QOTD: Assuming the Costs of Piracy

Wonkbook is on the trail of some of the claims about the cost of piracy to the economy, but buried within the post is one of my favorite arguments. Brad Pulmer writes:

Part of the difficulty here is that it’s not always easy to tally up the true costs of piracy. For instance, if a person illegally downloads a movie or song that he never would’ve downloaded otherwise, then it’s not clear what the losses are (the benefits, by contrast, are much clearer).

That point of availability beyond the market, to me, is always fascinating. Just something I’m thinking about during this debate.