Pirates vs. Corporations 2: Sailboats vs. Warships

This is the second of two articles analyzing the benefits of allowing multimedia and software intellectual properties to be reproduced and distributed without license, i.e., to be pirated.

State of the Country with Piracy vs. without Piracy
Without movie, music and software piracy, the Philippines would less happy, less progressive and less wealthy as it is today. Not to say that the country is very happy, progressive and wealthy, but the situation would have been a lot worse if not for software piracy.

Happiness
There is more utility, i.e. amount of happiness, in allowing multimedia and software to be pirated in the Philippines. As stated in the last article, the usual intellectual proprietors victimized by pirates are large multi-million-dollar corporations. Large corporations will get economic utility if piracy is stopped. Hence, they will continue to be in business and exist. If piracy is allowed, everyone else becomes happy. Pirates will obviously become happy because income will be distributed to numerous entrepreneurs instead of coagulating in accounts of large corporations. Consumers will get the most utility both economically and psychologically: economic utility because obtaining pirated movies, music and software will not harm financial reserves as much as purchasing original ones; psychological utility because consumers will be able to enjoy various movies, music and software instead of being able to purchase few expensive originals. Even in the extreme circumstance that large corporations shut down, the impact on the society is negligible for these companies are few as compared to the entire population.

Progress
It is common knowledge that most offices and small-to-medium scale enterprises in the country do not own original software. If all are required to use original software, most offices and enterprises would not be able to operate, or at least be as efficient as they are now using their pirated software. Much productivity of offices and enterprises come from the use of computers; but without essential software such as operating systems and word processors, most businesses would not be able to use computers and be plagued by lack of order and manpower. The proliferation of cheap pirated software in most offices and enterprises allowed the masses to easily set-up businesses and nurture the health of microeconomics in the country.

Also, knowledge development will suffer. Virtually all schools and homes nowadays need computers; and operating systems are required to run these computers. It is no secret that most computers in schools and homes, especially in the provinces, use pirated operating systems and office programs. If there are no available pirated software, it is a modest estimate that 90% of students and homes will not be able to use computers. That would translate to the same percentage of loss in knowledge development in the country.

Wealth
If in every purchase, there is flow of wealth: the purchaser becomes poorer and the vendor becomes richer. If original software is bought, a considerable amount of money is transferred from a person to a large corporation. With the current economic status of the country, it is an enormous financial burden to buy an original movie than a pirated copy. If consumers are forced to purchase originals, a large fraction of their income will be given to international corporations instead of devoting their money to basic necessities and wellbeing. The total wealth loss of the country would be tremendous: for example, Windows XP costs 5,000 pesos, and, on the average one resident per baranggay purchases Windows XP (there are at least 70,000 baranggays in the country), the country will transfer 350,000,000 pesos to Microsoft for the purchases of Windows XPs alone, without any programs to install and use on them. Money will leave the country to be paid to foreign corporations instead of circulating within the country. This is unacceptable to a country wherein children die due to poverty.

Conclusion
Software pirates are like sailboat merchants who keep the local economy lively and give utility to consumers. Large corporations who own most law-enforced intellectual properties are like warships that consume much wealth for its mere upkeep. For poor countries such as the Philippines, it is better to have small sailboats available to the masses than few large naval warships that would consume much of their resources.

Currently, Philippine sailboats do outnumber Philippine warships. The country cannot afford expenses of warships, but its masses could use services of sailboats. This set-up also exists in Philippine movie, music and software reception. The country will suffer more in spending for originals; in the end only upper class will purchase movies, music and software – creating social injustice, widening the social divide and depriving the masses of the fruits of the brilliance of the human mind.