At the end of the day, the people who "do stuff" will always have the advantage over the people who "don't do stuff". Pirates are slowly motivating ever increasing levels of DRM and in time, I hate to say it, DRM is going to win. That's because the people motivated to make the DRM work (the people who do stuff) greatly outnumber the motivation of the people who don't do stuff.
One can easily picture a future in 5 years in which the telecoms, the PC makers, the OS makers, and the software makers have teamed up (and you only need any two of them to do so) to eliminate unauthorized usage of a given piece of IP. If you don't think it can be done, then you probably don't have much experience in writing software. The DRM and copy protection of today is piddly 1-party solutions.
The DRM of tomorrow will involve DRM parternships where one piece of protect IP can key itself off another. Thus, if even one item on your system is pirated (whether it be cracked or not) it will get foiled as long as there is one item in the system that you use that isn't cracked (whether it be the OS or something in your hardware or whatever). It will, as a practical matter, make piracy virtually impossible.
Computer games and video will likely be the first two targets because piracy of them is so rampant. A pirated copy of something doesn't mean it's a lost sale. But piracy does cause lost sales. Moreover, it's just incredibly frustrating to see people using the fruits of your labor as if they were somehow entitled to it.
I have long been and continue to be a big proponent of alternative ways to increase sales. I don't like piracy being blamed for the failure of a game because it tends to obscure more relevant issues which prevent us, as an industry, from improving what we do. But at the same time, I don't like pirates trying to rationalize away their behavior because they do cost sales. I've seen people in our forums over the years boldly admit they're pirating our game but that they are willing to buy it if we add X or Y to it -- as if it's a negotiation.
I don't like DRM. But the pirates are ensuring that our future is going to be full of it because at the end of the day, the people who make stuff are going to protect themselves. It's only a question of when and how intensive the DRM will get. And that's something only the pirates can change -- if you're using a pirated piece of software, either stop using it or buy it.
Here's another idea I want to throw into the discussion, but first, a little blurb about me.
I used to pirate games a lot, but have ceased to do so. The reason for that was - surprisingly - Sins of a Solar Empire. I chanced upon the game via a torrent website while it was still in its very first beta, so I decided to give it a spin. The game's mechanics and the way it plays reminded me so much of Master of Orion that I used to love (and still have original copy of) that I decided that the game itself really warranted the price.
That also got me thinking - realistically speaking, how much money did I lose on that purchase compared to how much I spend each month. So, I've given myself a bit of a games budget, and I can safely say that bar one exception (that I'm going to talk about in a second), every game I played in the past two years, I have also bought. That having been said - I finished my university studies, and am fully employed now, so I DO have that kind of money to throw around. Working two part-time jobs and studying full-time (with horrendeous university fees) usually left me with NO money - hence my career of piracy during my university days.
And that's something that's important to keep in mind. Most pirates arent older men in well-to-do positions with big families - they are younger people who are in, or have just left university. They are probably the kind of men and women who dont have lots of money to throw around on games, music, and videos. Therefore, while I (no longer) approve of piracy, I can at least understand where some people might get their justification from. I mean - let me put it like this - Fallout 3 is a great game, and I've loved every second of it. Do I think that the GBP 30 or USD 45 price tag was warranted? No, I dont think so. Do I think that the Red Alert 3's Collector's Edition was worth USD 60? No, I really, really dont think so. Game prices are incredibly inflated - simply because now they CAN be inflated. Gaming has become mainstream, and there's a bigger audience. Companies are simply saying "There's people who will pay, dont worry" and then they raise the prices up.
Broadly speaking as well, if you stole something from a company, you would damage them more than if you were to pirate their content. If you steal a car, you are stealing something that someone has made using real resources. If you pirate digital content however, the WHOLE effort that has gone into that game isnt suddenly destroyed. If we were to put it into numbers, it would look something like this: If you steal a car, you steal 100% of the company's effort that has gone into that car (labour, parts, etc.) Out of everyone who owns a game, say that 80% bought it, and 20% pirated it. Theoretically speaking, the company is only losing 20% of the effort that went into that game. That's why digital companies can make a nice profit despite piracy. Again - this is not justification, it is more an explanation of the reasoning that goes into pirating.
Keeping in mind that I'm not a pirate anymore, nor do I approve of it - listen to my experiences of a few weeks ago. I live in the UK, and yes, I do own a credit card. Came across a game called Legion Arena a few weeks ago (game was released in 2005), and I decided I wanted to buy it. You'd think that would be an easy task, no? Well, as it turns out - none of my local retailers stock it (because it's really not mainstream), and I could not find it on Amazon or eBay, even second-hand. So, I turned to digital distribution, and I DID find the game online. The problem was, for some reason, the company refused to take transactions from the UK. Don't ask me how or why - but I attempted using two of my credit cards, as well as two of my friends' respective credit cards, and it all backfired. In the end, in my frustration, I logged onto a torrent site and downloaded the bastard game. Turned out to be only okay to be honest... So - honest question - did I do the wrong thing? The game was three years old, so unlikely to make any more profit realistically speaking. Furthermore, my intent was to pay for it and give the money to the rightful owners - but they certainly did not make that an easy task. If the purchasing page was to be any judge, then the people who made the game certainly didnt care about it that much anymore.
What I'm getting at is this - piracy and sharing sometimes CAN be useful, if done properly. Imagine a company leaking an early beta to a torrent website. People download it like crazy, realise its a great game, get hooked on it - and then - HOPEFULLY - go out and purchase it once its out properly. Unless, of course, they have no moral fibre and simply download the full game and crack it.
In which case I say we nuke Planet Earth and start again with amoebas.
Intellectual property is something that's really a weird concept to many Asians. If I think up a great story, it's my obligation to make sure as many people as possible hear it. I owe them thanks for deigning to hear my story, and I can make money off of mass market economics. It's always been that way, for hundreds of years now.
The influx of Western copyright ideas has changed many minds about that, but hearts are difficult to change. A lot of people I know simply don't believe that they ought to pay $30 for a game, and if you had well over 2 billion customers to distribute the game to, I doubt you would really need to charge that much to pay overhead. There's a reason Jackie Chan is as ridiculously rich as he is, despite practically throwing money away left and right.
What Asians believe in is paying for is an experience and for product, even virtual ones. This is why Asian games are setup as they are - free games; cheap customizable add-on content. I like the fact that you're offering me a free game experience, and if I like it enough, I'll buy customized outfits for my Sorceress, which is okay to charge small amounts for because it's completely unnecessary - a vanity on my part.
nah, the key issue is, it is easier to buy a console game, than to pirate it, for the majority of users. Sadly i believe the philippinian market in not exactly the prime target of developers.
Take Sims2 for example. All the little girls who are playing it dont know sh*t about computers, It is too difficult for them to search for a pirated version. They simply buy it and dont bother. And look at the charts..
More likely, the parents of most little girls who patronize Sims2 fall into 2 categories:
1. Don't know enough about computers to pirate it
2. Want to spend money to feel good about pampering their little girl
Or both. Heck, if a pirate forced them to accept a pirated copy, they would probably shove 50 bucks at him just to be rid of the money.
The Philippine and Chinese software market is relevant because I believe that many of the most sophisticated hackers and pirates reside in these markets. If you want to take a big club to pirates, you hit them in their home turf.
It is NOT easier to buy a console game when pirates sell nearly the exact same product just outside the legit store for a fraction of the price, particularly when the companies that sell the legit company don't care enough to look at market structure in that market to price their game right.
If you ask me, it's karma. Most Western companies don't give a crap about markets beyond the Western hemisphere, so Eastern consumers are left essentially in the cold. Pirates take up the slack. It's their own fault, really.
3. parents gain more money per time needed to pirate the game4. potential risk of being charged for law violation The asian market is large indeed.. but law enforcement.. very low. In the West you cant just, you know, sell pirated stuff in the open on streets. How devs are supposed to care about a market where reselling pirated stuff isnt strictly persecuted.
If they care about stamping out piracy, then they care about markets that spawn pirates. It's that simple.
But you see, markets do not spawn pirates. The system does. Pirates are not the reason, there are the consequence, of bad laws. It is pointless to fight pirates in Asia since new ones will immediately step up on that vacant place. Besides, every homeuser can make and spread zillions of copies already thanks to the internet. And fighting foreign laws is beyond the scope of power of any regular developer. Except Microsoft. Therefore, noone cares, not because they do not want the market, but because they cant do a damn thing about it. Unreachable. Except for products which cant be pirated very well, like WoW.
Roller123:
It is pointless to persecute individual pirates in Asia because game developers do not have the power to make it painful enough for them to desist given the rewards they get.
It is NOT pointless for game developers to pay attention to market forces and fight piracy by competing with it directly.
DRM doesn't work on consoles either. It's against forum rules, although I break so many of them perhaps I shouldn't be minding this one either, to post links to pirated material or I'd link you. If you have half a wit, you can pirate console games just fine with slightly less ease than PC games. They even get pirated before release date, it's just ignored because it doesn't fit the pc game publishers little box that says his customers are pirates and if he could only get more control, they'd all buy it!
It would be nice if you actually answered instead of posing yet another pointless question in a futile attempt to turn it around on me. Perhaps we could get somewhere instead of repeating the same drivel.
Justice, in the simplest term possible, is balance. If you do something to someone, it is done to you. This applies to both positive and negative. If for instance, I am a kind and caring person(hold the laughter), a just response is to treat me in kind. Since I am an asshole with little respect for my fellow man, I deserve little respect in return. If you treat me like the dick that I am, you are doing me justice. If you treat me better than I deserve, you reward me unjustly. I assume you would agree with this, correct? Perhaps this is asking too much considering the idiocy wave known as political correctness.
When EA is boycotted, they are harmed by that boycott. Harm can be just. Considering EA's current tact, a boycott would most definitely be a just action yes? Boycotting a company because they donate toys to orphans would not be a just action, and would also harm them.
If, instead of boycotting which will already harm EA equally, I pirate, I have changed nothing of the effects to EA. Your irrelevant question is now answered, yes?
My question was if it would be WRONG or justice. As you passed on answering, mine follows. My property is no longer sacred to them, so theirs is no longer sacred to me. Justice.
Except that: EA gets even more reasons to blame piracy and put even more drm on its products. Which will, if people follow your "logic", make more ppl pirate it and so on. I wouldnt call that "no effect" to EA or anyone.
And if you only want to boycott it, why take the hassle to download gigs of software? Just buy a game from another publisher instead. There should still be plenty and you will support publisher and developers who do not use draconic drm. Which has the positive side effect of encouraging less drm.
And if you cannot buy another game instead you couldnt have buyed EAs game. And you cannot boycott something which you couldnt afford anyway. So boycotting fails to justify piracy in this case too.
We established a while ago that pirating doesn't actively harm the company. That argument is out.
We've never disagreed on "try-before-you-buy". That can be ignored.
Protesting DRM is fine; with any luck, the fact that the game with the most restrictive DRM on the market was also the most pirated one in history will serve as a lesson for EA. (Who am I kidding; they'll probably start releasing their games on flash drives that will stop talking to your computer if they suspect that your computer is doing anything with the game data other than actually playing. Still, I can dream, right?)
However, I remain against piracy for one reason: I believe that you should pay for any game you want; if having that game isn't important enough to pay full price or to wait for the prices to drop, you shouldn't get it. If you can't afford the game, tough; entertainment is hardly a necessity, electronic entertainment even less so. People who do not want to (or are unable to) pay for the game are not entitled to play it.
I hate that I've degraded myself to something only slightly more meaningful than "it's wrong because it is", but that is how I feel.
EA's stupidity is not my fault, just as I am not responsible for the literary lobotomy spewed forth from your cranial void when you reply to my posts. I am responsible for my own actions, not the irrational actions of another. The opportunity to be a fucking dumbass isn't at fault.
Stop posting, please. You're causing irreparable brain damage to innocent bystanders.
Edit: Wtf on the hour old post that wasn't there two minutes ago when I started replying...
So basically, you have no argument, have been utterly defeated by reason and accept all points, but insist on calling it wrong in general without knowing how many pirates actually fall under the pirate just because category, or whether the end result is a net gain or loss for the industry through future market generation. I should probably be happy, at least you're thinking.
Not calling black people dirty niggers I get. Not calling someone with a weight problem a beached whale, I get. Not stating the obvious, not so much. If someone is being stupid, tell them so. Perhaps they don't know it and need to be informed. Pretending reality isn't there in a misguided attempt to avoid offending the offending party just leads to more offense. Kinda like my not being banned for knowingly disregarding the rules against insults and profanity hasn't stopped my frequent swearing and calling people idiots.
That's just plain false, and only a propaganda slogans of the publishers : look at the situation in the music field, there's now more creation than ever !
And look at literacy/books, it never really suffered of "piracy" in centuries, it was not even considered a problem.
That's why I don't think DRM will "win" eventually : it's a deadend, making price increase all over the board and leading to problems for the customers, then customer number dwindle, then piracy thrives, then DRM level increase, etc.
I really expect that the DRM eruption from 2000-2008 will soon end and looks like an aberation.
That your own actions might cause actions of others doesnt even come into your so called mind?
And no, i wont stop posting just because someone who cannot make logic conclusions thinks that i shouldnt. I am really sorry for overstressing your "brain".
This logic s flawed: Just because the music industry never stopped to grow yet, piracy can never stop it from growing?
Because books are physical and cannot simply be copied and sent all over the net.
Theres alot of books up on torrent sites.
i support piracy actually, not the whole of piracy, just a single tab of it, just like supporting the gaming industry, but hating a single company... (wich i do aswell)
piracy is in most occasions just people who do not want to spend their money on a product.... kind of pathetic.... i do not support this type of scamming
then you also have the pirates that crack games becuase they have games that just do not work, i support those people, and there are so many occasions in wich i turn to pirate says, download a crack and play my game rather then going through some annoying technical support site wich makes me wait 2-3 weeks then get a reply like "what exactly doesnt work in the game??" (even tough you've stated that in your previous mail)
or the most annoying of all (yes theres stuff more annoying then this) "your computer doesnt have sufficient (memory, graphics audio etc.etc.) so you cannot play the game" (even tough game requirements are much lower then what you already have) and many, many more of these examples
if you buy a game it should work outa the BOX!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j-uulRB1OmY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IKUPYMxkbVY&feature=related
yes, now replys will come over pirates not buying, but like i said, thats notthe type of pirates im talking about here, im talking about fair people, who distribute siple, home-made fixes for games becuase the company's are to busy trying to stop piracy, DRM is so easy to crack these days.. people just have to click a few buttons and voila, 100% game 0% DRM
Amen
if it worked that way i guess gaming would be a godlike economy type
actually to most people here.. a big fat Amen.... atleast i feel some peopel understand how piracy works not the usual
1.piracy owns, drm must die
2.piracy sucks pirates must die
but the "not-so-often-seen-becuase-most-people-are-to-dumb-for-that" #3
3. piracy isnt all that complicated, it's a simple group that rebel against "unfair" company standards and/or other reasons
It's actually true - books are all over the internet. If you accept that the essential part of a book is its intellectual content, then books quite simply "suffer" much more piracy than software, for the simple reason that few books become obsolete, there's more books to be had, and they're easier to upload and spread.
The last time I tried looking to download a book I couldn't even find the book I wanted because the sea of information out there is just so vast.
Well, Bodyless, I had to try for the sake of my fellow man. Not that I give a shit, I just figure the world is already stupid enough as it is.
You lack clarity, completely. If I am responsible for actions others take in response to me, then the same must hold true for all. Thus no one is responsible for anything and the pirates aren't doing anything wrong because they're just reacting to the prices. I myself am not responsible for any actions I take myself, thus not responsible for any actions taken because of them. Either people are responsible for their own actions, or people aren't responsible for anything.
Anyway, go back to your verbal diarrhea.
I dont make any certain pirate repsonsible for all the copy protections. But how much DRM would there be without piracy in the first place? There is a causality between piracy and DRM. Or do you think anyone would spend money on it for no reason?
So every pirate is partially responsible that we got that level of DRM now and DRM wont simply go away by pirating even more.
I guess those were released online because i cannot image someone scanning in a whole book to only upload it as torrent.
tbh i have downloaded a few things my self, okay i know its wrong and therefore i do very little and have done almost nothing that way recently (couple of months). thing is i prefer if companys worked similarly to stardocks little/no copy protection. cos i have bought many games which looked amazing/loads and loads of hype and then i just got bored of so quickly thus buying the game was pointless as it now just sits on my self collecting dust (eg spore). thus games i like and will always do/play i consider paying for it as a good investment, if you see what im saying. this makes stardock's policy awesome cos i can play the game run it around in circles, fiddle with it etc to make sure that i love the game and therefore willing to pay for it.
i guess im trying to say let me play it, doesnt have to be the full version (but not a demo as the limits are far too tight either x amount of time or limit to what you can get etc) doesnt have to have internet multiplayer stuff any of that i just need to get a feel of whether i consider it worth buying. if i like it then i wouldnt mind paying for say an access code (in stardocks case the serial number) or something to get the rest of it.
it could be worked that there was a demo (very limited), one sorta 1/2 way, and the full full full version which is just say the missing files to the middle one + serial code + multipayer + updates. the demo and middle verson can be spread around the internet w/e as its a digital copy which will get laods of attention and the full version can be tightly witheld and the accessed by a direct download and serail emailed seperatly?.
What do you recommend we do to resolve the piracy problem, beyond rewarding legitimate customers? I am interested in hearing different alternatives.
There's nothing you can do unless you're willing to go after the actual pirates from a legal standpoint (and even then I don't know if there's much you can do). Wasn't it Brad that said 'ignore the pirates. Pirates don't count' (or something to that effect)?
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