Why I don't like piracy: a software developer's thoughts.

[rattling_bean]

These games manafacturers are obviously still raking in huge profits, or they would cease producing games. It's not like anyone is not getting paid for their work - just Mr EA makes $50 million instead of $100 million. Big deal, he can only afford 10 Lamborghinis this year. I can understand the anger from smaller companies, but these are invariably swallowed by the gaping maw of huge corporations anyway (if not, then they are obviously not making decent games so deserve to be taken off the market). By tightening their grip around the customers, piracy will only worsen and their sales will drop. It all comes down to greed, which is a sad fact. It's human nature to take as much as possible and give away as little as possible and both the corporations and pirates are afflicted by this - neither side is going to give in.

 

[ThePlasmatizer]

I don't download games, when Phoenix Wright Trials and Tribulations comes out over here I will buy it because I want to support Capcom for a great game.

A reasonable protest to a bad product or service is not to use it and dissuade others from using, it doesn't mean you should steal it.

Also while you think large games developers are in fact big faceless corporations they are in fact made up of people just like you! shock!

Imagine if a games developer makes a regulation that you don't like that is ineffectual on the gameplay, people then start mass pirating it including you, the games developers put a lot of money into the development and it's a financial disaster; to make up the costs they fire a department of people or two and close down an office,
these people will be regular people exactly like you, they have families to support and you just cost them their job.

 

[Imitation Saccharin]

Uhm... if you are arguing from the point of how things "should be", then you are the one doing the Is-Ought Fallacy.

Or I would be if I was basing my arguement on what is.

You are arguing that IP ought to be none existant...

Nope. I don't understand why it is so hard for you to respond to Socratic arguement without implying opinion.

The intersection of the sets Scientific Discovery and Intellectual Property is not equal to any of them.

Hence point 2.

 

[Sayvara]

Um, I don't know how much experience you have with TiVo, but, it's not really like closing your eyes and sticking your fingers in your ears...

And um...why are you saying "At most, not watching commersials could be concidered a breach of contract"? Isn't a contract the embodiment of a property owner's wishes? How do you go from your original post were you go on and on about how morally bankrupt pirates are when they don't respect your wishes for your property, but then turn around and trivialize an instance where some other property owner's wishes aren't respected?

Don't you see the metric ton of contradiction in arguing that someone's "business model is flawed" due to advances in technology in a thread where you complain about software piracy?

I say again: the conditions that a property owner presents you with in order to use his IP must be reasonable.

Forcing people to watch ads is not very reasonable. While using a TiVo is not the same thing as sticking your fingers in your ears and closing your eyes, the latter would be the exact same kind of breach of contract as the former, i.e. refusing to watch ads (assuming a Must Watch Ads provision in a contract holds any legal weight, which I seriously doubt it would).

May I then enquire as to your thoughts on copying a game I've already bought in case the disc goes el-scratcho. Or going so far as to pirate a game that I bought a long time ago, and have since scratched/lost the disc? Would I still be in the wrong then, despite having already bought the game?

My personal view is that obtaining a copy of IP for which you bought a license to use at any time in your life is not wrong. I think that the licence to use the IP is not bound to the container in which it came. In fact I think it is your right as a consumer to take precautions that ensures that you can use the product which you paid for to use. Idealy the IP owner should provide you with replacement copies should you lose your copy... for a reasonable administrative fee of course. But if they won't do that, I think that you can get a copy yourself by any means necessary. Consumer Rights precede Copyright at that point.

/S

 

[wgreer25]

If you are an indie developer, I will gladly give you my money, to use your software, however, if you work for a publishing corporation, *cough* EA *cough* then the developer's rights become whatever the corporation says your rights are. The fact remains that if corporations continue to effectively insult the consumer by automatically assuming that they are pirates, they will increase piracy. Most gamers are honest, they will often, overwhelmingly choose to actually spend money on a game, rather than pirate it. However, if you push a consumer far enough, you will eventually drive said consumer to pirate the game out of pure principle. The general thought process is, if you insult my integrity outright, then you dont deserve my money. If said software is of sufficient quality and you stop troubling them after the purchase, people will overwhelmingly choose giving you money for it, rather than pirate it.

This is a perfect case of "you can't have your cake and eat it, too." If you don't like invasive DRM practices - and I certainly don't - boycott them. Unfortunately, that also means you can't play the game, since piracy is a violation of the publishers' basic property rights.

I dissagree with the piracy of software but I agree with the message that is being sent by illegally downloading Spore, I just think you should send that message in a different way. The Spore DRM was very subtle and if you are not people like us who are in the know, you might get screwed by their DRM. If you disagree with their DRM, don't buy it and don't steel it, just boycott and spread you message of boycott on the interwebs.

Software piracy is no different from Pepsi steeling Cokes recipe and using it. Intellectual Property is property and should be protected.

 

[squid5580]

Well since I rent my PVR (the canadian version of TIVO) from my cable provider I feel no guilt by fast forwarding through commercials. It isn't like I am going to run out and buy (insert product here) everytime I see a commercial anyways so it isn't like they are really losing any money they could have potentially made.

 

[molesgallus]

These games manafacturers are obviously still raking in huge profits, or they would cease producing games. It's not like anyone is not getting paid for their work - just Mr EA makes $50 million instead of $100 million. Big deal, he can only afford 10 Lamborghinis this year. I can understand the anger from smaller companies, but these are invariably swallowed by the gaping maw of huge corporations anyway (if not, then they are obviously not making decent games so deserve to be taken off the market). By tightening their grip around the customers, piracy will only worsen and their sales will drop. It all comes down to greed, which is a sad fact. It's human nature to take as much as possible and give away as little as possible and both the corporations and pirates are afflicted by this - neither side is going to give in.

It's not human natur to take as much as possible, and giive as little.I'm a human and its not in my nature. Nor, i hope, in yours.

 

[Sayvara]

*Groan* No, you are.

Let me qualify my statement:

I think that people that commit the act of software piracy are committing a rightfully dislikable act. The act of committing piracy is to show a lack of respect of the rights of the property owner and to disregard the principle of the sanctity of ownership, something which also implies that the persons in question are using double standards since I assume that they themselves hold that people should respect their rights as property owners. Whether the persons in question as a whole are good or evil or something in between remains an open question. I do not however have any sympathy for whatever damage or plight their pirating actions might cause them.

Whether the persons are snot-nosed pimply kids or not have no bearing on the matter and were simply mentuinade as an example of people that might commit that an act that peeves me.

Happy?

/S

 

[Sayvara]

These games manafacturers are obviously still raking in huge profits, or they would cease producing games. It's not like anyone is not getting paid for their work - just Mr EA makes $50 million instead of $100 million. Big deal, he can only afford 10 Lamborghinis this year. I can understand the anger from smaller companies, but these are invariably swallowed by the gaping maw of huge corporations anyway (if not, then they are obviously not making decent games so deserve to be taken off the market). By tightening their grip around the customers, piracy will only worsen and their sales will drop. It all comes down to greed, which is a sad fact. It's human nature to take as much as possible and give away as little as possible and both the corporations and pirates are afflicted by this - neither side is going to give in.

I'll just copy my post straight from this thread, also regarding piracy: http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/18.72308?page=2#757060

"Mainstream gaming's lowest-common-denominator, bland, useless-feature-bloated offerings are a direct result of piracy. 10,000 units pirated on a game by EA that sells millions of copies looks like a drop in the bucket to the gamers, but to the eyes of smaller developers who expect to appeal to a smaller base it's discouraging at the very least. When the big boys start reporting numbers in the hundreds of thousands of pirated copies, what then does the little guy do? Merge or don't develop the IP, or worse, half-ass the attempt in order to cut costs. Obviously it's not the only reason for the state of the industry, but to say that piracy has no effect, or that nobody (or nobody important - everyone at EA is a monster, right?) is harmed by it is very far from true."

 

[Sayvara]

Okay--what if the contract wasn't that you had to watch ads (which you insist on going back to even though I've never said anything about watching ads, but only about skipping them, yet you keep brining up watching ads for who knows what reason), but that you couldn't skip the ads? Why isn't that reasonable?

Answer this: how would skipping ads be a wrongful act if you are not obliged to watch the ads in the first place?

/S

 

[molesgallus]

*Groan* No, you are.

Let me qualify my statement:

I think that people that commit the act of software piracy are committing a rightfully dislikable act. The act of committing piracy is to show a lack of respect of the rights of the property owner and to disregard the principle of the sanctity of ownership, something which also implies that the persons in question are using double standards since I assume that they themselves hold that people should respect their rights as property owners. Whether the persons in question as a whole are good or evil or something in between remains an open question. I do not however have any sympathy for whatever damage or plight their pirating actions might cause them.

Whether the persons are snot-nosed pimply kids or not have no bearing on the matter and were simply mentuinade as an example of people that might commit that an act that peeves me.

Happy?

/S

People are not good or evil as a whole, that's silly. Everyone has an equal capacity for both, good and evil. And everyone is hypocritical, everyone...

 

[Sayvara]

Also, what's a 'mentuinade'? I've Wiki'ed it, Googled it, and Definr'ed it, and I get no results.

Urk.... sorry about that. It's the invisible bondage faeries that insist on having sex on my keyboard that got an orgasm and completely messed up my typing. The word was supposed to be "mentioned".

/S

 

[Silent Biohazard Solid]

You know... That's why they're called pirates. And I know that people like to use the term as a compliment these days, but pirates used to sink or steal ships, rape women, steal money... So yeah, obviously if people who steal software are being labeled with that word, they have no concept of ownership rights.

 

[AshuraSpeaks]

Compare it to renting. Just because you gave the car rental 50 USD to use the car over the weekend, doesn't give you the rights to use it in a demolition derby. You bought the right to use the car under certain conditions. You did not buy the car itself.

Haha, that reminds me, I almost watched Jackass: The Movie again the other day.

Oh those wacky kids and their ultimately expensive and immoral hijinks.
-Ashura

 

[clarinetJWD]

OK, so here goes.

There's a balance to be achieved. Piracy is wrong, but so is restricting legitamite customers. Sayvara: you're conduct in this thread is enough that I do not think I'd ever give you my business, as you have shown absolutely no interest in the rights of your customers, only yourself.

My personal policy is as follows: Games have demos, I play the demo and either buy the full game or forget about it.

Other software isn't so clear cut. Some companies (like Adobe) give anyone a free 30 day trial of the complete product for evaluation. I'll download it, use it for 30 days, and then decide if I want it. If however (I'll use Norton Ghost as an example, because it's the most recent time it happened to me) the demo is somehow restricted from the full version by something other than a use limit or time limit, I cannot assess the quality of the features. I downloaded it, used it, and when I saw how good the full version was, I bought it. (I used to pirate a lot of software, but over the last 2 years when I actually have some disposible income of my own, I've whittled it down to pretty much nothing.)

Music, TV shows, and movies is the least clear cut of all. I bought a Blu-ray/HD-DVD drive for my media PC. Even though I have an HDCP video card, motherboard, drive, cable, and display, PowerDVD reports the cable as being not protected. So I use AnyDVD to decrypt the DRM and play the movies I own. By your argument that's illegal and wrong.
TV: I record all my TV shows and use a WMC extension to automatically cut all the commercials...is that wrong?
Music: Here's the hardest situation for me. I can get a small clip of a song or piece on Amazon or iTunes, but most of the music I listen too can't be judged by 30 seconds of preview, so I download the music, and every time I go to a big box store, or order from Amazon, I buy a CD that I downloaded that I think is worth my money.

What about fair use laws? the US law says that I have a right to make personal copies of software and media for my own use. CDs and DVDs are easy, but the new video formats and games are sometimes exceedingly difficult, which is an infringement of my rights. Don't bring up the EULA as a response, though, as there is plenty of precident of EULAs being overturned for infringing on fair use, and the overall legality of the EULA has long been disputed.

I'll reiterate what others have already said: Piracy is and will continue to be a problem as long as it's easier than legally obtaining and using the product. This includes, but is not limited to, intrusive DRM, unfair EULA restrictions, lack of digital distribution methods, the inability to resell the product due to DRM or other factors.