Wait so then does playing a game that maxes out my GPU for two hours use enough power to charge 1000 smartphones?

Because that’s a lot.

hopefully this is just a ‘blip’ and rates of theft begin to fall again as the economy recovers.

If not, we can expect to see legal channels raising their prices again to cover the losses caused by piracy.

This is a crazy thing to write. Every streaming service already has their prices set at whatever they think will maximize profit. If they raise prices in response to piracy, they’ll push even more people away.

If anything, piracy will serve as competition, and it will cause the streaming services to lower prices.