Pirate Bay still wins, again. Average citizen will probably suffer, again.

The entertainment industry has embarked in an all-out war against piracy around the globe, with the hopes of scaring would-be pirates from illegally obtaining digital media. But if the likes of the MPAA and RIAA plans on sinking the ship that millions sail throughout the Internet, they should think again.
The primary target for the entertainment industry, as it would seem, has been The Pirate Bay. It is far more than a website that enables users to acquire digital content of both legal and illegal variety. It is a symbol. It is a powerful message that the entertainment industry hates but many people, even those who don’t commit acts of piracy, agree is true: the system is broken.

 Welcome back to the piracy scene. I'm your host, nerdzilla, and we're here to examine Piratebay. Now, Piratebay is nowhere near the only site of it's kind, and quite frankly I personally have no idea why it is the only site under this much fire. Perhaps Piratebay is simply the most popular, or perhaps this is the entertainment industry's way of suppressing the people. Perhaps this is there way of threatening people, scaring people into doing what they want. However, Pirate Bay does a lot more than offer torrents that just happen to contain "ilegal" MP3s or videos.

I personally go to a less controversial site for my free, legal music.Consequently, I can't name a single popular band.

A defining issue that plagues the industry and, more importantly, consumers is draconian Digital Rights Management (DRM) techniques that everyone’s hearing about lately. This is why you can’t read that e-book you purchased on a competing device, listen to that MP3 anywhere you want to, watch that movie on your computer, or play that game without an always-on Internet connection. It’s these very techniques that drive paying customers to piracy (even yours truly has fallen victim to DRM gone horribly wrong).

 I was under the impression it was common knowledge that DRM is a torture device. (<-- satire) But since some people actually think it's an effective method of protecting things let's go over DRM. DRM is a method of security applied mainly to video games, music, and video by large companies with the intentions of making sure you don't do anything considered pirating. What it does however, is put vague limits on what you can do with what you bought with your hard earned money. Want to install your video game? Have you installed it more than 5 or so times with said CD-key? Whoops! No can do. DRM has now stepped in and you're no longer allowed to play that video game you bought, with money. Want to play the music you bought on Itunes on your Zune? on any other media player except iTunes? No sir. DRM says to take a hike.

DRM is essentially flawed to the core idea because it makes limits that it THINKS pirates are especially likely to break, but ignores completely that completely legal users can do so as well. Therefore, legal users are often victimized by the limits set by DRM.

If that wasn't bad enough, DRM is pretty weak in that it can often be removed, ilegally, pretty easily.

Yeah... right now a pirate is playing the game without hassle and you're labeled a pirate and not allowed to listen/play for no good reason.

This, is why most people hate DRM.

Beyond the technological advances that will keep illegal file sharing going for the foreseeable future, the one thing that matters more than anything else is the fact that many people actually participate in piracy and have no issue with doing so. There are surely those that feel no moral implication for their actions, and that number is probably growing.

It's disgraces like DRM that make it so that in your average private chat on MSN or even public chat on a chatroom, nobody will think poorly of you for admitting to pirate things. I've had friends I've met on forums pirate games to play with me, and not really cared. After all, I have a legal copy and am not helping them. I don't feel obligated at all to stop them. (Unless it's a game I REALLY like, in which case I may casually suggest paying for it.) Even then though. What am I supposed to do? Refuse to play with them?

The industry might sue someone like me though, simply for not being terrified of their little regime. It wouldn't be the first time they've done something horribly controversial to the little guys and quite frankly I wouldn't be able to win. It wouldn't surprise me if some of the court officials were biased. As some may know, that has already happened.

Like DRM, which victimizes the average citizen and only makes it slightly more tedious for the average pirate, the industry will probably once again do something that doesn't solve the problem in an attempt to win this hopeless war that will probably wind up offending everyone, again.