If there's actually a concrete claim you want to make, something more precise like "copyright infringement" or "violating the license agreement" is probably better. If you aren't accusing them of anything in particular but wish to express disapproval, it would be best just to call it "morally wrong" — though I don't think that would make for a very productive discussion.
"Piracy" is a political term used generically to mean "people not doing what I want who should be made to obey me by force of law." It may refer to actually harmful illegal acts (bootlegging) or things that are simply not preferable for somebody's business model (watching legally obtained content on an "unauthorized" device).
That's precisely the crux of the problem. Is your app marketed as "free"? If it is, how can I pirate it?
It's not that I consider the word itself a troll-bait, but the misuse of it. Like other commenters already noted, there are other terms that apply to what you're complaining about. Claiming that people are "pirating" an ad-supported application seems to me like a misuse of an already widely-misused word.
On the other hand, if you're arguing that ad-supported applications should not be considered or labeled or marketed as "free", then all I can say is that dragging piracy into the discussion is not the way to support that argument. The flaw, in this case, would be in confusing the cause with effect, just like saying "It's not free because you're stealing it!"
The cause-effect relationship is exactly the point. IRL, I am an app developer. When I deliver a new app, I have two ways to monetize my development time: I can either charge money for the app (and call it the "Pro" version), or I can put ads in the app (and call it "Lite"). If someone ends up with a copy of the app that they did not pay money for (Pro) and does not show my ads (Lite), that is pirating. Whether you stole a copy of the "Pro" version or circumvented the trust I placed in the OS (to make the internet available for ad delivery whenever feasible) does not change the fact that you have broken our (admittedly loose) agreement and stolen my software from me.
I agree that it is entirely possible for the user see no ads in the Lite version anyway, perhaps because they actually don't have an internet connection. Similarly, it is entirely possible for Paypal to make some mistake and fail to credit my account properly for a purchase of the Pro version. My advertisers might by paying by click-through rather than views, in which case I am operating on a statistical basis and not making any money off of many of my users. Those details do not change the ethics and do not cancel out the wrongness of pirating.
(@chc suggests that I should say "morally wrong" instead of "pirating". I think that sounds kinda ad hominem, so I've stuck with "pirating".)
By this logic, muting TV commercials is also piracy.
circumvented the trust I placed in the OS (to make the internet available for ad delivery whenever feasible)
That's not something you can or should be able to "trust" the OS to do. It's not your hardware. If you don't want "pirates" running your app, then have it refuse to run unless it can download ads. Don't pretend you have any right to dictate whether the user is allowed to disable Internet access.
Not even remotely. Photoshop has a well defined sticker price. It is well established (at this point) that in order to get a legitimate copy of Photoshop, you have to pay said sticker price.
There are no EULA agreements that people agree to when downloading free apps.
Furthermore, when an app is 'ad-supported' it is not clear at all what agreement you have implicitly engaged in. Have you agreed to allow ads to collect data that you enter into the app itself? Is the author only receiving funds if you click on the ads? Are you morally obligated to click on the ads then? If not, how is my decision to never click on ads any different than blocking them outright? How much data from the app to the marketers is being collected? If I plan a trip with your app, are sponsoring companies receiving this information as well? Are ads simply keyword identified or are they using a profile?
Without transparency about how the ads provide funding (which actually violates Google ad words TOS) I don't see how this is a simple black and white situation. I believe most people operate on the assumption that the ads are "you click, I get paid". As a result, most people view ad supported applications as a variation of donationware. If you don't want donations to be optional, don't use this method.
I'm not a lawyer and I'm not really talking about the law.
You raise some really excellent points about privacy and ads that I totally agree with. But if you don't want ads in your ad-supported app, I think the only fair thing to do is not use it. In the same sense the it's only fair to pay for shareware that you routinely use, even if there's no DRM and you're not legally or functionally obligated to do so.
