Would you teach your kids how to pirate?

My gf and I have had discussions about teaching morals to kids. In that vein, I asked myself, would I teach piracy to my kids? Yes, it’s technically illegal and carries inherent risks. But so does teenage sex carry the risks of teenage pregnancy, and so we have an obligation to children to teach them how to practice safe sex. So, is it necessary to teach them how to stay safe in the sea? How to install adblockers, how to detect fake download sites that give you computer aids? Show them how to use a VPN and choosing the right one (a true pirate must always choose a VPN with port forwarding capabilities, so you can still seed) I feel like this is all valuable info we all learned as pirates the hard way, and valuable information to pass on to our kids.

I definitely want my kids to know about libgen. Want a book you want to read about? Wanna learn about dinosaurs from a college level textbook for whatever reason? Just go to libgen, son!

And I attribute most of my computer literacy and education to piracy, trying to install cracks to various games, trying to make games work, and modding the fuck out of skyrim as a young teenager. That, and also jailbreaking android phones. All the interesting things i’ve ever done with computers was probably against some BS terms of service.

So, is piracy something you would actively teach your kids? Sit them down and teach them how to install a Fallout 3 FitGirl repack? Or is this something you’d want them to figure out themselves?

uriel238 , (edited )
@uriel238@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

Media piracy is in the tradition of oyster piracy (stealing from landlords trying to control the oyster market) and the golden age (robbing the Spanish silver train that was exploiting the nations of the new world) in that it's crime against unreasonable state regimes.

This is not to say underground media sharing has always had the moral high-ground, and it's not even to say that fair copyright laws are unreasonable, but since the mid 20th century (since Disney, essentially) intellectual property law has not served the public in a community effort to build a robust public domain of ideas and content, rather has been used to do the opposite, to favor established businesses over new ones with complete disregard for the public.

But then there's the technological matter, where DRM is used to obstruct of sharing (reasonable or otherwise, legal or otherwise). Here in the states it's legal to use DRM to obstruct legal backups and sharing, but it's not legal to bypass DRM to facilitate legal backups and sharing. It shows us that our regulatory agencies are captured, that our government serves rich companies and plutocrats rather than the public. The law runs contrary to the social contract.

We are in an age in which our language (English) only has words for wrongdoing that acknowledges two authorities: Sin (wrongness against the Church -- allegedly against God) and Crime (wrongness against the state, in accordance to what laws are enforced by a legal system). When we talk about other entities that can be wrong, say, individuals, the community, the world population, ecosystems outside of human society, we have to make do with the words we have, e.g. sin against nature, crimes against humanity, and so on.

Intellectual property law is a construct that (according to the Constitution of the United States) was intended to do a thing that it has totally failed at, going as far as creating perverse incentives to misuse the law. And given the companies that produce the media we might pirate are poor at compensating artists and developers, or at recognizing licenses already established (say, your DVD copy of Ghostbusters when the new medium emerges), given they pirate each other's content shamelessly, and will steal yours outright if you can't outspend them in court, it has actually become more ethical to pirate content than to buy it legitimately.

But I'd teach my kids not just to pirate, but to recognize shoddy work from good work, and to not consume at all when they can, since consuming content benefits its producers, whether or not it's acquired legally. (The MCU is about hero-team organizations who defend the status quo from all enemies, including the far left, and including those who want the human species to have a future. So they're not really our heroes, are they? Batman runs around and beats up poor people, leaving the wealthy to continue to rule over the rest of us whose last resort is crime.

If we're going to consume content, let's use it to inspire the content we make ourselves, until commercial content is entirely unwanted and unnecessary. This is the future the MPAA and RIAA fear. Not everyone pirating their stuff, but everyone not bothered to pirate their stuff.

Edit: Clarification

aldalire OP ,

Well written!!

veniasilente ,

mods where is the "upvote twice" button?

Faceman2K23 ,
@Faceman2K23@discuss.tchncs.de avatar

Sonarr/Radarr etc make it very easy and safe for media, but apps and games would be more of a serious sit down and talk kind of situation as more can go wrong there.

Proteus , (edited )

Not a parent yet, so take this with a big grain of salt.

But if I were to talk about piracy from a moral standpoint, I would first talk about stealing. Yes, we all know it's not the same, and it isn't, but there will certainly be someone who says it is, and it's better to clear that out. Besides, there are some parallels.

  1. Stealing is reprehensible, but extremely so when you steal for someone who much needs it himself. Shoplifting is bad and can lead to serious consequences. Stealing money from a poor person is extremely bad and can't be justified.
  2. Stealing is when you take something and the owner doesn't have it anymore. Piracy ain't that.

Then a bit on moral and legal grounds of piracy:

  1. While piracy isn't stealing, piracy does decrease profits of the rightful owner. When you pirate from someone who does not profit much off something, it's same as stealing from poor man. Piracy is impactful, and it's important to remember.
  2. Piracy may lead to legal consequences, which is why one shouldn't normally pirate stuff regardless of morality. But if the conditions of rightful ownership (cost, regional or use restrictions etc.) are inadequate, there exists such a way.

And in any case, I think the later you tell your kids about "illegal doesn't mean bad" the better. Could save a lot of trouble IMO.

cerement ,
@cerement@slrpnk.net avatar

Piracy decreases the profits of the publishers, publishers decrease the profits of the rightful owner. Piracy hurts the rich man, the rich man hurts the poor man. The publishers will still hurt the rightful owners whether piracy happens or not.

aldalire OP ,

YES. My gf made the point that when our kids are young, when their frontal lobe hasn’t developed yet, we will teach them black and white morality. But that’s only half the truth, since stealing from walmart or a big chain has a different moral flavor than stealing some random person’s things. In a way, I acknowledge that piracy isn’t stealing, and carries with it enormous societal benefits, like the freedom of information, but it’s still illegal, and I don’t want them to be OK doing illegal things.

Maybe the perfect solution is to leave out the inconvenient fact that piracy is illegal when teaching them how to pirate. LOL

HackerJoe ,

Taking something from Walmart removes the item. This can increase prices for other shoppers and has consequences.

Duplicating/downloading a movie or a games does not. It just creates an identical copy and removes nothing.

Those are not really two things you can compare. I am totally OK with the latter, I consider the former unlawful.
I can still go and buy a license to pirated content if I feel it's worth it after I consumed it.
I guess Walmart would be very confused if you came back to pay for the banana you stole a week ago because you did enjoy it. Might even get you into trouble.

EDIT: And you're right, it doesn't make sense that piracy is illegal. The law should be changed. At least the punishment is ridiculous.

Wilker ,
@Wilker@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

in my opinion, the key here is that asking "why?" is going to be the most important skill you can teach your kids early on. "because yes" or "because not" or "because i told so" is never a good answer, and learning to ask what moving parts there are to anything can and will open up a lot of options for things they will learn later on.

Saeculum ,

While piracy isn't stealing, piracy does decrease profits of the rightful owner.

Only if you would otherwise have bought it. If you never had any intention to buy the thing, the rightful owner loses nothing.

UnRelatedBurner ,

I would have played no games or learnt adobe software while I was a kid if I haven't pirated it.

I started playing some of my all time favorite games pirated, because my parents didn't want to spend money on videogames and I had no credit card as a kid. Now, however, I purchased them all. (alr well, not all I'm still not rich and I didn't deem all of them worth the money thrown out donated. Like Sims4, I'm glad I tried it, but it costs like (Steam says all DLCs are:) 1234.22 eur, insanity)

lseif ,

smart. though i would add that shoplifting can be bad, unless its from a corpo. but i understand not telling ur child that

WeLoveCastingSpellz , (edited )

Yup! Better if they don't make the same mistakes that we did at the start of our journeys at the sea. "Minecraft free download no viruses.exe" etc

Wilker ,
@Wilker@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

MinecraftSP.exe

that's it, that's the whole query back in 2010 all the way to 2014

AnarchistArtificer ,

I'm not sure. I don't plan on having kids, so this is a purely theoretical question that I won't have to answer in practice, but I think I probably would, at least to some degree.

I had a pretty iconically millennial childhood when it comes to tech; I remember my mum being on the phone to the internet people and asked "he's offering me an unlimited packaged for [money] extra. Is that good, do we need that?", to which my brother and and I vigorously nodded. We were young enough we didn't know shit, but unlimited sounded good and we weren't paying the bills. My mum probably realised we didn't know what unlimited Vs metered internet meant in practice, and opted for unlimited as the safe option, because if she felt the need to ask her children for advice, she wouldn't be great at managing a metred connection. That's the context in which I grew up and is why I'm as techy as I am today.

I learned the hard way, and whilst I don't think that's necessarily the best way to learn, I don't know how one might teach people how to recognise which "download" button to press, and when a dodgy looking site is actually dodgy. It's like internet street smarts, but what that means has changed since I was a kid, and I don't necessarily know how I'd teach that beyond the basics, like installing adblockers and other common sense things.

melpomenesclevage ,

set them up with something disposable (or at lewst that you can reinstall the OS on every couple weeks) that runs on an architecture other than x86 to avoid viruses; pi is perfect for this.

AnarchistArtificer ,

That's a really cool idea actually. I knew a guy who used to install viruses for fun on a separate machine that wasn't networked. I bet a more creative person than I could probably figure out a fun learning activity for kids using a "disposable" system

melpomenesclevage ,

sure. you create a parental control firewall, and tell them they're not allowed to see anything fun until they can get past it, and if they do, tipping off the programmeans youll look for countermeasures after a few days. here's some good leads on the right white papers for a temporary fix. good luck!

JasSmith ,

I’m a capitalist but even I think visual media needs a come to Jesus. If they had adopted the Spotify model everyone would be a lot happier. I would be paying for content still. Instead they broke up into a dozen different services with walled content. This is so stupid. I have no qualms keeping my own collection when this is the paid offering.

jabjoe ,
@jabjoe@feddit.uk avatar

Isn't that an argument of monopoly by Netflix would be better?

JasSmith ,

No. See Spotify, Apple Music, YouTube Music, and Tidal. They all contain something like 99% content overlap. You can subscribe to any of them and access almost all music. The difference is price, performance, UX, and features.

jabjoe ,
@jabjoe@feddit.uk avatar

I'm not sure that's true of TV series. I'm not arguing for monopoly by the way. Exclusives are anticompetitive and that's bad!

neon_commie ,

Do you own a factory or something? Believing capitalism is the best economic system does not make you a capitalist.

nintendiator ,

From an ethical standpoint, in the modern world, not teaching your children how to pirate is being an irresponsible parent. Not just because the "download stuff for free" aspect of piracy, but because piracy is associated to a number of moral and ethical decisions and tenets that also form important ideologies. Getting ready access to information, and being capable to redistribute information, for example, is a key element to anti-fascism ideologies which is why eg.: punk places an emphasis on radio. Being able to fight your own fights instead of only trading on the currency (digital or otherwise) other people impose on you is a core element of both digital and physical sovereignty, which is one of the reasons why stuff like KYC laws or banning of sex workers in economic operations have to be fought against.

Riyria ,

Yes, when they’re older. I’d rather be the “dad, can you find this for me?” guy, and then when they’re older and start talking about wanting to set up their own Plex server or something I’ll show them how to do it, if they even want to. I would be perfectly happy being the perma media pirate for my family.

Appoxo ,
@Appoxo@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

And what if they get a love letter because they were too stupid to practice safety?

Appoxo ,
@Appoxo@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

I would not teach them safe piracy but rather safe computer literacy and usage.
Exactly like you said: How to spot fake ads or scams etc..
But if my child would like a book from XYZ and they would pirate it I would question the motive instead of getting it from, for example, a library.
Doing illegal shit out of convenience (like pirating a book instead of showering, getting out and enter a library searching for it) is still illegal. Even if you juat read what you want and put the book back in the shelf.

I would also firewall the shit of the little buggers computer. Also no account witg admin/sudo rights.

drunkensailor ,
@drunkensailor@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

ain't got none but hyptotheticaly, sure. better'n them gettin busted with a dcma or whatever cuz they dont know how to chekc for dns leaks and use failsafes to block non-vpn access. most of us started off and had to lern ho wto do shit the reight way. why nt help em do beter

i woldnt want my kibds to be soem kind of normies that dont even know wtf a vpn is

scoobford ,

I'd teach them once they are old enough to understand it on a technical level, as well as the potential consequences.

And I find your comparison to sex ed very strange. Sex is something they will do with huge consequences if they fuck up. They need to understand it, and they need to understand it early.

aldalire OP ,

Yee idk just a showerthought

rufus ,

Sure. To prepare someone to become a responsible adult, they need information. Learn things good and bad. Understand especially WHY people do things and consequences of actions.

I mean if you exclude half the truth, your kids will not learn how to judge things and make decisions.

And things not being etically 100% correct is not a reason to hide them altogether. I mean my mom also reads murder mystery stories and murder is not okay... I think beginning with a certain age it is important to learn also about ambiguous stuff. It's part of life.

That doesn't mean I'd have to teach them myself. But I'd talk to them and make sure they learned the right things.

ReveredOxygen ,
@ReveredOxygen@sh.itjust.works avatar

She read murder mystery stories, but not a guide about how to get away with murder

rufus , (edited )

I read a few and saw a few movies that tell me otherwise... Discussing an hypothetical "perfect murder"... Detailing how they were murdered with a frozen icicle so there won't be any weapon or fingerprints left...

I mean those examples are a bit exaggerated. But there are pretty realistic stories. And I'd say the lines between story and guide aren't always that clear. That's part of the thrill. The good ones are kinda detailed enough to be both.

Same goes for historical records.

And I think if you grow up completely sheltered from evil and true life, you're bound to miss out, not to know aboud bad things. You won't have any understanding or defense against it and will get exploited. And you're missing half of the fun and intelligence that would otherwise be your potential. Also you can't keep kids from having to make their own decisions forever. At some point they need the tools and knowledge to decide for themselves.

I can recommend the sci-fi dystopia "The Giver" about that. (The sheltering part, not the murder mysteries.) But read the book, the movie isn't good at all. And read it while you're young, it's probably more suited for adolescents than for adults.

FiniteBanjo , (edited )

Children playing on a computer unsupervised has to have rules and boundaries (and physical backups). No, I'm not going to teach children, who are not even in their teens, to download or install anything, ever, unless I want them to learn about ransomware specifically.

Scipitie ,

Preventing teenage pregnancy by obfuscating sex has the same idea.

I agree with the boundaries part. The second part though: they will figure it out either way... At least my brother did when he was young and our parentsgot a nice lawyer in voice for that (fucked up laws, I know, I know).

Personally I want them to learn about ransomware! If that cost me a PC... My fault.

FiniteBanjo ,

Sorry I was unclear, I meant to say I'm not teaching children who are not yet in their teens. I can see how it could be misconstrued as not teaching them even when they are teens. I'll make an edit to clarify.

I would teach teens how to torrent, about cyber-security and VMs, and how to know if something can or cannot be trusted.

Scipitie ,

Thanks for the clarification! A wish you an awesome start into the week :)

Andromxda ,
@Andromxda@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

Absolutely. My entire network is behind a VPN, so they can't fuck up. Windows is banned in my household, so I'm not worried about malware. I'm not paying 20 bucks a month for limited access to the ever shrinking Netflix library, which I can't even use behind a VPN or share with other people. Piracy is the only way forward.

Tabitha ,
@Tabitha@hexbear.net avatar

sicko-tux

mihor ,

My spirit animal!

UnRelatedBurner ,

Bro, I've started saying this line not that long ago, are we in a hive-mind?

bamboo ,

Windows is banned in my household, so l'm not worried about malware.

This is a false sense of security and just because you're not running Windows doesn't mean you're immune to everything and can let your defenses down. For example, KDE recently had to announce that downloading themes will execute arbitrary code and cited someone who had personal information deleted because of downloading a theme.

lseif ,

well its a step up at least...

bamboo ,

Exactly, like how an ocean liner is a step up above a sailboat. That doesn't mean you're unsinkable and don't need to worry about icebergs.

KillingTimeItself ,

in regards to privacy using something like windows already has you fucked up. As opposed to something like using KDE which might rm -rf your system.

Andromxda ,
@Andromxda@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

I knew I would get a comment about this. Yes, I absolutely know that Linux is not at all immune to malware, but the chances of finding Linux malware on a typical piracy website are very low. That's why Anti-virus is unecessary on Linux.

zaknenou ,
@zaknenou@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

TempleOS! You will never find malware for that holy OS

Ildsaye ,

chefs-kiss

sirico ,
@sirico@feddit.uk avatar

It lead me to learn so much about servers and automation as well as everything I've learnt from material I've acquired

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