Originally posted here by pooh sun tzu
Am I one of the few people here that does not pirate a single OS, Game, software, or music? From the sound of the forums and the IRC channels, a plethora of AO members pirate like there is no tomorrow. What happened to ethics people?
I can honestly say that I have never pirated a single game (which is probably the easiest software to get hold of) and the only music I have downloaded consists of singles that I can no longer find in the shops. If the iTunes music store was available in the UK or the record companies didn't charge so much, I'd quite happily buy those songs legitimately too. However, at the moment WinMX is the only way I can get hold of them. Seeing as the record companies don't sell these singles any more (or at best make them damn difficult to find, or offer them in the US only and forget about the rest of the world), they're not losing any money by me downloading them so I don't see what their problem is.

As for ethics, they are on an individual basis. You might think it's unethical to pirate software, other people obviously don't.