Memes

I have to say I mostly disagree with your points.
At that kind of profit margins only the dividends get financed.

And I do spent the money on donations (FOSS devs, Wiki, random research, animal stuff), tho I haven't though of donating to unions. I didn't even know that is a thing. It isn't where I live.

I understand they need to be financed, but the whole point of unions is to get a better bargaining position & thus finance. That shouldn't need money. You dont donate to the strog guy that already has the power, you donate to the poor. Ot perhaps like some sort of semi-political parties that help organise workers? But we have regulators that strongly encourage unions at certain company size or sector.

What you can donate to or finance is smol studios. That's boycotting the big studios, regardless of content consumption.

I’m sorry, how do the artists get paid when you pirate?

my guy, they were already paid for their time, this isn't a small indie production.

For you to pirate, there was already an archival copy.

is it not the case that the more archival copies there are of something the more likely it is to survive?

There is a rather simple paradox, in the world of online and digital archival where, unless you archive it, nobody else has any reason to archive it. I could simply not archive any of the stuff i have archived, under the pretense that someone else probably already archived it, but that's just a guess and i have no idea whether or not that's the case.

Once i archive something, it's possible someone else has already archived it, but i being a known archiver of that material (or not, most archives are private) also substantiates that same paradox.

And besides, let's say i am archiving, how am i supposed to verify the integrity of my archival copy? Am i not supposed to consume it? That's the most effective and reliable way to determine the integrity of an archive. Sure i could use hashes or checksums, but those are only are reliable as the original creation of the hash/checksum.

spotify basically killing services like limewire?

I thought you said that "piracy made the music industry be reasonable." Spotify basically killing limewire is not evidence of that any more than saying radio made the music industry be reasonable since it's just as killed.

any of the licensed content would've already been paid for.

Look up "residuals"

if this was the case why would we see piracy decline over the last decade, only to see it increase noticeably in the last 4-5 years or so

Because streaming services have been charging more for less content, as the content owners have come to realize how much streaming cannibalizes purchases from other revenue streams.

I'm not trying to argue that people don't pirate less when there are cheap convenient services available. I agree with that. But that's just people behaving in their own self-interest, not some moral good about fighting big companies or other stuff pirates say to feel better about it.

I accept that people do selfish things, just as I accept when people jump the turnstile in the subway without paying their share. What I don't accept is the self-righteous pirates who try to act like they're doing something good for society, like I should be thanking them for downloading the shows I helped pay for, and pretending that it has no impact whatsoever on the people who depend on that for their income.

Which is my point. People do things which are cheap and convenient because it is in their self interest. They stop pirating for selfish reasons just as they were pirating for selfish reasons.

Which is why I can't stand self-righteous pirates who try and convince themselves and everyone else that they aren't actually doing it selfishly, they're doing it for some fabricated moral good and we should be thanking them for their service, that they're fighting corporations somehow, and pretending that they aren't withholding money from the people who spent the time making the things they enjoy.