CS103F: Ethical Foundations of Computer Science

Before beginning this blog post, please watch Appropriation & Attribution from Ethics Unwrapped.

For this blog post, you will analyze software piracy and its impact. A good example of an informal study done on software piracy is the game, Game Dev Tycoon. The developer released both the licensed version of the game and a cracked version of the game on the same day. You may analyze this case directly or use it as a jumping off point to consider other cases of software piracy.

Consider:

• Who benefits from software (or other digital media) piracy?
• How do people justify the pirating of software?
• What issues arise from pirated software?
• How has technology has affected piracy?
• What consequences that arise from this relationship between technology and piracy (e.g. DRM, free-to-play mechanics, streaming services, advertising, etc)?

This resource may be useful to you:

• Patrick, What happens when pirates play a game development simulator and then go bankrupt because of piracy?, Greenheart Games Blog, April 29, 2013.

Please construct your response so that it has a main idea, supporting arguments, and a conclusion. Your response should be approximately 300 words and you are welcome to link to relevant media (articles, videos, etc.).

We do expect professional presentation: your spelling and grammar should be correct---you should not be using text shorthand or emojis.

Once you have created your blog post, submit a URL to the relevant assignment on Canvas. When you submit your URL, Canvas will take a snapshot of that URL, so be sure to submit once you are finished with your blog post.

Finally, the Ethics Centre has blog posts that may be useful as examples--they are often longer than your requirement, though. One of the recent good examples is "Why Victims Remain Silent... and Then Find Their Voice".