I remember the commercial well. It interrupted my morning cartoons with flashing colors and threats of jail time. It showed a man stealing a purse from a woman at a restaurant and a burglar lifting a TV through a window in the night. It asked viewers if they would take these items from their rightful owners. What I remember the most was the final catchphrase, written in fuzzy white text on the black screen — “Piracy. It’s a crime.”

I was lucky to grow up in an age of analog media — bound books, movies on DVD or cassette, music on CD. My family kept an extensive collection of all three. Back then, piracy meant filming in the movie theater and burning CDs into MP3 files. They converted a physical format into a digital version, which could then be dispersed online to a wider audience for free. 

When streaming services became the normal mode of media access, subscription fees introduced an impermanence to media. If you purchased a physical disk, that music or movie was yours to keep forever. It was a tangible, unalterable item that could be shared, replayed and owned. 

Nowadays, if you stop paying X dollars every month, you lose access to a particular media library entirely. Further, many services introduced advertisements as yet another obstacle, incentivizing users to purchase an upgraded experience free of distraction. Worse, movie streaming services offer exclusive films and shows that cannot be accessed on other platforms. If consumers want to watch everything new, they often have to pay for multiple services.

As a teen, I took to seedy websites or poor-quality versions to access my favorite shows. I remember watching an entire season of “Attack on Titan” on YouTube. It was posted in resolution so low it was near impossible to decipher the subtitles.

Most dedicated piracy websites are riddled with pop-up ads and connection issues. Typically, they’re run entirely by volunteers. Associated costs are paid out of pocket or with donations, and often these websites are struck down by the government within a year. Some groups rebuild their site, migrating to a different domain and starting all over again. It’s a labor of love, but it is objectively illegal.

The outdated commercial frames media pirates as taking something away — that their theft harms the creator’s profit and creative effort. I believe that the opposite is true in the modern era of media piracy. Websites offer free alternatives to the slew of overpriced subscriptions forced on consumers by huge corporations. It’s not so much a malicious attempt for the pirate’s personal gain, but rather an act of protest.

I don’t have a solution to this problem. As both a rule-follower and a cheapskate, I struggle to determine an ideal future. Media can’t be free of cost, but streaming services are coming full circle. Cable was cheap because it aired advertisements to offset the cost to individuals. When they were shiny new inventions, streaming services bragged about their ad-free, albeit more expensive, alternative to television. 

Now, streaming services also force ads on viewers, while perpetually raising prices anyway. 

Is piracy a victimless crime? The question is rhetorical when used in anti-piracy commercials and online infographics — the only logical answer is assumed to be “no.” I agree. The only victims of illegal media streaming are the huge businesses that benefit from stripping ownership away from individuals.