What does a post-piracy world look like?

I believe we're approaching the final 3-5 years of prevalent piracy for several reasons:

  • Software: The difficulty of cracking and modifying software has significantly increased.

  • Movies and TV Shows: Numerous streaming sites have been shut down or faced legal penalties.

  • Adult Content: New releases are often removed within 1-5 weeks, and many older titles are no longer available on piracy platforms.

Given these trends, what might a post-piracy world entail?

onlinepersona ,

Post-piracy? There will only be darkweb piracy that untraceable and unkillable. Everything will be available anonymously through I2P and there will be a jump in its popularity. Every normie will know that in order to download the new blockbuster, all they have to do is install I2P, an eDonkey clone, QBittorent, or Popcorn Time (which will run on I2P's anonymous torrents).

I pray that they shut down every single clearweb streaming and download website for us to finally all move to the darkweb.

Anti Commercial AI thingy

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LemmyQuest OP ,
@LemmyQuest@lemm.ee avatar

Did you ever actually use i2p?

It's very very slow that I don't think most people can do it.

onlinepersona ,

Yeah, and I used it when it was even slower. With a seed-box, it's fine. Just like in the 2000s when you had to download stuff overnight or wait a week. There are way fewer nodes in I2P than TOR nodes, but if it were to grow in popularity, speed wouldn't be an issue anymore.

Anti Commercial AI thingy

CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

aldalire , (edited )

More brazen crackdown of piracy, DNS-level or maybe even IP-level blocking. Complete overhaul of the infrastructure of the internet to make it more "corporate friendly."

We got to remember that piracy, whose backbone is the bittorrent peer-to-peer network, exists because the current infrastructure of the internet allows users to open their ports and allow people from all over the world to request media from them. The internet infrastructure is controlled by the government, who is controlled by corporate overlords. As of right now, the government has (imperfectly) worked hard to retain the neutrality of the internet, but we might be losing this battle folks.

I've always advocated for i2p (https://geti2p.net/en/) because it allows us to be more resilient to the current infrastructure, with the added bonus of not needing a VPN to download stuff. It would be lovely to see you all at tracker2.postman.i2p :-) Yeah, speed might be an issue but it'll get better once there are faster nodes in the network. I2p allows people to participate in the network even when behind a CGNAT and unable to forward their ports, as is the case with a lot of restrictive ISPs.

More detailed tech information to be found : https://geti2p.net/en/docs/how/tech-intro

quirzle ,
@quirzle@kbin.social avatar

Dumb.

Kolanaki ,
@Kolanaki@yiffit.net avatar

To me, the term "post-piracy" means that piracy has taken over and is the norm; not that it's been abolished. "After piracy has taken over..." I suspect wearing parrots on your shoulder would be much more in vogue.

antlion ,

Hahahaha

sheepishly ,
@sheepishly@kbin.social avatar

Can't wait for the highly dystopic future where we transfer files via smoke signals

MyNamesNotRobert , (edited )

It'll happen some day. There will eventually be "Illegal" wireless transmitting devices that do things such as transmit data over disallowed frequencies, break the token rate speed limit imposed by the fcc (fuck 56k) and illegally use encryption (using data encryption on amateur radio is illegal). When they do start becoming a thing, they'll be able to transmit data maybe a few miles at up to a megabyte per second (not 1 megabit), or for dozens of miles at a few kilobytes per second. Depending on whether the designers wanted to prioritize speed or distance.

The technology exists to make such wireless transceivers using off the shelf parts available to normal people, there's just no reason for them to exist. Yet.

ArcaneSlime ,

*Software: Idk, never really messed with pirating software, that's how you become part of someone's botnet.

*Movies and TV shows: Torrents and Usenet.

*Adult Content: Torrents and Usenet.

*Music: Slsk and yt-dlp.

LemmyQuest OP ,
@LemmyQuest@lemm.ee avatar

The problem is not their absence from the P2P networks; rather, it’s the lack of seeders that renders them useless.

dsemy ,

Usenet isn't P2P

ArcaneSlime ,

He's right, usenet isn't p2p, but finding old movies there can be a challenge. Still, I manage just fine for old movies with ipt and tl for the most part, or the rare thing I can only find on soulseek of all places. Archive actually has a bunch too.

cooopsspace ,

Honestly my friends ask me tonnes of questions like this, including "what happens when AI takes over", or "when everything mines your data".

I don't think people realise how close me as an IT person is to going and living in an off grid cabin in the woods.

jbloggs777 ,

Your friends will find you wherever you are and will continue asking you such questions. There is no escape.

Blackmist ,

As somebody who only got back into this recently (thanks Amazon, you sticking ads into Prime gave me the push I needed), it involves a lot of subscriptions and unavailable content.

rufus , (edited )

I think 1) and 2) have already been that way for at least 15 years. Software copy protection used to be very simplistic and is getting improved constantly. Also when I grew up games didn't yet talk to servers and they do it for quite some time already. Every new physical video format gets a new copy protection mechanism... DVD, BluRay,... now streaming services with DRM... Illegal sites get shut down all the time.

The piracy scene also adapts, changes their methology. I'm pretty sure it'll continue that way. I asked the same question 10 years ago and yet here we are.

The adult content is getting worse though. But i think mainly for the big and well known commercial streaming sites. Maybe there are still torrents of that around and pirating adult content will get similar to pirating a tv series.

reallyzen ,
@reallyzen@lemmy.ml avatar

[??Uh, you're getting downvoted for asking a straight question? WTF lemmies??]

halm ,
@halm@leminal.space avatar

OP's question is "given the above arbitrary and largely unfounded claims, how would a post-piracy world look?" which is... not straight. It's not just based on anecdotal premises, it also demands answers that don't call those into question.

reallyzen ,
@reallyzen@lemmy.ml avatar

OP's premises may be not wrong on the first point, is in need of some realignment on the second, and I have no idea about the third.

The idea of a post-piracy world can still be envisioned and discussed; will it be full of FOSS and CC-BY-SA? Will it leaves us with only secondhand pulp comics while our roku devices blast 23h out of 24 of ads? Who knows?

rufus , (edited )

Sure. But I'd drop the premises for that discussion. A post-privacy world is probably where convenience trumps everything. Everything is commercialized even more. Access to the internet isn't free any more, options like selfhosting or uploading things are heavily restricted and each and every service requires you to show your ID card into the webcam and give them your phone number. All private is being sold and AI shows you ADs and propaganda like in the old scifi movies.

I mean we're already half-way there. And I think it's especially bad that all the people use closed services that require me to dox myself and give them my phone number if I want to participate. It's just that we still have alternatives. It now needs politics to cut down access to the internet so only the big companies can host platforms and then force them to stop piracy. And cut the free flow of information and connections to other countries with other legislation. Reasons could be to protect intellectual property, stop crime (also like in the old dystopian movies) or "would somebody please think of the children"... These attempts to take away freedom happen regularly in politics. I think a post-privacy world would simultaneously be one without freedom. Either a scifi dystopia, a Cory Doctorow novel or like in the countries where they currently filter the internet successfully, which aren't democratic countries.

I think I'm far more concerned with the loss of any privacy or freedom in such scenarios. Not being able to pirate things would be a minor inconvenience in such hypothetical worlds.

I strongly doubt that it'll happen out of the reasons OP gave. They're all technical in nature. And in the past we were always able to circumvent the technical ones. Countermeasures have also improved. I don't see a reason why it's different now. But I think society could change and affect this. And there are anti-democratic things happening currently...

reallyzen ,
@reallyzen@lemmy.ml avatar

You wonderfully deviated this conversation towards the real threats we are facing in the near future, and right now. That was very well said, thank you.

halm ,
@halm@leminal.space avatar

I think your examples apply only to a specific use case. In particular, for movies and TV shows — illegal streaming sites only account for one part of pirated material. I would assume many more simply download film/TV.

Can't speak to the others but I'm fairly sure that pirates will find a way to pirate no matter the obstacles.

SweetMylk ,

"You'll own nothing and be happy"

BreakDecks ,

There has never been a better time to use free open source software. Software piracy is actually less convenient today. Game piracy is really only dead for big multiplayer games, which makes sense since they rely on online services.

Pirate streaming sites were a stupid thing to begin with. I'm happy to see them and the malware they push die. Torrents and P2P will always be king.

Porn piracy is absolutely huge. I think you're just doing a bad job downloading it.

A post piracy world can only be one thing: crushing authoritarianism. That's the only way piracy dies.

haui_lemmy ,
@haui_lemmy@lemmy.giftedmc.com avatar

I really like your way of thinking. Have a good one.

chahk ,

Porn piracy is absolutely huge. I think you're just doing a bad job downloading it.

Unless you have a very particular kink or fetish, porn is the one thing that you can find for free all over the internet. You don't even have to look that hard.

Piracy of movies, TV, music, & books is alive and well with no intention of slowing down. If anything, the advent of streaming helped get media in higher quality sooner than before. It's even easier if you're willing to pay a little for a private tracker membership, of a Newsgroups subscription.

Gaming is the most difficult part because cracking copy protections carry a very high risk of infection your computer with a nasty virus. Even then, if you know where to look, there are trusted groups that value their reputation and pride themselves on releasing clean repacks.

Bottom line is, there's not going to be a "post-piracy world" OP asks about. The game simply changes d to paying for a single all-in-one subscription instead of being nicke-and-dimed to death by corporations. And it's already here.

rockhandle ,
@rockhandle@lemm.ee avatar

Game piracy is currently in a precarious position, given how difficult it's become to crack denuvo. Games without denuvo still release very often, but especially in the AAA space, piracy is definitely slowing down

eighty ,

honestly not trying to be a shill but there was a brief period that caught a glimpse of a post-piracy world where there were very little streaming services that had all the content you could want. It moved me away from piracy because of the convenience, library, and being able to share with friends and family.

Ideally a post-piracy world would have the options for uncensored/original versions of content, the ability to buy and store said content locally and own in perpetuity, with a price point for access to a vast library from a very small number of services. As many have said, the way to combat "piracy" is to offer a service better than piracy itself.

bane_killgrind ,

Yeah same re: purchasing convenience vs pirating.

Pirating is a juicy prospect once again.

BreakDecks ,

If video streaming worked the way music streaming does, that would be a major blow to piracy for sure.

If I had to have Spotify, Deezer, Tidal, and Apple Music in order to listen to everything I want to listen to, I would subscribe to none of them and pirate all my music. Fortunately, most of these services have the same core catalog, the major difference between them is UX and extra features. You just choose the one you like and you're set.

No such luck with video streaming services which have nearly no overlap.

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