Yep, it seems the court ruled that their intent was to help illegally distribute copyrighted works and sentenced each of the four to 1 year in prison and a $905k fine.
Source: http://torrentfreak.com/the-pirate-bay-trial-the-verdict-090417/
Quite interesting, I think.
Actually, no, that's not how law works. That's why we have a gigantic legal system, with courts, lawyers, judges, appeals, etc. Law is never simple, saying "if something is illegal then it is illegal" seems completely out of touch with not only the way that law works, but out of touch with the entire concept of justice.
Killing a person - is that illegal or not legal? Depends. Were they an enemy combatant? Was it an accident? Was it in self defense? Were they commiting a crime? Did they give consent to be killed? Law is complicated and ever-changing.
The law can and does draw lines like this all the time. See murder above. We don't say "Well, if it's illegal for Bob to kill his wife, then it should be illegal for the police to kill the insane guy shooting down innocent people in the mall" or "Well, if beating someone with your fists is illegal, it has to be illegal to touch anyone at all". Consequences, intent, and harm done are all important factors in any court case, and that's exactly as it should be. Do you honestly want to live in a place with rigid, unchangable laws enforced by robots?
In some cases yes, because attitude can determine intent. There would be a difference in a court case where a person legitimately seemed truthful in saying that he hit someone by accident with his car, and someone who laughs maniacally through the whole trial talking about how much they love to murder innocent people, even if the physical evidence was mostly the same. In the Pirate Bay case, their attitude clearly showed their intent, that they were purposely trying to cause harm to the copmanies they were stealing (or not stealing) from, and that they had every intention of trying to keep doing what they're doing, and that they were actively trying to destroy the livelihoods of anyone who produced things legally under copyright law.
It's funny, because everytime they DO arrest a seeder, all the pro-piracy kids complain that they're just making an example of someone who is totally innocent and that the real people who should have been arrested were the ones who downloaded it, since they committed the actual crime. And anytime they DO arrest a downloader, all the pro-piracy kids complain because they're just making an example, and they should have arrested the uploader since they were the one committing the crime.
They didn't bring them to trial for being annoying.
Let's be honest: you have no idea how much money they made. The police and the Pirate Bay owners both make two different claims. You believe the Pirate Bay owners, and some people believe the police. Unless anyone has actual evidence beside he said / she said, then let's not pretend that we know how much money they made. The only thing I can say is that it's somewhat absurd to blindly believe someone when they say the police are liars and they don't have any money, when their entire business is about breaking the law and stealing income from other corporations.
Follow how? By giving everything away for free to ungrateful, selfish teenagers? Do you think that's a sustainable model for any actual industry?
I don't know if arrest was needed, maybe jsut fines. Then again, maybe fines wouldn't send enough of a message, i bet this won't even stop things much. I doubt sites like what.cd ,or other big sites will stop all of the sudden
Piracy isn't free. You should have payed attention in economics 101.
First, depending on your location, it's illegal. All illegal acts have cost attributed to them because they are illegal. You risk jail, fines, court costs, etcetera etcetera. Second, it has potential negative consequences beyond the judicial response. You decrease the incentives for providing the products you're liberating. Third, if you actually are doing harm to the providers, there's this funky thing that everyone who shouldn't be retroactively aborted on sight has. It's called a conscience, you've heard of it yes?
Education helps a lot. If they were to show how much a game costs, how much they make off of it, where everything is going, they'd guilt a lot of people into buying that are currently pirating. This is of course predicated on the premise that they're actually being hurt by piracy and aren't making ridiculous returns already. The people pirating because they think hollywood and such are a bunch of greedy assholes wont become customers if they really are a bunch of greedy assholes making 200% profit margins while shitting bricks and inconveniencing their customers over losses. I suspect the loinshare of the copyright industry can prove no such thing. The only industry I know isn't reaming us while whining about it is the print industry, I know for a fact that most musicians get rich off concerts and barely get anything out of the album sales.
At this point, my conscience wouldn't bother me in the slightest, generally speaking. All the lies and bullshit forced on me leave a bad taste in my mouth when I think of buying things. I'd never pirate something like Sins from guys that aren't fucking me in the ass as thanks for my purchase. The latest Sony published album that costs 20 bucks, tries to install a rootkit when I put it in the drive, and makes me work to rip it to my computer where I listen to it better than 99% of the time? Fuck em, I doubt the guys writing the music even get a penny on every dollar I'd spend, and I'd rather the guys running Sony drop dead in a slow and painful manner than give them money.
Television is over one fourth commercial, and most of them are annoying. No one actually watches them either, because a three minute ad break is so fucking irritating that we get up and do something else while it's trying to torture us. The media networks are shitting bricks over people recording shows because they know, but wont admit, that they have a serious problem. Their product isn't worth the price. If it were, we'd watch the commercials. I buy a fucking movie and the assholes lock out the menu to force me to watch their goddamned advertisements. I'm paying for a movie, not advertisements. Advertisements are something they're supposed to pay me for.
They're even showing ads in movie theaters. It doesn't bother me when I watch ten minutes of movie previews, but a Geico commercial? Who the fuck are they kidding? I'm paying eight bucks for a matinee ticket to a dusty theater with a splotchy screen, an out of focus projector running a poor quality reprint, and shitty speakers that are way too loud. On top of that I'm forced to pay 2-1 on any munchies because they wont let you take your own food in and ream you on their own services, and then they let some lady bring her two year old in. Like telling people to turn off their cell phones does any good when they don't ban babies as well.
The only thing that stops me from pirating is an irritating sense of morality. I go to the theater once or twice a year, I buy three or four video games a year, I've bought a grand total of two CD's that were made in the last decade. I'll cease to be a customer entirely with the way things are going. When I hear some executive making 30 million dollars a year in bonuses claim that piracy is driving him out of business while he pushes out unfinished products and then cuts off support, a little more venom gets added to the mixture. I don't begrudge the guy his check, more power to him for being successful, it's that he's pissing all over me anyway.
If they keep it up, eventually I'll be a pirate. There's nothing like a strong sense of loathing to get me to stick it to someone just because I can. Right now I'm just pissed off enough that I only get what I really want to have and skip all the maybes.
Well put totally agree!
I guess most of the people in America don't have a conscience then (which actually isn't that surprising.) You can see from the vast majority of posters in the thread, and somewhat from you yourself, that almost all pirates feel like they're morally justified in pirating everything they want.
I'd suggest reading this article: http://www.bruceongames.com/2008/04/23/game-piracy/
Most people don't want to be educated. It's much more convenient to believe that every corporation in the world is an evil moustache-twirling villain that deserves to be stolen from. That means you can have everything for free, and you're even a good guy for doing it!
Then don't buy their albums. You don't need to pirate them. You don't NEED all these albums at all. The musicians who sign on with Sony aren't all a bunch of braindead zombies who got duped. Musicians sign on with big labels because they want large-scale distribution and marketing, because the money they will make by becoming famous generally greatly outweighs the cut they take in royalties from album sales. Sure, musicians wish major labels would give them more money, but stealing those musician's albums isn't helping them - they don't get any money at all, and if too many people steal instead of buying, the label considers the album a failure and cuts them off.
No you wouldn't. No matter how much you like a TV show, if you have the option of watching it without commercials, you probably will. Anyone would. Just like if you have the option of paying for a car or getting it for free, you'd take the free one. That doesn't mean the car or show has no value though. You obviously like the show, since you're watching it or downloading it, so it has some value to you. If you absolutely had to watch the ads in order to watch your show, you probably would.
So what would you have TV shows do if they can't sell ad space? Charge people for watching the shows? You already can pay for ad-free shows on iTunes, yet millions of people pirate them instead.
The fact that you think watching a Geico commercial is someone pissing all over you is ridiculous. You know, there is a genocide going on in Darfur right now with hundreds of people being massacred? Those people have it rough. You are watching a Geico commercial for five minutes of your precious time. You are not getting pissed all over. It sounds to me like you do just begrudge the guy his check.
My First sins version was downloaded from Pirate Bay ... because the boxed version was not yet existing in Europa several month after having a game revieuw in our European magazine... Since, i have legaly buy several boxed version of sins ( make a good gift )...
The same have happen with Entrenchment, until i have found someone with a credit card who was able to help me...
Without Pirate Bay, i will never be in love with sins and will never have buy it... simply forget about it after some week waiting and buy something other...
By the way, their labour have fill your pocket with several hundred $$$ ... not difficult to reach these amount when the European version is priced at 60 euro... who is almost 80$ !!! ... price have rise from 40 euro to 60 euro at the begin 2009, when Stardock was awarded for Sins... speaking of opportunist !!!
I have wrote it in several other topic on the subject... if Pirate exist, it is because people ask/need something... feed the need of the people and the Pirate will not more exist... people are tired to pay a lot of money for thing that they cannot test and reveal to be a bag of sh!t later... people are tired of over protection who make a game unplayable or who need always a cd/dvd running in the drive... people are tired to be obligate to have a internnet connection for play a game ( i live in a modern country but not all place have some internet hotspot for my laptop )... etc ...
In some case, the situation is reverse... i first buy a legal version but download later a cracked version... Again, it is all profit for the distributor... because if i was not able to find a cracked version, i will never buy again something from these distributor...
In my country, a lot of P2P site are blocked... so, i am obligate to use a US proxy for download my perfect legal DVD copy from a Linux OS... laws, by blocking the P2P system are punishing the legitimate user of these system...
YES ... they already make it here... for the TV cable connection, around 50% of the price is for the connection itself and the other 50% is for the author right... If you use a antena, you only pay these 50% author right... So, yes, people are charge for watching show AND publicity...
About copy/record from TV, it is not illegal... in reality, for all blanck support ( CD, DVD, tape, etc ) a tax is apply ( again for author right )...
Now, i have only one question... Where go all these money collected by gov via the author right excuse ? Sure that no author have see the color of these money... not sure that any distributor have see it's color too...
Everybody cheat everybody... why us, simple citizen will not be allowed to cheat... money that Gov, publisher, devs and distributor call THEIR money is in reality OUR money that we have earn in the hard way...
About the EULA that several game have... in a lot of European countries, they are not valid because we cannot read them BEFORE buying the product... do you will find logic to pay a fire insurance for your home without being able to read it before, and with the guy selling the insurrance saying that once your have read it, you cannot return the product if you are unhappy !!!
Some will say that you don't buy a software but you receive a license to use it... if you hire a house, you are able to check the house BEFORE sign the location contract !!!
What will be great, it is that media distributor ( game, film, music, etc ) begin to follow the same logical rules that any other business... if media distributor try to fµck us, don't be surprised that we fµck them back !!!
The vast majority of the population is incapable of responsibly operating a credit card, and you expect them to recognize market force trends years in advance? *I* know piracy isn't free, but most people don't. Not to mention that there are no user-level legal consequences for piracy. Distributing, maybe - but not users. Never underestimate the ability of the general public to deceive itself. I've said before and will again now; it would take news footage of teenagers in prison orange to drive this bit of knowledge home, and that just isn't going to happen.
We could always go to the UK tax based system. You pay for TV whether you're watching it or not.
I've been there for years.
I wouldn't have limited that to Americans. It seems to be a general rule.
Hi Thoumsin, I do appreciate your support, but I wonder why you just didn't try out our demo? It was a fair representation of our game, unlike many other demos out there. There certainly are others like you who have pirated then bought our game, but it seems highly unlikely they would outweigh those who took the game without paying for it later.
I live in the U.S., and standard network TV is free; are you in the UK? It sounds from the other post like they tax TV there. I don't know how the system works over there, but in the U.S., all network TV makes its money through ads, not taxes. So unless they start charging, that's not an option. And pirates aren't going to welcome new taxes with open arms; they're convinced that the government should give them everything for free too.
Plus, the amount of tax you'd have to raise in order to pay for all the movies, music, and games that we have now would be astronomical. It would basically be an imposed socialization of the entire entertainment industry. I'd much rather we work on socializing health care and other legitimately important things before we try socializing something as needless as video games or tv. And most Americans run around screaming and frothing at the mouth if you even mention the word "socialize" near them. So huge taxes are not a valid option.
I don't know; if you tell me what country you live in, I'm sure I could look it up. But it sounds like you've already decided that you think the tax is wrong as well, and that everyone who takes it is evil and greedy. So, again, what's the solution? It sounds to me like you think you should get everything for free.
Consumer media like movies and games aren't a house though. It's more like a sandwich. You don't get to eat the sandwich before you decide to pay for it, do you? Then you probably shouldn't get to watch the movie before you decide to pay for it.
What logical rules? A game is not a house because you don't get to keep the house for free if you say you don't want to pay for it. With the game, if you decide not to pay for it, you still have it. There's no incentive to pay for it. The "logical" rules you're talking about don't work when it comes to digital products.
The problem with this debate is that there are arguments on both sides and that we will never agree. The problem with digital media is that the hackers outpace the developers and uintil that can be changed it is almost fruitless to argue. You will tell me my logic is skewed and I will redirect the accusation back to you.
Also, being a former musician, having successful musician friends and being a writer in the print medium I can understand the effects this has. But I also know the benefits my friends received from increased turnouts at their shows. They can personally tell you there is no money in the recorded media, it is all from shows and merch. As for books. Even though I can DL any book I want for free, I have a large library at home. Why? Well it is just nice having something physical in my hands. It is nice to bring it to work to read on lunch when it is not feasible to have a computer. etc... The people that won't pay, won't and the people that will, will. It is really that simple. Until it gets too hard to do, it won't stop.
Yes that is how law works. You may try your best to twist what i say, but that does not make me any less right. Saying that if something is illegal then it is illegal is perfectly viable. To use your example of killing. Nowhere in the law does it say that killing is neccecerily illegal. In many cases killing is legal, self defence/self defence on other people's behalf, war, accident that lies beyond personal responsibility etc. What is illegal hovewer is MURDER. The law sets up a definition of what is illegal and then follows with a long line of exceptions, like the examples above. Law is actually pretty simple once you understand how it works, its humans that is complex. One jury may find that in one case the proof is enough, another may find it sorely lacking. And a good lawyer can get you off because he's a good talker compard to having a bad one which will send you to jail. That is however not the essence of law. We strive to follow the same rules and apply the same principles to have a system thats fair and right for everyone, but we never make it because we are all so different. To make it perfectly clear for you, "Murder is murder" is correct because if it falls outside of the legal definitions of murder it is no longer murder. The same would go for piracy etc etc thus making my point perfectly viable.
And if offering a service that lets people of their own free wil share material, be it legal or illegal without supervision is illegal then many others need to go. Heck you can without supervision send files to others via the inbuilt program on msn messenger, Sure it goes slower, which means smaller files, but remember: a 40 kb book file of copyrighted material is just as illegal as a 15 gb pc game. The law cannot separate them. Im sure you see the circle here, one cannot attack google, msn and the rest for this, thus the ruling cannot stand as it cannot contine and it needs to do just that. Perfect example of stupid people in action.The law can and does draw lines like this all the time. See murder above. We don't say "Well, if it's illegal for Bob to kill his wife, then it should be illegal for the police to kill the insane guy shooting down innocent people in the mall" or "Well, if beating someone with your fists is illegal, it has to be illegal to touch anyone at all". Consequences, intent, and harm done are all important factors in any court case, and that's exactly as it should be. Do you honestly want to live in a place with rigid, unchangable laws enforced by robots?
And you keep going with the same silly example. Ive never said that. What ive said however is that once we have defined what is illegal it has to be applied to everyone. As i see it when they define people that run a service that lets people share things unsupervised with eachother as illegal then it has to be applied to others that do just the same. That is not the same as your example above in which case they would not be dooing the same things at all. and as for the attitude: well its not illegal is it?In some cases yes, because attitude can determine intent. There would be a difference in a court case where a person legitimately seemed truthful in saying that he hit someone by accident with his car, and someone who laughs maniacally through the whole trial talking about how much they love to murder innocent people, even if the physical evidence was mostly the same. In the Pirate Bay case, their attitude clearly showed their intent, that they were purposely trying to cause harm to the copmanies they were stealing (or not stealing) from, and that they had every intention of trying to keep doing what they're doing, and that they were actively trying to destroy the livelihoods of anyone who produced things legally under copyright law.
No, in no way is attitude illegal. That you can even say such a thing shows me you have absolutly no knowledge of law beyond what you can read on the internet or watch on a show. And then i cant really understand why you are trying to debate law with me, you may be an intelligent man but that does not make you qualified to debate the finer nuisances of law. No law and no judge has ever instructed a jury to try to interpret the facial and bodily expressions of a person sitting in a court of law to determine his intent. Simply because they are not qualified for that, and misreading human behaviour is all to easy. However the jury or the judge are human and so they are influenced by what they see, whether its on a rational level or sub-counscious. But that does not make attitude illegal. But offcource, i cannot speak for US law as ive never practiced it nor have i been to the US. How US law is applied is also of no matter here as it is swedish law that is beeing used. I dont argue against your right to state your oppinion, but maybe it would be wiser for you to state what you think is right based on how you think it should be compared to how it actually is, which you obviosuly have little real knowledge of. with the guy who had put it there and the ones seeding/downloading it.It's funny, because everytime they DO arrest a seeder, all the pro-piracy kids complain that they're just making an example of someone who is totally innocent and that the real people who should have been arrested were the ones who downloaded it, since they committed the actual crime. And anytime they DO arrest a downloader, all the pro-piracy kids complain because they're just making an example, and they should have arrested the uploader since they were the one committing the crime.Sure they complain whenever something happens to them, just like the other side do it when its the other way around. I dont see what your trying to say here beyond pointing out obvious human nature.but annoying someone is not illegal.They didn't bring them to trial for being annoying.What do you know of the reason they had for bringing them to trial? Do you know anything at all abouth what went on in the trial beyond what you can read in the tabloid? Seeing the sad lack of real evidence against them and the way the case was beeing run it seems like it lies real merit in saying that the case should never have been run at all, and that it may be something in the argument abouth us goverment pressuring swedish goverment in this issue. Now you can go on abouth the fact that they were found guilty and of how that shows that there was something in the case against them. Which is offcource wrong as we have to wait to see what is decided in a higher court. As i said before this court in sweden can be pretty strange at times, making decisions that gets easily overturned higher up. It is not like in the US i belive in which the appeal system is very different.Also the piratebay has not made much cash at all. There was some rediculous amounts beeing circulated both in court and in the media, with amounts beeing made beeing around 4-5 million dollars, when in reality it all amounted to around 220,000 dollar for all the years they have been running it. And running such a place takes a substantial amount of time aswell as expensive stuff so its not like theyve really made any cash at all.
Yes, lets be honest. I personally know nothing beyond what was said and verified in the court. But i do know that there was beeing said that the piratebay had made millions of dollars in profit and i know that the procecutor could prove that they actually made 220,000 dollar. AND THAT THERE WAS NOT THE SLIGHTEST EVIDENCE SUPPORTING THE FACT THAT THEY HAD MADE MORE. Now you can offcource go and say that does not prove they did not make more. But the fact is that the procecutor worked real hard to dig up their financial record and all he could ever find was the 220 thousand dollar or close to that amount. So you saying that this is just a matter of two oppinions is silly. If there is not the slightest evidence they have made more than that would you not say it would be stupid to pretend they made more? On what basis then, your own need to look upon them as vile profiteers of other people's work? Their entire business is not abouth breaking the law and stealing income from other people. They run a place where people can share whatever they want, which they can also do so many other places. Are you at all thinking before you speak? You need to take a breath now before you make a complete fool of yourself.
But times change and they need to follow or they will be left behind.Follow how? By giving everything away for free to ungrateful, selfish teenagers? Do you think that's a sustainable model for any actual industry?
The internet for one, something which changes the way media is acceccible to people. Its not abouth giving everything away for free. The fact is that the companies are still making good money (not counting the economic crisis we are currently in, though from entirely different reasons) and that many view what is happening as good and free advertising for their products. Example someone finds music he likes on the internet he may go and buy their album or go to a concert with the artist. I am not saying that some companies are not loosing profit over this, because they most likely do. But they are not dying. It amuses me to no end when artists like Madonna or Metallice go out on the barricades and cry over that they are loosing money to piracy. Oh so the 300,000,000 dollars you have is not enough? Well poor you. Here have a biscuit. Sarcasm aside. In most cases the ones who are loosing money here are those who allready have plenty, and the masses which often cannot afford everything gets a little more entertaiment.
My personal oppinion is that making a profit of other peoples work as in selling copied games/movies/music should be illegal. Also actually stealing a phycical copy of say a game and then putting it out on the internet is just that:stealing and the perpetrator should be punished. I also feel that running a torrent site and taking money for membership beyond what is neccesary to run the site without profit should be illegal. But i feel that it is uneccesary and somewhat foolish to go after the ones downloading it after its been put there. So in my humble oppinion the laws should change to something more appropriate for our time. Appropriate from where im standing offcource not neccesarily others.
EDIT: the ruling was made on an existing somewhat new law. As prior to that law it would not be possibly to convict them for such a crime. There was much debate as to what actual information was stored on piratebays servers as the judge wanted to ascertain that without the hash stored on pb's servers the transfers would not be possibly. Without using someone else's torrent or some other mean offcource. But no beyond that the court was not very interested in the technology. For the benefit of the people who asked. (hope i remembered it correctly)
You know what is it for some people?
People like me...
Yes you may bitch on me later, and take your time, please!
But before that you must understand that here are lots of different groups at the interwebs. You've got brainless dowload-zombies, you've got pop-listening-retard girlies and so on.
And yet there is another group!
The group to wich i belong.And i am referring to this because it annoys ME that people are constantly pretending to be some sort of sacred, having never ever downloaded anything in there lives.. Hypocritic ^*$&#(
I need to point out what i'm trying to say, right?
Well: You know EA? you know BMG? Sony? Universal? all the other annoying BIG labels?
You do
And you know what they do?
You do!
They PRETEND to collect the money for the small artists and studios.And that sickens me.
And that is why i think people should continue donloading games like Need for Speed, and albums from bands like U2. Just to learn them a lesson.
And of coarse, i am sane enough to be aware of the fact that there is a reason that stardock has NOT placed som sort of annoying serial shit thingy on their wonderful game.
They sort of trust us! And the good thing is; People using a strategy like mine are testing this game by downloading it, and then buy it!
And though that's not my point, but it is Ideal testing!
Sadly enough it's not the bulk that thinks this way... But maybe! One day...
Thanks
Also, since you followed the trial, did the prosecution introduce evidence better than the screenshots they tried to use? I know the day 7 article talks about the screenshots and that they had to drop the half the charges on day 2 because their earlier screenshots didn't prove what they wanted. If the prosecution never introduced evidence better than the screenshots, this ruling needs to be overturned on account of stupid(or did the prosecution somehow manage to become competent near the end of the trial?).
How comes that piratebay website is still aviable after they went to jail?!
Hhhmm.... Of the top of my head, I can think of three good ones:
1. There is an appeal (Not in jail yet methinks).
2. The servers are outside the country.
3. Others will step up and take over.
Ohhhh, the main problem for me was not a demo for test the game... i have always trust my computer game magazine... the problem was a distribution problem... several month waiting for a European release !!!
About people who have download a pirated version of your game... first, you have two torrent version... the rare good one who is a exact copy of a original game... and the several one having a name like "sins cracked" who are filled with virus, trojan, adware, etc ... few people know that sins cannot be cracked because he have no protection...
So, for people having downloaded a "good" pirated version... around 50% of the guy will try it and find it not interesting... maybe 20% will not buy it because they are greedy... the remaining 30% will buy it for several reason like the upgrade, the online game, some mod, etc...
Be aware that sins is not a top game on the torrent site... first because the game have no protection to crack, second because online game is only possible with a valid serial, and finally the update system who need a legit serial too... in fact, i don't understand why you don't use toorent for distribute your game, it will spare you some server band and maybe lead to more publicity for you... in reality, we pay mainly for the valid serial...
I put them together because they're related. I read the article, it's filled, from top to bottom, with bullshit. His little essay is riddled with half truths and misinformation. The downfall of the PSX for instance, he's blaming the drop in game publishing after the PS2 came out, on piracy. No mention of reality. The DS beating out the PSP, yet again it's piracy's fault. No reality mentioned here either, a vastly better battery life and a touch screen couldn't possibly have anything to do with it. Pay no attention to Sega getting it's clock cleaned for making a similar mistake with the Game Gear!
He even mentions his own outfits fubar publishing practices. His particular example is Severance: Blade of Darkness. Yet another game released in an unfinished state with shitty marketing. Maybe Codemasters sucks because Codemasters sucks, and not because of piracy? Have they ever published a high quality, finished product for the PC in their entire existence? I can't think of any, all I can remember are rush jobs. Even better, these are the same hypocritical assholes that were publishing unlicensed NES games. They're fucking pirates themselves.
This dick you blindly choose as a point of reference is a prime example of why so many people appear to be without a conscience. He's a lying sack of shit covering his own fuckups by blaming everything on piracy when there are clearly other causes. If he were a developer instead of in marketing, I'd want to go pirate his shit just for that article.
Were you just born yesterday or what? Dragnet episodes are twenty-five minutes long, Star Trek episodes are fifty. We can get a little more recent too, the commercial breaks in the eighties were around ten minutes an hour too. Remington Steele episodes are still fifty minutes long. Just three years later, in 1989, Quantum leap had around forty-seven minute long shows. Where are we today? Forty-two minute episodes with fast rolling credits squished to the bottom of the screen while more ads roll, or the next show opens, and big banners and popups riddling the show while it's playing. We've gone from ten minutes of commercial to twenty minutes of commercial with irritants even while it's running. Surprise, no one watches the several three minute ad breaks!
I already have the option of watching television without ads. It's very simple, you go to google and type Chuck torrent. Walla! Chuck episodes. I also have Dish with a DVR reciever. That's actually how I watch Chuck, it's the one show I watch on TV because I'm not the only one in the house that likes it. We don't watch the commercials, O'Rielly gets watched while it's being recorded. What do I watch the rest of my shows on? Hulu. One ad, 15-30 seconds generally, a reasonable number of breaks comparable to network tv. I don't get up and take a piss during the ads, mute the sound, browse other sides, get food to eat. I watch them. I have a choice between watching and not watching the ads, and I watch them.
I'm ignoring the rest of your cherry picked quotes and out of context responses. You're just like Bruce, you conveniently ignore what's already known and focus only on what will support your point. Willful ignorance.
There have been people fined for user level activity. The RIAA has taken quite a few people to court over music file sharing. You may be right, but assuming everyone is in capable of learning means the war is already lost so we might as well give up and pirate everything till progress collapses and everyone is stuck playing pacman. I'd prefer we at least attempt an educated public before calling it a lost cause.
For the rest of your replies, I think I sufficiently answered them in the above wall of text.
Edit: Thomousin, that last reply of yours is utterly badass. I'd weep if I had to download Sins from a torrent though, you don't know agony till you use bit torrent with satellite. Forgetting a couple of my disks in Anchorage was very painful.
I am from Belgium
I don't know how the system works over there, but in the U.S., all network TV makes its money through ads, not taxes.
Both system... tax and ads... main difference is that we have around two "pause" with ads in one film... the frequency of ads is lower here that in US...
Plus, the amount of tax you'd have to raise in order to pay for all the movies, music, and games that we have now would be astronomical.
It is... around 180 euro by year for a cable connection... multiply this for each home in the country !!!
I'd much rather we work on socializing health care and other legitimately important things before we try socializing something as needless as video games or tv.Health care, pension, education, etc... are already "socialized" here...
But it sounds like you've already decided that you think the tax is wrong as well, and that everyone who takes it is evil and greedy. So, again, what's the solution? It sounds to me like you think you should get everything for free.
Ohhhh... but i already pay for some free stuff... i am a Linux user... Linux can be downloaded for free but i always buy a Powerpack around the 70 euro... Why, because i like to support devs who make me happy... several time years, i make some donation to wikipedia who is a free service too... related to sins, i have already make 2 donations to the mod that i use the most...
I don't remember the name of the business but a software compagny release their product without tag price... it is the user who choose how much he will pay... the business have say that in the middle, people was paying around 15% more low that planned but that the total sale was 200% more high that planned...
About the tax, it is not something bad... the problem is the corruption in gov... from the huge amount pay by user, only a little part reach the legit destinataire...
Consumer media like movies and games aren't a house though. It's more like a sandwich. You don't get to eat the sandwich before you decide to pay for it, do you? Then you probably shouldn't get to watch the movie before you decide to pay for it. In the case of a sandwich, you can return it if it is not what you have order or if it not like on the description... if the sandwich is bad ( know it only once you begin eat it ), you can be refound... if the sandwich make you ill ( like the bad software who install in a automatic way in my computer ), you be be refound and in some case, ask some money for damage...What logical rules? A game is not a house because you don't get to keep the house for free if you say you don't want to pay for it. With the game, if you decide not to pay for it, you still have it. There's no incentive to pay for it. The "logical" rules you're talking about don't work when it comes to digital products.
Think outside the box... for example, let's take sins... put sins on a torrent site, so distributor will not have to pay internet band for diffuse it... you can use it freely but if you wish online game or upgraude, you need to buy a serial...
You have the incentive to pay for it, a cheap distribution system, and it is a digital product..
For some product, it is possible to apply a hire system... software for free but you pay in function of how much you use it... again, some serial and internet connection needed... already some distributor use a similar system...
Why game cannot use a system like some of my professional 3D software... a short time free trial and the software is blocked until you buy a valid serial for activate it...
You see, a some solution already exist for digital products... the thing is that distributor need to adapt to the digital world... never, the digital world will adapt to them... for distributor, maybe we can return to the stone age... book carved on huge stone was not easy to copy !!!
I'd just like to take a moment to hijack psychoak's rant about TV viewing to sing passionate praises for the 'dying' optical disc format. Broadcast is dead, and there might be some reasonable little sadnesses there, but in the end "Must Watch TV" is pretty close to having Stalin plan your weekly menu, at least in terms of when you get to eat.
Until we have decent consumer privacy laws and a broadband infrastructure that does not make me pay for both fat downloads that I want *and* an endless series of cable channels I *never* watch, I'll be happier giving money to an outfit like Netflix than I will be about any cable bill. (I should confess that my cable company gets around 30 bucks a month from me because I'm too fond of the Comedy Central News Hour and too weak to avoid wasting some regular time on the Food Network. Maybe when the Sci Fi to SyFy rebranding goes live, I'll finally get disgusted enough to save myself the money.)
Wow, I really botched your name up there, sorry about that...
bingo. This is how you fight piracy. You blow the individuals out of the water, but you don't punish everyone with DRM. Instead of wasting money on DRM, companies should hire hackers to find these pirates and punish them severely. Punish the individual scum but not the innocent.
That's soooo much what i forgot to say! We, in the godforsaken country of the Netherlands, have to wait for about half a year for a decent game to come out when everything has been released in the States en asia already...
And it happens quite often that people that download things and like it before it comes out play, buy, reïnstall WITH serial and go online.
I like that...
They did not make millions offf of piracy.
The claim of making millions was based on there being 64 advertisements on every page, and all 64 non-exsistant banner ads being clicked each time a .torrent was downloaded.
Yeah, right.
Should of had the case thrown out right there when the prosecuters said that crap.
They could find out they made $220,000 over like 5 years split between 4 people. $11,000 a year. A minimum wage job pays more than that.
Dude!!
Never works & way too costly.
In my opinion you have to break Piracy down into classes or groups. These groups would be as follows:
Pirates (people selling pirated software at a profit) - these guys do it for money
Hackers (people that download software to crack/copy/hack) - these guys do it for the challenge
Downloaders (people that download, play/watch & delete) - these guys do it because they can
Hoarders (people that download) - these guys do it because they can & will often have huge collections
Now out of all 4 groups I think I could safely say that the only group listed that is actually making a dent in profits would be the Pirates. They are making money off of another persons work, this is wrong.
All of the other groups were going to do it anywayz and probably only by the game if
a: it was worth it
b: multiplayer online key
Please remember the laws that govern copyright are absolutly flawed. Like I said previously if you have ever borrowed a dvd/book/game to anyone else you are more than likely breaking the law.
The only way I can see people paying for software is:
Prices dropping to levels that are realistic and reflect the games quality. Much too often Ive played games that are an absolute disgrace, take Sim City Societies as an example, buggiest piece of crap I have ever layed my eyes on.
Software & Video distribution based entirely around a subscriber model. By this I mean you pay an amount each month and can only play software whilst connected to a company server.
An example of this would be me paying x amount of $$ per month for steam. I would have access to all the games whilst connected to the internet and am constantly verified by the server in the same way that mmorpg's work. This would force the developer to keep coming up with good quality software or else the subscriber base would drop and thus lose money.
Right now I can only name a few developers that actually have very good quality control processes & release quality software that I would & do pay for.
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