This is enough proof to show that piracy IS hurting PC game sales a lot:

-Super Street Fighter 4 Canceled on PC due to Piracy (and now Capcom is giving a second chance)

http://www.1up.com/news/super-street-fighter-4-canceled

-Crytek swears off PC-exclusive games due to piracy

http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtopic.php?f=43&t=1087435

-EndWar PC version coming after console version due to piracy; PC pirates would cannibalize consoles sales (and Ubisoft did it with Assassin's Creed and other games)

http://www.shacknews.com/article/55166/endwar-pc-coming-after-consoles

-Ubisoft CEO changing focus to consoles due to PC piracy

http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/ubisoft-guillemot-E3-games-piracy,news-28947.html

-Epic Games: Piracy has killed our enthisiasm for PC

http://forums.computerandvideogames.com/viewtopic.php?p=1690755&sid=4545b70e0d95da8c9de4dcf61867bbc1

I can give you MUCH more, but I won't spend more of my time in this thread (but yes, I am happy to see that SSFIV:AE is coming for PC, so I will be able to play it with some friends). We all know it's a fact that piracy is a  big (really big) problem in the PC gaming industry, so there is no need to argue against facts.

Wait wait wait. Let me get this straight. The Universities are biased for piracy? What about the US,Dutch, and Japanese governments? Are they also biased for pirates? Really, are you even hearing how bafflingly stupid that sounds?

Did you even read the posts in the thread? The exact same crap was linked, and the response is the same this time. ALl this shows is that even developers don't know shit about the effects of piracy, and would rather use piracy as their scapegoat instead of admitting they amde a game no one wants to buy for $60 in the first place. Kind of like the bullshit the Wii sees. As I have already said, there are multiple studies which have shown that piracy does not cause lost sales, and the biggest cause of piracy is people not seeing the value that piblishers ask of them. In other words, shitty games aren't worth $60.

Link me to a study that shows that piracy leads to lost sales.

I think these people who do the studies will come up with any conclusion they desire to get some attention. Like spinning an argument about how piracy helps the economy but ignoring how it directly hurts the studios that develop the software. You read that crap like its bible because it probably makes you feel better about piracy.

Like I said, find me some statistics showing piracy doesn't deter potential sales. If you can't than stop babbling.

It doesn't matter if its worth $60. Pirates don't want to pay shit period. You think pirates are sending out pay checks to studios for what they actually wanted to pay?

You keep asking for that but don't have any links showing it doesn't deter sales. These  are numbers that are not possible to track.

Wow, seriously? Sit down and read who you just blamed of being biased FOR piracy. Please do.

Furthermore the study linked in this thread clearly shows piracy PROMOTES sales, not deter. Or did you not read that link either? Or did you not read it to protect your fragile ego?

Who are these people writing this crap? My guess there are tons of researchers looking for anyway to get some attention. And it clearly works because I know someone posting this crap on a forum to defend piracy.

By the way, this study was conducted by Birgitte Andersen and Marion Frenz, it has little to do with the actual University. And you know how they got their information? They just surveyed a bunch of people. Its bullshit.

Here's what a commenter said and it makes sense...

"Why does it have to be that downloading INCREASES music sales, and not just:
People who download music LIKE MUSIC, and therefore are prone to buy more in general regardless of torrents.

Why does downloading and buying have to be directly linked in the behaviours of my mind, they are cousins (similar trends) and not twins (where one only gains if the other looses)."

This is a joke right? You don't need a study to show that piracy leads to lost sales. Piracy on any system leads to lost sales (I don't care if the impact is big or not, there will be lost sales), because you can always force some people to buy your game if the system doesn't have piracy. When developers says "hey, piracy is hurting the sales of my PC game" they know what they are saying because any big company has people who knows if the game is being pirated or not and if the piracy is huge or not, so they have their own study, or do you think that Capcom doesn't have someone in charge of sales data?

You can try hard but you won't change the fact that a lot of developers said that piracy is hurting pc gaming sales.

I am sorry but I will take a developer's word over your word any time.

If you don't want to accept facts, it's okay. I know you want to defend the platform, but it's not possible, really. Even if you can't use "piracy" as the main problem, we can always say "only a few games/genres (like The Sims, FPS, strategy games etc) can succeed on PC, so it's not really a good platform to launch some games/genres", and then, why would it be rational to launch games like Top Spin 4 and UFC 2011 on PC?

You obviously filed to understand what "University of London researchers" means then. You have YET to provide me with ANY sources for yoru bullshit. All you do is talk and spout some stupid bullshit about how government and univiersity studies are biased FOR piracy (I mean, I am trully laughing at this but I am starting to think you might actually believe your own bullshit).

Oh so let's forget about the people who kno what the fuck they are doing, and let us proceed to listen to random people on forums without any form of backing. But to address the question, you do realize that those people probably love so much music due to piracy, which led them to buying more CDs, right?

I am still awating for statistics that support your stance.

It's not my word though, here are several links to studies which show what a load of crap that view of piracy is:

http://gamrconnect.vgchartz.com/post.php?id=3988276