| The harsh sentence for piracy is a high end. Judges can impose a lesser sentence. The reason behind that high end is not to catch someone copying their older brother's BG2 CDs, but to stop pirates selling anywhere from hundreds to millions of copies of a popular DVD or CD.
I honestly can't see any downside to this. When we were in a street market in Sofia, Bulgaria, about 10 years ago, there was a vendor selliing nothing but pirated copies of American movies and CDs. I understand that if you multiply him by hundreds, you have the situation in downtown Singapore. And in the US, there are quite a few pirate outfits that circulate these materials via email. It's certainly not as pronounced, but it definitely is a major problem.
I figure that I want a game company, or a record producer, or a film studio, that issues something I really like to get back every cent due them, in the hopes they will have enough revenues to do it, again. If it means throwing a few pirates in jail and scaring the rest to accomplish this, that's fine.
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To the Righteous belong the fruits of violent victory. The rest of us will have to settle for warm friends, warm lovers, and a wink from a quietly supportive universe. |