Fighting Piracy

[paktsardines]

You're correct on all points. It was both funny and well thought out. I also clearly didn't mean that $30 is nothing in the literal sense. By definition $30 is something, even if it's almost nothing.

The simple fact is Twojastara should either not buy the game because he can't afford it, or save up and buy the game. He should not get on the forums and whinge about how he can't afford the game because it's 'too overpriced', and encourage others to pirate the game.

If he _really_ wants the game he should ask his mum to buy it for him. I know she has $30.

[Mas Tnega]

Sickeningly prolix summary with three "IT'S LOGIC!!!" paragraphs

That is exactly the sort of bloody nonsense I call a justification.

[wildweasel1]

It has always been my opinion that the people that pirate games, movies, music would not buy it anyway regardless of price or financial situation. There is a percentage that if it is to easy will pirate the game rather than buy it. There are also some that will also buy it and never pirate.

The most important thing is to make a good game that people want to play, then the sales will be good. The thieves are not lost sales because they would not buy it. Simple copy protection will keep the lazy thieves at bay. The people that would buy a game and not steal it will be more likely to buy this one if it gets good reviews or is recommended by their friends. If the game is released as a buggy POS and gets reviewed that way they will not sell many copies. So far I would say this game is a winner.

The thing that needs to be remembered is this type of theft is not the same as walking into a store a stealing physical merchandise (This is factored in to business cost as shrinkage), or stealing property from someones house. There is no actual cost to the owner of the IP other than a potential lost sale, there is no upfront or replacement cost. In some cases it does prompt people to buy it like a demo would. The best thing the devs could do would be to flood a bunch of early alphas on torrents with no mention of them being alphas. Then clearly state in game that it is an alpha and where and how to get the full version. At release this will make it a lot harder to find a full pirated copy.

There is no point in arguing with people about stealing because in their minds they have already justified why they are ok doing it. The best thing to do is use human nature to your advantage.

[FlamingWheel]

You're correct on all points. It was both funny and well thought out. I also clearly didn't mean that $30 is nothing in the literal sense. By definition $30 is something, even if it's almost nothing.

The simple fact is Twojastara should either not buy the game because he can't afford it, or save up and buy the game. He should not get on the forums and whinge about how he can't afford the game because it's 'too overpriced', and encourage others to pirate the game.

If he _really_ wants the game he should ask his mum to buy it for him. I know she has $30.

Where I come from, making fun of one's family isn't the best thing to do.
Though I don't understand why people automatically assume that parents will pay for every little thing that kids ask for.
Not a parent myself yet, hopefully I can still last maybe 2 or 3 years before a miniature version of me is crawling around.
Though I'm pretty sure that if my kid wants something he should buy it himself from his allowance that he gets from doing chores.

Give them a sense of monetary value and work early on in life. I sure could've used that when I was younger.

Sickeningly prolix summary with three "IT'S LOGIC!!!" paragraphs

That is exactly the sort of bloody nonsense I call a justification.

It seems that you aren't willing to accept anything else other than the ideology you firmly believe in, an open mind wont do you any harm.

I was hopeful that I could actually learn you something about being responsible with your actions, not necessarily changing your ideology but at least planting a seed that could grow to us exchanging thoughts. I find it sad that you reacted in the fashion you did, I was far more interested in hearing why you think that my ideology is 'improper', instead of having you mindlessly repeat that I was merely justifying my actions.
I'll at least give you credit for reading what I said, even if you completely misunderstood my intentions.

Let me repeat however that I don't have to justify anything. There is literally no legal ground for me to be blamed. Which, I assume you know, is what to justify means: To prove that your actions are right, to absolve.

In the Netherlands, the act of 'illegally' downloading is not illegal. Instead every citizen pays a copy levy on anything that can store digital media. HDD's, SDD's, cellphones, laptops. You name it.
It's a good alternative to what the rest of the world is doing. Not fully understanding the benefits of piracy, something I previously shared in this thread.
Don't misunderstand, most of us don't use this law as a free ticket towards entertainment, we use it to try out various forms of media prior to purchase and purchase those that are actually decent products.
I can relate however to people not understanding, we are slightly ahead of the rest of the world on some areas. Too bad our politicians aim to much towards liberalism, threading in America's footsteps rather than taking a gander at our northern friends.

[paktsardines]

Where I come from, making fun of one's family isn't the best thing to do.

Where I'm from, it's great.

I wasn't going to respond because this [anti] piracy thing has been going on for 5 pages, but I do want to hear about the Netherlands case. Specifically, how they expect it to work. I know if I was in the Netherlands and wanted to record a video [perhaps while visiting someone's mum], what's to stop me ordering a 1tb drive from overseas and not paying anything extra? For that matter, what's to stop me from taking a day trip over the border to Belgium and coming back with a boot full of hard disks?
Sounds like they don't expect it to work at all, and they're just using it as an excuse to boost taxes. Did you buy your digital media storage locally?

[Mas Tnega]

Sickeningly prolix summary with three "IT'S LOGIC!!!" paragraphs

That is exactly the sort of bloody nonsense I call a justification.

It seems that you aren't willing to accept anything else other than the ideology you firmly believe in, an open mind wont do you any harm.

A mind left open is like a door left open; devoid of function and it invites in criminals.

I was hopeful that I could actually learn you something about being responsible with your actions, not necessarily changing your ideology but at least planting a seed that could grow to us exchanging thoughts. I find it sad that you reacted in the fashion you did, I was far more interested in hearing why you think that my ideology is 'improper', instead of having you mindlessly repeat that I was merely justifying my actions.
I'll at least give you credit for reading what I said, even if you completely misunderstood my intentions.

You said "I have sufficiently little money that it has greater value to me. This product is not worth that much, I'll pay for it when it is worth that much. Until then, it's heavily implied by my being here that I'm playing it anyway." It's what everyone else says. I won't stop calling it justification just because you're saying it this time.

Let me repeat however that I don't have to justify anything. There is literally no legal ground for me to be blamed. Which, I assume you know, is what to justify means: To prove that your actions are right, to absolve.

And yet you're in this thread of all places saying "It's OK for me to do it because..."
I don't recall ever bringing this up as a legal issue, why do you assume it's that? I thought I was very explicit about being tired of people talking about how cool they are for not paying for it because it's "overpriced".

In the Netherlands, the act of 'illegally' downloading is not illegal. Instead every citizen pays a copy levy on anything that can store digital media. HDD's, SDD's, cellphones, laptops. You name it.
It's a good alternative to what the rest of the world is doing. Not fully understanding the benefits of piracy, something I previously shared in this thread.

That money is not going where a fan of the developers would prefer your money to go.

Don't misunderstand, most of us don't use this law as a free ticket towards entertainment, we use it to try out various forms of media prior to purchase and purchase those that are actually decent products.

You give people far too much credit.

I can relate however to people not understanding, we are slightly ahead of the rest of the world on some areas. Too bad our politicians aim to much towards liberalism, threading in America's footsteps rather than taking a gander at our northern friends.

I understand perfectly. Stop being a smug, "enlightened" git about it.

Where I'm from, it's great.

That's what she said.

I do want to hear about the Netherlands case.

That's what she said.

[DHKold]

The thing that needs to be remembered is this type of theft is not the same as walking into a store a stealing physical merchandise (This is factored in to business cost as shrinkage), or stealing property from someones house. There is no actual cost to the owner of the IP other than a potential lost sale, there is no upfront or replacement cost. In some cases it does prompt people to buy it like a demo would. The best thing the devs could do would be to flood a bunch of early alphas on torrents with no mention of them being alphas. Then clearly state in game that it is an alpha and where and how to get the full version. At release this will make it a lot harder to find a full pirated copy.

Even if I don't disagree, I must ask this: making a physical game requires very few money. plastic, dvd, printer paper. It's cheap. I would be very surprised if, for large number, it's over $0.5 a box. So with your argument, one could just steal that box and send $0.5? But then you would miss the main cost of a product, which starts by design and continues until marketing and support. That's why any product has a price over its physical production/distribution cost.

Virtual just decrease/removes distribution and concentrates the production into one huge single "developpment".

Lets imagine you've a car company, you design and develop a new car, it costs you $1M (R&D, etc.). You budgetise $1M for marketing, sales, etc. You expect to sell 1000 cars. You need 1h to build a car and it cost you $1000. Simple math says you need to sell each car $3000 to avoid a loss.

Now lets say you're a virtual car company. You design and develop a virtual car, it costs you $1M. Marketing, sales etc is still $1M. But then you only need to build one car to be able to duplicate it freely. This one time production takes 1000h and has a $1M cost. You still need to sell each car $3000. But since this is virtual and the car can be copied, you face arguments like "it's virtual, it does not cost anything to duplicate so I can download one without paying".

I disagree. You're actually making other pay for you. Of course one could say that once the company has reach profit, it's not that bad. But then it would be the same for the first company, saying what they earn on other cars cover largely the one you steal.

And for the argument : I they don't steal it, they won't buy it either. So? How is it bad for the company. For little ones, that may be a good way to get known, but I think a huge rate of piracy concerns well known and established products, that don't need it to make the buzz. Maybe only 0.1% of pirates would actually buy the game, that's still higher than 0.


I'm not against piracy, but I don't think those "justifications" make sense outside of a court.

[111none]

I am new to western ideology, in china, there is no such thing as "interlectual copyright." its just out of respect.

[Medens]

I am new to western ideology, in china, there is no such thing as "interlectual copyright." its just out of respect.

I think what you meant to say was in China they just behead you when you steal something

[Medens]

And for the argument : I they don't steal it, they won't buy it either. So? How is it bad for the company. For little ones, that may be a good way to get known, but I think a huge rate of piracy concerns well known and established products, that don't need it to make the buzz. Maybe only 0.1% of pirates would actually buy the game, that's still higher than 0.

Where is this idea that a pirated copy isn't a lost sale coming from! Who says that they wouldn't have bought the game if they couldn't pirate it! That is exactly why multiplayer games sell better than singleplayer games because you actually, most of the time, need to buy the game to play it online!

[Disc10]

As much as I dislike pirates using this excuse to justify their actions, they have a point there. AFAIK, no one has been able to prove a pirated copy is a lost sale, whereas there's been several cases (Hotline Miami being a recent example, that was a stroke of marketing genius) where pirates have bought the game.

I tend to agree with Mas Tnega though, many pirates give people WAY too much credit.

[Daimaju]

Guess what?
I could not tell if the game would be to my liking just by watching videos.
30$ for an alpha is indeed very heavy, so I "checked the game out without buying a license first" and what happened?
Today I bought the standard 30$ license, because this game is worth every penny.

Depending on development, I will very likely upgrade my purchase, because I love and respect indie developers - they are currently rescuing the game indursty in my opinion, but that leads off topic...

Anyone who bashes on the bad pirates should start to get his information right. As a matter of fact, piracy in movies, games and music is doing a lot good to the branches, even if it sounds retarded first.
Google it up and respect the skull...

PS: Awesome game, I spread the word and two of my friends already consider buying it too!

[111none]

I am new to western ideology, in china, there is no such thing as "interlectual copyright." its just out of respect.

I think what you meant to say was in China they just behead you when you steal something

well my point is meaning in china, i havent seen a single iv pirate

[paktsardines]

30$ for an alpha is indeed very heavy

You're not paying $30 for the alpha, you're paying $30 for the full game and it just takes a little longer for the delivery.

[Daimaju]

30$ for an alpha is indeed very heavy

You're not paying $30 for the alpha, you're paying $30 for the full game and it just takes a little longer for the delivery.

True, of course.
Yet, there is this certain risk the final game might not be to your liking - or development fail for some reason. You do not have this risk with a finished product.

Wait.

You should not have this risk, but reality shows, customors won't get what they thought they pay for anyway - look at Aliens: Colonial Marines for example

So, 30$ is fine I guess