I download and I vote (oh, and #iitrial is cool)

Yes, I “illegally” download copyrighted content. There are many reasons why I do that and for some time I felt a tiny bit guilty about it. I don’t any more. I am not THAT person to say that I buy more DVDs than ever before or that I ALWAYS buy the TV show DVD when it comes out in Australia.

I download because I don’t have to pay for it. Simple as that. And no matter how much anti-anti-filesharing people bang on about studies about people who download also buy more stuff I don’t believe it. I simply don’t believe that I am in the minority. In fact I don’t personally know a single person that says that they buy the DVD when it’s available. As far as I am concerned it’s a forum rhetoric.

Many people support iinet in the whole ii vs. AFUCT ordeal because they want to be able to download stuff for free. Except they’d say it’s because of privacy concerns, ISPs shouldn’t be judge, jury and the executioner etc. They are still in denial.

Whilst I admittedly am infringing that does not make my support for iiNet less valid. I think iiNet have good a good chance at defending themselves from all the accusations because I believe that entertainment industry should not bully their way around protecting their failing business models. I believe my moral compass is about on par with most people, so that is an indication of us being right and them being wrong.

Technically I think that any ISP can stop or at least slow down a game changing percentage of “illegal” downloads to the point where downloading becomes a domain of super-geeks. In demanding something like that the movie studios are not THAT unreasonable. It can be done. That still doesn’t mean it should be done.

The industry is where it is now because of people’s creativity and technology that enables it. The technology changed but people will always be creative. It may kill entertainment industry (highly unlikely though) but it will not kill entertainment. If if it does, so be it. They are a bunch of pricks anyway.

I spent $80 on internet ($30 of which is phone, which I wouldn’t spend if i didn’t need to have a phone line). This is how much I am willing to spend on my entertainment. I download mainly shows and barely ever watch a movie. This is my budget. If there was a service out there that would give me the ability to check emails and watch a half a dozen episodes a week I’d get it. $3 per episode on iTunes??? Come on, you gotta be joking. I would also pay for a device/service that gives me one click easy access to anything I want. Without stupid time or region windows.

If I was Jason Calacanis and I had my own podcast I would say: “Dear TV/movie industry executive donkeys. Please stop treating us like stupid people. Internet has been around for decades now. Region windows do not make sense. Start doing things that make sense and give us a good way of accessing the content. Please someone clip this and put it up on YouTube.”

So when I say that I want to get stuff for free I actually am saying that there is an amount of money that I am prepared to pay each month (i.e. what is now spent on Internet) for access to stuff without feeling restricted. So yeah, please, entertainment industry executive donkeys, start making sense.