History Main / DigitalPiracyIsOkay

** Their 2003 album, ''Music/HailToTheThief'' was [[ContentLeak leaked by a third party]] before its release, which angered the band... not because our lost them revenue, but because they hadn't set the final mix yet, and that what had been circulated was an incomplete product.

* Music/{{Radiohead}} are arguably the {{Trope Codifier}}s for "legal" digital distribution. Their 2000 album, ''Kid A'' was available for streaming from their website before its official release, and their 2007 album ''In Rainbows'' was released for sale on a "pay-what-you-want" system, but they've since indicated that they will not pursue it further.
** Their 2001 album, ''Amnesiac'' was leaked by a third party before its release, which angered the band; however, they were not upset because of the download, but because they hadn't set the final mix yet.

-->'''[[http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/953151.stm Colin Greenwood]]:''' we played in Barcelona and the next day the entire performance was up on Napster. Three weeks later when we got to play in Israel the audience knew the words to all the new songs and it was wonderful.

* [[Music/Evanescence Amy Lee and Ben Moody]] have gone on record to say that they are fine with people freely downloading their pre-Fallen songs, due to the fact that [[http://www.evanescencereference.info/music/ it's not even remotely affordable to buy like their current stuff]].

** As a part of an AlternateRealityGame, Reznor and his crew left various USB drives containing new songs in various areas of venues, with the specific intention that they be leaked as a part of the game. Instead, those who leaked the files were hit with cease and desist notices from the RIAA, despite Reznor and his label specifically notifying them of the game and files. Needless to say, [[https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2007/mar/29/pop.guardianweeklytechnologysection Reznor was furious]] and, along with further ExecutiveMeddling of his music, is the reason he went independent after ''Year Zero'' was released.

** Reznor once blasted his record company for inflating the price of [=CDs=] in regions with a bigger fanbase, claiming "as a reward for being a 'true fan' you get ripped off", and urging fans at a concert in Australia to "steal" his songs. Since then, he's left record labels (apart from ''Hesitation Marks'' which was released through Creator/ColumbiaRecords) and now acts as a free agent with an emphasis on digital distribution, putting out an album with a "pay-what-you-want" system (''Ghosts I-IV''), and three for free (''The Slip,'' ''Ghosts V: Together'' and ''Ghosts VI: Locusts'') .

* While Creator/PlatinumGames didn't outright tell people to steal their latest game, their reaction to Creator/{{Sega}} delaying the release of VideoGame/AnarchyReigns outside of Japan by 6 months for no reason other than to try ensure that it would have less competition in their opinion and the fact that they didn't even bother notifying Platinum of their decision ahead of time, something that would greatly fracture the playerbase due to its heavy online nature even though the game was already fully complete and translated, they posted a notification on their homepage that the game has no region coding and the Japanese version already includes a localized translation for English and other languages, letting people know that they could safely import the game and play it that way without having to pointlessly wait for another 6 months due to Sega's boneheaded decision: sure enough, when the game was ultimately released elsewhere officially, its online modes were much more barren that would've been normally expected, which was especially bad since a number of game modes required a large number of players and there was no option to use bots as a replacement for human players.

[[quoteright:299:[[Music/SystemOfADown https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/disk2.png]]]]

* Blog/{{Froghand}}:

* Following the popularity of Music/SiIvaGunner (a channel dedicated to making musical jokes under the guise of actual video game soundtrack rips, previously known as GiIvaSunner), many people became inspired to do their own take on the trend. However, in order to accurately recreate a track in its exact form (and then change the melodies and such), you need the original plugins/sample libraries/etc, which can be (and are most often) very expensive to buy (and, if dealing with old sample CDs, very difficult to legally acquire), so as a result the ethics and morality of piracy are often ignored in this regard.

* Following the popularity of Music/SiIvaGunner (a channel dedicated to making musical jokes under the guise of actual video game soundtrack rips, previously known as GiIvaSunner), many people became inspired to do their own take on the trend. However, in order to accurately recreate a track in its exact form (and then change the melodies and such), you need the original plugins/sample libraries/etc, which can be (and is most often) very expensive to buy, so as a result the ethics and morality of piracy are often ignored in this regard.

* Music/{{brentalfloss}} engaged in a piracy-based prank around the release of his second album, ''Bits of Me''. When the CD was briefly delayed from its official release date due to production/distribution issues, Brent -- realizing that early [=MP3s=] of the songs would begin getting circulated by pirates before people received their pre-orders -- decided to beat them to the punch by uploading a fake version of the album on several torrent sites. In this pirated version, all of the songs start as normal [[BaitAndSwitch before being suddenly derailed by Brent and his friends]], [[TakeThatAudience fun of the listener for not paying for the album]], then filling up the remaining runtime with whatever nonsense they feel like doing, such as Creator/DougWalker singing public domain tracks [[StylisticSuck with "a god-awful Randy Newman impression"]], or Brent's girlfriend going on a bizarre lecture about applying makeup using home construction equipment.

* Music/MitchBenn wrote a song called "Steal This Song", which claims he doesn't care if you copy it onto cassette, put it on the internet or "change half the words and claim you wrote it".

** When a Australian fan had requested to have ''Film/WeirdTheAlYankovicStory'' be available in their country on a Twitter AMA, Yankovic tweeted a coded response suggesting to look on [=BitTorrent=] indexes it until Roku obtains distribution rights.

** When a Australian fan had requested to have ''Film/WeirdTheAlYankovicStory'' be available in their country on a Twitter AMA, Yankovic tweeted a coded response suggesting to look on BitTorrent indexes it until Roku obtains distribution rights.

* Music/WeirdAlYankovic appears to have this stance, having released several songs on his website and encouraged fans to download them, including "Don't Download This Song", a song that completely mocks the whole DigitalPiracyIsEvil attitude. The only real problem that seems to irk him is all the vulgar and profane novelty songs, that have been [[MisattributedSong mistakenly linked to him]] as a result.

* Rob Swire (of the House duo Music/KnifeParty) encourages people to [[http://25.media.tumblr.com/1b3572b63d05cafd86f07e7d3dce857e/tumblr_mh1ujmFJaV1r318rho1_500.png steal what they can't find on Beatport]], mostly because he just wants people to be able to listen to his stuff.

* When Creator/DanaTerrace shared [[https://twitter.com/DanaTerrace/status/1520480477093769218 a screenshot of an episode]] of ''WesternAnimation/TheOwlHouse'', fans noticed that it contained a watermark from ''[=TheOwlClub=].net'', a popular site for pirating the show, which lead to them believing that Dana must've pirated her own show. [[https://twitter.com/DanaTerrace/status/1520481382048444418 She admitted to the deed as soon as it was pointed out]], stating that she didn’t have cable and the episode wasn’t available elsewhere at the time.

* After Creator/HBOMax removed ''WesternAnimation/InfinityTrain'' from their service and [[BuryYourArt basically wiped it from existence everywhere else]], creator Owen Dennis changed his Twitter biography to read "Creator of [=#InfinityTrain=], a show that got pulled from [=@HBOMax=] and can now only be pirated."

* After Creator/HBOMax removed ''WesternAnimation/InfinityTrain'' from their service and basically wiped it from existence everywhere else, creator Owen Dennis changed his Twitter biography to read "Creator of [=#InfinityTrain=], a show that got pulled from [=@HBOMax=] and can now only be pirated."

{{Abandonware}} is a related concept, where circulating obsolete software is given a pass because the market for it literally doesn't exist anymore.

* Despite being an AcclaimedFlop, Swedish indie developer Crackshell gave Bulgarian cracker Voksi [[https://torrentfreak.com/voksi-pirates-new-serious-sam-game-with-permission-from-developers-180312/ their blessing]] to release ''[[VideoGame/SeriousSam Serious Sam's Bogus Detour]]'' for free via the Revolt forums as part of an unusual marketing strategy to bolster sales of the game. The "officially-sanctioned" pirate edition, for the lack of a better word, is feature-complete and for the most part identical to the paid release, but has a small note at the bottom urging those who downloading it to consider purchasing the game.

---> So long as game companies continue to show willful malice the their audience, it is necessary to reverse-engineer, emulate, and disseminate all games, consoles, and software that they release in order to create a culture that allows for sharing regardless of the company's consent - because the company that does not give consent for the consumers to do whatever they like with the products that they paid for, without limitation, is not a company that deserves to be bought from in the first place, with the exception that all products bought will eventually be used to preserve the freedom of the quiet majority which refuses to accept such malicious practices.

---> So long as games companies continue to show willful malice the their audience, it is necessary to reverse-engineer, emulate, and disseminate all games, consoles, and software that they release in order to create a culture that allows for sharing regardless of the company's consent - because the company that does not give consent for the consumers to do whatever they like with the products that they paid for, without limitation, is not a company that deserves to be bought from in the first place, with the exception that all products bought will eventually be used to preserve the freedom of the quiet majority which refuses to accept such malicious practices.