Slimebeast said: NJ5 said: Slimebeast said: You don't have to comment that "not every pirated sale is a lost sale" because that's pretty obvious. We knew that already. But even if theres only 1 lost sale for every 10 pirated games, that's still lost sales and means financial impact on someone. Maybe you knew it, but Zucas and other people don't take it into account when they say that piracy is always theft under a broad definition of theft that also includes virtual losses. IMO it's ridiculous enough to call something theft when nothing is being removed, but to go as far as to call something theft when it can have no impact at all, that's too much.   One comment on the green though. Do you really think that's ridiculous? Do you know the game Mount & Blade? It's a niche strategy/RPG PC game developed by a small Turkish independent studio. Many people in forums and gametrailers flame the game for having weak graphics. It's pretty obvious it hasn't got top-notch grafix due to their limited resources. I pirated the game. Many others did too. Now the sequel M&B Warband came out, with the same graphcis and you hear the same comments. Again it's due to limited resources. I feel that we who pirated the game, by not contributing financially to something we enjoyed without asking permission, we as a collective removed something. We removed income to the developer and we removed quality from the sequel by denying it resources. Because a proportion of us would have paid for it if it wasn't so easy to pirate.

Don't you feel it is up to the developers to make something compelling enough to purchase or at the very least come up with a game model that forces the hand of a purchase?   I do.   Sometimes games, music, movies that get purchased never would have been purchased gets pirated simply to see if a person would maybe enjoy that game or those types of games.  When they get that answer from personal experience they may become a fan of a game they never would have. 

This is just like the music industry all over again. People wanted to be able to listen to music on their computers in easy/user friendly manner as PCs were ever growing in homes.  Napster provided a way for that to occur.   The music industry was left at the alter with old business models and over-priced 20 dollars CDs filling the shelves.   They failed to provide the consumer with ANY viable alternative to what they wanted. 

Steam is an excellent example of a smart decision to protect company revenue from games and provide an easy to use avenue for consumers to flock to.  PS3 has provided another excellent example of a company protecting its revenue from games sales.  But what is absolutely funny about the PS3 example is that it commonly sells less software than the 360.   Which makes you wonder,  does the 360s piracy contribute to actually increasing software sales?

 

I won't defend the Music/Movie/Game/TV industries because in my opinion they have for far too long ripped off the very consumers that allow them to keep doing business at the capacity that they have.  Rather then attempt to make the experience as enjoyable as possible for the consumer.  It's like running a Theme Park and charging outrageous prices and once the consumers get inside they find out that there are no restrooms inside the park just outside in the parking lot. 

Music Industry -  CDs cost virtually nothing to make yet CDs you get at the store are 20$ with $18.50 going to the record label and contain 1 to 2 good songs and the rest just filler BS ones. No viable alternatives.  Prosecuting grandma's in vein instead of fixing the problem.

Movie Industry  -  VHS/DVD/Blu-Ray -  And just when you get a full collection of VHS or DVD you're going to need to get Blu-Ray but just when you get Blu-Ray you're going to need ______.   Happens every time. 

Games Industry - Promises of expansions to consoles, support for attachments, future support for consoles, etc.  Ever increasing prices for everything.  150$ for a plastic guitar/drumkit and cheap microphone?   Gameboy games for $40?  Seriously?   The jump from $49.99 to $59.99. The nickel and diming of their customers (Paying $0.99) per 'cheat code' in Madden 2010.    $1.00 for a PSN avatar? (A picture that either took 4 seconds to create or was just copied from somewhere else and moved onto their server as a possible avatar)?      Blizzard charging $25 dollars(2 months subscription time) for a virtual in game 'mount' in a game where you are paying for constant new content?

 

 

I would have an easier time justifying piracy as theft or as a terrible thing in general if there was some serious tangible proof that it hurts sales, because that's the core issue here.  And that's where it is commonly confused.  If I enjoy pirated Product A, but never would have purchased Product A in the first place that is not a loss of a sale.   Some people believe that, this = a sale and is a crime of theft in itself.   However, if it doesn't impact the sales or the overall bottomline of the owner of the product then how can you define it as theft?  You can't.  Thus the dilemma. 

@Slimebeast: Actually his rights to his work were removed.
Look, you point out to a completely different situation. You would have a good point there if the options were only the two that either everything is bought legally or everything is pirated. The real situation however is, that some copies are pirated and some copies bought legally.

The difference what i'm trying trying to point out here is, that theft causes losses directly, while piracy causes loss in sales.

Rpruett said: Slimebeast said: NJ5 said: Slimebeast said: You don't have to comment that "not every pirated sale is a lost sale" because that's pretty obvious. We knew that already. But even if theres only 1 lost sale for every 10 pirated games, that's still lost sales and means financial impact on someone. Maybe you knew it, but Zucas and other people don't take it into account when they say that piracy is always theft under a broad definition of theft that also includes virtual losses. IMO it's ridiculous enough to call something theft when nothing is being removed, but to go as far as to call something theft when it can have no impact at all, that's too much.   One comment on the green though. Do you really think that's ridiculous? Do you know the game Mount & Blade? It's a niche strategy/RPG PC game developed by a small Turkish independent studio. Many people in forums and gametrailers flame the game for having weak graphics. It's pretty obvious it hasn't got top-notch grafix due to their limited resources. I pirated the game. Many others did too. Now the sequel M&B Warband came out, with the same graphcis and you hear the same comments. Again it's due to limited resources. I feel that we who pirated the game, by not contributing financially to something we enjoyed without asking permission, we as a collective removed something. We removed income to the developer and we removed quality from the sequel by denying it resources. Because a proportion of us would have paid for it if it wasn't so easy to pirate. Don't you feel it is up to the developers to make something compelling enough to purchase or at the very least come up with a game model that forces the hand of a purchase?   I do.   Sometimes games, music, movies that get purchased never would have been purchased gets pirated simply to see if a person would maybe enjoy that game or those types of games.  When they get that answer from personal experience they may become a fan of a game they never would have.  This is just like the music industry all over again. People wanted to be able to listen to music on their computers in easy/user friendly manner as PCs were ever growing in homes.  Napster provided a way for that to occur.   The music industry was left at the alter with old business models and over-priced 20 dollars CDs filling the shelves.   They failed to provide the consumer with ANY viable alternative to what they wanted.  Steam is an excellent example of a smart decision to protect company revenue from games and provide an easy to use avenue for consumers to flock to.  PS3 has provided another excellent example of a company protecting its revenue from games sales.  But what is absolutely funny about the PS3 example is that it commonly sells less software than the 360.   Which makes you wonder,  does the 360s piracy contribute to actually increasing software sales?

No because it's not always possible. For many people including me services like Steam and Apple-store mean nothing. I want the content, not the service. It's impossible to get enough revenue from just creating some artifical 'service' around the content. The value is in the content, and if the content can be pirated you can't offset it by just creating some service. It works for some people (browser games, Steam to some extent, Apple store) but not for the genres I like - niche hardcore games, heavy metal musicians, epic movies.

Rpruett said: I won't defend the Music/Movie/Game/TV industries because in my opinion they have for far too long ripped off the very consumers that allow them to keep doing business at the capacity that they have.  Rather then attempt to make the experience as enjoyable as possible for the consumer.  It's like running a Theme Park and charging outrageous prices and once the consumers get inside they find out that there are no restrooms inside the park just outside in the parking lot.  Music Industry -  CDs cost virtually nothing to make yet CDs you get at the store are 20$ with $18.50 going to the record label and contain 1 to 2 good songs and the rest just filler BS ones. No viable alternatives.  Prosecuting grandma's in vein instead of fixing the problem. Movie Industry  -  VHS/DVD/Blu-Ray -  And just when you get a full collection of VHS or DVD you're going to need to get Blu-Ray but just when you get Blu-Ray you're going to need ______.   Happens every time.  Games Industry - Promises of expansions to consoles, support for attachments, future support for consoles, etc.  Ever increasing prices for everything.  150$ for a plastic guitar/drumkit and cheap microphone?   Gameboy games for $40?  Seriously?   The jump from $49.99 to $59.99. The nickel and diming of their customers (Paying $0.99) per 'cheat code' in Madden 2010.    $1.00 for a PSN avatar? (A picture that either took 4 seconds to create or was just copied from somewhere else and moved onto their server as a possible avatar)?      Blizzard charging $25 dollars(2 months subscription time) for a virtual in game 'mount' in a game where you are paying for constant new content?     I would have an easier time justifying piracy as theft or as a terrible thing in general if there was some serious tangible proof that it hurts sales, because that's the core issue here.  And that's where it is commonly confused.  If I enjoy pirated Product A, but never would have purchased Product A in the first place that is not a loss of a sale.   Some people believe that, this = a sale and is a crime of theft in itself.   However, if it doesn't impact the sales or the overall bottomline of the owner of the product then how can you define it as theft?  You can't.  Thus the dilemma.

 I hate this argument. It's not for us to decide who is allowed to make lots of money and who is not. That's commie ideas ffs.

The consumer votes through his Dollars. If the product is bad, don't buy it. I don't like this anarchistic idea of "if I steal everything they are forced to change lol".

Green part: 1 pirated game is not 1 lost sale, no. But piracy overall hurt sales to some extent. Just accept that fact and we can discuss from there. If you can't see that PC software development is getting hurt by piracy then it's not worth to discuss with you.

Man you guys left me waaaaay behind

Zucas said: Khuutra said: Legally speaking, that isn't the case. Theft is defined as the removal of someonne else's goods or services without compensation - you on't actually remove anyone's goods or services, or prevent them from being compensated. That's the difference between pirating and walking out of a restaurant without paying, or going into a movie theater without paying: no one is actually deprived of limited resources without recompense, which is why there's a legal difference. Copyright infringement in the case of game piracy is more about gaining the advantages of creation without paying for it: the idea is that you don't have the right to experience somethign without paying for it, even if you're not depriving someone else of recompense or that same experience. Piracy is illegal and wrong, sure, but it's distinct from theft. Well not anymore.  That would been true before 1997.  It used to be to constitute copyright infringement that there had to be a motive of financial gain.  Aka the scenarios that have been discussed.  But under the No Electronic Theft Act, it amended the the idea to including copyright infringement without financial gain.  Most arguments used to be, is if they don't use it for monetary gain, then the company isn't losing anything.  But apparently that has been reversed to showing that there is a notion that something is being lost, and now there is virtually no legal difference. Thus under current U.S. law, it is completely illegal to take and/or distribute something whether physical or digital when it is copyrighted, even if it isn't for the use of personal financial gain.  That means, under U.S. law, ALL FORMS of piracy that we know of today is completely illegal.

Zucas, I'm not sure you're cleear on what I'm arguing. I acknowledged in the first place that piracy is wrong and illegal, but not all illegality is equivalent and one act being illegal does not make it the same as another illegal act.

More, the scene of piracy has changed immensely since 1997 - the provisions under these laws mgiht not even apply to torrenters, sinc distribution of the media happens without expectation of any compensation (including access to more media as a result of distribution) and thre's still a limit as to the absolute value of distributed works. You read that article, you know as well as I do that the law in 1997 was written in reference to bootleggers and people who try to falsely claim copyright.

It represents an oversimplified view on what constitutes piracy (Youtube on the whole is guilty of infringement of copyright here, by sheer virtue of hosting videos of concerts), it doesn't apply to cases wherein ther is no expectation of compensation, and - oh yeah - it still doesn't equate piracy with theft.

Whether piracy is really a problem or not, there isn't enough evidence to back any of these points up

Slimebeast said: trent44 said: I think it is rather odd, the route these IP holders have taken to try and secure their "potential" profits. What is an Intellectual Property anyway? Short story: it is a government sanctioned monopoly over and idea. In terms of macroeconomics (large scale economy), it is a flat out retarded move. Why? Simple, monopolies maximize profits by minimizing marginal benefits to the population. i.e. You pay more & you get less. Yes, this is nice for the head honchos that scrape by on multimillion dollar bonuses each year while clearing out unessessary costs by say laying off 15,000 workers. The American dream for one man, The American nightmare for many... People fear loosing their jobs now days because the market is starting to canabalize itself. Wallstreet is going back up and unemployment is still through the roof, what gives? Well, besides profit maximizing greed that americans have begun to chant as though it were an ultimate means to all salvation, one thing that is keeping a lot of jobs from being created? Intellectual Properties. I.P.s prevent many many competitors form entering an occupied marketspace, and it also prevent the jobs those competitors would create. Even in the events where competitors can enter the market, there is more initial capital needed as the barrier to entry to the market, as it is raised by redundant research and lawsuits. So what needs to happen? Resructuring of the current business model. The shift from I.P. focused profits to goods/service focused profits. How do can you compete if there it no I.P. system in place? Make higher quality products, cut costs that are actually wasteful (such as CEO salaries and bonuses), provide service people actually want enough to pay for. This also means you can free up billions of dollars of lawsuits and redundant research and wasted time. What about Media? How can we convert media from I.P. based profit to service based profit? Comissioned Art = service. Music Concert = service. Video game Subscriptions = Service. Etc. But, wait are you actually saying I have to continually put in hours of work to make money, rather than rely on this convinent system of secured profits? Where dead men 20 years in their grave are making more profit EACH YEAR, than a guy busting his ass 80 hours a week for his entire life could ever hope to make? Yes, you would have to continually work for profits...just like everyone else... I hate this kind of argument. Socialism.

How is this socialism?

The firms would be privately owned, less government regulation, more resouces freed up from lack of I.P. related lawsuits and redundant research, and there would be more competitors in the market. All that sounds like free market to me.

Cutting cost of upper management salaries rather than cutting tons of jobs keeps the economy at a more sustainable level, people without jobs cannot inject money back into the economy, cashflows slow, business slows down, then corporations start closing because there arent enough customers with purchasing power...sound familar?

Now, I guess this part could have been misinterpreted. I did mention that continually profiting off and I.P. would no longer be viable in an economic system without I.P.s. What I listed were simply a few examples (new business models could be made) of how those previously I.P. focused businesses could be converted to good/service focused businesses. Continually profiting off goods/service business models after you are dead would still be viable...

Slimebeast said: Rpruett said: Slimebeast said: NJ5 said: Slimebeast said: You don't have to comment that "not every pirated sale is a lost sale" because that's pretty obvious. We knew that already. But even if theres only 1 lost sale for every 10 pirated games, that's still lost sales and means financial impact on someone. Maybe you knew it, but Zucas and other people don't take it into account when they say that piracy is always theft under a broad definition of theft that also includes virtual losses. IMO it's ridiculous enough to call something theft when nothing is being removed, but to go as far as to call something theft when it can have no impact at all, that's too much.   One comment on the green though. Do you really think that's ridiculous? Do you know the game Mount & Blade? It's a niche strategy/RPG PC game developed by a small Turkish independent studio. Many people in forums and gametrailers flame the game for having weak graphics. It's pretty obvious it hasn't got top-notch grafix due to their limited resources. I pirated the game. Many others did too. Now the sequel M&B Warband came out, with the same graphcis and you hear the same comments. Again it's due to limited resources. I feel that we who pirated the game, by not contributing financially to something we enjoyed without asking permission, we as a collective removed something. We removed income to the developer and we removed quality from the sequel by denying it resources. Because a proportion of us would have paid for it if it wasn't so easy to pirate. Don't you feel it is up to the developers to make something compelling enough to purchase or at the very least come up with a game model that forces the hand of a purchase?   I do.   Sometimes games, music, movies that get purchased never would have been purchased gets pirated simply to see if a person would maybe enjoy that game or those types of games.  When they get that answer from personal experience they may become a fan of a game they never would have.  This is just like the music industry all over again. People wanted to be able to listen to music on their computers in easy/user friendly manner as PCs were ever growing in homes.  Napster provided a way for that to occur.   The music industry was left at the alter with old business models and over-priced 20 dollars CDs filling the shelves.   They failed to provide the consumer with ANY viable alternative to what they wanted.  Steam is an excellent example of a smart decision to protect company revenue from games and provide an easy to use avenue for consumers to flock to.  PS3 has provided another excellent example of a company protecting its revenue from games sales.  But what is absolutely funny about the PS3 example is that it commonly sells less software than the 360.   Which makes you wonder,  does the 360s piracy contribute to actually increasing software sales?   No because it's not always possible. For many people including me services like Steam and Apple-store mean nothing. I want the content, not the service. It's impossible to get enough revenue from just creating some artifical 'service' around the content. The value is in the content, and if the content can be pirated you can't offset it by just creating some service. It works for some people (browser games, Steam to some extent, Apple store) but not for the genres I like - niche hardcore games, heavy metal musicians, epic movies. Rpruett said: I won't defend the Music/Movie/Game/TV industries because in my opinion they have for far too long ripped off the very consumers that allow them to keep doing business at the capacity that they have.  Rather then attempt to make the experience as enjoyable as possible for the consumer.  It's like running a Theme Park and charging outrageous prices and once the consumers get inside they find out that there are no restrooms inside the park just outside in the parking lot.  Music Industry -  CDs cost virtually nothing to make yet CDs you get at the store are 20$ with $18.50 going to the record label and contain 1 to 2 good songs and the rest just filler BS ones. No viable alternatives.  Prosecuting grandma's in vein instead of fixing the problem. Movie Industry  -  VHS/DVD/Blu-Ray -  And just when you get a full collection of VHS or DVD you're going to need to get Blu-Ray but just when you get Blu-Ray you're going to need ______.   Happens every time.  Games Industry - Promises of expansions to consoles, support for attachments, future support for consoles, etc.  Ever increasing prices for everything.  150$ for a plastic guitar/drumkit and cheap microphone?   Gameboy games for $40?  Seriously?   The jump from $49.99 to $59.99. The nickel and diming of their customers (Paying $0.99) per 'cheat code' in Madden 2010.    $1.00 for a PSN avatar? (A picture that either took 4 seconds to create or was just copied from somewhere else and moved onto their server as a possible avatar)?      Blizzard charging $25 dollars(2 months subscription time) for a virtual in game 'mount' in a game where you are paying for constant new content?     I would have an easier time justifying piracy as theft or as a terrible thing in general if there was some serious tangible proof that it hurts sales, because that's the core issue here.  And that's where it is commonly confused.  If I enjoy pirated Product A, but never would have purchased Product A in the first place that is not a loss of a sale.   Some people believe that, this = a sale and is a crime of theft in itself.   However, if it doesn't impact the sales or the overall bottomline of the owner of the product then how can you define it as theft?  You can't.  Thus the dilemma.   I hate this argument. It's not for us to decide who is allowed to make lots of money and who is not. That's commie ideas ffs. The consumer votes through his Dollars. If the product is bad, don't buy it. I don't like this anarchistic idea of "if I steal everything they are forced to change lol". Green part: 1 pirated game is not 1 lost sale, no. But piracy overall hurt sales to some extent. Just accept that fact and we can discuss from there. If you can't see that PC software development is getting hurt by piracy then it's not worth to discuss with you.

Sure it is.  We are the people who put the money into the producers pockets not the other way around.  You pay for a service/product when you buy something.  That service/product should cater towards what you (The consumer) wants.   If it doesn't then the consumer will find another way around it. 

The consumer has no way of knowing if a product is bad in the current landscape (Which is precisely the issue).  They just have to trust that all the complete BS the company who produced a product is spewing is truth or fact.   In the current landscape of the world and with the ever increasing cost for games/music/movies,  it's not as small of a loss if you get burnt.   The people who produce these products need to come up with a way to show the consumer that their product is a worthy purchase.   If they don't provide an avenue for this,  I don't blame people for pirating it.

 

Again,  you can't declare that piracy overall has hurt sales to some extent.  Anymore than you could say that Piracy has helped sales.   And no, I don't agree with your premise in many levels so I just won't  "Accept" what you say as fact.     Piracy is pretty rampant in China / South America / etc  but then again isn't distribution horrendous there too? 

It's hopeless to argue with pirates. No honesty.

Making something good is not enough.

If you don't market it, its pointless.


That is why good games fail...

Not because of piracy..