I guess, I just don't see many people getting something for free then deciding to go buy it out of the goodness of their heart... maybe I'm too pessimistic.

I try not to pirate music production software because I make some small money from my music, and I've personally seen companies go bust and get snapped up by Apple because everyone (me included) justified pirating their small plugins as "they're making lots of money anyway". But I justify pirating shit like Adobe to myself I hate paying a subscription to use software. I dunno maybe more people have this mindset than I realise and are happy to pay after 'trying before buying'.

I'm interested to hear responses from anyone who genuinely buys the music they enjoy after pirating it. Why would they not just buy it in the first place?