Pirating is the act of unauthorized copying of computer software from music, Windows/Mac applications and video games but it is controversial in plenty of countries because of copyright laws.
People argue that the makers of this software are losing money but the other side can argue that they're not losing money because we're technically not stealing, more like copying and borrowing with the plan of not giving it back much like your next door neighbour's lawnmower.
Many places shun this type of "theft" but don't actually do anything about it though some places do;
_Under the proposed US Uniform Computer Information Transactions Act (UCITA), a controversial model law that has been adopted in Virginia and Maryland, software manufacturers are granted broad rights to shut down unauthorized software copiers without court intervention similar to some of the provisions found in Title II of the US DMCA, the Online Copyright Infringement Liability Limitation Act, which allows copyright holders to demand that an online service provider (OSP) expeditiously block access to infringing materials. If the OSP complies, it is granted a safe harbor, providing it immunity from infringement claims. If it does not comply, it does not become liable, but may instead rely on the protection of the Communications Decency Act.
Title I of the US DMCA, the WIPO Copyright and Performances and Phonograms Treaties Implementation Act has provisions that prevent persons from "circumvent[ing] a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work". Thus if a software manufacturer has some kind of software, dongle or password access device installed in the software any attempt to bypass such a copy protection scheme may be actionable — though the US Copyright Office is currently reviewing anticircumvention rulemaking under DMCA — anticircumvention exemptions that have been in place under the DMCA include those in software designed to filter websites that are generally seen to be inefficient (child safety and public library website filtering software) and the circumvention of copy protection mechanisms that have malfunctioned, have caused the software to become inoperable or which are no longer supported by their manufacturers._
-Wikipedia article on software piracy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piracy_of_software)
_Piracy helped the young generation discover computers. It set off the development of the IT industry in Romania."_ - Traian Băsescu, president of Romania
And apparently Bill Gates is somewhat of a fan:
_As long as they are going to steal it, we want them to steal ours. They'll get sort of addicted, and then we'll somehow figure out how to collect sometime in the next decade._
Last 3 quotes taken from (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piracy_of_software)
People have even cracked iPods and iPhones called "jailbreaking" where you can get an application to mess around with your handheld device and add "sources" to it and get applications off the App Store for free as long as people have uploaded the cracked application/game to something like _Mediafire_ or _Filedude_.
I've personally saved hundreds of dollars on video games and music, I've downloaded every Sims 2 expansion pack, Sims 3+ all Expansions, Fallout 3, Fallout New Vegas, The Elder Scrolls IV, I'm in the process of Dragon Age: Origins and Mafia II, SNES, and Nintendo 64 games (for an emulator) dozens of music CDs (minus the CD of course), and most recently Stick RPG 2: Director's Cut and an application called RPG Maker and also Game Maker.
Pirating can also lead to viruses if some people want to have a bit of fun and destroy your computers so many pirates have good antivirus software which they may have even pirated.
I like to think as long as the makers of this software makes the money back they spent to create the software, pay the employees and have some left over it's fine to just take the leftover because they obviously have the money to make more because the developers are still making more games and people are still buying hard copies or downloading from the developer's website.
How do people with higher morals think? Fellow pirates? Video game developers? I'd love to hear everyone's perspective in the comments below
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