Morals and Online Piracy

Usually when I write this blog every week, I have the general idea in my head of what I will write about for at least 2-4 days before I sit down and write it. I actually had the idea for writing about online piracy for at least a month now, but I thought because of other more pressing things coming up, that I should just wait until nothing more topical pops in my head before I write about the illegal downloads of various media on the internet. When I finally found myself sitting down and starting to write, I found myself in a moral quandary. I could write about how I think piracy is bad, and how you shouldn’t do it, but the more thought I put into it, the more pointless it seemed.

Take for example, the idea that piracy is stealing, the problem there is that online piracy violates the key reasoning of why people think stealing is wrong; that the object being stolen is coming at a loss of both the owner of what is stolen and to people wanting to buy it, but can’t now because it was stolen. With online piracy of digital items, neither is really true; the only thing someone steals when they are stealing a music file, video, or whatever, is the potential money that person could of spent if they were to pay for it. On one hand, there is a potential money loss, but on the other hand, having a person watching the media is potentially more profitable than if they were not going to spend any time experiencing it at all. So, in the end, if the money is the only thing really being lost in online piracy, is it then morally okay if the person doing the piracy then pays for something from that same owner based on the thing they pirated?

I personally don’t think it is moral, but I also honestly think that people who are heavily into online piracy are cheating themselves. They are spending their time with something they don’t like enough to shell out the money for. I understand that there are some people who just don’t have the money to afford media, but to then waste your time with something that the owner does not want available to you (unintentionally or not) when there are plenty of people who are willing to give out their stuff for free (or at least at “name your own price”) is ludicrous to me. Sure, maybe a big movie blockbuster like “Battleship,” at 10 bucks a ticket, is too expensive, but to then download it instead of supporting some movie that is cheaper is a lose-lose situation. The owner loses because of the loss of potential money, and the downloader loses because they spent time watching something that they didn’t care enough to pay for in the first place.

This paradigm of “don’t waste time if you can’t waste money” does become a bit murky though when it comes to things that people can not normally buy anymore. For example, I can’t buy the mono version of “Sgt. Peppers Lonely Heart Club Band” anymore, but I can get it if I hunt down and pay a huge premium for the entire Beatles catalog. Even worse, what about all those things that are only being preserved by online piracy? There are so much media that is going to be lost to the annuals of time if left to the efforts of their owners. Can people honestly say that with the knowledge of the history of an artist like Van Gogh (who was not considered a painting genius until after his death) that there shouldn’t be an effort from people to not let various music, videos, games, and whatever else die just because their fans cared more about them than the owners ever did?

And that is why I couldn’t just write a didactic “piracy is wrong!” blog. I don’t pirate things, but that is because I am usually too busy with the things I already have (and not having a ton of free time due to work and whatnot helps). I can’t blame people for downloading things, but I can blame them for not supporting those things they love, I suppose. I just wish that companies and owners of these properties that many people love would be more embracing of the people who love them, and stop setting up programs and rules that seem to both punish their consumers and the pirates equally. Until that happens, just remember you always have free blogs from people who really care about your readership (like mine! well, that is until I can figure out how I can monetize this thing, haha! just kidding!)(or am I???)(naw, just kidding).

A Motherly Blog

I sometimes wonder if my want of writing this blog is somehow subconsciously connected to my inability to create life within myself. Though, I should give myself more credit, my body is filled with mitochondria, bacteria, and countless other life forms, but no matter how hard I try, I can not be a mother. I am not sure if I am indifferent towards this or jealous, but in the end I have an immense gratitude towards mothers. Without them, I wouldn’t exist! All my favorite people wouldn’t exist! It would be pretty horrible. That being said, for the most part, women become mothers voluntarily, so it is not like it is necessary some sort of grand sacrifice that people have to suffer for my sake in order for the human race to continue, but I appreciate mothers all the same.

My appreciation for mothers most certainly comes from my own mother, who had to deal with me as a child. To be honest, I was not an easy child to deal with. I didn’t even talk until I was about 5, which I used to joke that made me half as smart as Albert Einstein (Einstein didn’t talk until he was about 9), but I stopped that joke once someone informed me that would mean my IQ would be about 90 (still trying to rework that joke somehow). Anyway, my mother dealing with me as a child and still being kind and considerate is one of the big reasons I am a functioning adult today. While all mothers may not have to deal with children like I was, there is at least an opportunity for mothers to care and bring children up in a way that helps the world.

Perhaps because of that sort of opportunity that mothers have been both praised and condemned in various stories and media. I figure that these good and bad mothers alike represent both peoples ideal and fears of mothers, and not really what mother hood is all about. I am not sure if I am really qualified to say what is at the heart of motherhood is from personal experience, but I can say that no matter what the blood relation, age, or even gender, the care and love a mother can bring is something everyone can aspire to.

So, thank you all mothers, no matter the circumstance: birth, adoption, or maybe even just taking care of a child for a while. Children may be the future, but mothers are a big part of making sure that future is going to be a worthwhile one.

On Adventure

When I was a child, I remember very distinctly wanting to go on “an adventure.” I don’t think I ever had a really clear idea of what that “adventure” would actually entail, but that was sort of the appeal. The whole idea of adventure to me was for something new, exciting, dangerous, and most importantly unexpected. I also remember at some point giving up on this, but as I child I remember giving up on a lot of “dreams.” For example, I remember as a 7 year old boy thinking I wanted to be a soccer star and I fantasized about being interviewed on TV. I gave up a week later when I got bored of the idea. I think it was honestly more about lack of patience than a lack of drive.

As I look back on my life, there are plenty of things I could call adventures, though nothing really life threatening. Well, if they were life threatening, I was not aware (which is probably for the best, because I am pretty sure in life threatening situations I stop having fun immediately, which is why I don’t do things like sky diving). The more I think about it, the more I realise that the vast majority of things I consider adventures are all things I label in retrospect. I hardly ever go into a situation that I consciously thought was going to be adventurous. I am not sure if that means I am just a fuddy duddy, stick in the mud, or I am just like a Bilbo Baggins, and I got to wait for my Gandalf to come around and take me to adventure.

Which, talking about The Hobbit, is probably the reason why I got this whole fixation in the first place. “Adventuring” seems to have been invented by books, and stories that people tell. It makes me wonder if adventure really exists, or if it is just a relative concept. I imagine back in the prehistoric days, every day was an adventure for humanity just to survive. As time went on, and humans got to a place where more people could live their lives without worrying about their own survival. I guess people got bored to the point that they wanted to get closer to that age where everything was so threatening, but also so new and exciting.

For me, the concept of adventure has become a way to cope with potentially stressful situations. Whenever I am on the road and have no idea where to go, or get stuck outside in the pitch black night with no flashlight, or end up in some place I really don’t want to be, I think to myself, “Whelp, I guess I am on an adventure now!” and try to make the best out of it. Adventure has become less of a “fantastic voyage,” and more of the silver lining of events I normally find tough to deal with. That perhaps is not the ideal for people who define adventure as doing something drastic as climb Mt. Everest or walking across the Sahara desert, but I think it is more valuable to be able to define your own adventure than let other expectations do that for you.

What I've Been Doin' (Part 2)

Here is a continuation of the two part series of what I have been reading, watching, and playing. Hope you enjoyed it!

30 Rock

After watching random episodes on airplanes, and then reading the Tina Fey memoir Bossy Pants, I decided I want to watch 30 Rock.  I started with the first season, and while watching it I thought about how hard it must be to establish a series. Both trying to introduce characters, their relationships to each other, and then still trying to tell jokes is a really hard thing to do. 30 Rock stumbles here and there trying to make its mark, but it still manages to be just as funny as later episodes (especially with Tracy Jordan and the episode where they were trying to figure out whether or not he can read). I can’t wait to watch more!

Nichjou

I used to unconditionally love anime. Nowadays, I find myself wondering if I watch Japanese cartoons ironically, or mostly just watch them so I can make the excuse that I am studying Japanese in context. The days of that sort of genuine love of anime seems to be fading away into this sort of scholarly haze of trying to figure out what this animation says about its audience. When I watched Nichijou though, it is something I found hard to watch ironically. Maybe it is because of the language and culture barrier, or perhaps the quality animation, or how completely insane it is, but the show felt more like it was ironically appreciating me. It took all my assumptions, and made them completely useless. Whether it is the kid professor making its adult robot spurt roll cake, high school students getting smacked with raw fish, or a rich guy riding a goat, it is all kind of strange and wonderful.

Rin Tin Tin

If you read Susan Orlean’s book about Rin Tin Tin expecting a book just about the famous German Shepard, you may be disappointed. The entire book is surrounded in an exploration of how we are supposed to research history, and how people’s preconceptions can influence how history is written. Orlean uses Rin Tin Tin as the string in which World War 1, the early movie industry, and her own personal history are all strung along and examined through. I am not a big fan of how Orlean uses official sources, and then exerts her own personal opinions as fact, but as long as the reader parses through her interpretations, Rin Tin Tin is both entertaining and informative.

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

I will admit I am several years late on the whole Harry Potter thing, and despite my skepticism of anything too popular, I am finding myself enjoying myself with every book so far. Harry Potter reads like if Charles Dickens decided to take his serial novel style and write fantasy. Stuff like character names, Victorian-esque values, the difference between adults and children, and the plot twists are all very Dickens-esque. While I don’t think Rowling reaches the type of insight that Dickens is famous for, she makes it up in shear readability. Dickens novels are characterized by the fact that he was paid by the word (hence, why they are very wordy and sometimes a bit hard to get through), but I can read through 200 pages of Harry Potter and feel like no time has wasted. I wish that the antagonists were a bit more relatable (especially with the 3rd person narration making that entirely possible), but Harry Potter is a very fun fantasy series, and I am looking forward to reading the next one!

Trials HD

Often times, when I find myself in video game discussions, I will hear the sentiment that video games just need to be “fun,” and any other aspiration is not only wasteful, but contrary to good game design. I am always confused by this because, first of all, “fun” is a very subjective term, and second of all, most of the best games aren’t just fun. Even classic games like Super Mario, Contra, Sonic, etc. had moments of failure after failure that I am not sure if many people would label “fun.” The experience as a whole might be considered “fun,” but games don’t have to be fun at all. Video games need to be fulfilling. “Fulfilling” is also a subjective term, but it is much closer to the truth of good game design than “fun” is. The word fun brings up images of candy, fireworks exploding, taking a swim at the beach, the sort of thing that brings joy without much effort put into it. Video games, by their very nature of being interactive, shouldn’t be just “fun.” “Fulfilling” implies that the more you put into something, the more you get out of it, which to me, is the perfect video game design. Granted, sitting on the couch and inputting button presses in not what most people would call “effort,” but it is that interactivity, that sort of metaphorical chess match between the player and designer, that makes games great. Trials HD is the perfect game to demonstrate this with. Sure, messing up on the same part of a track, cursing your motorcycle all the way may not be called “fun,” but once I clear that track and get that 30 seconds of joy that comes after conquering something I couldn’t do before, sure is fulfilling. That kind of fulfillment is the root of good video games