> Paid mobile apps are widely released, and people I know make a living selling them. Is anyone who buys a mobile app a chump?
You used google and facebook as an example, they are clearly not releasing binaries but are in the service industry. Mobile applications (which I think are a transient phenomenon that will evaporate when mobile web applications will be more viable, the same happened with desktop software, with some notable exceptions) are already pirated wholesale (see http://news.cnet.com/8301-1035_3-20107572-94/how-piracy-ruin...) that doesn't make the writers of mobile software 'chumps', but it does mean that they will have to factor this in or they will likely be hurt.
> It would be just as easy as copying a movie, and the data is out there, so you are arguing that it's OK to do that?
No, obviously I'm not arguing that it is ok to do that.
You used google and facebook as an example, they are clearly not releasing binaries but are in the service industry. Mobile applications (which I think are a transient phenomenon that will evaporate when mobile web applications will be more viable, the same happened with desktop software, with some notable exceptions) are already pirated wholesale (see http://news.cnet.com/8301-1035_3-20107572-94/how-piracy-ruin...) that doesn't make the writers of mobile software 'chumps', but it does mean that they will have to factor this in or they will likely be hurt.
> It would be just as easy as copying a movie, and the data is out there, so you are arguing that it's OK to do that?
No, obviously I'm not arguing that it is ok to do that.