[Voultapher]

Based on all the comments you left in this thread, I'm not sure you really want to engage this topic earnestly.

I think you are making the mistake of applying social contracts that can work well on a person to person level to person vs corporation situations. With the latter, one party has way more leverage than the other. On top of that corporations have proven again and again that they will mislead, lie to you and abuse you to the extent permissible by law, or even more if they think it's lucrative to so. On a person to person level that would be a very toxic relationship. They certainly didn't uphold classical inter-personal social contracts, so why should you?

Genuine question, did you fully read the article before commenting here?

[WendyTheWillow]

I not only read the article, but I am familiar with Doctorow’s positions on this issue, and am fairly well versed in ethics.

The problem here is probably that most folks can’t separate what “is” and what “ought” to be. For example you’re discussing how corporations behave despite it being wholly irrelevant to the question of whether or not piracy is immoral. The argument is one of “oughts” and you’re trying to talk in terms of “is”, despite the gaping crevasse separating the two of them (Hume's Guillotine).

This isn’t where ethics is ambiguous or debated; it’s very obviously immoral to pirate, for a whole host of reasons, some of which I’ve already mentioned. From there you surely can concoct scenarios where a baby would die if it doesn’t hear a Metallica album or whatever, but the general point will stand.

[Voultapher]

I see your point. Based on your earlier replies it was not clear to me you were talking about the abstract concept in an unrealistic world. Might help to make that more clear.

In some kind of perfect world there would be no need for violence. Yet we live in a complex and ambiguous world, where the widely accepted moral view that killing is a bad thing is sometimes the "right" thing to do. Or would you argue the Ukrainian people should just roll over because the social contract says killing is bad? My point is, I don't see how the notion that piracy is bad in a world we don't live in helps this discussion. To me it feels more like an argument one could use to demand people stop doing this immoral thing now.

[WendyTheWillow]

No, what? This is not about an ideal world, it’s about what ought to be in this one. Murder is wrong, stealing is wrong, and piracy is wrong, same kind of thinking (though hopefully it is obvious that one is worse than the other).