system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
CMV: Pirating media (mainly games) that is no longer in circulation isn't a crime

My friend and I were recently having a conversation about some of our favorite games from the late 90s and early 2000s, reminiscing about the old days. Most all of them are no longer in circulation and many don't even have rumors about being remade or re-released. The consoles that they were sold for have since been discontinued. 

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Now online, you can find so many emulators for Super Nintendo, Sega Genesis, Nintendo 64, Playstation 1, etc. and you can find ROMs for various games that are no longer being made. You can even setup something like RetroPie on a Raspberry Pi and play all sorts of old games. However, if not mistaken, under copyright and trademark law, it is considered piracy to copy and use something without the proper license (e.g. you bought it).

I often wonder, why does anyone care? Like, I could see if it was a PS4 or PS5 game, a game still in circulation that the publishers can still make a profit off of. But a game that is no longer in print for a system that has long been discontinued, they've made all the money that they are going to make off of that property. 

I guess this could also extend to things like movies and maybe other media that has since gone out of circulation. Thoughts?

EDIT: to be clear, I know that it is considered a crime. I guess I should have worded it stating "It Shouldn't Be Considered a Crime"
gpt
It *literally is a crime*, nowhere does copyright law say that IPs fall into the public domain due to disuse. 

You might want to argue that the copyright system as it exists *is unjust*, but it is doubtlessly what  it is. 

Also, if this would change, then a shitload of properties would suddenly fall into the public domain, and suddenly people would have access to lots of free content, that would compete for your time and attention paid content, so big studios would end up losing money.

That would of course be a good thing for society, but it would be a bad thing for their shareholders, so they have every interest in keeping copyrights longer.