Here’s a table I adapted from Louis Rossman’s video on the levels of piracy, grey areas and his morals and ethics on it. (spreadsheet file)
I tried to condense each rank and make it less about a specific type of media like CD audio or DVD video, along with a table of simplified characteristics of each situation. Of course more levels can be added and there are many situations not covered. This hierarchy is simply the way Louis ordered it from more to less justifiable; he respects people can think about it differently and I do too. He suggests that he doesn’t really care about people that pirate without giving a shit about creators, and that he only has a problem with people who aren’t honest with themselves about their motivations.
Setting legality aside, what ‘level of piracy’ is morally or ethically acceptable to you?
Depending on the situation, up to #13 for me. A caveat to that might be whether or not the creator has appropriately priced their product so as to justly compensate themselves without charging consumers excessively. While I had it in my Steam library already, Factorio deserves to be pirated for breaking with the standard practice of not raising game prices with inflation. Same with Sega’s anti-consumer move to remove the Sonic ROMs from the Sega Genesis collection to boost sales of Sonic Origins.