought you would? No problem, you can refund it. Now compare that movies and TV shows. An ever-expanding range of streaming services that all want $15 a month from you, region locking, staggered release dates. Nothing new you want to watch this month? Too bad, your $15 is now our $15 dollars, and we’ll take $15 from you next month too. Movie and TV show piracy provides a more valuable and convenient service, so it wins hands down.

I feel like most people agree with this, most people who really hate piracy have a stick up their ass or really like money. I mean even alot of artists and indie devs are fine with a little piracy as long as they get enough money to make a living.

As long as piracy is easier than obtaining something legally, I’ll continue to do it. I stopped pirating music, because Spotify is much much nicer to use and gives a better experience overall. I stopped pirating games since steam is nice. I almost stopped pirating movies when Netflix came out. Only pirated some extremely niche stuff. But now I’m back in the high seas, baby!