Piracy

[staySICK]

http://gamrfeed.vgchartz.com/story/84663/thq-has-a-little-surprise-for-those-who-pirate-homefront

 

 

Well this is a first (as far as I'm aware)

That's not "pirate homefront on PC". That's pirate it on the 360.

Of course the side effect is that it also means if you buy it used and want to play online, it'll cost you $80.

I guess THQ assume it'll be more pirated than bought used if they're willing for that huge side effect to be there.

 

 

Going back to this, the battle code is now only 800 msp on 360. $10. That previous amount may have been held for before the game's street date.

[TheMightyEthan]

The one question I always keep asking myself when I see shit like this is: Why the hell hasn't anyone started reevaluating copyright law. In the digital age, it's outmoded. Industries can't exhibit the same control over their IPs that they could before. It just isn't possible. If copyright law isn't revisted and intelligently modified to be relevant and enforcable in the the digital age then things are just going to get worse and worse for everyone involved.

The easy/cynical answer is that it's the big publishers who have all the lobbying power when it comes to this stuff.

[CorgiShinobi]

People still use Limewire? Last time I heard of Limewire, 95% of the files were ridden with viruses.

[Thursday Next]

Honest question for TN, what do you feel about piracy in this situation?

 

I'm holding in my hand my physical, legitimately purchased copy of American McGee's Alice, which I am trying to reinstall. However, it's telling me that the CD key I wrote down on the paper in my CD-book is invalid, and I can't find the actual box to get it from (it's in storage somewhere, don't know where though).

 

Is pirating the game acceptable to you under these circumstances?

 

Sorry, been away from this thread for a while. Sure it's morally acceptable. It's still technically an infringement of the laws against circumventing © protection, but yeah.

 

In fact, I'd say that if you own the physical version of a product on a system then I'd have no problem with you pirating it to have a digital version on the same system (pirating a PC version when you own the PS3 version I'd be less comfortable with). In fact a certain game publisher who shall rEmain nAmeless is quite keen to have a solution whereby you buy access to content once and can then access it from any platform in any form.

 

The problem is that the industry can't tell the honest pirates from the dishonest ones, and businesses (mine in particular) have a habit of seeing and working on the basis of worst case scenarios. As such, (almost) every download is seen as a dishonest pirate and a lost sale. Before you point out how ridiculous it is to assume that, bear in mind that you have little / no more proof that a number of pirates are honest than they do that they are not.

[Cyber Rat]

Not really gaming piracy, but: http://yro.slashdot.org/story/11/03/25/1212258/MS-Wants-Laws-To-Block-Products-Made-By-Software-Pira

 

"Microsoft seems to be trying to get its own personal unfair competition laws passed state by state, so it can sue US companies who get parts from overseas companies who used pirated Microsoft software anywhere in their business. The laws allow Microsoft to block the US company from selling the finished product in the state and compel them to pay damages for what the overseas supplier did. So if a company overseas uses a pirated version of Excel, let's say, keeping track of how many parts it has shipped or whatever, and then sends some parts to General Motors or any large company to incorporate into the finished product, Microsoft can sue not the overseas supplier but General Motors, for unfair competition. So can the state's Attorney General. I kid you not. For piracy that was done by someone else, overseas. The product could be T shirts. It doesn't matter what it is, so long as it's manufactured with contributions from an overseas supplier, like in China, who didn't pay Microsoft for software that it uses somewhere in the business. It's the US company that has to pay damages, not the overseas supplier."

 

Also, poking around the comments section of the article, I found this: http://www.techpavan.com/2009/05/24/microsoft-deepz0ne-pirated-cracked-sound-forge-windows-xp-audio/

[TheMightyEthan]

I'd be willing to bet that that's more a case of "a Microsoft employee pirated Sound Forge" than "Microsoft pirated Sound Forge."

[Cyber Rat]

I'd be willing to bet that that's more a case of "a Microsoft employee pirated Sound Forge" than "Microsoft pirated Sound Forge."

 

If the employee was making something for Microsoft, why would he pirate software instead of Microsoft supplying it? That's like asking shop employees to supply their own cash registers.

[TheMightyEthan]

I'd be willing to bet that that's more a case of "a Microsoft employee pirated Sound Forge" than "Microsoft pirated Sound Forge."

If the employee was making something for Microsoft, why would he pirate software instead of Microsoft supplying it? That's like asking shop employees to supply their own cash registers.

I can think of several reasons: out of habit; maybe he worked on it at home where he had a pirated version; maybe pirating it was easier than getting approval through the proper channels to buy it; maybe he already had a pirated copy on a disc in his laptop bag and it was easier to just install that on his work computer; maybe MS wanted them to use a different program but he liked Sound Forge better. There could be any number of reasons, those were all just off the top of my head.

[Cyber Rat]

I'd be willing to bet that that's more a case of "a Microsoft employee pirated Sound Forge" than "Microsoft pirated Sound Forge."

If the employee was making something for Microsoft, why would he pirate software instead of Microsoft supplying it? That's like asking shop employees to supply their own cash registers.

I can think of several reasons: out of habit; maybe he worked on it at home where he had a pirated version; maybe pirating it was easier than getting approval through the proper channels to buy it; maybe he already had a pirated copy on a disc in his laptop bag and it was easier to just install that on his work computer; maybe MS wanted them to use a different program but he didn't like the other program. There could be any number of reasons, those were all just off the top of my head.

 

Makes sense. Still, if you have such a strong anti-piracy stance, some more control within your own company is in order.

[deanb]

OPINION: Can we benefit from piracy?

[McBeeferton]

:bravo:

 

Someone... who gets it.

[excel_excel]

Brilliant article. This particular part is my favourite.

 

Swedish developer Frictional Interactive has had its run-ins with file-sharers. The firm’s Amnesia: The Dark Descent was on torrent sites 24 hours before release in October 2010.

 

The studio’s Jens Nilsson argues that piracy deserves analysis, rather than knee-jerk condemnation.

 

“We think it is important to talk about piracy – not to complain, but more to discuss it,” he said. “The option otherwise is to not say a thing and invest in DRM. Which so far always punishes the people buying the game.”

 

He suggests the old defence – that the industry provides a better service to the consumer than pirates may be wearing thin: “It was the exact same thing with C64 games. Game cassettes bought in the store would take forever to load but pirated “turbo games” gave you 20 games on a cassette, and loaded five times as fast.”

 

This is key as far as I'm concerned. Feel like buying Amnesia now!....naw too scary

[Mr. GOH!]

Honest question for TN, what do you feel about piracy in this situation?

 

I'm holding in my hand my physical, legitimately purchased copy of American McGee's Alice, which I am trying to reinstall. However, it's telling me that the CD key I wrote down on the paper in my CD-book is invalid, and I can't find the actual box to get it from (it's in storage somewhere, don't know where though).

 

Is pirating the game acceptable to you under these circumstances?

 

I think that if you can find a cracked version you could download without also distributing the data (like a torrent would) you'd be in the clear, legally.

[Thursday Next]

“You could allow a game to be torrented so long as you have some way of doing micro-transactions or in-game ads on the back of it.

“In order to be able to properly leverage or harness piracy, you have to make sure that your business model caters to that. This is a day one decision.”

 

I agree with this sentiment. It's why I approve of day 1 DLC (especially where it is included in the box as with Bioware titles), and Online Pass.

 

Saying "Oh well, if the game is good all the pirates who were going to buy it will buy it and those that weren't are not lost sales." may well be a great philosophical position, but it won't pay the bills. On the other hand if the people who pirate have to pay for access to content that legitimate purchasers get for free, then that's all good in my book.

[Mr. GOH!]

“You could allow a game to be torrented so long as you have some way of doing micro-transactions or in-game ads on the back of it.

“In order to be able to properly leverage or harness piracy, you have to make sure that your business model caters to that. This is a day one decision.”

 

I agree with this sentiment. It's why I approve of day 1 DLC (especially where it is included in the box as with Bioware titles), and Online Pass.

 

Saying "Oh well, if the game is good all the pirates who were going to buy it will buy it and those that weren't are not lost sales." may well be a great philosophical position, but it won't pay the bills. On the other hand if the people who pirate have to pay for access to content that legitimate purchasers get for free, then that's all good in my book.

 

I'm curious as to how many pirates buy such DLC. My guess is few, if any. I suspect such policies are far more targeted at the used game market than pirates.

[Thursday Next]

I'm curious as to how many pirates buy such DLC. My guess is few, if any. I suspect such policies are far more targeted at the used game market than pirates.

 

From a publisher perspective, there's not a huge amount of difference between the two.

[TheMightyEthan]

Honest question for TN, what do you feel about piracy in this situation?

 

I'm holding in my hand my physical, legitimately purchased copy of American McGee's Alice, which I am trying to reinstall. However, it's telling me that the CD key I wrote down on the paper in my CD-book is invalid, and I can't find the actual box to get it from (it's in storage somewhere, don't know where though).

 

Is pirating the game acceptable to you under these circumstances?

I think that if you can find a cracked version you could download without also distributing the data (like a torrent would) you'd be in the clear, legally.

Yeah, what I did to try to get as close to that as possible was set uTorrent to only upload to 1 person at a time, and I limited the upload speed to 1 kB/s. I realize that's kind of contrary to the idea of torrents, but at the same time I imagine most of the people downloading it weren't doing so for legitimate reasons.

[TheMightyEthan]

I agree with this sentiment. It's why I approve of day 1 DLC (especially where it is included in the box as with Bioware titles), and Online Pass.

I don't have any problem at all with "project 10 dollar" type initiatives if the content is included with the new game.

 

I do, however, have a problem with Gamestop charging $55 for the used copy on day-two, knowing full well that the customer will then have to shell out an additional $10 to get everything that's included with the $60 new version. That's a problem with Gamestop though, not the publishers.

[Mr. GOH!]

I'm curious as to how many pirates buy such DLC. My guess is few, if any. I suspect such policies are far more targeted at the used game market than pirates.

 

From a publisher perspective, there's not a huge amount of difference between the two.

 

Well, there should be. Used sales are demonstrable lost revenue; used buyers actually pay for their games, just at a lower price.

[Kovach_]

Yeah, but the game companies/publishers don't get money from those, therefore it's pretty much the same for them.

 

I agree with this sentiment. It's why I approve of day 1 DLC (especially where it is included in the box as with Bioware titles), and Online Pass.

 

Online Pass type of things i'm fine with, but day one DLC, or even worse, DLC that's actually on the disc itself is just bullshit imho.

[TheMightyEthan]

Yeah, but the game companies/publishers don't get money from those, therefore it's pretty much the same for them.

You missed the point of what GOH was saying: from the publisher's perspective used sales are actually worse than piracy. A used sale is definitely a lost sale because that person was definitely willing to pay money for the game, whereas a pirated copy may or may not be a lost sale because there's no way to know whether the pirate would ever have bought the game or not.

[Kovach_]

Ah, right, my bad there.

[Mr. GOH!]

Ethan's right. Used sales represent a part of the market that's willing to buy game X from Company Y at a lower price than the market value for a new game. It's money the publisher could get a taste of, theoretically. It's revenue the publisher should actively chase, whether it be in dubiois DLC schemes, online passes, or creativity in setting price.

 

I think it's clear that EA is pursuing a mixed startegy in this regard. Online passes and day-1 DLC represent value lost to used customers without paying a fee directly to the publisher. You may also have noticed that EA games tend to come down in price much more quickly. This is likely to depress used prices further as well as secure sales from customers who are willing to pay a few bucks more for a new copy of a month-old game. I'd be interested in knowing how EA accomplishes this when retailers are increasingly trying to get a piece of the used game market themselves.

[excaliburps]

I just wrote a feature about piracy where I'm from. Let me know what you think.

 

http://bit.ly/hTCX90

 

Hope it makes a lick of sense somewhat to you guys.

[TheMightyEthan]

Good article, though at the beginning you lose some credibility (at least with me) for saying that it's the same as walking into a store and taking something off the shelf. It may be just as morally unacceptable, but it's not "the same" any more than murder and rape are the same.