Is piracy a necessary evil?

[Myth]

Nothing wrong with piracy when it's about old games when their devs are long since out of business. I don't intend to pay money to some company like EA who just went and bought some legal rights to an old title, when the crew that actually created it will get nothing (since it's long been disbanded). Same about GOG, I don't need help with making a good old game run on my modern PC, the fans produce patches and mods for that, and actually regular old releases with fan patches work BETTER than most GOG games from what I read.

[TinCow]

I'll get one point out of the way before I go on to the rest of my post. Piracy is inevitable. Doesn't matter what anyone does to try and stop it, it will always exist.

I have pirated unbelievable amounts of games, music, and videos in my lifetime. I stopped pirating games several years ago (with an exception I'll note below), but I still pirate music, television shows, and movies. The reason I stopped pirating games, and still pirate the rest is convenience. Sure, lack of money was certainly an issue when I was much younger, but it hasn't been something that got even a momentary thought for me for a decade. I pirated because I did not want to wait for the product. I hate having to go to a store to get someone, let alone not being able to use it when it is most convenient to me. Once digital downloads became widespread, I had no reason to pirate games anymore. Steam and GoG download at speeds that basically get me the game faster than if I were to drive out to the store, buy the game, and drive back. Auto-patching and other such things from streaming services only make the decision even easier.

For movies and television, I have reduced my piracy, but not yet eliminated it. If something is available on Netflix or Amazon Instant Watch, I pay for it. I regularly pay $3-5 to rent films off of Amazon and I'm entirely satisfied with that situation. I pirate media when I can't get them on those services, or when they're only for sale on Amazon and not for rent. I think that's an old and busted business model and I say sucks to you and your 20th century mindset, MPAA! I also pirate TV shows when they're aired first in other countries before coming over here. I don't want to wait. Don't make me wait and I'll pay for it the normal way. My entire media center is configured to make this process super easy for me. I torrent media and then dump them into a specific folder on my home server which is configured to be accessible by my TiVo, which can stream any media ever created. Poof, 1080p perfection on a big-ass television with no effort on my part. Convenience!

Convenience is such a big deal for me that I've even pirated some games that I own and have the discs for because I can't be bothered to dig through the CD cases and find them, then do all the disc swapping. Far easier to use a pirated version of Baldur's Gate I than to dig out my old 5 disc version. Music is kind of an outlier for me. There are super-convenient places to get music, but I guess I pirate out of habit now. That said, I download almost no music anymore. I listen to Sirius, Pandora, and podcasts for 95% of my audio listening time. I'd like to blame my loathing of the RIAA for pirating the other 5%, but the reality is I have no reason, it's just habit.

For the rest though, offer me a superior product that is easier than piracy and I will use it. If getting my entertainment the legitimate way is harder than piracy, you will not be getting my money.