this post was submitted on 07 May 2025
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Piracy: ꜱᴀɪʟ ᴛʜᴇ ʜɪɢʜ ꜱᴇᴀꜱ

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I wanna listen to a particular song by an artist who has recently turned pretty nazi. As I generally use Spotify I now refuse to listen to his music in there, esp as it generates earnings. I kinda wanna pirate the music somehow…I’m not gonna as I’m not gonna down a song or two and then store it on my phone like it’s the year 2000. But short story is this me justifying piracy to myself.

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (1 children)

I would rather own my files on my phone like it's the year 2000 than my devices becoming useless whenever $streaming_service shuts down or changes policy like it's the year 1984...

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

I agree with this. But also, it's hard to beat the convenience of music streaming. It's getting more expensive, which is sad, but for awhile there it worked great. Almost any artist or music you wanted, just, available.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 weeks ago

Personally between downloading music from youtube with yt-dlp and bandcamp I don't feel like I'm missing out.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 weeks ago

Spotify has fraudulent practices, so morality forces me not to give him income. All my music comes from Soulseek.

Here's a link for you to get an idea of what I'm talking about: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Controversy_over_fake_artists_on_Spotify

What other option is there, other than Spotify? I doubt much that buying all the albums I hear is an option, as I hear a lot of music.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 weeks ago

This is why you should only ever buy physical or DRM-free, rather than streaming. If an artist goes in a direction you don't like, you can still enjoy their older work without giving them active income via streaming.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 weeks ago

Spotify only pays for the first few listens I think. Also, the payout is a fraction of pennies.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 3 weeks ago (4 children)

Honestly, after seeing billionaires buy the US gov and then learning that Spotify is owned by a billionaire and artists are terribly compensated, I have been planning to once again fly the pirate flag. I want to pay the artists, but fuck the current options unless there is a different way idk about.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 weeks ago

I moved to Qobuz for that reason. Much better payout for the artists.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 weeks ago

Don't forget that they fund the military complex.

Daniel Ek? More like Daniel Ick

[–] [email protected] 6 points 3 weeks ago

Bandcamp is decent. If you wait for Bandcamp Fridays, all of your money goes to the artist.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 3 weeks ago

I'd make backups of my purchases and share them with love for preservation and promotion of their authors hard work. "Piracy" was already shown to increase sales, not reduce them. If you really want to do something against an artist you no longer align with, dont consume their products. Don't purchase, don't download and don't share their stuff. Just look around for other artists you do align with, get hooked to their art and support them instead.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 3 weeks ago

piracy is always better than paying a corpo

[–] [email protected] 6 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (1 children)

You don't have to justify it, really, but it does feel satisfying when you do.

Which song of his out of curiosity? Just use Soulseek. (nicotine+ on desktop or Seeker on Android)

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 weeks ago

Thanks for the response. I’ll take a look

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

Anyone found a convenient way for music that’s not perpuating a subscription? I’m an iPhone user and do like my tunes in the car. I’m good for movies shows etc. Dropped them all ages ago.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

Download all the music you like, whether buying it on Bandcamp or Amazon or pirating it for literally any reason. If it's too much media to keep locally on your phone then host it on a computer in your house with one of any number of hosting solutions (Jellyfin, Plex, Subsonic, etc.) and VPN your phone's internet connection to your home network so you can stream them from anywhere without having to set up and secure another method of remotely streaming it. If you were on Android I'd recommend Symfonium, but I don't know anything about the iOS app ecosystem.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 weeks ago
[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 weeks ago

Nearly everything is priced in dollars and I'm too fucking broke and Brazilian to pay the asking price most of the time.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 weeks ago

If there is an indie game that I like I will buy it

[–] [email protected] 38 points 4 weeks ago (1 children)

My wife refuses to let me pirate books for her. She wants to support the authors she reads, which is fair. But she decided she wanted to try the Harry Potter books, and asked me to pirate them for her to make sure JK Rowling didn't get a penny out of her.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 4 weeks ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 19 points 4 weeks ago (2 children)

I periodically delete my Metallica collection so I can re-download it for no other reason than fuck Lars.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

I play bass. Metallica cut Newsted's bass line out of And Justice for All. I'll hate them for it forever. I love Trujillo now and still have not listened to a single Metallica album since he's played with them.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 weeks ago

Doing this is not only moral; it's virtuous.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 4 weeks ago

Yeah. I refuse to give cuts to amazon, spotify, netflix etc.

If I pirate something from a not super rich artist and I really enjoy it. I’ll send them an email and propose to transfer them some money to support them. I don’t want spotify or amazon or google taking a cut.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 4 weeks ago

I never needed any moralistic reason to pirate.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 4 weeks ago* (last edited 4 weeks ago)

Pirate away but... i would simply still not listen to any music made by a nazi. Plenty of good songs out there NOT made by a nazi.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 4 weeks ago

I am the High Priest of Kopimism. Download from where you want, and go in peace my child.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 weeks ago

Of course. I stand on high moral ground when I chose to pirate.

Economy is broken and anti-consumer. Piracy if the only way I know to balance things of. If I wouldn't be pirating I would just be letting those economic bullies take advantage of me.

And specially with cultural products there's another big reason, as I think human culture is to be shared, not sold. I do actually think is inmoral to prevent other humans to freely access anything that could be considered cultural.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 4 weeks ago (1 children)

My piracy is probably equal parts sticking it to greedy corpos and me just not wanting to pay when I can get it for free.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 weeks ago

Same, but rather than not wanting to pay its more like I can't afford to pay.

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