Lawyer Destroys Arguments for Game Piracy

[crazyarms33]

The arguments for game piracy seem a bit flimsy in response to stories like CD Projekt's DRM-less Witcher 2 being pirated more than it was purchased or this abominable list of pirated games from TorrentFreak [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/115003-TorrentFreak-Reveals-Top-Pirated-Games-of-2011]. The games industry can't just ignore these thefts, and no amount of backwards logic can argue the impact of piracy away.

And yet there is nothing they can do to stop it. They will never stop piracy, or hurt it in any meaningful way, and all companies like Ubisoft and EA are doing is kneecapping paying customers.

Piracy continues to be a viable way for potential customers to try out their very expensive product and see if it suits them before dropping their hard earned money. I noticed that of the games on the top pirated list, only FIFA and Crysis, and Forza had demos.

So because they can't stop it they shouldn't try? Seems silly to me...

edit: Also, it's not theft and it's simply incorrect to call it such.

How is it NOT theft? They are obtaining a product which is sold to the general public through a market for profit, but pirates get it through illicit means paying no money so that the producer makes nothing. I'm not trying to be thick, but please tell me where in the world this is not considered theft? It would be like not paying the grocery for bread but eating it anyway because hey I like bread... just not enough to pay for it.

 

[Weaver]

Yep, piracy is just killing the industry

With revenues climbing every year!

But Hollywood is hurting too, right? That's why they had their highest grossing year in the history of Hollywood in 2009 I assume. Admittedly 2011 box office sales dropped 4.5% this year, but movies kind of sucked this year...

The games industry has grown their revenue by billions of dollars every single year since 1993.

 

[Ashsaver]

I think Piracy is still a theft,but I don't treat all pirates as filthy thieves.

I live in Thailand (If you don't know: it's a place where piracy is a very big problem) and I help moderating a Minecraft Server.

We know that there are very few people who legitimately bought Minecraft in this pirate heaven,and if we open an "online-mode=true" server,we won't last very long.

So instead we open "online-mode=false" but give benefit to users who bought the game and keep persuading "pirates" on our server that buying the game is the way to go if they want these benefits.

Well,It didn't automatically convert all pirates to go legit,but at least the number of Premium Minecraft Players are going up,and that's a good thing =) (fewer pirates more legit gamers)


What I am trying to say is this:Those pirates don't just represent lost sales,but they're also potential customers who interested in your product,if you somehow convince them that buying your game instead of pirating it would benefit them more,then you can convert some of those lost sale into profit.

 

[Something Amyss]

Yep, piracy is just killing the industry

With revenues climbing every year!

But Hollywood is hurting too, right? That's why they had their highest grossing year in the history of Hollywood in 2009 I assume. Admittedly 2011 box office sales dropped 4.5% this year, but movies kind of sucked this year...

The games industry has grown their revenue by billions of dollars every single year since 1993.

Yeah, I've always hated the "piracy is killing the industry" argument. You can kind of argue damage as it's a grey area, but it's clearly not killing anything.

Is piracy good? No. But that doesn't mean it's "killing the industry."

But people are still hung up on trying to pretend it's theft, so I'm not sure how much this will matter to anyone. Still, gotta remember that graph.

 

[BaronIveagh]

Purewal says there is really no evidence that most pirates have the desire or technical chops to effectively mask their IP address, and even if some did, that's hardly a reason to stop going after pirates.

....except that IP addresses have been ruled, at least in the US, to be inadmissible as proof of identity in a court of law. So... how do you bust a pirate? You need some logical argument that would stand up in court in order to get a warrant to search someone's PC.

Oh, and as far as the 'it might not have been them' argument goes, I'd like to refer you to this case: http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2011/07/hacking-neighbor-from-hell/ and this case: http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/technology/2011/07/19/paedo-used-next-door-s-internet-connection-to-download-child-porn-115875-23280772/

Since, it was discovered in each of these cases that... it really WASN'T the owner of the IP address. And these are not unique.

 

[Xanthious]

The entertainment industry is not in the business of giving out interest free loans on it's IP

I'm not sure what the view is like from where you are but from where I'm standing that's exactly what they are currently in the business of. They may not want to be in that business but make no mistake they are currently doing it regardless of their feelings on the matter.

Bottom line there is fuck all these companies can do about piracy that doesn't equate to cutting off their nose to spite their face. So that leaves them with two options to choose from as far as meaningful things they can do to combat piracy "nothing" and "like it".

The pirates are so grossly ahead of the industry it's fucking pathetic. But rather than lead with carrot rather than stick these head strong fucks in charge choose to futilely bang their heads against a wall over and over. To say they are fighting a losing battle is just about as large an understatement as I can make.

By all means though sites like The Escapist should keep running sensationalist articles like this one. Sticks and stones man sticks and stones. The people who stand against piracy can do nothing more than impotent bitching while piracy goes about as strongly as ever with no end in sight. Maybe when people want to approach the situation realistically rather than morally some headway will be made.

 

[ResonanceSD]

The entertainment industry is not in the business of giving out interest free loans on it's IP

I'm not sure what the view is like from where you are but from where I'm standing that's exactly what they are currently in the business of. They may not want to be in that business but make no mistake they are currently doing it regardless of their feelings on the matter.

Bottom line there is fuck all these companies can do about piracy that doesn't equate to cutting off their nose to spite their face. So that leaves them with two options to choose from as far as meaningful things they can do to combat piracy "nothing" and "like it".

The pirates are so grossly ahead of the industry it's fucking pathetic. But rather than lead with carrot rather than stick these head strong fucks in charge choose to futilely bang their heads against a wall over and over. To say they are fighting a losing battle is just about as large an understatement as I can make.

By all means though sites like this one should keep running sensationalist articles like this one. Sticks and stones man sticks and stones. The people who stand against piracy can do nothing more than impotent bitching while piracy goes about as strongly as ever with no end in sight. Maybe when people want to approach the situation realistically rather than morally some headway will be made.

Alternatively, SOPA passes. Headway of a kind, you'll agree.

 

[Weaver]

I think Piracy is still a theft,but I don't treat all pirates as filthy thieves.

I live in Thailand (If you don't know: it's a place where piracy is a very big problem) and I help moderating a Minecraft Server.

We know that there are very few people who legitimately bought Minecraft in this pirate heaven,and if we open an "online-mode=true" server,we won't last very long.

So instead we open "online-mode=false" but give benefit to users who bought the game and keep persuading "pirates" on our server that buying the game is the way to go if they want these benefits.

Well,It didn't automatically convert all pirates to go legit,but at least the number of Premium Minecraft Players are going up,and that's a good thing =) (fewer pirates more legit gamers)


What I am trying to say is this:Those pirates don't just represent lost sales,but they're also potential customers who interested in your product,if you somehow convince them that buying your game instead of pirating it would benefit them more,then you can convert some of those lost sale into profit.

I think this opens up a very important point that not all people have it like we do in the west. Valve and Blizzard have both come out claiming that western price points in places like Eastern Europe and Russia, coupled with no localization or ports a year later are what is killing the market there.

They say the only way to solve the issue is to simply charge less for games there and have a localized version at release. I don't know if either company has actually done that, but both of them are self-publishers in the game industry so I assume they have a lot more stake in being correct than nearly anyone.

What I want to mention though is that not everyone in the west has things super well off either. If I may indulge myself in going off on a tangent: When I was a young nerd growing up I lived in a really shitty ass Canadian town (which shall remain nameless). My sole source of PC games was a wal-mart in town that was about 40 minute walk away. Also note that a 40 minutes walk in Canadian winter is also known as "suicide".

I didn't have a car, my friends couldn't drive, and the PC selection at this store was abysmal. Literally 1/5th of their games were ripped open and taped back together with scotch tape. Most of their games were 1 to 2 years old; and those were the new ones.

In the rare occasion my parents needed to drive to a neighbouring (and much better) town I could obtain actual modern releases, but this wasn't often and quite frankly my minimum wage job (minus union dues!) at the grocery store was hardly a monumental source of income.

Let me tell you about this grocery store for flavor; My produce department comprising of two drug dealers, a retired guy that boasted frequently how he gave whores crack for sex on the weekends, a diagnosed bi-polar manager who frequently yelled at the top of his lungs over the smallest things, wave off huge problems 30 minutes later and come back from lunch breaks in tears. The most normal person I knew was a biker guy who lived in a trailer because he spent the majority of his income on designer drugs. At least he was friendly.

Anyways, what did I do?
I pirated games.

Honestly, compared to the people I worked with it didn't seem that bad. Compared to freezing in the cold it seemed the wise choice. I wanted to save up for university too (to escape my hellhole) but in the meantime I guess I just wanted something to take my mind off things. Had I the real means (as I do now) to buy whatever games I wanted I absolutely would have; but I simply didn't.

Did I deserve any of those games? Nope.
Would I have bought they if I didn't pirate them? Not one chance in sweet hell, it wasn't physically possible for me to do so. Did I count as a lost sale? Would someone like this count as a lost sale now?

All I can for sure tell you is that honestly, some of those games are the only good memories I have from those years. High school was cruel to me, my parent's had a bad divorce, I felt like I had to go to work every day with the dredges of society; my "best friend" robbed my house for drug money (which has instilled me with severe psychological trust issues) - but I can still look back and smile at the LAN parties where I played my pirated copy of Unreal Tournament 99 with some of close my friends having fun and laughing for once. At that time it didn't seem to even cross my mind that Epic Games not having my money mattered in the slightest, I figured they'd manage.

I'm not entitled to games, but I felt entitled to at least a tiny, small bit of happiness in my life and I got it from gaming.

 

[Xanthious]

The entertainment industry is not in the business of giving out interest free loans on it's IP

I'm not sure what the view is like from where you are but from where I'm standing that's exactly what they are currently in the business of. They may not want to be in that business but make no mistake they are currently doing it regardless of their feelings on the matter.

Bottom line there is fuck all these companies can do about piracy that doesn't equate to cutting off their nose to spite their face. So that leaves them with two options to choose from as far as meaningful things they can do to combat piracy "nothing" and "like it".

The pirates are so grossly ahead of the industry it's fucking pathetic. But rather than lead with carrot rather than stick these head strong fucks in charge choose to futilely bang their heads against a wall over and over. To say they are fighting a losing battle is just about as large an understatement as I can make.

By all means though sites like this one should keep running sensationalist articles like this one. Sticks and stones man sticks and stones. The people who stand against piracy can do nothing more than impotent bitching while piracy goes about as strongly as ever with no end in sight. Maybe when people want to approach the situation realistically rather than morally some headway will be made.

Alternatively, SOPA passes. Headway of a kind, you'll agree.

Nope. Darknets, alternate DNS servers, Usenet, the list goes on and on as far as things that SOPA won't be able to touch. You think SOPA will do anything to piracy? You are deluding yourself.

 

[ResonanceSD]

snip

Gaming, totally a right for everyone. Not even slightly regarded as a luxury. No sir. Everyone is entitled to game.

http://penny-arcade.com/patv/episode/piracy

This video: 5:26 in. Go nuts.

something else

Oh no, I said it would be progress of a sort, I didn't say it would help.

 

[Kroxile]

Nothing this "lawyer" said destroyed anything. Rather just spouted the same grey area bullshit that people on his side have been spouting for years. Not to mention that he is STILL ignoring studies and actual factual data that shows he is wrong in several of his "points".

Misleading title is misleading.

 

[Grant Hobba]

but in the meantime it means a financial loss for the developer

NO, it does not. That logic is incredibly erroneous.

how is that not a financial loss for the developer.

game sales = money

games downloaded = sales lost to gaming distributors

no gaming distributors = no gaming developers

= no more games.

you guys can kid yourself all you like; but not actually buying the game hurts the game shops, if they see a down turn in sales they no longer buy in larger quantities if that keeps happening eventually it will lead to loss of money for the devs and in turn means lack of games... or no games.

 

[Weaver]

snip

Gaming, totally a right for everyone. Not even slightly regarded as a luxury. No sir. Everyone is entitled to game.

http://penny-arcade.com/patv/episode/piracy

This video: 5:26 in. Go nuts.

That's awesome for people now-a-days, play games on a $0 budget in 1999.
My family PC could run unreal at like 20FPS but it was all I had. You need to understand how poor my family was; Prior to high school I once passed out at school because I hadn't eaten enough food because we didn't have any in the house. Why did we have a PC? My dad liked computers, there's no other reason or we wouldn't have had one.

James can sit on his fucking high horse all he wants, but back then this was my escape and a way for me to make friends via a shared hobby and I don't regret it at all.

 

[Grant Hobba]

Yep, piracy is just killing the industry

With revenues climbing every year!

But Hollywood is hurting too, right? That's why they had their highest grossing year in the history of Hollywood in 2009 I assume. Admittedly 2011 box office sales dropped 4.5% this year, but movies kind of sucked this year...

The games industry has grown their revenue by billions of dollars every single year since 1993.

Yeah, I've always hated the "piracy is killing the industry" argument. You can kind of argue damage as it's a grey area, but it's clearly not killing anything.

Is piracy good? No. But that doesn't mean it's "killing the industry."


But people are still hung up on trying to pretend it's theft, so I'm not sure how much this will matter to anyone. Still, gotta remember that graph.

be definition... pirating is theft.

yes sales go up... but so does the population.

saying it isn't is like saying stealing furniture isn't in any way hurting that store....

 

[Grant Hobba]

how is that not a financial loss for the developer.

game sales = money

games downloaded = sales lost to gaming distributors

no gaming distributors = no gaming developers

= no more games.

you guys can kid yourself all you like; but not actually buying the game hurts the game shops, if they see a down turn in sales they no longer buy in larger quantities if that keeps happening eventually it will lead to loss of money for the devs and in turn means lack of games... or no games.

If only there was some other way people could sell games. Something that is easily accessible...

Oh, wait, there is. It's called the Internet.

downloading for free isn't buying a game.


you kids make long time actual purchasers of games look ridiculous with you unbelievable flawed "logic"

"pirating games isnt theft and has no negative consequences for the stores online of shopfront what so ever"

yup.

 

[ResonanceSD]

snip

Gaming, totally a right for everyone. Not even slightly regarded as a luxury. No sir. Everyone is entitled to game.

http://penny-arcade.com/patv/episode/piracy

This video: 5:26 in. Go nuts.

That's awesome for people now-a-days, play games on a $0 budget in 1999.
My family PC could run unreal at like 20FPS but it was all I had. You need to understand how poor my family was; Prior to high school I once passed out at school because I hadn't eaten enough food because we didn't have any in the house. Why did we have a PC? My dad liked computers, there's no other reason or we wouldn't have had one.

James can sit on his fucking high horse all he wants, but back then this was my escape and a way for me to make friends via a shared hobby and I don't regret it at all.

Nice to see you could somehow manage to tie up a phone line long enough to download games in 1999.

You might not regret it, that doesn't change the fact that it was then and is now illegal.

 

[Weaver]

snip

Gaming, totally a right for everyone. Not even slightly regarded as a luxury. No sir. Everyone is entitled to game.

http://penny-arcade.com/patv/episode/piracy

This video: 5:26 in. Go nuts.

That's awesome for people now-a-days, play games on a $0 budget in 1999.
My family PC could run unreal at like 20FPS but it was all I had. You need to understand how poor my family was; Prior to high school I once passed out at school because I hadn't eaten enough food because we didn't have any in the house. Why did we have a PC? My dad liked computers, there's no other reason or we wouldn't have had one.

James can sit on his fucking high horse all he wants, but back then this was my escape and a way for me to make friends via a shared hobby and I don't regret it at all.

Nice to see you could somehow manage to tie up a phone line long enough to download games in 1999.

When did I ever say I downloaded them?

edit: You're right it was illegal. I've tried to make amends; I own 323 games on steam and I have a closet full of boxed games. I spend thousands now each year on gaming, despite having seemingly less and less time. But had I not become so enamoured with games I would not be a heavy consumer now. I'm grateful to the industry that let me leech from it and, as hilariously cheesy as it may seem, actually helped me survive a difficult time.

What I was hoping to at least demonstrate is, via a human perspective, that not all piracy is fueled my sheer malace or greed and not every pirated copy can accurately equate as a lost sale.

 

[ResonanceSD]

snip

Gaming, totally a right for everyone. Not even slightly regarded as a luxury. No sir. Everyone is entitled to game.

http://penny-arcade.com/patv/episode/piracy

This video: 5:26 in. Go nuts.

That's awesome for people now-a-days, play games on a $0 budget in 1999.
My family PC could run unreal at like 20FPS but it was all I had. You need to understand how poor my family was; Prior to high school I once passed out at school because I hadn't eaten enough food because we didn't have any in the house. Why did we have a PC? My dad liked computers, there's no other reason or we wouldn't have had one.

James can sit on his fucking high horse all he wants, but back then this was my escape and a way for me to make friends via a shared hobby and I don't regret it at all.

Nice to see you could somehow manage to tie up a phone line long enough to download games in 1999.

When did I ever say I downloaded them?

Oh right, how silly of me. Anyway, still illegal, etc.

 

[ResonanceSD]

Ha. As if developers need big publishers and distributors to stay in business. The industry is so clogged with identical big-budget titles, an obsession with graphics engines that need ungodly amounts of man-hours to program, and huge studios frothing with an absence of creative control, that it needs some cleaning out. Piracy is a refusal to pay for a game that's not worth the money. I'm sure there are people who only pirate their games, but they are in a minority, and are in no position to influence the market. Pirates are people who want to have their cake and eat it too; it's a bit greedy to pirate games you normally wouldn't buy, but it's also essentially a form of boycott against overpriced games. I would see it as beneficial if it ruined the current market.

1) Actually, what it is is copyright infringement.

2) Markets operate on legal practices. Illegal means of manipulating entire industries are somewhat frowned upon by everyone in said industry, otherwise you end up with the mob running the show.

And are you seriously suggesting that because you don't feel that there's enough innovation and variation in the marketplace, piracy is a logical solution to a problem you have with the industry?

 

[ResonanceSD]

I agree with all of that. And this is where the lawyer's comments come into play. The simple facts are that we can be reasonably certain that those who are downloading the pirated software have not bothered disguising their IP addresses.

And provided they can prove that the individual pirated within the bounds of the law (that is, they don't break down the guy's door and take his computer, but instead follow legal channels), then by all means charge 'em and take them to court. But they better have solid enough evidence to convict if they're gonna pour money into that.

Due to the high risk/involvement level of said exercise, any entity willing to sue for that much is pretty much guaranteed to have all the relevant information required. No one goes into a prosecution like that hoping for "good luck"